MSU Today with Russ White

Michigan State University School of Journalism alumnus Mark Phelan is the widely respected automotive columnist and critic at the Detroit Free Press. He joins me on MSU Today to talk about all things automotive industry.

Show Notes

“It's fascinating because it's a mix of things that you could have seen coming and stuff that nobody ever imagined,” says Phelan, in talking about the state and future of the automotive industry. “The move toward electrification and reduced carbon emissions seems to really be gathering speed with vehicles that will become mainstream models. And more customers than ever before are considering whether they should get an electric vehicle. That's the foreseeable part of it, although it may have accelerated more in the last few months than most people expected.

“The unforeseeable is the fact that every automaker in the world is saying, ‘Where am I going to get the computer chips I need to build the cars that people want to buy?’ It is an after effect of the pandemic when automakers thought that sales would be depressed for a really long time. They're happy that sales recovered faster than they expected, but they canceled some of their contracts to buy parts. And the chip makers went out and got other customers.”

How do the auto companies define mobility?

“Sometimes I wonder if they know what they mean by that,” quips Phelan. “It's a word that resonates well with the investment community and with different groups of consumers because it can mean whatever they want. Generally, it breaks down into two buckets. One is developing vehicles that can increasingly take over some, most, or eventually all of the work of driving autonomous vehicles.

“The other half of it is adding services to vehicles that we never thought of before. It's a rare car these days that does not come with the capability of connecting to one of the digital assistants like Alexa. 

“The idea is making it easier for people to do more in their cars, to get better directions, to avoid delays, to make reservations for a hotel or place a carry-out order, and all kinds of other stuff. And the reason that the automakers talk about it so much and that the investment community wants to hear about it so much is that it ties into the capability to offer subscription services. The latest buzzword is subscription services.

“Electric vehicles will need considerably less regular service and maintenance than conventional vehicles do. That reduces one of the revenue streams for automakers and dealers. They're trying to find ways to offset that, and subscription services is one of the things that they think can do that. I don't fully understand what they're going to offer that customers will be willing to pay $5, $6, $10 - whoever knows how much – for a subscription to a service. But 8 or 10 years ago, I could not imagine having 5 or 6 streaming services that I pay a subscription for. What will people want to pay extra for?

“All of that wraps up in the idea of mobility, making it easier for people to use their cars, allowing them to do more things while they're in their cars, and making it possible for car companies to sell them things they never thought they wanted before.”

Phelan says the auto companies are going full speed ahead on electrification.

“Perhaps in our lifetimes, there will be a day when gas stations are as rare as the places where you buy hay for your horse. There will always be some gas vehicles that remain. There will be people who collect the classics. There will be events for them. But the big auto makers that can afford the investment, and it is massive investment, they have all reached the point of no return and kept going. They are on the route to electric. Most of the large automakers like General Motors, Ford, Volkswagen, and Mercedes are at the point where they are no longer beginning investment in new gasoline-burning engines. You don't come back from that. They're going to keep the engines that they've got for a while. They're going to keep building gasoline-powered vehicles for quite a while, but all of their capital investment is going into electric vehicles these days.

“It would take some kind of a catastrophic intervening event for them to decide that they had to turn back now. But people worry. I get emails from people saying, ‘I'm thinking about buying a new car and I'm afraid to get a new Honda Accord because I'm worried that I won't be able to get spare parts for it, or I won't be able to buy gasoline in five years.’ Nobody should worry about that.

“There'll be gas stations on every corner for a long, long time. Automakers have to keep building parts for vehicles. And none of them are discontinuing these vehicles. Electric vehicles may be the way of the future, but you need to fund the future with money that you make today. And they make that money selling their current vehicles. There are going to be huge numbers of gasoline and diesel-powered cars and trucks built at least through the rest of this decade.”

Phelan describes his experience with Ford’s new F-150 Lightning and discusses how the country’s leading-selling vehicle could hasten the transition to electrification.

“We’re at a critical point where we need infrastructure to catch up. We need more generation and we need more charging stations. Both of those are things that are being addressed by the proposed infrastructure bills. There's a possibility of the pieces coming together and the change accelerating rapidly from here.”

Phelan talks about connected and autonomous vehicles. And he talks about cybersecurity issues facing our increasingly connected vehicles. 

“The recent pipeline hack is the perfect example of why cybersecurity is so important. I was at an automotive cybersecurity conference a few years ago. And people were talking about all of the things that they were doing to prevent these huge, sophisticated actors from being able to hack into their car.

