What's Wrong With This Picture: Fish In A Barrel Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: What Do You Want To Be When You Grow Up? Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: Back Like That Edition
Just as Toyota has coasted in recent years on a reputation built some time ago, Audi’s latest round of interior-cheapening has gone largely unremarked-upon in the motoring press. Sitting in the new A4, I don’t find myself thinking, as Motor Trend did, that its “high-quality materials and clean, attractive design continue to live up to Audi’s stellar reputation as the industry benchmark.” In fact, the interiors of nearly every current Audi (except the A8 and TT) strike me as cheap, disappointing and monumentally uninspired. In other words, the opposite of living up to Audi’s reputation.
What's Wrong With This Picture: The Missing Variable? Edition
The Atlantic’s Megan McArdle, piggy-backing on analysis started by Overlawyered’s Ted Frank, tracked down all the available ages of reported incidents of unintended acceleration in Toyotas and graphed them. The results speak volumes, as does Frank’s assessment that:
These “electronic defects” apparently discriminate against the elderly, just as the sudden acceleration of Audis and GM autos did before them. (If computers are going to discriminate against anyone, they should be picking on the young, who are more likely to take up arms against the rise of the machines and future Terminators).
McArdle’s graph of incidents by location (parking, freeway, etc) after the jump.
What's Wrong With This Picture: Kia's Optima-sm Edition
Quick, want to guess what the single piece brings more traffic to TTAC than any other? Thanks to an early Korean-spec test (don’t worry, further tests of the US-spec model are forthcoming) and the blessings of good Google rankings, our 2011 Hyundai Sonata review has been our single biggest source of traffic over the last several months. But getting a review out early isn’t the only reason so many folks are finding their way to TTAC by way of the Sonata: people are researching the car like crazy. Kelly Blue Book lists the Sonata as its number four most-researched vehicle, as does Edmunds.com, indicating that it’s poised to play with the perennial chart-toppers from Honda and Toyota. Meanwhile, Kia still has yet to make the jump to mainstream prominence, although its version of the Sonata (still unfortunately named Optima) could be an important step in Korea’s bid to make inroads on the US market. Certainly its Peter Schreyer-designed lines won’t have anyone confusing the Optima with a decontented Sonata.
What's Wrong With This Picture: To Protect, Serve And Haul A Little Ass Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: Keep On Truckleting Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: CR-Z DOA? Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: What To Do If Your Toyota Runs Away Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: Vista Bruiser Edition
As tipster starbird80 notes, “you see the strangest things on eBay!” But a Vista Cruiser Coupe (or is that a shooting brake)? Surely not…
What's Wrong With This Picture: The Pieces Fit But We're Still Puzzled Edition
It’s both annoying and strangely prophetic (we think) that Lancia and Chrysler don’t have one of those convenient “Brangelina” names, like Lancsler or Chrycia. Fiat’s execs aren’t exactly being subtle about the merging of the two brands, but then they’re also not giving us a lot of glimpses at the stunning execution that it will take to turn two marginal marques into a single, halfway viable brand. It’s almost as if the two are just being pushed together in a forced, unnatural manner, and the results thus far show a distinct lack of inspiration. Not convinced? Hit the jump for your morning glass of has it really come to this? [via unica-strada.com].
What's Wrong With This Picture: A Solstice For Alfa's Dark Night Of The Soul Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: The Porsche CAFE Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: Imagine What The All-New Saabs Could Have Been Edition
GM Shuffles Sales And Marketing Management
Shortly after emerging from bankruptcy last July, when GM’s sales were still showing few signs of recovery, then-Sales and Marketing boss Mark LaNeve had his marketing responsibilities stripped about a week before monthly sales came out. In a matter of months, LaNeve was out the door. Sales and marketing were rolled together again when Susan Docherty took over for LaNeve, but over the weekend it was once again stripped away, in one of the first signs that Docherty’s star is no longer rising at GM. And lets go ahead and start assuming that February sales must be looking fairly grim, because the only real explanation given to Automotive News [sub] is that
The shakeup shows that Chairman and CEO Ed Whitacre is impatient to boost sales and for consumers to appreciate what he believes is the high quality of GM vehicles. When he became chief executive in December, Whitacre said his sales and marketing team would need to show results quickly.
The perception gap claims another victim! But Docherty’s downgrade is Mark Reuss’s gain. The former Holden boss, now GM’s President of North American operations, will assume the sales responsibilities, leaving Docherty time to focus on the marketing side and polish up her resumé.
