On January 18 2025 06:02 Timebon3s wrote: He’s a genius bro. Mabye he isn’t well adjusted by god damn he gets shit done. Did you see that rocket backing into the launch pad. That was amazing.
Elon's entire contribution is delivering paychecks to the engineers who actually accomplished this amazing feat. There are thousands of other rich people who could've paid them. He's entirely replaceable. Fire him from the company and literally nothing changes.
If your assertion that he were replaceable held water, then from all the electric car startups
Blue Origin SpaceX Rocket Lab Virgin Galactic Relativity Space Axiom Space Sierra Space Firefly Aerospace Planet Labs Rocket Crafters Vector Launch SpinLaunch Momentus Isar Aerospace Skyrora Orbex Relativity Space Astra
there would already have been a wildly successful company that shot to the top of its market headed by someone other than him, especially for example Virgin Galactic because Branson was richer when he founded it (presuming that wealth is the requisite). This is the only evidence we could look for, because to hold the controlled experiment of actually replacing him would require shareholder votes that you don't have at the moment. And the evidence isn't there. There's no companies that have done anywhere close to the same thing. If he were replaceable, there would have to be one in the list by chance alone. There isn't. The two meteoric breakouts in each field have only one thing in common.
All the other billionaires must not have realized all you have to do is tell some engineers to build you some cool shit and voila, trillion dollar company. Honestly I don’t see why more billionaires don’t do it more often. I guess they are content with the money they have and don’t want any more. /sarcasm
Most people here are not contesting Musk's business chops. We're just saying that his business accumen does not translate to being good at anything else at all, really. He has a superpower to make money and not much else. Everybody thinking he's some kind of genius is dangerous. In fact, even when he tries to change his management style and micromanage things, it goes to shit. The cybertruck is an example of that. Twitter is another (from a business point of view. If all he wants it for is as a giant megaphone, his micromanaging made it a better "Elon Musk amplification machine").
He knows jack shit about AI, but claims he does. He knows jack shit about gaming, but claims he does. And I'm pretty convinced he knows jack shit about running the US government, despite his claims that he does.
On January 18 2025 17:55 Acrofales wrote: Most people here are not contesting Musk's business chops. We're just saying that his business accumen does not translate to being good at anything else at all, really. He has a superpower to make money and not much else. Everybody thinking he's some kind of genius is dangerous. In fact, even when he tries to change his management style and micromanage things, it goes to shit. The cybertruck is an example of that. Twitter is another (from a business point of view. If all he wants it for is as a giant megaphone, his micromanaging made it a better "Elon Musk amplification machine").
He knows jack shit about AI, but claims he does. He knows jack shit about gaming, but claims he does. And I'm pretty convinced he knows jack shit about running the US government, despite his claims that he does.
Perhaps most people... Magic Powers has said that Elon has contributed nothing to Tesla besides being an investor. WombaT said he thinks at least 10 people on TL.net could have been successful as Elon if they had some some seed money to bankroll their endeavors. It's a level of delusion no less than Elon's belief in his gaming ability.
Also confused on your point about micromanaging in regards to the cybertruck. Elon has been a notorious micromanager from day 1, demanding redesigns of Tesla's first vehicle when everyone around him was telling him they just need to complete the thing to put something out. My post from earlier in this thread:
On November 09 2024 00:26 BlackJack wrote: I don’t know what that means that the cybertruck is “the car that Elon built.” Elon is notoriously known as a micromanager. Even designing the original Roadster which was on a Lotus chassis with outsourced parts, Elon demanded the doors be larger, the seats be wider, the headlights be different etc.
With the Model S Tesla had employed Henrik Fisker of Fisker automotive fame to design the car. All the designs made the car look too bubbly, which was necessary to allow for enough headroom since the battery pack was in the floor unlike in the Roadster. When Fisker wouldn't accommodate Musk’s desires on the look of the Model S Tesla cancelled his contract and then hired Franz and Musk worked with the engineers to get them to make the battery pack thinner to make the car look the way he wanted.
On January 18 2025 17:55 Acrofales wrote: Most people here are not contesting Musk's business chops. We're just saying that his business accumen does not translate to being good at anything else at all, really. He has a superpower to make money and not much else. Everybody thinking he's some kind of genius is dangerous. In fact, even when he tries to change his management style and micromanage things, it goes to shit. The cybertruck is an example of that. Twitter is another (from a business point of view. If all he wants it for is as a giant megaphone, his micromanaging made it a better "Elon Musk amplification machine").
He knows jack shit about AI, but claims he does. He knows jack shit about gaming, but claims he does. And I'm pretty convinced he knows jack shit about running the US government, despite his claims that he does.
Perhaps most people... Magic Powers has said that Elon has contributed nothing to Tesla besides being an investor. WombaT said he thinks at least 10 people on TL.net could have been successful as Elon if they had some some seed money to bankroll their endeavors. It's a level of delusion no less than Elon's belief in his gaming ability.
Also confused on your point about micromanaging in regards to the cybertruck. Elon has been a notorious micromanager from day 1, demanding redesigns of Tesla's first vehicle when everyone around him was telling him they just need to complete the thing to put something out. My post from earlier in this thread:
On November 09 2024 00:26 BlackJack wrote: I don’t know what that means that the cybertruck is “the car that Elon built.” Elon is notoriously known as a micromanager. Even designing the original Roadster which was on a Lotus chassis with outsourced parts, Elon demanded the doors be larger, the seats be wider, the headlights be different etc.
With the Model S Tesla had employed Henrik Fisker of Fisker automotive fame to design the car. All the designs made the car look too bubbly, which was necessary to allow for enough headroom since the battery pack was in the floor unlike in the Roadster. When Fisker wouldn't accommodate Musk’s desires on the look of the Model S Tesla cancelled his contract and then hired Franz and Musk worked with the engineers to get them to make the battery pack thinner to make the car look the way he wanted.
"Magic Powers has said that Elon has contributed nothing to Tesla besides being an investor." Which is true. No one has refuted that whatsoever.
