A eulogy for Elon Musk’s ill-advised and barely functional emblem of a failed and stupid era

In early 2024, I started seeing one particular Tesla Cybertruck driving around Brooklyn. It was the first one I’d seen — a matte black version with a decal on the side that said “To the Moon,” a common phrase associated with trading cryptocurrency. I remember seeing it pop up in Williamsburg, in Greenpoint, and scattered spots throughout Bedford Stuyvesant and Crown Heights. At the time, it was a novelty — the only evidence I had seen in my little New York bubble that anyone was willing to buy these things.

Evidently, though, people did buy Cybertrucks. Just not enough of them. All told, Tesla sold around 70,000 of the vehicles between their release in November 2023 and Friday, when CEO Elon Musk announced that the company would wind down production in favor of a new self-driving taxi, the Cybercab.…