I own a TDI myself and this article seems a bit hasty in its logic. I have mixed feelings at present, but the author's feelings don't seem to be well thought out:<p>> As someone who just recently bought at VW diesel - my first VW ever, and almost certainly my last - I can of course only speak for myself. But everyone I've talked to feels pretty much exactly as I do. And if after some more independent analysis, the numbers come back and they are even close to what we currently read in the press (10-40x more pollutants than advertised), I will sell the car immediately even if it is at an almost total loss.<p>I agree not to reward Volkswagen's fraudulent behavior, but if everyone is made whole as a result of this saga I am not sure that I have an issue with Volkswagen moving forward. I certainly would not sell my car. The only actions that make sense through the author's lens of wanting to be environmentally conscious would be to fix the emissions or crush it. Selling it appears to just move the problem to someone else.<p>>There is one, and only one reason why I would consider buying a VW in the future: massively beat Tesla at their game. Abandon all fuel-powered development today and invest every single cent into long-range electric cars, and build the electric charging infrastructure throughout Europe and the US (and the rest of the world). In addition, the development of the self-driving car has to be your top priority. The car of the future has no human driver in it, and of course you know this (anyone at VW who doesn't, let go of them immediately).<p>The author believes that an entity engaged in a scandal for shady software cheats should engage in making software that once again has the ability to impact people other than their owners in order to make amends for their current software cheat?<p>I can't say as I agree. I believe the amends that they need to make are:
1) fix the emissions issues in all current and future cars,
2) make the environment whole to the fullest extent possible. I'm not sure what options are available for this, but fines and funding third party research would fit the bill if nothing else,
3) make the owners of the cars whole: If the emissions fix alters the car's attributes negatively I want to be compensated for the delta from the car I actually bought.<p>> The new CEO, Matthias Müller from Porsche, thinks autonomous vehicles are an unjustifiable hype. I wish I was kidding, but I'm not: the VW board thought that the best person to replace the guy who oversaw the cheating software scandal (or was unaware of it) is a guy who seems to have even less appreciation of the ongoing software revolution.<p>Finally at the end of the article we get to some actual meat!! That is unfortunate, and would be worth putting at the top of the article and expanding on.