Twitter is the worst thing to happen to Musk. The social media addiction knows no class/age/wealth/religious/creed boundary. It’s like social cancer that slowly destroys your relationship to society.
Musk has done great things but these days I think he’s at his lowest point.
/I’ve said this about three times now in threads like these.
Worst thing? His influencing is central to his success.
Unfortunately for civil discourse, it’s more effective to create controversial messaging that resonates with your followers, than sanitized messaging that is generally inoffensive. Controversial messaging makes your supporters increasingly loyal and attentive, as the noise from vocal ‘haters’ just keeps feeding your base. It’s perverse, it’s toxic, it’s exhausting but it works.
Look at the price earnings ratio of Tesla. What else is it but the world’s largest meme stock? His messaging vibes very strongly with Wall Street Journal readers and the Reddit trading community.
Where did OP say this was the only path to success? Warren Buffett took the more traditional one of just being related to influential and powerful people.
Buffett has worked the media/pr angles magically. He interviews just frequently enough. He has his homespun wisdom persona. His letters to shareholders are marketing gold.
His followers show up to the annual meeting like a pack of cult members.
None of this is to say he's a bad guy, he seems like a good guy. But he's a marketing genius too. No vitriol spewing required.
Yes, he could even be described as beloved. He is quoted constantly, and his quotes have a homey every person kind of vernacular that makes them relatable.
That's a false dichotomy. In reality, there are more options than just "be boring" or "be sensational." Those other options just aren't in fashion right now.
> Unfortunately for civil discourse, it’s more effective to create controversial messaging that resonates with your followers, than sanitized messaging that is generally inoffensive.
Those aren't the options. You can - and many do, as a matter of course - create effective, powerful messaging that is not 'sanitized' or offensive. You can see it all the time on HN.
> Worst thing? His influencing is central to his success.
Musk has been more unhinged in his online activities than ever in the past six months or so, coinciding with a 45% slide in TSLA share price. Hypothesizing that his social media addiction is central to his 'success' would be pretty easy to test by simply comparing TSLA's performance to another auto manufacturer, e.g. Ford or GM. Doing that, TSLA is not showing any advantage - all three have suffered about the same amount of share price decrease.
So just looking at the numbers, it's clear Musk could just focus entirely on productive work, skip the 'influencing' and wanton reputational damage to the businesses he manages, and it wouldn't make a bit of difference. TSLA and the others would arguably be in the same place if the average person had no idea who Elon Musk was.
Not according to BusinessInsider [1] that notes that he lashes out in the media to cover particularly bad moments for Tesla. We saw this tactic being used over and over again during the previous Presidency. It works so well because there is only so much room ‘above the fold’. So as long as you fill it with a sensational nothingburger, then damage is controlled.
You make a good case that his real contribution is merely writing checks to smart people. I would argue, however, that this doesn't need to come along with his baggage in terms of his distracting social media activities. It's pure self indulgence on his part, and likely making a lot of smart people not interested in his money regardless of how big the checks are.
A company that brooks no criticism is no different from a Regime that does the same. It had better be involved in basic extractive activity, because more complicated ventures tend not to work if the become brittle like this.
This is such an astute and concise description of one of the reasons we're currently living in this bizarro world. It can be applied across American culture, to both sides of the political divide, and even brands are beginning to do this.
He’s the same old Elon, the pedo guy tweet and taking Tesla private at $420 are just as embarrassing if not more so , he’s just on the other side of the culture war divide now (I.e the Republican side) so he’s now considered shameful in many parts.
About his recent republican coming out: he knew a paper about his flight attendant story was about to come out. The journalists contacted him for comments before publishing. He didn’t comment but did this coming out PR stunt just before the article was published, so that he could pretend it was all made up to punish him joining republicans.
The journalists decided to publish the article anyway.
He’s lying and turning his fan base into hating the democrats who have nothing to do with the article.
That’s who he is, that’s what he does.
He’s lying and turning his fan base into hating the democrats who have nothing to do with the article.
Fair he's always been polarizing, but the size of the naysayers (and fanboys) seems to have grown quite a bit recently and I think it comes down to politics.
He’s also become the richest man in the world over the last few years (at least publicly known wealth). That tends to bring you a lot of attention. His politics isn’t the only thing that changed
> he’s just on the other side of the culture war divide now (I.e the Republican side) so he’s now considered shameful in many parts.
That's a defensive projection from both Musk and Republicans to incite his "new side" to arms and protect him implicitly from any criticism whether it's about labour rights or sexual harassment.
Maybe it's 4D chess to get the Cybertruck to be popular with the right wing.