“And then I asked one of them in a side conversation, ‘Why would any of these big multinational organizations, terrorists, criminal, governments, whatever it may be, want to hack my car? The worst they can do is have me run into a wall and is that really worth their effort?’ And the person looked at me and said, ‘No, your car is the gateway to the infrastructure.’ And that's where cybersecurity becomes really important for the whole country.

“Connected and autonomous vehicles are going to have direct links to infrastructure. The more autonomous vehicles we get and the more driver assistance we get, the more we will have vehicles that can communicate with stoplights, with railroad crossings, and with other vehicles on the road.

“Similarly, as you're more connected, you may pay for a charge or for a carry-out order just by tapping ‘purchase now’ on the touch screen in your car. That gets your car connected to financial infrastructure. So, your car is the potential gateway to disrupting basically all aspects of life in America. And that's why connected cars need to have absolute cybersecurity.”

Phelan talks about the evolving field of journalism and discusses its challenges and opportunities.

“At least we are not being called the enemy of the people on a daily basis,” he quips. “But there are still tremendous challenges economically. Newspapers are increasingly getting a handle on it because they have learned how to monetize more services. The Free Press now has premium content that requires a subscription for access on some stories. And we've been very successful in getting people to sign up for that access.

“But when there's a story that's an emergency, as with most of our COVID coverage, we make that and most other newspapers also make that available to everyone for free because we feel an obligation to do that. It's incredibly competitive. We still live in a world where there are far too many voices that are making claims that they can’t support and just making wild charges in general.

“We can all probably think of five examples from the last week's news of that kind of thing. But we are continuing to do everything that we can to provide the information that people need and to make sure that we get it right. There isn’t anyone at any of the established outlets that doesn't feel a real responsibility to people who trust us to provide information.”

Phelan talks about how and why MSU was the right college choice for him coming out of high school. And he describes how his MSU J-School experience has impacted his life and career and those of many of his Free Press colleagues. And he offers his advice for young people who want to get into journalism. He also provides an update on what’s going on with the Detroit auto show.

“The J-School was absolutely invaluable. I chose MSU because the J-School is outstanding. It's had a good reputation forever. It teaches the things you need to actually do the job as well as the big overarching principles of freedom of the press and giving voice to those who don't have it.

“And I had the good fortune at MSU to work at The State News. It was the best possible training. There are people who I worked with at the State News who are colleagues of mine at the Detroit Free Press today. It is a testament to the success of the J-School at MSU and to the State News. I've been incredibly lucky, and I can't overstate how much of that is due to the things that happened and that I was lucky enough to learn while I was at State.”

In closing and in returning the conversation to the automotive industry, Phelan says he will be closely following the practical limits of electric vehicles and hands-free driving.

“I’m hoping this fall to be able to take a road trip in which I might take one of the new electrified Fords, probably the Mustang Mach-E, on a drive where I would try both of those technologies. The people who are most uncertain about electric vehicles are the ones who are afraid that the longer charging time will be inconvenient for things they like to do.

“So, I want to see what is the best way to go 11, 1200 miles in an electric vehicle? How much longer does it take if I'm moving with the latest technology as far as finding charging stations? If I can combine that with a vehicle that does most of the driving for me when I'm on the highway, that would be ideal. “That's kind of the thing I'm most interested in attempting this year. Otherwise, I'm just really looking forward to seeing how various companies answer all of the questions that are facing them these days.

“The most interesting thing in the world to me is when you see two smart people come up with different answers to the same question. And maybe they both work. Maybe one of them is right, and one of them is wrong. And it's even better when you're spending their money and not yours to come up with these answers. We have enough different approaches to electric vehicles coming now that we'll be able to see what works, what doesn't, and what are the great new ideas we haven't thought of. Then we'll see people start to converge around a consensus on what these vehicles can do. I’m eager to learn more about the action to improve generating capacity and the charging that's really necessary for this technology to take off.”

MSU Today airs Sunday mornings at 9:00 on 105.1 FM and AM 870 and streams at WKAR.org. Find “MSU Today with Russ White” on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and wherever you get your shows.

Creators & Guests

Host
Russ White
I host and produce MSU Today for News/Talk 760 @wjrradio and @MichiganStateU's @NPR affiliate @WKAR News/Talk 102.3 FM and AM 870.

What is MSU Today with Russ White?

MSU Today is a lively look at Michigan State University-related people, places, events and attitudes put into focus by Russ White. The show airs Saturdays at 5 P.M. and Sundays at 5 A.M. on 102.3 FM and AM 870 WKAR, and 8 P.M. on AM 760 WJR.

Russ White 0:00
Well, Michigan State University journalism school alumnus Mark feelin is the widely respected automotive columnist and critic at the Detroit Free Press. And it's great to have mark on every so often to talk about all things automotive industry. So Mark, welcome back to MSU. today.

