Quote Of The Day: Go Tell It On The Forum Edition

Edward Niedermeyer
by Edward Niedermeyer

Nissan does not condone the comments made by this particular employee. While seemingly well-intentioned, many of the remarks are regrettable and do not represent the company’s views. Nissan’s policy regarding internet commentary is that an employee’s personal opinion must be preceded by a disclaimer that identifies their remarks as such and not necessarily the views of the company.

Ruh Roh!

As tends to happen when a car makes the leap from legend to reality, the Nissan GT-R was birthed amid considerable controversy. Aside from being an undeniably polarizing car, the R35 GT-R inspired a seemingly endless Nürburgring lap time brou-ha-ha, to say nothing of serious owner backlash on the launch control issue. It was this latter issue that apparently brought out the ugly side of one Chip Goetzinger, an assistant to Nissan’s North American Chairman, according to Jalopnik (who strangely call Goetzinger “A senior Nissan Executive”). The Gawker site captured comments that Goetzinger made on a corner-carvers.com forum, in response to, well, forum talk. The results speak for themselves.

The term “Parkinsons-ridden-testicle” has just been added to TTAC’s spam filter. Seriously though, this kind of comment does show how low discourse can fall on the internet… and why we take the time to moderate discussion here. TTAC requires employees of OEMs to identify themselves when they make comments, and requests that they use our contact form to pass along worthwhile information if they ever feel like throwing their career away. Topless Vobra’s comments are gone now, but they live on in internet infamy.

Edward Niedermeyer
Edward Niedermeyer

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  • Morea Morea on May 04, 2010

    I was at the track a few weeks ago and there were three GT-Rs there. (Indeed they are track fast.) But what struck me was one was smoking on hard acceleration (as it passed me, mulitple times!). I brought it up the the owner and he said he knew but offered no other details. Was it chipped to be over rich on wide open throttle? Or is there some engine malady similar to the transmission problem: floor it more than 10 times and you void the engine's warranty. Sort of like Porsche checking the ECU's RPM data log: too high an overrev from a bad downshift and your warranty just expired.

  • Niky Niky on May 04, 2010

    I don't think it's possible to over-rev a car with a computer-controlled automatic transmission. It's likely a failed (or disconnected) EGR or, as you said, aftermarket programming that's a bit too rich.

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