this post was submitted on 24 Jun 2026
396 points (96.5% liked)
Technology
85745 readers
3604 users here now
This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
Our Rules
- Follow the lemmy.world rules.
- Only tech related news or articles.
- Be excellent to each other!
- Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
- Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
- Politics threads may be removed.
- No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
- Only approved bots from the list below, this includes using AI responses and summaries. To ask if your bot can be added please contact a mod.
- Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed
- Accounts 7 days and younger will have their posts automatically removed.
Approved Bots
founded 3 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
That's what's called a pickup truck bed.
Sorry, my European brain cannot fathom how such a pickup truck bed could be useful in daily life.
Toss my bike in and goooo.
EDIT: Dammit I am legitimately curious why someone down voted this. Did they read my comment and go "You know what fuck you for riding a bicycle." Or were they like "You fool! You have to strap it down too. That's unsafe!" Maybe they're a hardcore bicyclist and had sympathy pains imagining me tossing my bike in the back of a truck.
I. must. know.
How could such a bed be useful? They're incredibly useful!
They're useful to load things quickly. Awkward objects can be placed in the beds without having to carefully maneuver around a vehicle interior and all its obstructions. I do a lot of woodworking. Before we got a pickup, I would transport 2x4s and other lumber inside a Toyota Corolla. I've discovered it is actually possible to fit several dozen 8 foot long 2x4s inside a Corolla. But the pickup truck is such a better tool for the job. Plus you're not moving a full sized sheet of plywood in a sedan.
They're useful fit to large objects that would never fit inside a vehicle. If properly strapped down, a pickup can transport an object much taller than the roof of the truck.
They're useful to move really dirty things you wouldn't want in your car interior. Imagine you want to fill some garden beds with mulch or compost from a garden supplier. You could get it in small bags, but that would be expensive. It's cheaper to buy in bulk. You could have them deliver it, but that would be more expensive still. If you need to move soil, compost, rock, or anything else dirty in bulk, a pickup is the way to do it. You can have the garden center fill your truck bed with a back hoe. Just dump it right into the bed. Then shovel it out when you get home. To clean out the bed, all you have to do is hose it off.
Now, this is pickups in general. We have a mid-2000s Ford Ranger, which is much smaller than the trucks all the big American manufacturers are selling today. A small pickup is a great utility tool. A giant one is a pointless penis extender.
Go to the garden store, buy 20 bags of mulch, sling them on the back, drive home. Or go to the drive-in theater and lay blankets in the back! Or put a kayak in the back and leave the tailgate down.
That's my use case anyway.
Go camping and just throw all the dirty stuff in the back to clean at home. Take all the yard clippings to the mulcher without having to bag them or keep a pile on the curb. I have a hard tonneau cover so sometimes I like keeping my tools under there if I have to park in the city without worrying about people seeing the valuables through a window.
People like to say truck owners never use their trucks but I use mine constantly. I'm camping at least 12-15 weekends per year, hauling yard equipment, kayaking, helping people move, and all in a midsized truck.
I don't really hear people say that about tacomas or equally sized trucks. Moreso the bigger ones and usually they don't have a scratch on them.
I can't afford a car, but I've got a house with a yard that needs that much mulch?
I'm sorry? We have an acre that we're converting from all grass to trees, shrubs, herbs, crops, and wildflowers.
Must be nice.
We got very lucky. A coworker was looking to get a bigger house when I started my job and we wantes to get out of an apartment. We didn't use a realtor and paid $170k for 1200 sqft and an acre. We're on the outskirts of a small college city so it's fairly quiet but close enough for a 15 minute walk downtown.
I think the point is that a pickup truck bed is better for hauling this than vehicles with other body styles.
You can get a flatbed pickup for $25k if it's not brand new. And it does the job just as well as whatever this thing is.
So what? Should no basic, inexpensive vehicles be produced because you could get a nicer or more capable used one for a similar price?
Also, this one is electric. Sans the Cybertruck, there aren't too many electric pickups out there, and probably not many on the used vehicle market.
I'm all for basic, inexpensive vehicles. This isn't basic, it's threadbare. And it isn't inexpensive, either.
Why do you think Americans have to spend so much more money on an electric vehicle than their international peers?
You're clearly not the target audience for this vehicle. Neither am I.
And you know what? That's OK
People act like the home depot wont deliver, and that trailers don't exist and that they have to daily a pickup so that they can move mulch once a year.
My brother in christ its a codpiece for insecure people. What you need is a fiesta, rented/borrowed/shared utility trailer and a removable tow ball.
Are you saying that the Slate being discussed in the article is a codpiece? I hardly think so. It's a pretty damn basic vehicle.
The entire vehicle segment and the trappings of it are all related. It could easily be a van and friend-shaped for collision.
So put a cap/shell on it to enclose it? It even shows this in one of the pictures. They are also releasing an "SUV" configuration. We can split hairs between the difference between an SUV and van, but I don't think it's helpful.
What do you mean? Are you wanting something more like a ute?
Delivery of heavy things is costly you know. It simply comes down to: if you're making use of it, it's worth it overall. Our pickup was only 35k, same price as the Subaru we'd otherwise be buying. We're outdoorsy and we're converting our yard from grass to trees, shrubs, and wildflowers, so a pickup is getting its mileage. If you only need this stuff a few times a year then it's certainly not worth it. People have different needs.
Motherfucker rent a uhaul. Its just a codpiece for the insecure.
What has you so bent out of shape? We make use of it. It's not even my car, it's my wife's. I drive an electric moped to work most of the time and my sub-SUV the four months it's too cold. Would you rent a uhaul to go kayaking!? We drove 2.5 hours to my wife's parents for a long weekend (Juneteenth) and brought an inflatable bed, kayaks, paddle board, and we came home with their smoker (they're retiring and downsizing). Besides, it's a Ford Maverick that gets 36 mpg, it's not a massive gas guzzler.
Drive what works for you, but what we're doing is economical and no more environmentally unfriendly than any other car.
There's a reason why they only exist in the US.
So.. a fiesta then? How many times a year do you need to haul 20 bags of mulch? Do you not have a trailer hitch?
Still not seeing the daily need for something so agricultural. I don't drive a unimog to the grocery store.
We know.
I love how riled you got them.
Pickups are big, stupid and wasteful. And not pedestrian-friendly. Just get a van-based tipper truck if you really need to haul mulch or waste.
The Americans have a pickup-truck based cognitive blind-spot and really cannot see it any other way.