Mark Phelan 0:17
Thank you, Russ, it's great to talk to you.

Russ White 0:19
So, Mark, I know there are entire conferences held on this. But in general, as we catch up, what's sort of the state of the automotive industry? What are some of both its challenges and opportunities. It's fascinating because it's,

Mark Phelan 0:33
it's a mix of things that you could have seen coming and stuff that nobody ever imagined. The move toward electric vehicles, electrification, reduced carbon emissions, seems to really be gathering speed with vehicles, you know, that will become mainstream models, and more customers than ever before considered if thinking maybe I should get an electric vehicle. That's the foreseeable part of it. Although it may have accelerated more in the last few months than most people expected. The unforeseeable is the fact that every automaker in the world is saying, Where am I going to get the computer chips, I need to build the cars that people want to buy. It is an after effect of the pandemic, when automakers plus there's no sales would be depressed for a really long time. They're happy that sales recovered faster than they expected. But they canceled some of their contracts to buy parts. And the chip makers, you know, went out and got other customers. So you're right now there are parking lots full of cars that have been completed, except for one or two chips that the automaker can get right now. And they're waiting for him to come in so they can install them. General Motors earlier this year, dropped one feature that was quite popular on its best selling pickups, because they couldn't get the chip to enable if so everybody, for a few months who has been buying that truck has been you know, going without something that people took for granted last year. But it's it's it's as they all seem to be it's a fascinating year in the auto

Russ White 2:06
mark, one word we're hearing more and more is mobility. And I don't want to say buzzword, but I think it means a lot of things to a lot of different people. How do the auto companies define mobility? What do they mean?

Mark Phelan 2:19
Sometimes I wonder if they know what they mean by that, because you're right, it has become a catch all. It is a it's a phrase that I read a word that resonates well with, you know, the investment community and with different groups of consumers, because it can mean whatever they want. Generally, it comes it breaks down into two buckets. One is developing vehicles that can that can increasingly take over some most store, eventually, all of the work of driving your autonomous vehicles. The other half of it is adding services to vehicles that we never thought about before adding Well, it's a rare car these days, that does not come with the capability of connecting to one of the digital assistants, you know Alexa or Google, whatever they call, there's I don't even remember, hey, Google. So that kind of thing is part of, you know, the idea is making it easier for people to do more in their cars to get better directions to avoid delays, to you know, make reservations for a hotel or, you know, place a carry out order, all of that kind of stuff. And the reason that automakers talk about it so much, and that the investment community wants to hear about it so much is that it ties into the capability they think, to offer subscription services. And that's the latest buzzword is subscription services. We don't know exactly what they are yet automakers want to have backing up slightly electric vehicles will need considerably less regular service and maintenance than conventional vehicles do. That reduces one of the revenue streams for automakers and dealers, they're trying to find ways to offset that. And subscription services is one of the things that they think you can do that we don't really fully I anyway, don't fully understand what they're going to offer. The customers will be willing to pay five, six, you know, 10 whoever knows how much dollars a month for, but eight 910 years ago, I could not imagine having five six however many streaming services that I pay a subscription for. And I may only use one of them. I have only used you know Disney in the year and a half that I've had Disney. I've used Disney to watch Mandalorian Falcon and the Winter Soldier and wandavision that the lot and I'm paying that. That's three programs and I'm paying whatever I'm paying each month for it. But I want to repeat those three programs badly enough that I'm going to keep paying it. So the subscription model, I think, is waiting for automakers to show us what is the automotive Falcon and the Winter Soldier. What will people want to pay extra for? That they haven't demonstrated it yet, but there's a lot of work going on. But all of that kind of wraps up in the idea of mobility making it easier for people to use their cars, making it making allowing them to do more things while they're their cars, and making it possible for car companies to sell them things they never thought they wanted before.

Russ White 5:36
I'm catching up with Detroit Free Press automotive columnist and critic Mark feelin on MSU today mark the other word and is electrification. And in a moment, I want to ask you one of the few people whose you didn't drive up but you've got to ride in a moving f150 lightning. Before we get to that, though, in general, the auto companies are definitely moving to an electrified future, right? I mean, is there going to be a day perhaps not in our lifetimes where there's not a corner gas station or I mean, how far is electrification going to go