The example you give of Elon being a "micromanager" is not a praise, it's a condemnation. Because he doesn't manage, he demands. He micro-demands. That approach is lucky when it succeeds instead of resulting in crashing and burning. Why you may ask? Because Elon has no expertise. His demands are fantasy and he provides no solutions. Other people have to find solutions for him. It's the exact same thing he's done with his laughable DOGE fantasy. Cutting 2 trillion from 6.5 trilion. It's not only impossible, it's stupid. He's a joke.
On January 18 2025 06:02 Timebon3s wrote: He’s a genius bro. Mabye he isn’t well adjusted by god damn he gets shit done. Did you see that rocket backing into the launch pad. That was amazing. https://youtu.be/RYUr-5PYA7s?si=nCG7bWjlJkRBg4b6
Elon's entire contribution is delivering paychecks to the engineers who actually accomplished this amazing feat. There are thousands of other rich people who could've paid them. He's entirely replaceable. Fire him from the company and literally nothing changes.
If your assertion that he were replaceable held water, then from all the electric car startups
then
there would already have been a wildly successful company that shot to the top of its market headed by someone other than him
No? That doesn't work logically, it's just something that you're saying. Every replaceable and every irreplaceable job (or in this case, absence of job) is currently held by someone who isn't being replaced.
On January 18 2025 17:55 Acrofales wrote: Most people here are not contesting Musk's business chops. We're just saying that his business accumen does not translate to being good at anything else at all, really. He has a superpower to make money and not much else. Everybody thinking he's some kind of genius is dangerous. In fact, even when he tries to change his management style and micromanage things, it goes to shit. The cybertruck is an example of that. Twitter is another (from a business point of view. If all he wants it for is as a giant megaphone, his micromanaging made it a better "Elon Musk amplification machine").
He knows jack shit about AI, but claims he does. He knows jack shit about gaming, but claims he does. And I'm pretty convinced he knows jack shit about running the US government, despite his claims that he does.
Perhaps most people... Magic Powers has said that Elon has contributed nothing to Tesla besides being an investor. WombaT said he thinks at least 10 people on TL.net could have been successful as Elon if they had some some seed money to bankroll their endeavors. It's a level of delusion no less than Elon's belief in his gaming ability.
Also confused on your point about micromanaging in regards to the cybertruck. Elon has been a notorious micromanager from day 1, demanding redesigns of Tesla's first vehicle when everyone around him was telling him they just need to complete the thing to put something out. My post from earlier in this thread:
On November 09 2024 00:26 BlackJack wrote: I don’t know what that means that the cybertruck is “the car that Elon built.” Elon is notoriously known as a micromanager. Even designing the original Roadster which was on a Lotus chassis with outsourced parts, Elon demanded the doors be larger, the seats be wider, the headlights be different etc.
With the Model S Tesla had employed Henrik Fisker of Fisker automotive fame to design the car. All the designs made the car look too bubbly, which was necessary to allow for enough headroom since the battery pack was in the floor unlike in the Roadster. When Fisker wouldn't accommodate Musk’s desires on the look of the Model S Tesla cancelled his contract and then hired Franz and Musk worked with the engineers to get them to make the battery pack thinner to make the car look the way he wanted.
I don’t believe I said that, if I said something that conveyed that meaning it was unintentional.
IIRC I said there were TLers I’d consider more intelligent, or given the resources Musk has now, one of those two things if memory serves.
Starting out with some wealth makes accumulating more a lot easier, but I’m not really a subscriber to the idea it makes being a billionaire any kind of likely outcome. It’s a whole different level of magnitude, one that almost without exception requires a drive and ruthlessness many people don’t possess. To possess such a fortune also quite aptly generally requires a lot of luck.
It’s not something outside of pure inheritance that luck alone can bequeath you, you still have to make the right moves. But if you lack that component you can do all the right things and not end up a billionaire. Introduce revolutionary tech just a smidge too early and you can crash and burn doing something that ends up enriching the next person. Too late, even by a fraction and you can get beat to the punch.
Anyway I think there’s a tendency for people to consider Musk as this static, consistent figure when doling out criticism or praise.
As I’ve said before I think he does have a certain skillset which helped in establishing the empire we now see before us. But I think over time you’re seeing the flaws in his personality growing and exacerbating his weaknesses and mitigating his strengths.
Critics go backwards from the Musk before us now and apply that person to everything that came before and conclude he’s an outright lucky fraud. Musk stans pull past successes out to deflect criticism in the present.
I don’t really prescribe to either approach, they’re all components of a man who I’d almost break down into phases. Early Elon, space nerd Elon, whatever the fuck he is now Elon etc.
Sure it’s the same person fundamentally, but people and context change. Trump’s probably not much different temperamentally now than when he was that bloke from the Apprentice, but it’s very functionally different now he’s a front line politician.
Him consistently doing stupid things, I’d argue dangerous things with a platform and seemingly having absolutely nobody to rein him in can happily co-exist with him doing good work with Space X and getting that endeavour off the ground so to speak. But that’s a fair while ago now, and contrasts pretty sharply with the most recent work he’s done in running another company.
I guess the TLDR is there’s a rather selective picking of his historical record to augment whatever case someone is trying to make. I don’t think there has to be, what’s he doing now? Do you think x or y are good or bad? Make your argument accordingly.
If someone’s concern is his increasing interjections into politics and his acquisition of a big social media platform are quite concerning in combination, it’s not really any comfort on that specific question how his stewardship of Space X or Tesla went.
Alternatively I don’t think one has to make the dubious case that he’s a complete talentless fraud in totality for criticisms to have validity and land. Indeed, I imagine trying to make that case makes people less, not more receptive to hearing out specific criticisms.
On January 18 2025 06:02 Timebon3s wrote: He’s a genius bro. Mabye he isn’t well adjusted by god damn he gets shit done. Did you see that rocket backing into the launch pad. That was amazing. https://youtu.be/RYUr-5PYA7s?si=nCG7bWjlJkRBg4b6
Elon's entire contribution is delivering paychecks to the engineers who actually accomplished this amazing feat. There are thousands of other rich people who could've paid them. He's entirely replaceable. Fire him from the company and literally nothing changes.
