More or less I'm in agreement... but having gone through the rules (and found them to be remarkably similar to F1, GP2), I think that they are as much an impediment, if not more than electrical technology.
There are a least a dozen major technological concepts that are proscribed by existing rules which waste enormous amounts of energy and that prevent its full recovery. So even with the fact that current electrical energy storage technologies are much less energy dense than petroleum based fuels, it's technically feasible to produce cars which could produce laps times much closer to F1 or GP2 cars.
Total race time is another problem... but in all honesty at some point the cars can achieve some percentage of what the GP2 cars are doing (say 60%) and the rest is 'hidden' from the casual spectator by race design (as in sprint races with multiple heats).
I'm not really sure of all the factors that went into formulating rules that exactly match existing formulas (other than just copying the rule texts)... but result has been exactly what you said "no more than a dog and pony show" and it's no wonder why they've kept the races as far away from existing formula car racing as one can conveniently accomplish with a planet the size of ours.
At this point to me it is a gimmick, although I think the organizers have been fairly straight forward about the fact that it is going to take time to get this right. And they are working on a lot of things that I have doubts about, it is just going to take time.
Right now it's a spec series. When they finally make the move to each team or manufacturer developing it's own chassis, I think things will get a lot more interesting.
Although I'm really not sure if Formula E is going to be around for the long term. I know the FIA and ACO (Behind the WEC) are keen on seeing an all electric prototype at Le Mans in the near future. Personally I think rather than an all electric series I would much rather see a series with a whole scale of options ranging from Full internal combustion, to IC assisted Hybrid Systems of various capacities in the middle, with full electric on the other end.
There are a least a dozen major technological concepts that are proscribed by existing rules which waste enormous amounts of energy and that prevent its full recovery. So even with the fact that current electrical energy storage technologies are much less energy dense than petroleum based fuels, it's technically feasible to produce cars which could produce laps times much closer to F1 or GP2 cars.
Total race time is another problem... but in all honesty at some point the cars can achieve some percentage of what the GP2 cars are doing (say 60%) and the rest is 'hidden' from the casual spectator by race design (as in sprint races with multiple heats).
I'm not really sure of all the factors that went into formulating rules that exactly match existing formulas (other than just copying the rule texts)... but result has been exactly what you said "no more than a dog and pony show" and it's no wonder why they've kept the races as far away from existing formula car racing as one can conveniently accomplish with a planet the size of ours.