Mark Phelan 6:09
as far as the eye can see, basically, and yes, there will be maybe in our lifetimes, there will be a day when gas stations are as rare as the places where you buy hay for your horse, you know, there will always be some gas vehicles that remain there will be people who collect the classics, there will be events for them, but but the big automakers that can afford the investment and it is massive investment, they have all reached the point of no return and kept going they are on the rush to electric. Most of the large automakers, you know that the you know, General Motors, Ford Volkswagens Mercedes of the world, are at the point where they are no longer beginning investment in new gasoline burning engines. And that you don't come back from that, you know, frankly, I mean, they are going to continue there, they're going to keep the engines that they've got for a while they're going to keep building gasoline powered vehicles for quite a while. But all of their capital and investment is going into electric vehicles these days, you know, and so it will happen, it will take some kind of a catastrophic intervening event for them to decide that they had to turn back now. So we are on the roof. But people who worry, I get emails from people saying, you know, I'm thinking about buying a new car, and I'm afraid to get a new Honda Accord, because I am worried that I won't be able to get your spare parts for it, or I won't be able to buy gasoline in you know, five years, nobody should worry about that, you know, there will be gasoline, there'll be gas stations on every corner. For a long, long time, automakers have to keep building parts for vehicles, they've just continued for a long time. And none of them are just continuing these vehicles because electric vehicles may be the way of the future. But you need to fund the future with money that you make today. And they make that money selling their current vehicles, there are going to be huge numbers of gasoline and diesel powered cars and trucks builds for at least I think through the rest of this decade.

Russ White 8:28
And Mark, tell us about this Ford F 150. Lightning because I read someone said somewhere you know, Tesla made it cool to be having an electric car Ford, when it's the largest selling vehicle for 40 years in the world may bring it to the masses just talk about this truck and what it's Ford says you can power your house if the power goes out and charge tools at the website, I got to believe it's going to be very popular.

Mark Phelan 8:55
I think so and that example you give of powering your house is the kind of thing that I was talking about with the new applications that people haven't thought of yet. Because there there are very few people who are dissatisfied with their current your vehicles that they start every day they get them where they need to go. They're not saying I'm desperate to trade this for a new technology. Even the people who are most committed to reversing climate change, you understand that the vehicles need to be practical, they need to be accessible to the vast majority of people Forge. I mean, it's corny to say it, but they did this with the Model T you know, 110 years ago, they build cars were a luxury good. Until then, they built a car that the people who made the best car could afford to buy and the world and the F 150 is the kind of vehicle that can be that sort of inflection point for electric vehicles to because they prices, starch just under $40,000, which is serious money. Absolutely. But it is well within the range of our people pay for current F 150s. So it's a car, it's a vehicle that's attainable. The technology is still improving, and it will for a while. So there are still drawbacks in terms of how far can you go, and how long does it take to recharge the battery, but they are offering new features like the ability to power your house for three days in a blackout, and something that will be part of an app that they are basically you ready, you've got a 240 volt charger that you have installed at your house, and you charge it overnight. And that gives you enough power to excuse me to drive 300 miles, or power worksite if you if you're a contractor or your house, really for dates, maybe they've even got a

function built in, where if you are powering the worksite, you can you plug 1011 different power tools, lights, air compressors, you name it into various outlets from this truck, you can work all day, they for up to three days, but you can work all day. And you can program in a little note that says when I'm done, I need to drive 80 miles to get home. And it will stop powering those before you get to that critical level. So the amount of thought that has gone into this to make it not just practical, but to offer new features that people never realize they wanted before is what would open the door people want people are now willing to consider electric vehicles, they need to be convinced that the electric vehicle gives them something more, and things like that. Plus, I I suspect that people will very quickly realize that they love not having to stop for gas, you know, every Tuesday afternoon or whatever, you know, not not being stuck out in the in the heat or the snow or the rain, just plugging it in every night. And it's got a full charge when you start the next day. So the F 150. Even though the F 150. Lightning is the name they use for the electric version, it won't be unsealed until next spring. But it's hard to overstate the significance it may have at that point. And it comes at the same time that Volkswagen is finally beginning to get a lot of vehicles on the road from its big shift into electric vehicles. GM is about to you know, get their their first GM like Ford decided to make their first vehicle a luxury vehicle. And there's arguments for that too. And part of what makes me optimistic about the market is the companies are approaching it from all these different ways. GM is also going to have an electric version of their Silverado pickup, that will go on sale, probably around the same time as the F 150. Lightning. So between that and newcomers like rivian, which is financed essentially by Amazon, so there's no way that's not going to come to fruition. And Tesla with their cyber truck which appeals to a totally different group of people. Nobody's going to buy a cyber drug because they're a contractor. Because the best of it is like what you would see in an old El Camino. It's not a practical vehicle. It's a style statement. But it's another thing that increases the mass of the momentum of the shift that's going on. So it It feels like all of that is at a critical point. And we need infrastructure to catch up. We need charging, more charging, we need more recharging stations, we need more generation and we need more charging stations. Both of those are things that are being addressed by the proposed infrastructure bills. So there's a possibility of the pieces coming together and the change accelerating rapidly from here,