But for most of us who are progressive and environmental, we have been pushing back against his ego and authoritarianism for years - worried that he is sabotaging his stated cause more than he is helping it.
For me the last straw was The Boring Company. I was still All In on Musk as a real-life Tony Stark who would make humanity interplanetary and solve the computer-brain barrier all the way up to Neuralink. Even Hyperloop seemed compelling if he could execute on it and seemed like it might be a clever hack to work around American resistance to high-speed rail.
The Boring Company revealed to me the self-aggrandizing fraud that he is.
Lots of civilizations have struggled with drug problems in the past. The Americas, China, India all had lots of problems with opium addictions during colonial times, IIRC. And of course the USA post-WWII has dealt with a slew of drug problems, from cocaine heroin to meth. How have past civilizations broken free from the yoke of drug addiction? Maybe we can take some cues from the past.
Seeing how smoking cigarettes went from being popular to being rare in a lots of places I would say:
1 - make it uncool (no more james bond smoking in cinemas, packaging that reminds of diseases)
2 - make it expensive (tax the hell out of it)
3 - make it a hassle (no smoking in closed spaces, airplanes, universities etc)
The thing is, both weed and social networks became popular right about when smoking stopped being popular. So maybe there is an extra step, a perverse one:
that's the thing, they don't break free without some exogenous factor that forces a total reckoning. e.g. China with opium, getting humiliated by western powers in the opium wars. this sort of thing always marks the end of a declining empire. even after the opium wars, it took a century before resurgence. stuff like trafficking drugs in China now are punishable by death, they've learned their lesson for sure.
> you just don't like what he has to say, which in the real world, means absolutely nothing to 99.999% of the planet.
Yes, but could mean a lot to the talent pool discussed in the open letter, in the face of growing competition to SpaceX and Tesla, which ultimately will impact the product, revenues and value. Seems shortsighted or almost as if he’s done working on hard problems.
He's a hard boss for sure. That's why he is successful. He doesn't take your shit and pushes you to do your job at its maximum potential. Of course, you don't need to work there, McDonalds' is always hiring and I hear they will be nice to you.
What are Elon Musks accomplishments? His ability to get financing? Hiring the right people to push the success of SpaceX and Tesla? His ability to inflate the stock price of his company (above that of a historic bull market).
This isn't a cynical comment, I'm honestly trying to understand his actual accomplishments other then the ancillary praise one gets in America just for getting rich(er).
SpaceX was founded after Blue Origin owned by Jeff Bezos and today, they are ahead of them in terms both technology and volume of launches they handle.
Fisker Automotive and Better Place are two electric car startups that were founded after Tesla that you've probably not heard of, even though between them, they raised close to a billion dollars.
The reason why he gets so much praise is because he tends to do quite well—better than other smart folks that are similarly resourced (i.e. access to VC capital)—in industries notorious for high rates of failure or where it is hard to break even.
> Hiring the right people to push the success of SpaceX and Tesla?
Probably this. Its not easy to do.
I think there is also something to be said about the singularity of vision Musk brought to these companies. Its easy to dismiss (and I haven't been a fan of him much since the whole Thailand incident) but its one of those annoying aspects that eludes the desire of developers' (i.e. the average reader of this site) desire to quantify everything.
It makes me think of the story of Steve Jobs after his return to Apple, where he called a meeting of team leads, made a quadrant on a white board with the edges labeled "desktop" and "portable" on the vertical, "consumer" and "professional" on the horizontal, and demanded the company only produce 1 product to fill each of the four squares, eliminating the rest.
> Hiring the right people to push the success of SpaceX and Tesla?
I'm obviously not a fan but I agree he likely deserves a lot of credit for this. But at the same time, don't a lot of people participate in hiring decisions throughout a company? The board? Other executives?
It irks me that Musk should get all the credit of what is undeniably a team effort.
If you read the book I think you'll agree, desperate is the correct word in the title of that book and Elon did plenty.
I still can't believe they're landing rockets backwards. When I took control systems it was the canonical example of an unstable system. Guess those books need updating. :)
Yeah - its important to set aside space where we can both recognize Elon has done some impressive things, but also rightfully point out he has consistently been a massive bellend.
Regarding the landing rockets issue, I've found BPS Space's youtube series on trying to land a model rocket in a similar matter very enlightening. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=miMT44LFUjs
>What are Elon Musks accomplishments? His ability to get financing? Hiring the right people to push the success of SpaceX and Tesla? His ability to inflate the stock price of his company (above that of a historic bull market).
