Billionaire Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk went on a Twitter rant blasting the media yesterday after a recent string of bad headlines about his companies, and ended by suggesting he'd start a site to rank media credibility that he'd call Pravda, the Russian word for "truth" that was the name of the official newspaper of the former Soviet Union's Communist Party.
Musk's outburst came after media stories that included Consumer Reports saying there were, quote, "flaws -- big flaws," with Tesla's Model 3 electric car, and the Center for Investigative Reporting’s Reveal website charging that Tesla factory management deliberately failed to report injuries in order to make its numbers look good.
Musk accused journalists yesterday of being sanctimonious and hypocritical, and blamed the negative Tesla headlines on big oil and gas companies spending money on media advertising.
He declared: "The holier-than-thou hypocrisy of big media companies who lay claim to the truth, but publish only enough to sugarcoat the lie, is why the public no longer respects them." When some of his Twitter followers accused him of trolling the media like President Trump, he shot back, "Anytime anyone criticizes the media, the media shrieks, 'You're just like Trump!' Why do you think he got elected in the first place? Because no one believes you any more. You lost your credibility a long time ago."
Musk says he is going to create a website where users can track and rate the credibility of journalists, editors, and publications.
In a series of tweets Wednesday, Musk vowed to start the website touting his "faith" in people and their quest for truth.
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