If your assertion that he were replaceable held water, then from all the electric car startups
Blue Origin SpaceX Rocket Lab Virgin Galactic Relativity Space Axiom Space Sierra Space Firefly Aerospace Planet Labs Rocket Crafters Vector Launch SpinLaunch Momentus Isar Aerospace Skyrora Orbex Relativity Space Astra
there would already have been a wildly successful company that shot to the top of its market headed by someone other than him, especially for example Virgin Galactic because Branson was richer when he founded it (presuming that wealth is the requisite). This is the only evidence we could look for, because to hold the controlled experiment of actually replacing him would require shareholder votes that you don't have at the moment. And the evidence isn't there. There's no companies that have done anywhere close to the same thing. If he were replaceable, there would have to be one in the list by chance alone. There isn't. The two meteoric breakouts in each field have only one thing in common.
All the other billionaires must not have realized all you have to do is tell some engineers to build you some cool shit and voila, trillion dollar company. Honestly I don’t see why more billionaires don’t do it more often. I guess they are content with the money they have and don’t want any more. /sarcasm
They do. The bottleneck is that there's only a couple of domains per decade with enough hype for a trillion in growth. If Bezos or Zuck had never existed your life would be exactly the same. You'd just do your online shopping on The Nile and post your pics on Facetome and the billions would go to someone else who thought they were god's gift to the universe. These aren't innovations, they're gaps being filled in demand created by the underlying technology and cultural conditions.
The actual innovations are massively collaborative. We're at a point in our knowledge as a species where all the low-hanging fruit has been picked. One person can't revolutionize jack shit. And when there is either a new hyped technology or a new fearsome danger, one or a few organizations win the race to fill the requirement. And then we confuse that with the actual innovation.
Let's look at AI for example. NVIDIA gew a hundred-fold by being the main supplier of GPUs to feed the AI hype, did they reinvent the wheel? No. If they hadn't been able to do that the giant AI data centers would still be built but that demand and money would go to AMD, Intel, NXP, etc who would have to scale up more.
Sam Altman might be next person whose wealth will balloon, not long ago he was close to being booted from OpenAI. Had he left or had a piano fall on his head or whatever, would AI stop advancing? No.
I'm not saying they have 0 qualities or skills to have won those races. But them specifically winning the race is not relevant, the race itself is the driving force.
On January 18 2025 17:55 Acrofales wrote: Most people here are not contesting Musk's business chops. We're just saying that his business accumen does not translate to being good at anything else at all, really. He has a superpower to make money and not much else. Everybody thinking he's some kind of genius is dangerous. In fact, even when he tries to change his management style and micromanage things, it goes to shit. The cybertruck is an example of that. Twitter is another (from a business point of view. If all he wants it for is as a giant megaphone, his micromanaging made it a better "Elon Musk amplification machine").
He knows jack shit about AI, but claims he does. He knows jack shit about gaming, but claims he does. And I'm pretty convinced he knows jack shit about running the US government, despite his claims that he does.
Perhaps most people... Magic Powers has said that Elon has contributed nothing to Tesla besides being an investor. WombaT said he thinks at least 10 people on TL.net could have been successful as Elon if they had some some seed money to bankroll their endeavors. It's a level of delusion no less than Elon's belief in his gaming ability.
Also confused on your point about micromanaging in regards to the cybertruck. Elon has been a notorious micromanager from day 1, demanding redesigns of Tesla's first vehicle when everyone around him was telling him they just need to complete the thing to put something out. My post from earlier in this thread:
On November 09 2024 00:26 BlackJack wrote: I don’t know what that means that the cybertruck is “the car that Elon built.” Elon is notoriously known as a micromanager. Even designing the original Roadster which was on a Lotus chassis with outsourced parts, Elon demanded the doors be larger, the seats be wider, the headlights be different etc.
With the Model S Tesla had employed Henrik Fisker of Fisker automotive fame to design the car. All the designs made the car look too bubbly, which was necessary to allow for enough headroom since the battery pack was in the floor unlike in the Roadster. When Fisker wouldn't accommodate Musk’s desires on the look of the Model S Tesla cancelled his contract and then hired Franz and Musk worked with the engineers to get them to make the battery pack thinner to make the car look the way he wanted.
I don’t believe I said that, if I said something that conveyed that meaning it was unintentional.
IIRC I said there were TLers I’d consider more intelligent, or given the resources Musk has now, one of those two things if memory serves.
Starting out with some wealth makes accumulating more a lot easier, but I’m not really a subscriber to the idea it makes being a billionaire any kind of likely outcome. It’s a whole different level of magnitude, one that almost without exception requires a drive and ruthlessness many people don’t possess. To possess such a fortune also quite aptly generally requires a lot of luck.
It’s not something outside of pure inheritance that luck alone can bequeath you, you still have to make the right moves. But if you lack that component you can do all the right things and not end up a billionaire. Introduce revolutionary tech just a smidge too early and you can crash and burn doing something that ends up enriching the next person. Too late, even by a fraction and you can get beat to the punch.
Anyway I think there’s a tendency for people to consider Musk as this static, consistent figure when doling out criticism or praise.
As I’ve said before I think he does have a certain skillset which helped in establishing the empire we now see before us. But I think over time you’re seeing the flaws in his personality growing and exacerbating his weaknesses and mitigating his strengths.
Critics go backwards from the Musk before us now and apply that person to everything that came before and conclude he’s an outright lucky fraud. Musk stans pull past successes out to deflect criticism in the present.
I don’t really prescribe to either approach, they’re all components of a man who I’d almost break down into phases. Early Elon, space nerd Elon, whatever the fuck he is now Elon etc.
Sure it’s the same person fundamentally, but people and context change. Trump’s probably not much different temperamentally now than when he was that bloke from the Apprentice, but it’s very functionally different now he’s a front line politician.
Him consistently doing stupid things, I’d argue dangerous things with a platform and seemingly having absolutely nobody to rein him in can happily co-exist with him doing good work with Space X and getting that endeavour off the ground so to speak. But that’s a fair while ago now, and contrasts pretty sharply with the most recent work he’s done in running another company.
