Welcome to a FREE preview of our weekly exclusive! Each week our team goes ‘Beyond the News’ and handcrafts a special edition that includes our thoughts on the biggest stories, why it matters, and how it could impact the future.
You can receive this newsletter along with all of our other members-exclusive newsletters, become a premium member for just $3/month. Your support goes a long way for us behind the scenes! Thank you.
One week after its reveal, I’m not sure there’s much left to be said about Tesla’s first foray into the truck world. The specs are obviously impressive, and the design has mixed reviews with the predictable players taking their predictable positions. I hadn’t planned on talking much about Cybertruck in my weekly newsletter column since, at this point, literally everyone with something to say about it has done just that. But something has been bothering me about the discussion.
I don’t like the divide the Cybertruck’s design is creating, and I don’t blame Elon Musk or Tesla. I blame the part of the Tesla fan base that is responding very poorly to criticism of a product that was expected to draw that very same criticism.
On one end, there’s the steady Tesla crowd ready to buy anything the company produces that their budget can afford. On the other end, there’s the average consumer who is paying attention to what’s going on in the green car movement and imagining how one of the latest electric cars would fit their life and style. After all, the decision to buy a car has numerous factors (literally) driving it, and an electric car has even more factors built-in thanks to the fact that the industry is still new. For example, home charging isn’t an option for a lot of people, and filling up is already a chore when it takes 5 minutes, much less 30+ minutes at a Supercharger. There would need to be several reasons for the average consumer (read: someone that’s not part of the Tesla fan base or electric car crowd) to make the decision to buy one.
That being said, if someone doesn’t like Cybertruck’s design, they’re not going to want to buy it unless there’s literally no other vehicle that meets their needs and wants with a more appealing design. And that’s okay. It doesn’t mean there’s something wrong with their opinion. It doesn’t mean they’re a boring person that’s part of a dying culture that will cease to exist in 50 years. It doesn’t mean Tesla will fail at their mission because its radical truck design doesn’t appeal to people that aren’t into radical truck designs. It just means that they don’t like it. Frankly, I don’t like it, either. I also didn’t expect to like it. I also expected to maybe like it but not want to ever buy it.
The Cybertruck isn’t just about thinking “outside the box” by creating a truck that looks like an odd box. It has a design that says something about the personality of the owner, and unlike a lot of conventional car designs, its message is overwhelming and distracting. If that’s your personality, great. If it’s not, great. Pushing this idea that if you don’t like the Cybertruck, or rather, you don’t like dystopian science fiction from the 80s and 90s, there’s something wrong with you… It’s feeding into a stereotype about electric cars that is annoying if not outright rude, dismissive, and very unhelpful for the green car movement.
Actually, what it starts to do is remind people (like me) of this long-term dystopian vision that they really really really don’t want that tech people are always pushing for as “cool” or “the unavoidable future.” Elon Musk might watch Blade Runner and love the designs it inspires, but I watch that movie and shudder to think of such an awful world to exist in. It’s one thing to like the artistic side of science fiction, but there are big glaring warnings about the worlds it represents. In Total Recall, for example, many like the whole Mars colonization thing it’s based on, but the back story is this company using mind control and manipulation while causing God-awful deformities in the people living there. Instead of focusing on that part, we wear shirts with “Get Your Ass to Mars” as a rallying cry for a mission to the red planet.
The inspiration to live on other worlds is something I love. What I don’t love is pushing the whole movie as the ideal future. That’s what I see in Cybertruck. I like it as a cool, movie-inspired design that will appeal to people who really like that style. I don’t like it as a representation of a full-on future that I have to like or I’m an idiot or a hater. In my opinion, throwing those types of stones at people who don’t like Cybertruck’s design feeds into the notion that if you’re not on board with the dystopian world it was inspired by, you have no place in the world’s future.
I like the Victorian touches of the mid-century A-frame I’m building, and the micro-controller watering and monitoring system I’m working on that will help with my gardening fuse the traditional with the new. I still don’t see a place for an angular, military-style truck in my driveway. It’s not my thing, and I really hope it stays as just a thing that some people like and not representative of a future that will dismantle my farm dreams in favor of robots vs. humans defending their right to live. Sheesh.
That’s one perspective the (typed) shouting matches about Cybertruck push. Another one is full of eye rolls and comments about Kool-Aid drinking. I honestly thought the point of the design was probably that Musk finally had the opportunity to do a vehicle that he knew would have a small market appeal but did it anyway because he just wanted to do it. He’d already done conventionally in the Model S, 3, and Y, pushed the limits a bit with the X and Semi, and was working on a sports car masterpiece with the next-gen Roadster.
