The Truth About Cars

The Truth About Cars (TTAC) is a website covering automobiles, automotive products and the auto industry. It's best known for the GM and Ford “Death Watch” and Chrysler "Suicide Watch" series. The site began publishing in 2002 , and features a mix of automotive reviews, editorials and news with an "in your face, no holds barred" attitude. The site is home to the annual Ten Worst Automobiles awards, which are nominated and selected by the readers.

The web site currently receives over 1.6 million page views hits per month and over 600,000 unique visitors, with a strong demographic favorable to automotive products and accessories. [1]Forbes Magazine lists TTAC as a “Best of the Web.”. PC Magazine lists TTAC as one of its "100 Top Websites."

Staff

Editor-In-Chief, Edward Niedermeyer
Managing Editor, Paul Niedermeyer
Overseas Editor, Bertel Schmitt

Regular contributors:
Stephan Wilkinson, author and former Car and Driver Editor-in-Chief
Mike Solowiew
Sajeev Mehta
John Clay Wolfe
Jack Baruth
William C. Montgomery
Steven Lang
P.J. McCombs
Adrian Imonti
Matthew Neundorf
Megan Benoit
Alex Dykes
Samir Syed
Martin Schwoerer
Jay Shoemaker
and Frank Williams

Andrei Avarvarii provides conceptual drawings of future models.

Style

The site has a fiercely independent coverage of the automobile world with strong editorial independence. TTAC offers its writers total editorial freedom to serve its readership. Reader comments are moderated to prevent flaming the site, its authors or fellow commentators, and to maintain a civil discourse in the comment section. Although some readers claim the site has a pro-import bias, the writers are outspoken in their criticism of both domestic- and foreign-branded automobiles.

Criticism

Because of their outspoken opinions, writers from the site have been excluded from many major manufacturer press events. Automakers such as GM officially refuse to acknowledge the site's existence. However, user logs indicate there are quite a few readers from the GM, Ford and Chrysler domains. All automakers have been explicitly invited to disprove any controversial statements.

Their controversial review describing the grill of the Subaru B9 Tribeca as a "flying vagina" caused BMW to officially stop providing any review cars. Many other manufacturers also withheld access to their press fleets in the past, but that is rapidly changing as readership grows. Aston Martin, Bentley, Mercedes-Benz, Audi, Volkswagen, Cadillac, Jaguar, Kia, Maserati, Mazda Mitsubishi, Suzuki, Nissan and Land Rover now provide access to their press cars, and others are following suit.

In addition, the general tenor of the site has been seen by some outlets (including Autoblog and Jalopnik) as overtly hostile to American cars.

Content

• Detailed car reviews and editorials from contributing writers
• “Death Watch” editorials detailing the decline and fall of the US car industry
• Annual Ten Worst Automobiles award, based on reader selections
• News blog and commentary
• Moderated comments section (free registration required)
• Daily podcasts between Mr. Farago and Managing Editor Justin Berkowitz where they discuss automotive topics from the news

External links

• The Official Site