What's Wrong With This Picture: Lexus And The Weary Sai Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: Honda Goes Back To The Future Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: No Way That's An Aveo Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: The UAW Is Looking Out For You Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: AC Cobra Redux Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: Karma's A Bitch Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: Evora-lution Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: One For The RAV-id Compact CUV Fans Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: Fly Like Fiat, Sting Like A Dodge Edition
Last week we took the counter-intuitive step of calling out Chrysler for refusing to hype its forthcoming products. “Let’s face it:” we wrote at the time, “Chrysler needs buzz, hype, awareness, or some kind of excitement surrounding its future generally and its forthcoming products in specific (if only in the irritating “teaser” format) almost as much as it needs anything else.” Well our wish has been granted, sort of, as this rendering of a 2013 B-segment Dodge hatchback has hit the internet [via AutoBirdBlog] to inspire rare optimism about the Chrysler Group’s future. For a number of reasons though, this is not the buzz-builder we were looking for.
Imitating Chrysler Is Not The Sincerest Form Of Flattery
The Orlando Sentinel reports that “a couple of years ago,” Seminole County’s Lake Mary High School made the curious decision to ditch its previous mascot (now known as “the old goat”), and adopt the Dodge Ram logo as its own. Chrysler only just found out, thanks to a local tipster, despite the logo’s presence on gym floors, t-shirts and athletic uniforms. Needless to say, a cease-and-desist showed up, and Lake Mary will be having to live with “the old goat” from now on. As Chrysler’s lawyer puts it [via Overlawyered]:
As I am sure you can appreciate from your years of work with the board, control of use of a mark by enthusiastic students and parents is quite simply not practical, and I know the school and board would not want to be in the position of censoring student expression associated with the design,
What's Wrong With This Picture: Searing Retina Damage Approved For The American Market Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: Dodge's Gender Issues Roll On
What do you sell if you can’t sell a car? Sophisticated commentary on the state of gender relations, of course. Hit the jump to see just how gendered one marketing campaign can get.
What's Wrong With This Picture: Lost In Translation Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: Mercedes Catches The Drift Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: Dodging The Durango Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: Renault Breaks Wind Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: CTS Versus Denso Toyota Pedal Assembly Edition
Kudos to Edmunds Inside Line for throwing up pictures of two Toyota gas pedal assemblies. The recalled unit, made by CTS, is shown above in a 2010 Camry. The non-recalled Denso-produced unit is after the jump.
What's Wrong With This Picture: Looney Tuned Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: The Journey To The Chrysler TC Begins With A Single Step Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: Mazda6 Wagon The Dog Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: Four's Company Edition
Volkswagen has announced [via Autoblog] that “in response to requests by many customers,” the Passat CC will now be available with seating for three in the back seat. The lesson: even the people who spend more money for a more-fashionable but less-practical version of a mass-market car want that extra seatbelt just in case. Which begs the question…
What's Wrong With This Picture: The Great American Towing Conspiracy Lives Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: Ham-Fist of Furai Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: Modern Obesity Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: Another Brick In The Wall Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: Spot The Facelift Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: Mercedes R Class, Hold The Horror Edition
Mercedes sold only 2,825 R Class “Grand Sport Tourer” models in the US last year, confirming once and for all that the eigenwillig CUV is a bonafide flop in this country. So much so that a GL-inspired restyling is already under development, possibly with a GL-inspired name as well: GLR.
What's Wrong With This Picture: Where The Wind Hits Heavy On The Ridgeline Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: MKX Gets Cetaceous Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: GMC Strikes Again Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: Jeep's Version Of New Product Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: A Whole New Aveo Edition
This is reportedly the new Aveo RS concept coming to the Detroit Auto Show, and apparently a near-production look at the next-generation Aveo. Well, you weren’t expecting it to look worse than the current model, were you?
What's Wrong With This Picture: The Juke's On You Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: All The World's Saab Owners In One Place Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: Not A Concept Edition
The production version of the Opel Meriva has debuted, and as promised, the suicide doors made the cut. But will the Meriva come to America, re-grilled as a Buick? A Gamma II-based MPV is rumored for Buick’s 2012 lineup, and suicide doors might just be the gimmick that helps America understand the concept of “premium compact.” Even though, as the image after the jump shows, they are little more than a gimmick.
What's Wrong With This Picture: Niche Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: You Know It's Socialism When… Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: Obvious Influences Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: Infrastructure As Art Edition
Feast your eyes on these images of the Mike O’Callaghan-Pat Tillman Memorial Bridge being constructed over the Colorado River near Hoover Dam. Sure, it cost taxpayers $160m, but just look at it. America may have lost its way in terms of auto manufacturing, but we’ve never stopped being the greatest country to explore by car. [Hat Tip: Dean Huston]
What's Wrong With This Picture: The Last Of The Big-Block Chevys Edition
What's Wrong With This Picture: This Is Not A New Chrysler Edition
This strangely blurry picture of a Lancia Delta rebadged as a Chrysler has shown up at Vince Burlapp’s blog, possibly giving a clue as to the identity of the rumored NAIAS Lancia-as-Chrysler showcar. Er, except that it’s clearly a photoshop of a Wikimedia image shown after the jump. Oops!
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