I didn’t think that Cybertruck was supposed to upend Ford’s or Chevy’s or Toyota’s hold on pickups, so when that argument started making the rounds and doubters shouted down… I was surprised. If there’s one way to be seen as a “Tesla bro” or not be taken seriously by the very consumers you’re trying to win over, that’s it. Also, 250k people putting down $100 on a truck that they don’t have to fork over the full cash to buy for at least another couple of years doesn’t prove that the design is a mainstream hit, either. It’s an encouraging sign for sure, but not as encouraging as the 350k Model 3 reservations in that same one-week timeframe that required $1,000 to make.
In summary, the Cybertruck might win people over in the mainstream, and it might not. The specs combined with the gas savings might pull in commercial customers and start a new movement in that direction on a design level. It also might not. Tesla could just revise its design a bit while keeping the specs and appeal to a much broader base (which I’m hoping for), but it still might not.
Perhaps yelling at people that don’t like it that they’re dumb and have no taste might win them over eventually. It also might not. Being obnoxious about the Cybertruck to people on the fence about electric cars might cull a new consumer base.
But again, it might not.
Elon Musk
The Boring Company just doubled its tunneling power in Nashville
The Boring Company’s Prufrock MB2 is commissioned and ready to mine beneath Nashville’s streets.
The Boring Company’s second tunnel boring machine, Prufrock MB2, is officially ready to dig in Nashville. The company confirmed the news on X, posting: “Prufrock-MB2 is ready to mine in Nashville! MB2 commissioning is complete, including the brief 11 rpm rotation shown here. Will MB2 catch up to MB1, who had quite the head start? And Prufrock-MB3 ships in August!”
MB2 arrives with meaningful improvements over its predecessor. Lessons learned from the launch and operation of MB1 have already been applied to MB2 to improve efficiency and prepare the machine for launch.
Traditional tunnel boring machines operate in a stop-and-go cycle, digging roughly five feet, halt, erect precast concrete segments to line the tunnel wall, then resume. That repeated interruption is one of the main reasons conventional tunneling is slow and expensive. Prufrock is designed to install the tunnel liner simultaneously with mining, eliminating the need to stop every five feet. The machine also skips the need for excavated launch pits. Prufrock arrives on a truck, tilts down, and launches into the ground within 24 hours. And when the tunnel is complete, it emerges from the ground and drives to its next launch site on a trailer, eliminating the need for expensive cranes or pit excavation. The machine is also fully electric and runs with zero people in the tunnel during normal operations, controlled remotely from a surface operations center.
Prufrock-MB2 is ready to mine in Nashville! MB2 commissioning is complete, including the brief 11 rpm rotation shown here.
Will MB2 catch up to MB1, who had quite the head start?
And Prufrock-MB3 ships in August! pic.twitter.com/TTrMql2aRg
— The Boring Company (@boringcompany) June 17, 2026
It won’t be long before we hear of another major update on The Boring Company’s Music City Loop project – a planned underground transit network beneath Nashville that would move passengers in electric vehicles through a series of tunnels at highway speeds, and bypassing surface traffic entirely. Nashville was selected in part because of its strong rock conditions that suits the Prufrock machines well, and relatively less regulatory hurdles.
Progress has been steady on multiple fronts. All 37 permits and approvals required ahead of tunneling have been obtained, out of 45 total. Key wins include a fully executed TDOT tunnel permit authorizing 25 miles of tunnel, unanimous airport authority approval for a Nashville International Airport station, and the city’s first residential station agreement serving downtown tower residents.
With MB1 already tunneling, MB2 now commissioned, and MB3 shipping in August, Nashville is becoming something of a live proving ground for scaled tunnel boring. The broader ambition is not limited to one city. The Boring Company’s stated goal is to make underground transportation a practical alternative to surface roads across major metro areas. Nashville is one of many cities, including a successful Las Vegas tunnel system, where that idea is being put to the test at real speed.
Investor's Corner
Tesla unfolded its first European “folding Supercharger”
Tesla’s folding Supercharger just arrived in Europe and it changes how fast charging expands.
Tesla’s Folding Unit Supercharger has officially landed in Europe, with the company teasing a new installation in its effort for a broader rollout targeting major motorway rest stops across the European continent in Q3 2026. The arrival marks a notable shift in how Tesla is thinking about network expansion, moving from hardware performance alone to engineering the logistics chain itself.
While Tesla did not reveal the exact location for the new folding Supercharger in Europe, the photo shared on X heavily suggests that this maybe somewhere in Norway. Historically, whenever Tesla rolls out an entirely new infrastructure architecture in Europe, whether it was the original Supercharger stalls years ago or these brand-new modular V4 “Folding Units”, Norway is almost always the designated launch pad because of its unmatched EV adoption rate and supportive infrastructure
The Folding Unit, introduced in March 2026, is a factory pre-assembled V4 charging station built on an industrial hinge system mounted to a heavy-duty concrete base. The entire assembly arrives on site ready to unfold and connect. Tesla confirmed the units feature telescopic light poles specifically designed for easy transportation and fast on-site deployment, a detail that signals how carefully the logistics chain has been engineered alongside the hardware itself. The design allows 33% more stalls per delivery truck, cuts installation time roughly in half, and reduces overall deployment costs by more than 20% compared to traditional installations.
