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Reflections on 2023, and this Forum

nischalr

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As the year closes and I look back on 2023 and for that matter my life, and as a person of a certain age, Gen X for whatever that may mean, and an auto enthusiast by birth from at 5 years old parsing the difference between the Mercury Marquis and a Ford Grenada by their hubcap designs from a distance through a Brooklyn apt window, I have been involved in all things automotive for as I can remember. Although I'm not involved in the car industry or engineering in my life pursuit, my passion for cars I would say define me as much as anything.

Growing up in the United States and thumbing Car and Driver magazine and relishing the writing of Csaba Csere and the letters to the editor, watching John Davis on Motorweek and wondering where this magical place of Owings Mills, MD was in hopes of running in to the crew. Reading the musings of David E Davis Jr on Road and track and absolutely relishing every word of Peter Egan and eventually Automobile magazine and Autoweek as the issues piled up.

The quality of journalism and editorialism during those formative years of mine were outstanding and as the world and times have changed, sadly it is hard to find that the level of passion, and true engagement anymore.

As budgets grew from trying to find ways to personalize a 1992 Nissan Altima hand me down, to feeling special and unique enough to venture into owning a Merkur Scorpio and drifting rear wheel drive 1982 Pontiac Bonneville station wagon and 1990 Toyota Previas in the snowy streets of Pittsburgh, into the absolute masochism of venturing into owning a first generation Audi 2.7T allroad, and many other oddball cars, I found magazines, and classified ads, and local car groups my companions.

Eventually car forums on the internet became a thing and have been a staple of resource and camaraderie over the years in my journey with cars.

I have tolerated these forums out of necessity, to gain information, and advice and guidance and have always appreciated them for that, but they have never really satisfied my curiosity and wonder like the "olden" days of print media. Even "journalistic" blogs have become so useless for true journalism.

In my years through navigating forums for the cars that I had owned or were interested in, I have never come across a forum with such a high level of intelligence and emotional quotient and maturity with healthy discussion, debate, disagreements, generosity and goodwill as this one.

I truly enjoy the international and world perspective of the members here and find this to be one of the most special aspects of this place.

I started my journey here in the middle of 2022 I believe in hopes of guidance and information for my search to purchase a Taycan and my time here was invaluable to thoughtfully put together a custom build of my car which I received in March of 2023.

I have never been more happy with a vehicle than this one, My first personal custom built new car for myself.

I had the pleasure of custom building a Porsche Macan GTS back in 2017 for my wife as my first custom Porsche build and although very satisfying, not the same as doing it for myself. Prior to that all of our cars had been slightly preowned to take advantage of depreciation (excepting a Honda Odyssey which does not count)

Nowadays when I venture to other forums, currently trying to be active on Q4 etron forum and even the Rennlist forum (specifically the Taycan one, not 911) it has been painful the level of misinformation, immaturity and lack of true enthusiast engagement.

I suppose part of that is a result of the skewed demographics here I assume of people open to EV's, and have the financial means to have the luxury of owning these cars.

I appreciate you reading my ramblings this far and would love to hear your stories and thoughts on your journeys.

This is a special place, and I'm thankful for its ability to rekindle some of my childhood spirit.

Nischal
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f1eng

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Nice post!

I have found most internet forums to be sources of irrational fandom where facts are not welcome since people are more interested in having existing prejudices and misunderstanding reinforced rather than questioned or corrected.

That is why it is so nice here with misunderstandings, including several of mine, politely corrected.

The more I know the facts, like Formula 1 where I have a lifetime of experience, the more exasperating the opinions of ill informed fans on the internet.

Pre-internet I used to be able to tell which magazine a fan read because they had the same opinion as its F1 reporter ;) but it was all knowledge based even if a favourite driver may get golden comment.
Now anybody on the internet has just as much access to broadcast their opinion as people who actually know what they are talking about destroying peoples access to actual facts, sadly.
 

ShiftyWolf

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Thanks for posting. I also really appreciate this forum and am glad I found it. Only since you are in the US and mentioned the Q4, I'll plug that my two years on Audi World were a similarly good experience of engaged and helpful people who were fans of the brand but also acknowledged the deficiencies in their cars.

Looking forward to 2024
 
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nischalr

nischalr

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Thanks for posting. I also really appreciate this forum and am glad I found it. Only since you are in the US and mentioned the Q4, I'll plug that my two years on Audi World were a similarly good experience of engaged and helpful people who were fans of the brand but also acknowledged the deficiencies in their cars.

