Re: Unintended acceleration on Dateline last night.

[RELAYER@aol.com]

In a message dated 2/11/99 12:09:06 PM Eastern Standard Time,
sinclair@prospro.com writes:

>  At the same time that the UA investigation was launched against Audi,
>  similar and claims were filed by owners of GM vehicles.  In fact, MORE
>  incidents involving GM vehicles were filed during the same period than
>  against Audi.  I don't want to come off as a conspiracy nut here, but GM
did
>  an amazing bit of spin control - I didn't hear a thing about UA outside the
>  context of Audi.  Makes you wonder who in Detroit might have pulled stings
>  or diverted attention 15 years ago.  Given that media moguls and domestic
>  car manufacturers are amongst the most powerful businesses in the world. .
.

Well, GM may have pulled some stings, but I think Audi mishandled the whole
fiasco from day 1.  Audi's PR basically ignored the whole thing hoping it
would go away, and the only thing that went away was the sales.  I have a lot
of anger directed at 60 Minutes, but I have just as much directed at Audi for
the gross incompetence that their PR guys displayed.  

As a matter of fact, there was a class action lawsuit against Audi by Audi
owners saying that Audi's lack of action caused the resale of the Audis to
drop by as much as 25% overnight.  At the time, my dad had an '82 Audi 5000,
and he got a letter in the mail saying that Audi had settled it's lawsuit with
the 5000 owners, and as a result, he could buy a new Audi and get an
additional $2000 off when it is time to sign the paper work.  He used that as
incentive to buy an '87 5000 turbo.

So, don't just blame 60 minutes...Audi is at fault for not doing anything.
Remember when Dateline had rigged the Ford trucks (or was it GM?) to blow up
on TV during side impact?  They busted Dateline, and sued the hell out them
and got half of the Dateline production staff fired.  Everybody was talking
about how Ford was set up.  If Audi had any PR, they could have done the same
thing by showing how 60 minutes had modified the throttle to get the car to
"take off" on it's own.

  /\        _I        Christian J. Long (& Breeze Parker Long)
/    \ I_I I_I I      Orlando, Florida, USA
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'98 Audi A4 1.8tsm    Neuspeed .8 bar, K&N, 17" Ronal R28s
'96 BMW 318ti         For sale!
'90 Audi 90              
Past Audis: '84 CGT, '85CGT, '87.5 CGT, '90 CQ
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