I guess the TLDR is there’s a rather selective picking of his historical record to augment whatever case someone is trying to make. I don’t think there has to be, what’s he doing now? Do you think x or y are good or bad? Make your argument accordingly.
If someone’s concern is his increasing interjections into politics and his acquisition of a big social media platform are quite concerning in combination, it’s not really any comfort on that specific question how his stewardship of Space X or Tesla went.
Alternatively I don’t think one has to make the dubious case that he’s a complete talentless fraud in totality for criticisms to have validity and land. Indeed, I imagine trying to make that case makes people less, not more receptive to hearing out specific criticisms.
I like to say the key distinction between prisoners and the superwealthy is that the former can't buy their way out of prison because they weren't born into wealth. The latter regularly purchase themselves freedom.
Money provides protection. Billions provide near immunity. The richer people get, the more easily they get away with crime. The most common crime they get away with is money laundering, which is sometimes an actual crime and other times a legal loophole. Other common crimes are bribery, monopolization, worker exploitation, etc. Their impunity becomes a runaway train as they accumulate more wealth and more connections. They become nearly untouchable, and catching them requires insurmountable evidence - as demonstrated by the fact that Trump is not in prison but instead POTUS. Literally the most powerful man on the planet. A convicted felon.
Fortunately not all of them are literally immune, as there are notable examples such as Sam Bankman, Bernald Madoff and Elizabeth Holmes. Noteworthy non-billionaires are Jeffrey Epstein, Harvey Weinstein, and many more. The downfall of these superwealthy individuals began only when their actions hurt other members of the elite. Nobody bats an eye when the victims are regular workers.
Elon and Zuckerberg for example aren't as criminally active as the above list of people, but they still benefitted very strongly from legal loopholes and grey areas, worker exploitation as well as many empty promises. They have a long list of victims. Nobody becomes superwealthy without walking over corpses.
Elon makes the mistake of continuously airing his dirty laundry in public, a character flaw which Zuckerberg doesn't possess to the same degree. This is why Elon's reputation is going down the drain, while Zuckerberg continues to party despite being accused of serious crimes.
On January 18 2025 06:02 Timebon3s wrote: He’s a genius bro. Mabye he isn’t well adjusted by god damn he gets shit done. Did you see that rocket backing into the launch pad. That was amazing. https://youtu.be/RYUr-5PYA7s?si=nCG7bWjlJkRBg4b6
Elon's entire contribution is delivering paychecks to the engineers who actually accomplished this amazing feat. There are thousands of other rich people who could've paid them. He's entirely replaceable. Fire him from the company and literally nothing changes.
If your assertion that he were replaceable held water, then from all the electric car startups
Blue Origin SpaceX Rocket Lab Virgin Galactic Relativity Space Axiom Space Sierra Space Firefly Aerospace Planet Labs Rocket Crafters Vector Launch SpinLaunch Momentus Isar Aerospace Skyrora Orbex Relativity Space Astra
there would already have been a wildly successful company that shot to the top of its market headed by someone other than him, especially for example Virgin Galactic because Branson was richer when he founded it (presuming that wealth is the requisite). This is the only evidence we could look for, because to hold the controlled experiment of actually replacing him would require shareholder votes that you don't have at the moment. And the evidence isn't there. There's no companies that have done anywhere close to the same thing. If he were replaceable, there would have to be one in the list by chance alone. There isn't. The two meteoric breakouts in each field have only one thing in common.
All the other billionaires must not have realized all you have to do is tell some engineers to build you some cool shit and voila, trillion dollar company. Honestly I don’t see why more billionaires don’t do it more often. I guess they are content with the money they have and don’t want any more. /sarcasm
They do. The bottleneck is that there's only a couple of domains per decade with enough hype for a trillion in growth. If Bezos or Zuck had never existed your life would be exactly the same. You'd just do your online shopping on The Nile and post your pics on Facetome and the billions would go to someone else who thought they were god's gift to the universe. These aren't innovations, they're gaps being filled in demand created by the underlying technology and cultural conditions.
The actual innovations are massively collaborative. We're at a point in our knowledge as a species where all the low-hanging fruit has been picked. One person can't revolutionize jack shit. And when there is either a new hyped technology or a new fearsome danger, one or a few organizations win the race to fill the requirement. And then we confuse that with the actual innovation.
Let's look at AI for example. NVIDIA gew a hundred-fold by being the main supplier of GPUs to feed the AI hype, did they reinvent the wheel? No. If they hadn't been able to do that the giant AI data centers would still be built but that demand and money would go to AMD, Intel, NXP, etc who would have to scale up more.
Sam Altman might be next person whose wealth will balloon, not long ago he was close to being booted from OpenAI. Had he left or had a piano fall on his head or whatever, would AI stop advancing? No.
I'm not saying they have 0 qualities or skills to have won those races. But them specifically winning the race is not relevant, the race itself is the driving force.
Correct me if I'm wrong but from what I read it looks like NVIDIA grew so fast because other players failed to deliver a similar product in the recent time period. Intel has huge issues and lost a lot of value exactly because they couldn't keep up with NVIDIA.
If we were in another timeline without NVIDIA's best people it's possible we would still be at the point before the internet was flooded with shitty AI generated images and videos that totally (don't) look like real content.
On January 18 2025 06:02 Timebon3s wrote: He’s a genius bro. Mabye he isn’t well adjusted by god damn he gets shit done. Did you see that rocket backing into the launch pad. That was amazing. https://youtu.be/RYUr-5PYA7s?si=nCG7bWjlJkRBg4b6
Elon's entire contribution is delivering paychecks to the engineers who actually accomplished this amazing feat. There are thousands of other rich people who could've paid them. He's entirely replaceable. Fire him from the company and literally nothing changes.