Looking forward to 2024
I have frequented Audiworld a lot over the years for far too many Audis. I have felt the same about that place. Unfortunately the activity for etrons was not as active since that’s what I had most recently been interested in and found the etron forum to be more active but less helpful. It has been a while since I last checked out Audiworld, will give it another go for sure.
 

allroadusa

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Interestingly (or not), AudiWorld is where my car enthusiast forum journey has started too... back in 2003. I even had my 5 minutes of celebrity, being one of the very first (the first ?) retroffiting a US spec Audi with an OEM color screen navigation system RNS4DX (only available in Europe), leveraging CAN bus cabling and VW Touareg Navteq map hacked CDs... Back in the day, I was working for an American Corportation and I had been relocated to the US for 2 years. I locally bought an Audi C5 allroad (see my nickname from that time) for the wife and had found fun in this project...

Anyway, thanks for this kind post, of which content I concur.:like:
 


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nischalr

nischalr

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Nice post!

I have found most internet forums to be sources of irrational fandom where facts are not welcome since people are more interested in having existing prejudices and misunderstanding reinforced rather than questioned or corrected.

That is why it is so nice here with misunderstandings, including several of mine, politely corrected.

The more I know the facts, like Formula 1 where I have a lifetime of experience, the more exasperating the opinions of ill informed fans on the internet.

Pre-internet I used to be able to tell which magazine a fan read because they had the same opinion as its F1 reporter ;) but it was all knowledge based even if a favourite driver may get golden comment.
Now anybody on the internet has just as much access to broadcast their opinion as people who actually know what they are talking about destroying peoples access to actual facts, sadly.
I think the civility and humility of the members here like yourself with so much specialized knowledge and experience is what makes this place so valuable.
 

Leawood CT

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Great post and it really took me back when you mentioned the Ford Grenada and Mercury Marquis as those were both cars my Dad had. I grew up in a car family and have always been a car guy too.

So jealous you had a Merkur Scorpio. They were neat cars. One of my possible retirement projects will be to redo a Merkur XR4Ti. Those were awesome.
 
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thecoloradokid

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Great post. And, you are 100% correct in sharing we are lucky to have this space.

For me, the car forums serve multiple purposes. First and foremost, it is a good place to find out if other people are experiencing similar issues with their vehicle as you might be. For instance, this forum was helpful in June, 2020, when my car was experiencing 12v issues and in the shop for 6 weeks waiting for parts from Germany. It was comforting to know that there are a few others who experienced the same issues and it was something Porsche was aware of, and then able to correct. While I never use the Porsche supplied mobile charger, the heat issues identified a while ago by @daveo4EV probably played a role in Porsche issuing their recent recall on the unit. I think that is this forum at its finest since he was unselfish in sharing his findings and advising for others to be vigilant if they used the mobile charger often.

Second, this forum in particular, serves as a sanity check. When I hit a road object last August and it caused significant damage to my CT4S, I was able to share with people here who understood how bummed out I was over the incident. That being said, we all have our moments, and I am sure most get frustrated with me over my comments on Electrify America.

Finally, any online discussion forum is a good place to get validation that regardless of how messed up you may think you might be, there are always others that are way more f*cked up than you!!!!!!! That type of perspective/validation is super cheap therapy!!!!!

I own a Rivian, and my CT4S. Luckily, the two forums I frequent for these cars are two of the better forums to follow. I remember back in the day the Tesla forums were a "safe place," but with the introduction of the Model 3 and Musk's decent in being a megalomaniac, it changed and the crazies took over. That played a role in my moving on from Tesla, and I have not looked back since.
 
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Gwaihir

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Totally agree, this is the best Taycan forum. Did have a look on Facebook, yeah! Soon gave those a big miss. . .
 

jkoya

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absolutely relishing every word of Peter Egan
I agree !! Peter Egan was the best part of Road & Track and I looked forward to everyone of his writings, especially the Jaguar E-Type. He was an amazing story teller.
 