Russ White 14:08
Mark. You know, the phrase Game Changer is often overused, but I think with the F 150. And as I'm pretty sure the Silverado is the second leading vehicle in the world. So any significant adaption of those may be starting next spring really could be significant. I think you make some good points. And I'm talking with Mark feeling from the Detroit Free Press covers our beloved automotive industry and Merck. You mentioned autonomous vehicles, there are connected vehicles explain that while they're related. They aren't the same thing. And where are we kind of on cybersecurity concerns with with connected vehicles? I don't know. Let me learn as much about that lately. But

Mark Phelan 14:47
let me start with cybersecurity because that's a fascinating area and it's one that is rightly very much in the news these days. The pipeline hack is the perfect example of why it's so Important, and I was at a cybersecurity an automotive cybersecurity conference a few years ago, and people were talking about all of the things that they were doing to, to prevent these huge sophisticated actors from being able to hack into their cars. And I asked one of them, you know, in a side conversation, why would any of these big multinational organizations, you know, terrorists, criminal, governments, whatever it may be, what a hack my car, you know, the worst they can do is have me run into a wall? And is that really worth their effort? And the person looked at me, they said, No, no, no, your car is the gateway to the infrastructure. And that's where cybersecurity becomes really important for the whole country. Because connected and autonomous vehicles are going to be you have direct links to infrastructure, the more autonomous vehicles we get, and the more driver assistance we get, the more we will have vehicles that can communicate with stoplights with railroad crossings, with other vehicles on the road to figure out, you know, where's traffic? You know, should I reroute all of those things. Similarly, as you're more connected, you may, you know, pay for a charge, or for a carry out order, just by you know, tapping, you know, purchase Now, on the touchscreen in your car, that gets your car connected to the financial infrastructure. So your car is the potential gateway to disrupting basically all aspects of life in America. And that's why connected cars need to have absolutely for trade cyber structure. That's why the sorry, cyber security. That's why it's such an emphasis. That's why you see some very high powered people from defense and intelligence being hired by automakers now. And interestingly, it's one of the reasons that the tech community in Israel has become a huge player in the auto industry, because so many people come from the Israeli military, and particularly Air Force, where they have a very advanced cyber operations to the auto industry, because they've been at the the sharp end of the spear in terms of, you know, penetrating and preventing penetration of systems. So the connected part is vital, autonomous, is coming, we've got a couple more cars, a couple more vehicles, this fall, that should be available with hands free driving on the on the highway. Right now, the only vehicles that can do that are ones from General Motors and have a system called supercruise. Some people with Tesla, I think their cars have got hands free driving, do not believe that if you have one, do not do it, please, Tesla's got a very interesting system. But it is absolutely reckless and incredibly dangerous to yourself or anybody else to think that you can close your eyes, get in the backseat, take a nap any of that stuff, you still have to be hands on the wheel, the soup General Motors system, and the new ones coming from Ford, GM is supercruise. Ford's is I think called Blue cruise. Those allow you to take your hands off the wheel on highway drives. It's incredibly, incredibly relaxing and enjoyable, I've done it. But you always have to be ready to resume control. And the cars have got alerts built in to let you know, there's anything going on in construction traffic there got tons of sensors, in my experience, the alerts are very effective, they give you plenty of time to resume control, but you have to be ready to do it. Those technologies should become much more prevalent soon. And they should even though they're not full autonomy, they should make driving more efficient and pleasant for people because, you know, part of it is that they just you know, stop some of the slowdowns, you know that you see, you know, when people are on your commute home, when you come to a curb on the highway, and the whole lane of traffic slows down because one person took their foot off the gas or brakes when they didn't need to bash doesn't have to happen if you're if the vehicles all have this hand for three driving system. They all know what's coming. The first car doesn't slow down. So then all the other ones behind it don't so just little things like that can make a big difference in the amount of time you spend on the road and how pleasant it is. So we'll see all of that full autonomy in limited areas. It's feasible now for deliveries and things like that. And I think it's reasonable to expect that we'll see that service for deliveries and for your perhaps your shuttles in limited geofence areas in the near future, that's going to make a big difference to people, it's one of the things that can be a big ongoing stream of revenue to automakers too. So when you get into connected services and subscriptions, that's part of what they're talking about as well, the engineers tend to be very cautious about complete autonomy, because in their minds, that means that you can basically be in an elevator, you don't see where you're going ever, you have no control, other than pushing the button that says this is my destination. And no matter whether it's day night snow flood, the system will get you there. That level where the system can compensate with any outside factor is very distant. It'll be a couple of decades, at least before we get to that if we ever do. But before then we will probably be at the point where hands free evolves into systems that will drive for you 95% of the time, but there still has to be a steering wheel available and windows so that if there is a flood, if there is a tornado that knocks out the infrastructure that talks to the car about upcoming obstacles that you can take over. That is feasible, and for most people that will be the equivalent of autonomy. And it's part of the reason that engineers are really hesitant to say yes, because they think of the absolute ideal idea of no windows, no steering wheel, you'd never have to do anything as autonomy. But there are other steps on the way that are coming relatively quickly that people will benefit from.

