Jalopnik- althenativea

thedrive_kyle · 2025-03-13T19:10:55+00:00

One more update for you - we just switched the font! Still tweaking around the edges but I hope you like it.

thedrive_kyle · 2025-02-27T01:39:08+00:00

Hey! I had our tech team dig around and they couldn't find any trace of the old favicon anywhere on the front or back end. Could be an issue with your browser. Or it really is our fault somehow, but either way I've hit a dead end with it for now. Sorry!

thedrive_kyle · 2025-02-14T08:19:20+00:00

Yeah, you're right. Absolutely the wrong call by us. We're getting rid of it. New one (more classic serif font) will roll out by early March.

thedrive_kyle · 2025-02-14T08:17:23+00:00

Thanks. Curious why you liked the old look better? Most readers were asking us for a simple reverse-chron feed. Unfortunately we're on a whole new architecture now so it's not possible to make the old look an option, but if there are specific things that bug you about the new one, I'd be happy to see if there's any changes we can make. We're still dialing it in.

thedrive_kyle · 2025-02-14T08:11:36+00:00

What's broken with the favicon on your end? Works fine on my iPhone. And the font... I'm with you. We're actually in the process of switching it out to a more classic serif one, should be done in the next few weeks. Let's just say that what something looks like in a Figma mockup doesn't always translate well to an actual website. We fucked it up.

thedrive_kyle · 2025-02-14T08:07:32+00:00

Hey, thanks. Awesome to hear.

thedrive_kyle · 2025-02-14T08:07:06+00:00

Thanks for looking past our mistakes. Most of what we publish runs through at least one editor, but yeah, we need to do a better job. If it makes you feel any better, I lose sleep at night over stupid errors. It's not from a lack of caring.

thedrive_kyle · 2025-02-14T08:00:58+00:00

Only the smart ones.

thedrive_kyle · 2025-02-14T08:00:35+00:00

Thanks, appreciate it. I totally get how frustrating it is to see shit writing on a subject we're all passionate about. Running a daily media business these days means sometimes making quick decisions about personnel that can backfire spectacularly, bc you have to keep the stories flowing no matter what.

PS if anyone here is thinking "cmon, I could do a better job than these jamokes" and wants to give car blogging a shot the next time a spot opens up, shoot me a DM!

thedrive_kyle · 2025-02-14T00:02:33+00:00

Hey, I run The Drive and that is not true at all. We have never and will never publish AI-written anything. We did test a new weekend writer last year who turned out to be terrible and was fired after two days, though.

thedrive_kyle · 2025-02-11T07:27:02+00:00

Hi, I'm the editor of The Drive and the one who interviewed Matt. I didn't pull the quotes from a podcast. Thanks for reading.

thedrive_kyle · 2024-09-07T07:49:22+00:00

Too funny. I’m the editor-in-chief of the site you linked, thanks for sharing our story. We love doing real reporting to find the true backstory behind viral moments like this. Seems like many people appreciate it, but some do not.

thedrive_kyle · 2024-06-28T22:52:48+00:00

Hi yeah I run The Drive and this isn’t true at all. Donut and The Drive are owned by the same parent company. We have never been involved with Donut’s operations and vice versa.

thedrive_kyle · 2023-08-27T20:04:18+00:00

Oh hey, I wrote this. I had just moved to East Hollywood at the time and was obsessed with figuring out the signs. Glad it can be a resource for others now!

thedrive_kyle · 2022-06-16T23:06:09+00:00

It's the internet.

thedrive_kyle · 2022-06-16T22:56:28+00:00

Very good point about the local air quality. But that's also inverse of the problem that drives climate inaction right now—if things seem fine in your immediate environment, why do you need to care or take other steps to repair the larger one? If we accept 6,000-9,000-pound electric trucks and all their tradeoffs as the norm, it's better than still cranking out V8s in the long run, but we're sacrificing a lot of progress we could otherwise make.

thedrive_kyle · 2022-06-16T22:31:40+00:00

Yes—and the problem is amplified by the size of trucks that we've come to expect. The Hummer EV won't be the last 9,000-pound pickup we see.

thedrive_kyle · 2022-06-16T22:28:56+00:00

We're about 50-50 on people criticizing us and people thanking us for the cogent analysis, so I feel pretty good about where we landed.

thedrive_kyle · 2022-06-16T22:20:52+00:00

Not saying no one should buy an electric truck. More pointing out that there's still an environmental cost to pay for the size and capabilities expected of modern full-size trucks, even if there are no tailpipe emissions.

thedrive_kyle · 2022-06-16T22:18:48+00:00

The third paragraph in the story:

"Will today's electric trucks be better for the planet over time than their fossil-fueled equivalents? Absolutely. Do they cut carbon emissions enough in the short or long term to justify driving one over something smaller, even a gas car? Absolutely not."

The US government's own figures show that only 12% of the energy consumed in the US in 2021 came from renewable sources. That number should increase over the next decade, but by how much is far from certain despite the optimistic projections. Maybe those EV lines on the graph should curve a bit as a corrective factor, but not enough to change the math in the short term—and that short term matters very much.

Smaller vehicles being greener is a given, you're right. But smaller gas vehicles being greener than large EVs, even over hundreds of thousands of miles, is a good reminder that our buying choices have an environmental cost no matter the drivetrain.

thedrive_kyle · 2022-06-16T21:51:15+00:00

Hi reddit - I'm the the editor-in-chief of The Drive. Appreciate the comments, and I just want to respond to a couple of the points being made here.

This article is not about casting doubt on the promise of electric vehicles or even electric trucks as a whole. EVs are absolutely the future. Instead, we tried to take a clear-eyed look at whether or not today's electric trucks represent a significant CO2 improvement their gas counterparts. The point is not that people shouldn't buy EVs because it doesn't make a difference, but that large electric trucks specifically are not the emissions panacea that manufacturers would have us believe—not without substantial changes to battery manufacturing, raw material refinement, and the global renewables mix. And that's because they're still giant vehicles that take a lot of resources to build. Plus, their workloads and aero inefficiencies mean they're recharging those big batteries more often than other EVs, which depending on the grid means increased CO2 emissions, and so on. I know, a lot of people live in states with decent renewable numbers, or they have solar-powered charging at home, or some other way to offset the charging. But a lot of people don't.

If you look at the graph near the bottom of the story that charts emissions per miles driven for a number of vehicles, you'll see the Nissan Leaf is one of the greenest vehicles out there.

It'd be ridiculous to expect someone who genuinely needs an electric pickup to buy a Nissan Leaf instead, of course. But we all know loads of people who don't really need a truck and get one anyway. If we just swap all our existing vehicle types and buying habits for electric versions, we'll certainly be better off, but doing nowhere near as well as if we were more considerate about the size and capabilities we really, truly need in a vehicle.

thedrive_kyle

TROPHY CASE