> 📚 Retrospective assessment. This examines predictions made across the motoring press generally, with attribution where cited. True Motion Auto is a new publication and has no archive of its own to reckon with — which is precisely why this piece ends by stating what we're likely getting wrong now.
Why this matters more than it amuses
Motoring journalism has a long record of confident predictions that time demolished. Cataloguing them is entertaining, but the useful part is understanding why the press gets things wrong — because the same errors recur, and we are certainly making some of them now.
The recurring error types
1. Assuming a trend continues linearly. The commonest failure. Something is growing, so it will keep growing at the same rate, forever. Almost nothing does.
Example: the widespread assumption in the early 2020s that pure-electric adoption would follow a smooth, rapid curve. It hasn't. As our own coverage documents, Ram cancelled its all-electric truck entirely in favour of a range-extender, and GM's decision to keep investing in the conventional V8 Silverado is looking increasingly well-judged.
2. Declaring things dead prematurely. The press has confidently buried: the estate car, the manual gearbox, the diesel engine, the saloon, the V8, and the hot hatch. Several are still here.
The V8 is the clearest current example. Widely written off around 2020; our Silverado prototype drive found the reasons for it — uncompromised towing, universal refuelling, proven durability, lower cost and genuine buyer demand for V8 character — were always practical rather than sentimental.
3. Underestimating how long transitions take. New technology arrives more slowly than enthusiasts expect and more completely than sceptics expect. Both camps are wrong, in opposite directions.
4. Overweighting the enthusiast perspective. Journalists are enthusiasts writing largely for enthusiasts, and enthusiast priorities — driving engagement, manual gearboxes, character — are not the priorities of most buyers, who want safety, running costs, space and reliability.
5. Dismissing newcomers on brand rather than product. Japanese manufacturers in the 1970s, Korean manufacturers in the 1990s, Chinese manufacturers in the 2020s — each was initially dismissed, and each proved considerably better than the dismissal implied.
As our Lexus retrospective found, the LS400 forced the German establishment to respond and improve. The pattern repeats.
6. Assuming the famous version is the best version. Our 512TR retrospective explored this: contemporary reception is shaped by cultural moment as much as merit, and hindsight regularly reshuffles the order — as our 1980s hot hatch piece found, where the 205 GTI's standing grew enormously and the Escort XR3i's fell.
What we're probably getting wrong now
This is the only genuinely honest way to write this article, so here are our own current positions most likely to look foolish later:
1. We may be overstating the charging network's decisiveness. We have argued repeatedly — in the Model Y comparisons, the £40K saloon test and elsewhere — that fast, reliable charging is worth more than the last 30 miles of range. If public infrastructure improves rapidly and universally, that advantage could erode faster than we expect, and several of our comparison verdicts would need revisiting. Our Model Y long-term test is explicitly designed to test this claim.
2. We may be underestimating Chinese premium brands. Our Xpeng G9 comparison concluded that brand standing and residual confidence cannot be engineered quickly, and placed it third despite winning on specification. The Lexus precedent says that gap closes — we've argued it takes decades, but we could be wrong about the timescale.
3. We may be overweighting lightness. We return to it constantly — the Mini, the GTI Mk1, the M5's 500 kg gain, the GR86 over the Mustang. It's an enthusiast priority, and enthusiast priorities are exactly what error type 4 warns about. Most buyers reasonably prefer safety and equipment.
4. We may be wrong about EREVs. We have been enthusiastic about the range-extender format (the Ram Ramcharger, Scout's Harvester). If charging improves quickly, EREVs could look like a transitional answer to a problem that solved itself.
5. Our depreciation warnings on EVs may age badly. We have flagged residual volatility as a genuine risk. If the used-EV market matures and stabilises, that caution will look overdone.
How to read predictions — including ours
1. Distinguish observation from extrapolation. "EV sales grew 40%" is a fact. "So they'll grow 40% next year" is a guess.
2. Be suspicious of death notices. Things declared dead are frequently just diminished.
3. Weight the buyer's perspective over the enthusiast's when predicting markets rather than assessing cars.
4. Assume transitions take longer than expected — and then go further than expected.
5. Judge newcomers on product, discount for brand, and remember the gap closes.
The bottom line
The motoring press gets predictions wrong in recurring, identifiable ways: extrapolating trends linearly, declaring things dead prematurely, misjudging transition speed, overweighting enthusiast priorities, and dismissing newcomers on brand.
Understanding those failure modes is more useful than laughing at individual mistakes — because they're the errors we're making right now.
We've named our own most likely: overstating the charging advantage, underestimating how fast Chinese premium brands close the gap, overweighting lightness, backing EREVs, and being too cautious on EV residuals.
If we're wrong about those, you'll read it here — because a publication that never revisits its own verdicts isn't being consistent, it's being stubborn.
- The press fails in recurring ways: linear extrapolation, premature death notices, misjudged transition speed, enthusiast bias, and brand-based dismissal of newcomers
- The V8 is the clearest current example — widely written off around 2020, and the practical reasons for it never went away
- We've named our own likely errors: overstating the charging advantage, underestimating Chinese premium brands, overweighting lightness, backing EREVs, over-cautioning on EV residuals
- The most useful discipline: distinguish observation from extrapolation, and weight the buyer's perspective over the enthusiast's when predicting markets
- A publication that never revisits its own verdicts isn't consistent — it's stubborn
Key takeaways
- The press fails in recurring ways: linear extrapolation, premature death notices, misjudged transition speed, enthusiast bias, and brand-based dismissal of newcomers
- The V8 is the clearest current example — widely written off around 2020, and the practical reasons for it never went away
- We've named our own likely errors: overstating the charging advantage, underestimating Chinese premium brands, overweighting lightness, backing EREVs, over-cautioning on EV residuals
- The most useful discipline: distinguish observation from extrapolation, and weight the buyer's perspective over the enthusiast's when predicting markets
- A publication that never revisits its own verdicts isn't consistent — it's stubborn
Sources & further reading
- Period automotive press
- True Motion Auto editorial positions (this project). *Retrospective assessment — we have no archive of our own to reckon with, which is why we've stated our current likely errors instead. Verified July 2026.*
Figures, prices and policy details were current at the last-updated date above. Automotive pricing, incentives and regulations change frequently — verify time-sensitive details with the linked primary sources. Read our editorial policy and fact-checking standards.