Russ White 21:40
That's Detroit, Free Press, automotive columnist and critic Mark field and sharing his expertise on all things automotive, with me and MSU today. And Mark, let me ask you about your craft journalism. I mentioned you're a grad of MSU. J School, which I'll ask you about in a minute. But coming out of maybe wasn't the most favorable, previous federal administration? I don't think I'm saying anything out of school there. But what sort of the state of journalism? And are we still using the word monetize a lot? I'm a happy digital subscriber to both the free press and news, but what's the state of your craft?

Mark Phelan 22:18
Well, first of all, thank you very much for subscribing. And thanks to everyone who listens, who does. We appreciate it. We as we take the the trust people put in us very seriously. I suppose you're right, we have gone from, you know, we were in the frying pan, and now we're just back in in the fire or who are the or vice versa, at least we are not being called the enemy of the people on a daily basis. So So there's that. But there are still, you know, tremendous challenges. Economically, I think newspapers are increasingly getting a handle on it. Because, you know, we they have learned how to monetize more services of the Free Press now has premium content that requires a subscription for access on some stories. And we've been very successful in getting people to sign up for that access. But we also when there's a story, that's an emergency, as with most of our COVID coverage, we make rash, and most other newspapers also make that available to everyone for free, because we feel an obligation to do that. So I mean, it's, it's incredibly competitive, we still live in a world where there are far too many voices, that are making claims that they can't support and just making wild charges in general. And I think we can all probably think of five examples, you know, from the last week's news of that kind of thing. But, you know, we are continuing to do everything that we can to, to provide the information Yeah, that people need to make sure that we get it right. Because I don't think there's, you know, that anyone at any of the, you know, established, you know, outlets that are real responsibility to people, you trust us to provide information.

Russ White 24:19
Yes. So, Mark, take me back when you were coming out of high school, you know, why was MSU the place for you to pursue journalism? And second part sort of how did your time as a Spartan impact you to get you where you are, you know, when

Mark Phelan 24:33
Oh, god, you're going? What a great question. Thank you for asking that. It's funny, I, I knew that I wanted to write. And I knew that writing was hard work and that I am lazy, and that I wouldn't do enough of it, to discover if I was any good at it, if I didn't have to do it. And journalism was the field that I could see where if you don't do it, The consequences are immediate. So that was really the beginning of this. I became a fan of newspapers. You're probably a as a teenager reading columns in, you know, amazingly enough, the Detroit Free Press, and you're seeing some of some of the syndicated columnists, you know, that are legendary names in journalism. Now, you'll Mike Royko, for from Chicago, Herb Kane from San Francisco. And, you know, realizing that it would be wonderful to be able to talk to people in that way, and to give them inflammation, this Yo, yo, one hopes that they would find, you know, valuable and entertaining. So yeah, that was really kind of, you know, your my, you know, evolution. It's funny, I was talking to an old friend from MSU. Recently, and she said that she remembered something I had completely forgotten. At some point, you know, while we were all in school here, you know, I said this someday I was going to be a columnist for The Detroit Free Press. And I thought, How lucky do you get? Yes, yeah, I am that, you know, thank you. So, in the J school was absolutely invaluable. It one of the things that is amazing, I chose MSU one, because the J school is outstanding, it's had a good reputation forever, it teaches the things you need to actually do the job, as well as the big overarching principles of, you know, freedom of the press, you know, voices, you know, giving voice to those who don't have, you know, accountability, all of those things. But it also it gets granule granular, I mean, the the wieder class for you know, the J school. And I assumed I suspect that it still is, was one where you just sash ash back then and manual typewriters and typed on paper, a story based on a list of facts. And if you had a typo in a person's name, it was a zero point, because you don't get to get people's names wrong, you know, that is sort of rule one, you have to get the basic facts, right. And from that point onwards, it really it focused on the things that you need to do that you need to understand to get the information and presented to people a in a way that is useful away, and you know, what hope is entertaining to them. And I had the great good fortune at MSU to work at the news, the the newspaper there, which is distributed, well, was then distributed to everybody on campus. Now they've gone to a largely online presence, but I assume that there's still places where you can pick it up, pick up the hardcopy, but it was the best possible meaning they won by students paid for by students. And you're focused on covering the meetings that influenced our classes, the meetings in East Lansing that influenced the places where a lot of us lived, the sports that we cheered for, you know, that the security of life on campus, the places you know, where you could get a good deal, how to avoid, you know, scams when you were signing up for your first apartment, you know, all of that stuff. So it was incredibly valuable. And there are people that I worked with, with whom I worked at the state news, who are, you know, colleagues of mine at the Detroit Free Press today. And I think that's just incredible. And it is a testament to, you know, the the success of, you know, the J school at MSU. And of the state news. It I, I've been incredibly lucky and I can't, under I can't overstate how much of that is due to the things that happen in that I was lucky enough. Well, while I was state,