If your assertion that he were replaceable held water, then from all the electric car startups
Blue Origin SpaceX Rocket Lab Virgin Galactic Relativity Space Axiom Space Sierra Space Firefly Aerospace Planet Labs Rocket Crafters Vector Launch SpinLaunch Momentus Isar Aerospace Skyrora Orbex Relativity Space Astra
there would already have been a wildly successful company that shot to the top of its market headed by someone other than him, especially for example Virgin Galactic because Branson was richer when he founded it (presuming that wealth is the requisite). This is the only evidence we could look for, because to hold the controlled experiment of actually replacing him would require shareholder votes that you don't have at the moment. And the evidence isn't there. There's no companies that have done anywhere close to the same thing. If he were replaceable, there would have to be one in the list by chance alone. There isn't. The two meteoric breakouts in each field have only one thing in common.
All the other billionaires must not have realized all you have to do is tell some engineers to build you some cool shit and voila, trillion dollar company. Honestly I don’t see why more billionaires don’t do it more often. I guess they are content with the money they have and don’t want any more. /sarcasm
They do. The bottleneck is that there's only a couple of domains per decade with enough hype for a trillion in growth. If Bezos or Zuck had never existed your life would be exactly the same. You'd just do your online shopping on The Nile and post your pics on Facetome and the billions would go to someone else who thought they were god's gift to the universe. These aren't innovations, they're gaps being filled in demand created by the underlying technology and cultural conditions.
The actual innovations are massively collaborative. We're at a point in our knowledge as a species where all the low-hanging fruit has been picked. One person can't revolutionize jack shit. And when there is either a new hyped technology or a new fearsome danger, one or a few organizations win the race to fill the requirement. And then we confuse that with the actual innovation.
Let's look at AI for example. NVIDIA gew a hundred-fold by being the main supplier of GPUs to feed the AI hype, did they reinvent the wheel? No. If they hadn't been able to do that the giant AI data centers would still be built but that demand and money would go to AMD, Intel, NXP, etc who would have to scale up more.
Sam Altman might be next person whose wealth will balloon, not long ago he was close to being booted from OpenAI. Had he left or had a piano fall on his head or whatever, would AI stop advancing? No.
I'm not saying they have 0 qualities or skills to have won those races. But them specifically winning the race is not relevant, the race itself is the driving force.
Correct me if I'm wrong but from what I read it looks like NVIDIA grew so fast because other players failed to deliver a similar product in the recent time period. Intel has huge issues and lost a lot of value exactly because they couldn't keep up with NVIDIA.
If we were in another timeline without NVIDIA's best people it's possible we would still be at the point before the internet was flooded with shitty AI generated images and videos that totally (don't) look like real content.
Very true. It might be in 2-3 years instead. From a history point of view that rarely matters but totally different people get rich.
There's zero reason to believe if Musk hadn't founded SpaceX some other company would be catching rockets out of the sky right now. Sure, somebody else would get there eventually but that's true for literally every advancement. It might take 5 more years or it might take 50 more years.
On January 19 2025 03:53 BlackJack wrote: There's zero reason to believe if Musk hadn't founded SpaceX some other company would be catching rockets out of the sky right now. Sure, somebody else would get there eventually but that's true for literally every advancement. It might take 5 more years or it might take 50 more years.
Nobdy's disputing that. Myself I'm arguing that his contribution is simply that he founded the company and invested in it. That's it. He didn't invent the tech, he didn't build anything. He wasn't even the first to have the idea. He brought the actual visionaries together under one banner, that's what he did. And for that he can receive credit, and he can receive credit for investing, but beyond that there's nothing relevant about his contribution.
Like do you think there weren't already thousands of people lining up to work on a project like this before Elon came into the picture? He got his idea exactly from those kinds of people. They wrote about it first and he saw what ideas existed and decided to actually start the project. He was able to do that because of the combination of his wealth and the fact that he believes it's extremely important for humankind to leave the planet tomorrow. That idea is not his, it existed at least since generations. Other people have already laid much of the groundwork long before he was born. NASA is the prime example.
On January 18 2025 06:02 Timebon3s wrote: He’s a genius bro. Mabye he isn’t well adjusted by god damn he gets shit done. Did you see that rocket backing into the launch pad. That was amazing. https://youtu.be/RYUr-5PYA7s?si=nCG7bWjlJkRBg4b6
Elon's entire contribution is delivering paychecks to the engineers who actually accomplished this amazing feat. There are thousands of other rich people who could've paid them. He's entirely replaceable. Fire him from the company and literally nothing changes.
If your assertion that he were replaceable held water, then from all the electric car startups
Blue Origin SpaceX Rocket Lab Virgin Galactic Relativity Space Axiom Space Sierra Space Firefly Aerospace Planet Labs Rocket Crafters Vector Launch SpinLaunch Momentus Isar Aerospace Skyrora Orbex Relativity Space Astra
there would already have been a wildly successful company that shot to the top of its market headed by someone other than him, especially for example Virgin Galactic because Branson was richer when he founded it (presuming that wealth is the requisite). This is the only evidence we could look for, because to hold the controlled experiment of actually replacing him would require shareholder votes that you don't have at the moment. And the evidence isn't there. There's no companies that have done anywhere close to the same thing. If he were replaceable, there would have to be one in the list by chance alone. There isn't. The two meteoric breakouts in each field have only one thing in common.
All the other billionaires must not have realized all you have to do is tell some engineers to build you some cool shit and voila, trillion dollar company. Honestly I don’t see why more billionaires don’t do it more often. I guess they are content with the money they have and don’t want any more. /sarcasm
They do. The bottleneck is that there's only a couple of domains per decade with enough hype for a trillion in growth. If Bezos or Zuck had never existed your life would be exactly the same. You'd just do your online shopping on The Nile and post your pics on Facetome and the billions would go to someone else who thought they were god's gift to the universe. These aren't innovations, they're gaps being filled in demand created by the underlying technology and cultural conditions.
The actual innovations are massively collaborative. We're at a point in our knowledge as a species where all the low-hanging fruit has been picked. One person can't revolutionize jack shit. And when there is either a new hyped technology or a new fearsome danger, one or a few organizations win the race to fill the requirement. And then we confuse that with the actual innovation.
Let's look at AI for example. NVIDIA gew a hundred-fold by being the main supplier of GPUs to feed the AI hype, did they reinvent the wheel? No. If they hadn't been able to do that the giant AI data centers would still be built but that demand and money would go to AMD, Intel, NXP, etc who would have to scale up more.
