[andrewjrhill]

> Will it even look like a car as we know it?

If he he hopes for any sort of market adoption it will have to look like a car as we know it. You can still make some changes here and there that push boundaries - but ultimately people want whats familiar more than unfamiliar.

[DaiPlusPlus]

This. Tesla was not the first electric car company - but it was the first electric car company that didn't make a car that looked like an electric car. Add a tail-pipe and a front radiator to a Roadster or Model S and you'd swear it was a Lotus (yes, I know...) or Italian car respectively.

Meanwhile the BMW i-series, Chevy Bolt and Volt, and even the GM EV1 all look _different_, and not necessarily in an a good way either: I'm surprised the BMW i3 is selling at all considering how much it resembles an oversized preschool children's toy car. I'm not seeing much "dignity" or timelessness in these car designs and it's what led me to believe that the executive management of these companies is somehow encouraging wacky designs to poison the notion of an electric-car being anything other than an impractical silly-looking vehicle only non-style-conscious tree-huggers would be seen dead driving.

I salute Tesla for making an electric car that... looks like a car.

[roryisok]

> you'd swear it was a Lotus (yes, I know...)

I'm guessing the thing you know is that the Tesla is based on the Lotus Elise but did you also know that the Elise was released as an electric car waaaaay back in 1998? It had a limited top speed of 90mph, a range of 120mph and recharge time of 1 hour.