Russ White 29:05
Spartans, well, that's right. Well, so mark, you know, with MSU, having every intention of returning to normal in the fall within, you know, person classes and whatnot. What would your advice be to the young Mark feelings, maybe sitting in a class in the commerce building now who may want to, in some way, follow you into this crazy ever changing communications world?

Mark Phelan 29:30
First of all, good luck, because that's important. find places where you can do the work now, because showing that you have done it is the best way to get hired afterwards. I mean, did the state news was raised the capital news service, which, you know, Michigan State initiated, is a phenomenal service that also gives people that that chance, I mean, whatever you can do to find To the opportunity to get into print and to work with photography with editors, who will tell you what they need and learning to understand that relationship is important. And also, the more different things you can do the better. I mean, I would never wait when I went to J school, you could get a degree that was as good as any place in the country without ever having your recorded your voice on anything without ever having taken a picture. And certainly without video because you know, the cost of video equipment and then was prohibitive. Now, you need to be comfortable with all of the different aspects of multimedia. You may spend most of your time writing texts, but you could equally spend your all of your time shooting video and narrating voiceovers, you're accomplishing the same thing. You're getting people information that they want or need. And and you know, and bring them with it. The more different things you that parts of the skill you can master, figure out how to do video, get comfortable with audio, learn what are the differences in presenting information in those. And, of course, you know, still photos also, no story makes the Detroit Free Press website, if there is not a photograph associated with it. And that's maybe the best lesson of all because it used to be that there was a bifurcation between people who wrote and people who took pictures. And there are people who will specialize in both the people who have got a great photographer photography and video, need to create things that I could never imagine in a million years. But you have to at least be competent in all of those things.

Russ White 31:55
And those iPhones take such good photos now market, it's amazing.

Mark Phelan 32:00
Stunning, and the video you can shoot with. I mean, it's it really is amazing. And I would never in a million years of thought that I would come to enjoy and really benefit from producing videos, I'll give you one fast example. It used to whenever I would be reviewing a vehicle. And there would be something that didn't fit, right, it hung it wasn't lined up at it, the gap was too big. If whatever the problem was, I would write about it. And the car company, you know, would you know, say no, no, no, we didn't do that, you know, that's not right at all. And the car that I had written about was already back in may have had that thing fixed by that time. The first video that I ever did to compliment review had some of those problems, and I took pictures of them and I shot the video. And I illustrated you know, the fact that you know, one of the gaps was so big that literally I stacked five quarters together. And I slipped it between two pieces of trim. And I ran that video, and I never heard of peep a complaint. So I mean, you it helps you to document yo what you were saying and and to give people yo yo more evidence. So it really does. You know, it improves the job that we do you know, getting the next two people

Russ White 33:20
on mark is always it's been great talking with you. I forgot one question before I get your final thoughts. Where are we with the auto show? It was going to make a big splash in June of 2020 and be outside and where are we Is there ever going to be another one as more and more internet things happen for cars? What's the state of the ones go beloved auto show?