Sam Altman might be next person whose wealth will balloon, not long ago he was close to being booted from OpenAI. Had he left or had a piano fall on his head or whatever, would AI stop advancing? No.
I'm not saying they have 0 qualities or skills to have won those races. But them specifically winning the race is not relevant, the race itself is the driving force.
Correct me if I'm wrong but from what I read it looks like NVIDIA grew so fast because other players failed to deliver a similar product in the recent time period. Intel has huge issues and lost a lot of value exactly because they couldn't keep up with NVIDIA.
If we were in another timeline without NVIDIA's best people it's possible we would still be at the point before the internet was flooded with shitty AI generated images and videos that totally (don't) look like real content.
You have to give credit to Nvidia being the market leader and taking advantage of that.
Equally they got a hell of a boost from Covid, and subsequently went stratospheric in the gen AI era.
Neither of which were especially the result of Nvidia’s business genius so much as them being well-positioned to take advantage of.
They’d still be a huge company regardless, but their elevation to that next tier is as much predicated on timing and the work of other sectors as it is their own. We live in such a complex, interconnected ecosystem that singular companies and visionaries can’t really achieve much flying solo.
I think was the wider point here anyway, I may be wrong.
Perhaps the uptake looks different and how it develops considerably different, it’s pretty crazy to consider how wealthy the likes of Tim Berners-Lee would be now if they had commercially licensed aspects of the modern internet.
On January 18 2025 06:02 Timebon3s wrote: He’s a genius bro. Mabye he isn’t well adjusted by god damn he gets shit done. Did you see that rocket backing into the launch pad. That was amazing. https://youtu.be/RYUr-5PYA7s?si=nCG7bWjlJkRBg4b6
Elon's entire contribution is delivering paychecks to the engineers who actually accomplished this amazing feat. There are thousands of other rich people who could've paid them. He's entirely replaceable. Fire him from the company and literally nothing changes.
If your assertion that he were replaceable held water, then from all the electric car startups
then
there would already have been a wildly successful company that shot to the top of its market headed by someone other than him
No? That doesn't work logically, it's just something that you're saying. Every replaceable and every irreplaceable job (or in this case, absence of job) is currently held by someone who isn't being replaced.
While this conversation was happening, Canoo went bankrupt.
Are you familiar with formal frameworks of reasoning besides deductive logic?
If you have 20 bald rabbits and 20 bald mice, and give them all different drugs, except give one of the mice and one of the rabbits the exact same drug, and those are the only two that became living Chia pets, while only a few of the other animals grew any hair at all, and several of them died explosively, this is at least circumstantial evidence for an underlying causal mechanism. You cannot prove at the level of 2+2=4 (i.e. with deductive certainty) that the drug does anything. But it significantly raises confidence, or if nothing else warrants further analysis.
The suggestion was Elon Musk played merely the role of an investor paying checks is in a similar vein. Although we can't switch the CEOs, just like we can't switch the drugs the rabbits had after the fact, we have an idea that SpaceX was not inevitably historically destined to be SpaceX. If Bezos had founded SpaceX, it would not be SpaceX. That is where the replacement happens. If just the situation of having a CEO pay checks, or having an investor (=taking any drug whatsoever) were the catalyst, one of the other 30 companies would have grown some hair. Because putting money in an empty, nonformed startup is functionally the same whether the startup is named Sierra Space or SpaceX or Canoo or Tesla. Bezos founded a company. Musk founded a company. Branson founded a company. That's where they're interchangeable and the divergence is the evidence. So that's how we know signing checks is not all he did.
I tend to come down on the side of Magic Powers' argument above, that the key difference of Musk as CEO is that he tells people to do things as CEO, and they do them, i.e. the "microdemanding." While other companies may be content to drift along with relatively safe mediocrity keeping their 9-5 club open, this peculiar brand of interference from Musk, the boss, giving directives to his employees, caused Tesla and SpaceX to balloon to approximately half of the global market share of their respective industries, an accomplishment not approached by others in these industries.
"Fire" Musk from SpaceX on day 1 and replace him with Branson, and you get a Virgin Galactic that's named SpaceX, not a SpaceX with Branson as CEO.
Among those 18 and 16 companies I listed, the chance of those two specifically being the ones to take over their respective spaces, assuming no other connections, is less than 1%. And the fact that those two companies were able to do it proves that it was always feasible for any of them, because the market was there to be tapped. So either he is extremely lucky at choosing what unformed companies, with no employees or technology, to found or invest in and become CEO of and luckbox into success, or his high risk method of over 20 years of... telling people who works for him to do things has something to do with it.
On January 18 2025 17:55 Acrofales wrote: Most people here are not contesting Musk's business chops. We're just saying that his business accumen does not translate to being good at anything else at all, really. He has a superpower to make money and not much else. Everybody thinking he's some kind of genius is dangerous. In fact, even when he tries to change his management style and micromanage things, it goes to shit. The cybertruck is an example of that. Twitter is another (from a business point of view. If all he wants it for is as a giant megaphone, his micromanaging made it a better "Elon Musk amplification machine").
He knows jack shit about AI, but claims he does. He knows jack shit about gaming, but claims he does. And I'm pretty convinced he knows jack shit about running the US government, despite his claims that he does.
Perhaps most people... Magic Powers has said that Elon has contributed nothing to Tesla besides being an investor. WombaT said he thinks at least 10 people on TL.net could have been successful as Elon if they had some some seed money to bankroll their endeavors. It's a level of delusion no less than Elon's belief in his gaming ability.
Also confused on your point about micromanaging in regards to the cybertruck. Elon has been a notorious micromanager from day 1, demanding redesigns of Tesla's first vehicle when everyone around him was telling him they just need to complete the thing to put something out. My post from earlier in this thread:
On November 09 2024 00:26 BlackJack wrote: I don’t know what that means that the cybertruck is “the car that Elon built.” Elon is notoriously known as a micromanager. Even designing the original Roadster which was on a Lotus chassis with outsourced parts, Elon demanded the doors be larger, the seats be wider, the headlights be different etc.
