[sangnoir]

> Can we?

Absolutely! The norm in a lot of industries is to judge on projected figures (electronics, CPU, GPU, automotive, aerospace, mining, etc).

> We know nothing of the build quality, reliability, safety, or a multitude of other characteristics of a mass-production version of these vehicles.

"Superb" is subjective - I could say a 1965 Porsche 911 is a superb car, even though it compares terribly with a 2018 Toyota Corolla on build quality, reliability, safety or a number of other features.

[RankingMember]

The norm in the industries you quoted is certainly not to judge the quality of the product before it exists. I don't recall Anantech or GamePro (RIP) or Motor Trend ever reviewing a product based on conceptual specs and concluding something like "Yep, excellent work, says it has a powerful V8 and a 6-speed but gets 60mpg- awesome, we're done here boys!". If we could just compare vehicle spec sheets, there would be no need for automotive journalists to drive the cars or do long-term reliability surveys. We'll see how it goes for Rivian, but to say "Rivian makes superb trucks" when they haven't made a single street-legal vehicle yet is a hell of a jump.

Re: your Porsche comment, I'm not sure what you're getting at. You could indeed say a 1965 Porsche 911 is a superb car, because 1. it actually exists in production form and 2. the public (and automotive journalists) have had the chance to drive and judge it for themselves. Not so for Rivian, which again, has yet to produce anything but concept cars. If you're comparing a 1965 911 against a 2018 Corolla, you're just being silly. Vehicles are compared to other vehicles in the time in which they were introduced. No reasonable person is judging a 1965 vehicle by 2018 standards.

Anyways, I'm looking forward to seeing what the production version of these trucks look like. It sounds like they've got some heavy hitter investors on board so hopefully that translates into a solid final product that delivers on the claims they've made.