The word we use to describe people-managing at this high level is "leadership".
lol - no he is not. Howard Hughes was mentally ill, didnt leave his house or shower (was a germaphobe), was super secretive (didnt meet people in person for years), never built anything important (although had a shitload of failures, like the wooden airplane) and inherited a lot of his initial money and revenue streams.
Not his entire career, his later decline became famous due to the scope of wealth and influence that allowed him to indulge in some truly eccentric behavior, but he didn't build said wealth & influence peeing in jars.
> never built anything important (although had a shitload of failures, like the wooden airplane)
Never built anything? How about Las Vegas? Or the several companies he founded and ran successfully across wildly divergent fields? The man designed, built and flew an aircraft that broke world speed records at the time.
> inherited a lot of his initial money and revenue streams
Seriously? Do you not know Musk's family background?
Actually the more I think about it the more I think mint2's comparison was apt, Musk really is a Hughes-like figure, quite brilliant in ways, but with a powerful thirst for publicity and corresponding need to control his image. I could see his paranoid tendencies tending to dominate in the years to come, especially if his halo fully disintegrates
A couple thousand when he left South Africa for Canada as a teenager. And then about $20,000 (10% of a $200,000 seed round) when starting Zip2. That's the extent of money given to him by his parents that wasn't spent for him during when he was being reared as a child.
> Seriously? Do you not know Musk's family background?
Musk hasn't inherited hardly any money at all (a couple thousand when he left SA and a bit more later when he started his first company). I think you're the one who doesn't know Musk's background.
Shocking lack of research on your part. His mother was a supermodel and his father was/is a fairly sketchy businessman. Despite knowing his father had a dark side, he still chose to be with him after their parents divorce, signaling where his true emotions lay:
"After Maye and Errol divorced in 1980, Elon mostly lived with his father, who says he owned thoroughbred horses, a yacht, several houses and a Cessna."[0]
Musk tweets accuses random people of being pedophiles on Twitter and is legally not supposed to tweet anymore about certain topics without getting prior approval. He also exhibits paranoia and often a lack of being grounded in reality.
I didn’t say he is Howard 2.0 Hugh’s, I said he’s teetering on the edge of it. If in a few years he goes full Hughes would anyone actually be surprised?
Citation please. I've seen no actual concrete evidence that Elon inherited any significant sum of money from an "emerald mine." This seems to be one of those internet myths which lives on in forums despite no credible evidence.
What a lazy argument... Elon's father is a fairly sketchy individual, and his wealth had an obvious boost to Elon's life and upbringing.
"After Maye and Errol divorced in 1980, Elon mostly lived with his father, who says he owned thoroughbred horses, a yacht, several houses and a Cessna"[0]
"Errol returned to South Africa with a half-share in a Zambian emerald mine, which would help to fund his family's lavish lifestyle of yachts, skiing holidays, and expensive computers." [2]
Nobody denies that Musk family was wealth. They were wealthy because his father was a successful engineer.
And at one point his father made a small investment in a mine. And even that is grounded on shaky evidence.
This mine investment might have been profitable (we dont know) but the idea that his family had some waste emrald mines is nonsense and that investment certainly didnt make the family rich.
And given their bad relationship, Elon lost support from his father when he came to US/Canada.
So your source is businessinsider? Elon himself says the story is bogus and when he came to the US, he came with nothing and ended up with 100k in student loan debt. And from where he lived and what he did, Elon was certainly not living some "rich man" lifestyle before the Zip2 and PayPal days, and no one who knew him in those days has shown any proof that Elon arrived in the US with any sort of wealth.
He's at his lowest point in the eyes of the media (which is how most of us see the world) but hes actually at the highest point in his career and achievements.
Tesla is about to explode in production with their "biggest building in the world factory" in texas, berlin and china.
SpaceX is about to achieve the holy grail of the space industry (an affordable and reusable rocket) not to mention Starlink.
Tesla has always been "about to explode" in one way or another. When will people realize that manufacturing businesses, when they are limited by property and equipment, are slow-burning?
Also, "reusable" doesn't matter as much as "affordable" for rockets. I am waiting for one of the smaller companies with a dirt cheap rocket to eat SpaceX's lunch.
That's actually not true. For example, the Russian Soyuz is expected to still have lower cost per kg to LEO than the Falcon rockets from SpaceX. Fuel is the vast majority of the cost of a rocket launch.
That's completely wrong. Fuel is a tiny fraction of a rocket launch. At best, SpaceX's Falcon 9 costs $15 million to refurbish and re-launch (according to Musk). About $200,000 of that is fuel. That works out to 1.3% of costs which is far from "the vast majority."