With the Model S Tesla had employed Henrik Fisker of Fisker automotive fame to design the car. All the designs made the car look too bubbly, which was necessary to allow for enough headroom since the battery pack was in the floor unlike in the Roadster. When Fisker wouldn't accommodate Musk’s desires on the look of the Model S Tesla cancelled his contract and then hired Franz and Musk worked with the engineers to get them to make the battery pack thinner to make the car look the way he wanted.
"Magic Powers has said that Elon has contributed nothing to Tesla besides being an investor." Which is true. No one has refuted that whatsoever.
The example you give of Elon being a "micromanager" is not a praise, it's a condemnation. Because he doesn't manage, he demands. He micro-demands. That approach is lucky when it succeeds instead of resulting in crashing and burning. Why you may ask? Because Elon has no expertise. His demands are fantasy and he provides no solutions. Other people have to find solutions for him. It's the exact same thing he's done with his laughable DOGE fantasy. Cutting 2 trillion from 6.5 trilion. It's not only impossible, it's stupid. He's a joke.
He's nothing but an investor but also a notorious micromanager.
oBlade blew up your beliefs on the last page. If all it takes is throwing money at something then Richard Branson and Jeff Bezos or any of the other space and EV startups would have already blown past Elon's endeavors. Afterall, he is a "net-negative."
On January 18 2025 17:55 Acrofales wrote: Most people here are not contesting Musk's business chops. We're just saying that his business accumen does not translate to being good at anything else at all, really. He has a superpower to make money and not much else. Everybody thinking he's some kind of genius is dangerous. In fact, even when he tries to change his management style and micromanage things, it goes to shit. The cybertruck is an example of that. Twitter is another (from a business point of view. If all he wants it for is as a giant megaphone, his micromanaging made it a better "Elon Musk amplification machine").
He knows jack shit about AI, but claims he does. He knows jack shit about gaming, but claims he does. And I'm pretty convinced he knows jack shit about running the US government, despite his claims that he does.
Perhaps most people... Magic Powers has said that Elon has contributed nothing to Tesla besides being an investor. WombaT said he thinks at least 10 people on TL.net could have been successful as Elon if they had some some seed money to bankroll their endeavors. It's a level of delusion no less than Elon's belief in his gaming ability.
Also confused on your point about micromanaging in regards to the cybertruck. Elon has been a notorious micromanager from day 1, demanding redesigns of Tesla's first vehicle when everyone around him was telling him they just need to complete the thing to put something out. My post from earlier in this thread:
On November 09 2024 00:26 BlackJack wrote: I don’t know what that means that the cybertruck is “the car that Elon built.” Elon is notoriously known as a micromanager. Even designing the original Roadster which was on a Lotus chassis with outsourced parts, Elon demanded the doors be larger, the seats be wider, the headlights be different etc.
With the Model S Tesla had employed Henrik Fisker of Fisker automotive fame to design the car. All the designs made the car look too bubbly, which was necessary to allow for enough headroom since the battery pack was in the floor unlike in the Roadster. When Fisker wouldn't accommodate Musk’s desires on the look of the Model S Tesla cancelled his contract and then hired Franz and Musk worked with the engineers to get them to make the battery pack thinner to make the car look the way he wanted.
"Magic Powers has said that Elon has contributed nothing to Tesla besides being an investor." Which is true. No one has refuted that whatsoever.
The example you give of Elon being a "micromanager" is not a praise, it's a condemnation. Because he doesn't manage, he demands. He micro-demands. That approach is lucky when it succeeds instead of resulting in crashing and burning. Why you may ask? Because Elon has no expertise. His demands are fantasy and he provides no solutions. Other people have to find solutions for him. It's the exact same thing he's done with his laughable DOGE fantasy. Cutting 2 trillion from 6.5 trilion. It's not only impossible, it's stupid. He's a joke.
He's nothing but an investor but also a notorious micromanager.
oBlade blew up your beliefs on the last page. If all it takes is throwing money at something then Richard Branson and Jeff Bezos or any of the other space and EV startups would have already blown past Elon's endeavors. Afterall, he is a "net-negative."
Micromanagement is an inherently neutral thing, it depends on how one does it. Musk formerly, or a Steve Jobs have got good historic results from shaping things to their personal intuitive vision.
Equally almost every Musk interjection with Twitter has been arguably for the negative, unless one’s preferred state of affairs is for it to be a dysfunctional platform.
Break a functional verification system, introduce a ton of technical problems, damage its pull with advertisers, drop users etc etc.
This doesn’t preclude him from successfully micromanaging details elsewhere, but it does somewhat show that his expertise has limits, but limits nobody is in a position to enforce.
On January 18 2025 17:55 Acrofales wrote: Most people here are not contesting Musk's business chops. We're just saying that his business accumen does not translate to being good at anything else at all, really. He has a superpower to make money and not much else. Everybody thinking he's some kind of genius is dangerous. In fact, even when he tries to change his management style and micromanage things, it goes to shit. The cybertruck is an example of that. Twitter is another (from a business point of view. If all he wants it for is as a giant megaphone, his micromanaging made it a better "Elon Musk amplification machine").
He knows jack shit about AI, but claims he does. He knows jack shit about gaming, but claims he does. And I'm pretty convinced he knows jack shit about running the US government, despite his claims that he does.
Perhaps most people... Magic Powers has said that Elon has contributed nothing to Tesla besides being an investor. WombaT said he thinks at least 10 people on TL.net could have been successful as Elon if they had some some seed money to bankroll their endeavors. It's a level of delusion no less than Elon's belief in his gaming ability.
Also confused on your point about micromanaging in regards to the cybertruck. Elon has been a notorious micromanager from day 1, demanding redesigns of Tesla's first vehicle when everyone around him was telling him they just need to complete the thing to put something out. My post from earlier in this thread:
On November 09 2024 00:26 BlackJack wrote: I don’t know what that means that the cybertruck is “the car that Elon built.” Elon is notoriously known as a micromanager. Even designing the original Roadster which was on a Lotus chassis with outsourced parts, Elon demanded the doors be larger, the seats be wider, the headlights be different etc.
