From 2010-2011, Weintraub covered all things Google for Fortune Magazine, amassing an impressive rolodex of Google contacts and a love for Silicon Valley tech culture.
It turns out that his hobby – the 9to5Mac news site – was always his favorite, and in 2011, he went full time adding his Fortune Google followers to 9to5Google, in addition to adding the style and commerce component of 9to5Toys gear and deals site. In 2013, Weintraub bought one of Tesla’s first Model S EVs off of the assembly line, which began his love affair with electric vehicles and green energy — this, in turn, became Electrek in 2014. To cover the burgeoning world of drones and UAVs led by China’s DJI, DroneDJ was born in 2018, and then more recently, Connectthewatts and SpaceExplored were launched to cover connected fitness and space.
From 1997-2007, Weintraub was a Global IT director and Web Developer for a number of companies, with stints at multimedia and branding agencies in Paris, Los Angeles, New York, Sydney, Hong Kong, Madrid, and London before becoming a publisher/writer.
Seth received a bachelor’s degree in Industrial and Systems Engineering from the University of Southern California with a minor in Multimedia and Creative Technology in 1997. In 2004, he received a Master’s from NYU’s Tisch School of the Art’s ITP program.
Weintraub is a licensed single-engine private pilot and a certified open-water scuba diver, and he spent over a year backpacking to 60 cities in 23 countries. Whatever free time exists is now guaranteed to his wonderful girlfriend, Alana, and two amazing sons.
In a very “Muskivelian” move today, Rivian CEO RJ Scaringe tweeted some cool new features that would be coming to owners, while Tony Caravano, head of Rivian customer engagement, told reservation holders with Ocean Coast interiors (like myself) that their vehicles would be delayed further. Oh and today’s the day that Rivian stakeholder and competitor Ford starts deliveries of the F-150 Lightning. So much for subtlety.
Today GM finally announced the electric AWD Corvette and perhaps something that will have a wider consequence outside of car enthusiasts: GM’s Ultium platform’s “energy recovery system”. The EV tech will help boost range, help vehicles charge faster, and heat car interiors with excess heat produced by the batteries.
Last week, a GM Cruise-converted Chevy Bolt without a driver was pulled over by San Francisco Police. In an unexpected turn, the car “bolted” …to a safe spot. Cruise responded below.
GMC flew Electrek out to Scottsdale, Arizona, last month to test-drive the new Hummer EV on proving grounds, backroads, highways, and desert trails. After a few days with this beast, it is clear that this thing has all the bells and whistles – but with a huge 200+ kWh battery, is the Hummer brand still a little excessive?
We’ll start to find out the answer starting today as GM celebrates its first Ultium powered Cadillac Lyriq rolling off the assembly line in its sprawling Spring Hill, Tennessee complex.
One of the (probably unintended) consequences of putting us in a hybrid before the fully electric Volvo C40 Recharge is juxtaposing just how thoroughly satisfying a quiet, powerful pure EV powertrain in a premium coupe-crossover can be.
The electric aviation world got a big shakeup today when Textron, the maker of Iconic small aircraft brands Cessna, Beechcraft, and Bell bought the Slovenian/Italian maker Pipistrel. The new organization has big plans for “eAviation”…
One area of the EV experience that traditional automakers seem to have little thirst for is the DC fast charging network that recharges their cars over long drives or in cities where Level 1/2 charging is inaccessible. Volvo is now exploring its own DC Fast Charging network of sorts, and it’s teamed up with charging heavyweights Starbucks and Chargepoint to do so…
Volvo flew us out to sunny Palm Springs to test the relatively new C40 BEV. But the Gothenburg, Sweden-based company couldn’t help but give us a quick drive in the bigger XC60 Recharge plug-in hybrid while we waited. The mid-sized SUV got a nice upgrade this year to 35 miles of all-electric driving in its “Pure” mode. That puts it into our “if you can commute without using gas, it’s an EV” category, but that wasn’t the only improvement…
The backlash from reservation holders, some from as far back as 2018, was alarming. In polls we and others took, a significant majority of reservation holders dropped their reservations. Most of the rest were waiting to see what Rivian did. Just two days later, we have an answer…
We’ve heard for a while now that Tesla would be implementing an app store system to allow third parties to build functionality into the TeslaOS. Today we were tipped to an impressive rendering of what such an app store would look like, and it almost seems real.
In a wide-ranging AMA on Reddit today, VW CEO Herbert Diess provided answers to a ton of questions from the Reddit community, some of which were news to us. Importantly, he clarified Volkswagen’s position on Autonomy and ID.4 charging update timelines while waxing eloquent on a low-price VW EV and everyone’s favorite, the Microbus.
Kia flew us out to wine and “winding road” country to test the new EV6, which is coming a bit late to the US, as it’s been out for a while in its native Korea and Europe already. So that means I’ve had months to digest the information about the car, its characteristics, and its place in the industry. But nothing beats a test drive through the mountains with fellow EV nerd and former Electrek writer Brad Berman to get to know a car intimately.
Ford’s versatile E-Transit 126-mile electric sprinter/cargo/van platform began production from its Kansas City, Missouri plant. Deliveries begin in a few weeks. I drove it, but drive impressions have to wait.
Ford is super high on its own supply of Telematics software but equally high on its new Salesforce partnership for software and services.
I came to California to drive a Ford F-150 Lightning and I got two awesome days in Sonoma meeting Francis Ford Coppola, chatting with some great Ford engineers/execs, drinking some amazing wine, and driving an electric sprinter van (not in that order).
We learned a lot this week as Ford flew us out to Sonoma, CA, and took us to some winery businesses that would soon be using not only electric Ford Pro vehicles but would also be using its telematics software stack to manage everything about them.
GM CEO Mary Barra took the wraps off the 2024 Chevy Silverado EV today at CES, and Chevy truck fans are likely to love what they see. The rest of us? We’re pretty split here on our takes of the 2024 Chevy Silverado…
Wallbox (WBX), the Barcelona, Spain-based charger maker, announced its second generation Quasar 2 bidirectional charger at CES this week, two years after the original Quasar won our best of CES 2020. The upgrades are many for this new charger, which we consider to be one of the most important new technologies in the EV ecosystem.
This pickup truck has everything – faster than most sports cars, a roomy interior with lots of storage and extras, and it can go off-road where no other production vehicle can go. It’s the first time electrification has hit the off-road pickup in a meaningful way, and it proves why electric is king both on-road and off.
As Ford’s CEO Jim Farley took to Twitter to announce a three times increase in Mustang Mach-E production, the company also alerted dealers that modest price increases and new packages would be coming for 2022 models. The California Route 1 edition also got a meaningful range bump.
Meanwhile, the company delayed a much anticipated Explorer EV and its Lincoln cousin…
For Electrek‘s first drive of the Grand Turismo Sport (GTS), Porsche brought us out to Willow Springs race track in the high desert, northeast of Los Angeles. The cars it gave us were stock models with nothing you can’t option at a Porsche dealer. Our basic instructions were to try and follow the professional drivers ahead of us and listen for instructions— and that was pretty much it.
Serial 1 provided a Mosh CTY review bike to me so I could commute from my hotel in downtown Los Angeles a mile or so south to the Los Angeles Auto Show this week.
But I used it to attend the USC Football game a few miles to the south, dinners/events in various parts of the city, and just generally get around instead of Uber or renting a car.