$200,000 is the cost of the atoms in the fuel. Most of the rest of the $15 million is the cost to get those atoms to the right temperature and pressure when they are stored at a different temperature and pressure, transport those atoms, and put them in the shell. Not to mention the cost of cleaning and coating the fuel tanks to make sure that they are inert and won't react to the fuel (this has to be done on non-reusable rockets too).
This is the typical sleight-of-hand that comes at Musk companies. The atoms in the fuel are cheap, but the process of turning those atoms into usable fuel is very expensive. This is the case for almost all rockets.
The Soyuz is partly cheap to launch because it doesn't need a lot of special fuel handling.
err, are you forgetting the cost to literally build a rocket? Or are you arguing somehow that fuel costs more than building the first stage of a rocket?
The idea somehow that Soyuz is cheaper than Falcon-9 is laughable.
You can buy the atoms from Sigma Aldrich or any other chemical supplier. You have to buy a lot of atoms, and you have to buy them by the liter.
If you want rocket fuel from those chemicals, you are going to have to pressurize them and cool them or warm them, and you need a lot of energy and equipment to do it. That is the expensive part. Often, rocket fuels are heavily pressurized orsupercooled, and supercooling a gas is expensive. That allows you to store more energy in a given volume.
Rather than digging in after your initial mistake, it'd be better to google it. This is a no-stakes random internet argument, so you've gotten the lesson cheap; but if you repeat the same mistake elsewhere you could do yourself a lot of harm.
And this is what i fail to understand. He has kept his nose clean, apart from some minor incidents ("pedo" tweet comes to mind). How does he have the time and why does he bother to spend his time making noise on Twitter. He should focus on the final push to get both of his major companies to the next level. It's almost as if he's gotten bored and wants to move on, but has to keep up the appearance of being involved in day-to-day managment of these companies
Tesla cars are garbage, speaking as a Tesla owner. They demo nicely, but they are put together poorly. The minute there's any meaningful competition they'll crumble.
Combined with the risks from their autopilot system and their mistreatment of workers and their CEO being a right wing edgelord? There's plenty of reasons to think Tesla might not be on a good path.
They've also been topping the lists of unreliability.
Many people like the things Tesla does well enough to not be bothered by the things it does poorly so are satisfied.
Tesla seems to have the best EV drivetrain in the business (I'm counting the battery as part of the drivetrain) and the best charging network, but seem to be worse in most other aspects.
My guess is that the other car companies will catch up on EV drivetrains faster than Tesla can catch up on the rest of a car.
They did top the lists, but they've dropped off as owners deal with the reality of owning them.
An electric car, competently built, will wow most folks. Remember that the satisfaction numbers are comparing apples to oranges, given the limited competition Tesla has at the moment.
This depends a lot on the factory / year of production. E.g. the 2021/2022 from Giga Shanghai have great quality. Of course, consistency is the key, Tesla has to achieve it across all of the factories.
And I have no idea what 'risks' are you talking about regarding autopilot.
On the contrary, I think Musks use of interviews and twitter has only helped him and his companies every step of the way. If you have been following him you have seen that he recently announced that he would be voting republican for the first time ever due to the change in the party stances of democrats and to expect backlash from announcing so. It funny that we are seeing exactly that backlash. Not two weeks ago people were also complaining that Musk wanted to reduce the work force by 10 % and have people work from the office, although those may have been separate things, I believe the 10% reduction was a leaked e-mail. The backlash there also seemed unusual, and I only attribute it to his political stance, as his company has lost around 50% of its value on the stock market, along with most of the other tech related stocks and it was almost as if he correctly predicted the further decline of the market in general we have seen lately. His responses to that seemed incredibly reasonable, a reduction in workforce and costs and measure to improve productivity. And yet as I said the response was not well taken in the media or online, it seems in my opinion to have started once people were made aware of his political stance. A stance which he says has always been consistent whether voting democrat or republican, it’s just that the parties have shifted in certain ideologies a I think we can all remember when democrats were the free speech party and now that opposite appears to be true.
Meh. Any group has their wacky extremist. Their existence is nothing new.
I just listened to a Vox Conversation where the guest said fat phobia wouldn’t exist if it wasn’t for black people or slavery. It was insane and I felt like I lost IQ listening to it; but it would be naive to think the other ends of the political spectrum isn’t also crazy. That’d be like saying Alex Jones represents the Republican Party.
Elon describes himself as a moderate, the closer to the center you are the easier it is to go back and forth over the party line. Don’t read too much into it.
Musk has done great things but these days I think he’s at his lowest point.
/I’ve said this about three times now in threads like these.