Tesla’s newest “Folding V4 Superchargers” are key to its most aggressive expansion yet
Tesla also noted telescopic light poles which provide benefits over traditional Supercharger installations that require fixed-height poles that are awkward to ship, slow to position on site, and often require separate crews and equipment to erect before charging hardware can even be staged. By engineering poles that compress for transit and extend on arrival, Tesla has removed one of the quieter bottlenecks in the physical deployment process. Every hour saved on a light pole installation is an hour redirected toward getting stalls energized. At scale, across dozens of new sites per quarter, those hours add up to a meaningful acceleration in how quickly a location goes from approved permit to serving its first customer.
Each Folding Unit pairs a single V4 power cabinet with eight charging posts. The V4 cabinet delivers up to 500 kW per stall for passenger vehicles and up to 1.2 MW for the Tesla Semi, supporting twice the stalls per cabinet at three times the power density of its predecessor. Longer cables make every new station immediately usable by non-Tesla vehicles, a priority as Tesla continues opening its network to Ford, GM, Rivian, Hyundai, Stellantis, and others.
As Teslarati reported when the Folding Unit was first unveiled, Tesla’s Gigafactory New York produced its final V3 Supercharger cabinet in March 2026 after more than seven years and 15,000 units, completing a full pivot to V4 production. The European arrival of the folding design is the next chapter in that transition.
Faster and cheaper deployment means Tesla can justify building in markets and corridors that were previously too expensive to serve, filling the coverage gaps that have slowed EV adoption outside major urban centers.
First Folding Unit Superchargers in Europe 🇪🇺 https://t.co/KNfYWJukkL pic.twitter.com/YR1udIpH1i
— Tesla Charging (@TeslaCharging) June 10, 2026
Elon Musk
SpaceXAI just launched into your kitchen with their new app
SpaceXAI just powered its first consumer app and it predicts what you want to buy.
SpaceXAI just made its first move into consumer AI, and it involves your grocery cart. On June 3, 2026, Gopuff and SpaceXAI announced the launch of Go, a Grok-powered shopping assistant built directly into the Gopuff app that predicts what you need before you even start searching for it.
Gopuff is an instant delivery platform that operates more than 400 micro-fulfillment centers across the U.S., delivering everyday essentials, snacks, drinks, and household items in as little as 15 minutes. It is not a restaurant delivery app or a marketplace. It owns its inventory, controls its warehouses, and handles its own logistics, which means it has built one of the most detailed consumer behavior datasets in retail over its 13-year history.
Go combines SpaceXAI’s advanced reasoning, voice, and image generation models with Gopuff’s dataset of hundreds of millions of orders and real-time cultural signals from X to prepare a suggested cart the moment a customer opens the app. It learns each shopper’s habits and automatically builds a personalized cart based on time of day, location, order history, and real-time indicators. Returning customers can check out with a single tap.
Rather than searching for specific items, users can describe a situation like a game-day party or the desire for a healthy breakfast and Go will assemble a cart automatically. It can also predict when shoppers are running low on items like coffee or paper towels and have them packed and delivered in under 15 minutes. Grok voice integration lets users talk to the app in plain conversational language and check out completely hands-free.
Gopuff co-founder and co-CEO Yakir Gola said: “Today, we believe the greatest friction left in commerce is not delivery or instantaneous access to the essentials customers need. It’s the moment before: the thinking, the deciding, the remembering. We’re combining Gopuff’s demand intelligence with xAI’s frontier reasoning to create an everyday shopping experience that feels like a true extension of you.”
Why SpaceX just made a $60 billion bet on AI coding ahead of historic IPO
The timing carries context beyond the product launch. SpaceXAI was formed after SpaceX completed an all-stock merger with Elon Musk’s xAI earlier this year, folding one of the most advanced AI labs in the world into the same corporate structure as the company preparing what could be the largest IPO in history. SpaceXAI is dipping into consumer-focused AI just as it prepares for its public debut, and while Musk has openly discussed building an everything app, this launch uses Grok to power another company’s product rather than launching a standalone consumer platform. Every consumer-facing deployment of Grok ahead of the IPO roadshow adds tangible evidence that SpaceXAI is not just an infrastructure play but a direct competitor in the AI application layer where OpenAI and Google are already fighting for dominance.
Tesla patent aims to improve common on-road complaint
Tesla Cybercab gets huge nod of support from Texas DOT official