WasserGKuehlt

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Great post, @nischalr - thank you for sharing, and, even more, for inviting others to share. Like you, I am a GenX'er, obsessed with cars and car magazines from an early age. (I am, too, the one who irritates family and friends by identifying cars - with series code name - by turn signals, mirrors or other fragments.) Born and raised in a communist country, my access to quality automotive press was a bit more challenging - we had an yearly 'almanac' that my father bought and collected, and which constituted my learn-to-read material. As my home country became ex-communist in the early 90s, my obsession simply took off, and I've amassed an unhealthily large collection of car magazines - ranging from AutoBild, auto motor und sport, quattroporte quattroruote (??‍♂), l'Automobile, car (speaking of great writing and stunning photos), Car & Driver, Top Gear, and a whole lot of BMW- and Porsche-specific magazines. (I am a recovering addict at the moment, down to just 2 magazine subscriptions; okay 3 with Panorama, and 4 if we are being generous with Christophorus.)

In the early 90s is also when I discovered the true importance of the then-nascent Internet: to find and download pictures of cars, and to find and communicate with fellow car addicts. Somehow I was able to join the UUC Garage gang - an online group of BMW nuts, who were actually driving BMWs. It is cathartic to discover, read and share's one passion with fellow-minded people, quite often of diverse backgrounds and other, non-car convictions. It gave me opportunities to indulge in writing, and it rewarded me with knowledge and entertainment: I've learned a lot about a lot, among a lot of laughter. (I didn't say I'm actually good at writing.)

The online tribe, however, is not all harmonious - and it seemed to get worse with alarming periodicity, and a strange frequency of "every 4 years". I gave up on lists, bimmer and Subaru forums and pretty much any other form of online presence, because, invariably, there was aggravation. I'm not one to back down from a (verbalprose) fight, and it's just emotionally draining to carry on arguing. I did find, however, that the degree of civility of a forum is directly proportional with the age of the car model/series - the older the model, the more factual the topics, and the more patient and open-minded the participants. (Except, of course, if we are talking about air-cooled Porsches.)

The Taycan forum was, for me, a refreshing reset to the early days of the Interned-based enthusiast community; I've spent more time here in the last ~1.5 years than I have, in total, on all forums in the previous 15. It reignited my own enthusiasm for a newly acquired car, which has not happened for my previous 10-odd vehicular purchases. I wanted to discover, read and share car-related experiences again - and not because of the car, but because of the community. (I did sign up in a rage, to provide a retort to a well-liked member here, but I did so with civility.) The information-to-noise ratio here is spectacular (I'm doing my part in bringing it down), the conversations are at least pleasant if not outright hilarious, and the mix of locales with identical experiences (HV heaters!) is fascinating. This last one, in particular, is still very intriguing and unusual to me - even for 'universal' models I've owned before, there would be separate forums for enthusiasts in different markets/countries, and almost unheard of to have members from non-English-speaking countries.

And so, cheers to you all, for making this one of the better corners of the online world, whether or not you intended to do so. Thanks for sharing, thanks for reading, and thanks for staying friendly.[/S]
 
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MarkR

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Reading the above, I feel that I want to share my experience of the forum.

I joined earlier in the year, whilst eagerly awaiting my CT4 to be delivered. I have been humbled by the community spirit, the in depth knowledge and civility of you all. I also enjoy the humour which in my experience is meant in a well mannered way, and never to belittle or alienate anyone. I find that I jump onto the forum on a regular basis, and have found the information very helpful, in particular where I needed to check anything since I have had my vehicle. Equally, I like to check out the various pictures that people have shared of their pride and joy. Quite simply, it is how a forum should be, and for that I thank you. It has made my ownership experience very positive and it is nice to be part of a group of like mined individuals. Long may it continue. Best wishes to you all for the new year.
 

PSUEric

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Great post! I had subscriptions to all the car magazines. The first magazine I got was an Aug 1968 Motor Trend that cost if I remember correctly $0.35. I threw a childish fit until my dad brought it for me. He thought $0.35 was a ridiculous price for a mag that would get thrown away, little did he know that 50 plus years later I still have that magazine stored away!

The forums were instrumental in me getting a Taycan. The knowledge, experience and common sense assistance provided by folks from around the world is amazing and worth it’s weight in gold.
 

Gwaihir

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Great post! I had subscriptions to all the car magazines. The first magazine I got was an Aug 1968 Motor Trend that cost if I remember correctly $0.35. I threw a childish fit until my dad brought it for me. He thought $0.35 was a ridiculous price for a mag that would get thrown away, little did he know that 50 plus years later I still have that magazine stored away!

The forums were instrumental in me getting a Taycan. The knowledge, experience and common sense assistance provided by folks from around the world is amazing and worth it’s weight in gold.
Maybe not a car magazine but I do have the 1969 New Scientist magazine covering the moon landing? Does seem a long time ago. Never kept that many being weekly so only digital now.
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