Mark Phelan 33:41
The the auto show has become a moving target for sure. At one point they had planned on having in October this year in downtown Detroit. The planning for these things, it goes on months in advance automakers have got budgets that are set relatively early in the year. And you have a big presence introducing a new vehicle at an auto show is an outlay of a million dollars or more just for the staging of you know of the big spectacular reveal. So earlier in the spring, the auto show got to the point where they were at the drop dead date. Whether they could tell automakers Yes, we will definitely have, you know, a big show set aside you know billions of dollars from your budget. They were not sure if they'd be able to have a big show or not at that point. So they pulled the plug on. So this year, there will not be a Detroit Auto Show. There are a couple of little things you know that that will try to fill the gap and I'll describe those to you in a second. But the plan right now is that there will be a 2022 Auto Show. It will be in downtown Detroit in early to mid June, as I recall, and it will do all of the things that they had originally planned. When they made the move from winter to summer. They will have outdoor events for driving, they'll have an off road campus built, they'll be able to demonstrate self driving vehicles and other technologies. And they'll have just you know, nice outdoor displays and food trucks and all of the things that you can do, you know, on the waterfront in Detroit in Michigan in June, that you would not want to try to do in January so that plan is still in place. For the fall. They the Detroit Auto Show, auto dealers plan right now is in August so still summer for that. They will have a new downtown car called the Motor City car grow, every your brand will be represented there will be no stands around downtown Detroit, you know, showing all of their vehicles they're expecting to have against you. Food trucks, music, try to make it a kind of a festival downtown. That's the first weekend in August. If you've got Motor City car call, you can figure that out. In late September or late mid or late September, there's going to be an event at a small private Car Club. Just north of Detroit, you know i on the southern border of Pontiac, the places called m one concours. And the event will be quote called motor Bella. They plan Italian for beautiful cars basically, they plan to have stands it's a big facility, there's a racetrack, lots of open ground, they plan to have displays from automakers, they hope to have a couple of new vehicles introduced, you know, the kind of news that used to drive a lot of traffic to the Detroit Auto Show that will be going on in September. It's at a smaller place, it's you know, not at a place that can accommodate hundreds of 1000s of people as TCF senator good for the Auto Show. So it'll be a much smaller event, but it will be available of people who want to go out. If you Google Marbella, you could get the details. And as the dates get closer, we'll have a better idea of what's going on. Certainly there'll be coverage in the Free Press, if any new vehicles are introduced. And if you're shopping for a car, it's probably a good way to, you know, spend an afternoon and again, you know, September, you know, in Michigan, you know, it doesn't get much nicer, you know, the weather will probably have So, you know, with any luck, it'll be successful at those two events are placeholders for next year's Auto Show. The one other thing I should say is that a couple of the other traditional auto shows have been a bit more aggressive. The Chicago auto dealers hope to have a show that is largely downtown, in largely outdoors in downtown Detroit, Chicago, in I believe July, and the New York Auto Show is going to try to do another thing outdoors in the fall. So we may see, we will definitely see whether the Detroit dealers were overly cautious when they decided not to have their bigger event in the fall. But there's motion going on the the environment is changing. So how much money and effort automakers wants to put into auto auto shows. We won't have a real answer to that until we go through a full normal calendar year. But things are beginning to happen again.

Russ White 38:24
Well, Mark, really appreciate you sharing all your insights today. And I guess just before I let you go, trends, you're watching what's kind of cool in the industry. What What excites you What are you going to be kind of looking at good or bad over the next several months?

Unknown Speaker 38:40
Oh, well, I really want to see

Mark Phelan 38:46
wash is what are the practical limits of two of the technologies we've been talking about electric vehicles and hands free driving. And I'm hoping this fall to be able to take a road trip in which I might take you know, one of the new electrified Fords the probably the Mustang Maki on a drive where I would try both of those because the the people who are most uncertain about electric vehicles are the ones who are afraid that the longer charging time will be inconvenient for things they like to do. So I want to see what is the sort of best case for you know, going, you know, 11 1200 miles in an electric vehicle, how much longer does it take if I'm dealing with latest technology as far as finding your charging stations and that kind of thing. And if I can combine that with a vehicle that does most of the driving for me when I'm on the highway, that would be ideal. So that's kind of my you know, the thing I've posted rested in attempting this year. Otherwise, I'm just really looking forward to seeing how various companies answer all of the questions that are facing them these days because you know, when the most interesting thing in the world is when you see two smart people come up with different answers to the same question. And maybe they both work. Maybe one of them's right one of them's wrong. And it's even better when you're there. They're spending their money and not yours to come up with these answers. So I'm going to be really interested because we've got enough different approaches to electric vehicles coming now that we'll be able to see what works, what doesn't, what are the great new ideas we haven't thought about. And then we'll see if people start to converge around a consensus on what these vehicles should do. So you know, that's what I'm most eager about. In addition to hoping that we do get the action to improve generating capacity and the charging that's really necessary for this technology to take off.

Russ White 40:53
And Mark again, thank you so much for joining me and updating me and all things automotive industry and MSU today.

Mark Phelan 41:01
Thank you so much, Ross.

Russ White 41:02
It's always a pleasure. That's Mark feeling. Michigan State University School of Journalism alumnus and widely respected automotive columnist and critic at the Detroit Free Press obviously just googled the Detroit Free Press or go to freak.com marks on twitter at Mark underscore feelin that's Ph D. Li n, and I'm Russ white. This is MSU today

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