With the Model S Tesla had employed Henrik Fisker of Fisker automotive fame to design the car. All the designs made the car look too bubbly, which was necessary to allow for enough headroom since the battery pack was in the floor unlike in the Roadster. When Fisker wouldn't accommodate Musk’s desires on the look of the Model S Tesla cancelled his contract and then hired Franz and Musk worked with the engineers to get them to make the battery pack thinner to make the car look the way he wanted.
"Magic Powers has said that Elon has contributed nothing to Tesla besides being an investor." Which is true. No one has refuted that whatsoever.
The example you give of Elon being a "micromanager" is not a praise, it's a condemnation. Because he doesn't manage, he demands. He micro-demands. That approach is lucky when it succeeds instead of resulting in crashing and burning. Why you may ask? Because Elon has no expertise. His demands are fantasy and he provides no solutions. Other people have to find solutions for him. It's the exact same thing he's done with his laughable DOGE fantasy. Cutting 2 trillion from 6.5 trilion. It's not only impossible, it's stupid. He's a joke.
He's nothing but an investor but also a notorious micromanager.
oBlade blew up your beliefs on the last page. If all it takes is throwing money at something then Richard Branson and Jeff Bezos or any of the other space and EV startups would have already blown past Elon's endeavors. Afterall, he is a "net-negative."
Micromanagement is an inherently neutral thing, it depends on how one does it. Musk formerly, or a Steve Jobs have got good historic results from shaping things to their personal intuitive vision.
Equally almost every Musk interjection with Twitter has been arguably for the negative, unless one’s preferred state of affairs is for it to be a dysfunctional platform.
Break a functional verification system, introduce a ton of technical problems, damage its pull with advertisers, drop users etc etc.
This doesn’t preclude him from successfully micromanaging details elsewhere, but it does somewhat show that his expertise has limits, but limits nobody is in a position to enforce.
I was more pointing out the contradiction of being a mere investor and a micromanager at the same time
On January 18 2025 17:55 Acrofales wrote: Most people here are not contesting Musk's business chops. We're just saying that his business accumen does not translate to being good at anything else at all, really. He has a superpower to make money and not much else. Everybody thinking he's some kind of genius is dangerous. In fact, even when he tries to change his management style and micromanage things, it goes to shit. The cybertruck is an example of that. Twitter is another (from a business point of view. If all he wants it for is as a giant megaphone, his micromanaging made it a better "Elon Musk amplification machine").
He knows jack shit about AI, but claims he does. He knows jack shit about gaming, but claims he does. And I'm pretty convinced he knows jack shit about running the US government, despite his claims that he does.
Perhaps most people... Magic Powers has said that Elon has contributed nothing to Tesla besides being an investor. WombaT said he thinks at least 10 people on TL.net could have been successful as Elon if they had some some seed money to bankroll their endeavors. It's a level of delusion no less than Elon's belief in his gaming ability.
Also confused on your point about micromanaging in regards to the cybertruck. Elon has been a notorious micromanager from day 1, demanding redesigns of Tesla's first vehicle when everyone around him was telling him they just need to complete the thing to put something out. My post from earlier in this thread:
On November 09 2024 00:26 BlackJack wrote: I don’t know what that means that the cybertruck is “the car that Elon built.” Elon is notoriously known as a micromanager. Even designing the original Roadster which was on a Lotus chassis with outsourced parts, Elon demanded the doors be larger, the seats be wider, the headlights be different etc.
With the Model S Tesla had employed Henrik Fisker of Fisker automotive fame to design the car. All the designs made the car look too bubbly, which was necessary to allow for enough headroom since the battery pack was in the floor unlike in the Roadster. When Fisker wouldn't accommodate Musk’s desires on the look of the Model S Tesla cancelled his contract and then hired Franz and Musk worked with the engineers to get them to make the battery pack thinner to make the car look the way he wanted.
"Magic Powers has said that Elon has contributed nothing to Tesla besides being an investor." Which is true. No one has refuted that whatsoever.
The example you give of Elon being a "micromanager" is not a praise, it's a condemnation. Because he doesn't manage, he demands. He micro-demands. That approach is lucky when it succeeds instead of resulting in crashing and burning. Why you may ask? Because Elon has no expertise. His demands are fantasy and he provides no solutions. Other people have to find solutions for him. It's the exact same thing he's done with his laughable DOGE fantasy. Cutting 2 trillion from 6.5 trilion. It's not only impossible, it's stupid. He's a joke.
He's nothing but an investor but also a notorious micromanager.
oBlade blew up your beliefs on the last page. If all it takes is throwing money at something then Richard Branson and Jeff Bezos or any of the other space and EV startups would have already blown past Elon's endeavors. Afterall, he is a "net-negative."
Micromanagement is an inherently neutral thing, it depends on how one does it. Musk formerly, or a Steve Jobs have got good historic results from shaping things to their personal intuitive vision.
Equally almost every Musk interjection with Twitter has been arguably for the negative, unless one’s preferred state of affairs is for it to be a dysfunctional platform.
Break a functional verification system, introduce a ton of technical problems, damage its pull with advertisers, drop users etc etc.
This doesn’t preclude him from successfully micromanaging details elsewhere, but it does somewhat show that his expertise has limits, but limits nobody is in a position to enforce.
I was more pointing out the contradiction of being a mere investor and a micromanager at the same time
On January 18 2025 17:55 Acrofales wrote: Most people here are not contesting Musk's business chops. We're just saying that his business accumen does not translate to being good at anything else at all, really. He has a superpower to make money and not much else. Everybody thinking he's some kind of genius is dangerous. In fact, even when he tries to change his management style and micromanage things, it goes to shit. The cybertruck is an example of that. Twitter is another (from a business point of view. If all he wants it for is as a giant megaphone, his micromanaging made it a better "Elon Musk amplification machine").
He knows jack shit about AI, but claims he does. He knows jack shit about gaming, but claims he does. And I'm pretty convinced he knows jack shit about running the US government, despite his claims that he does.
Perhaps most people... Magic Powers has said that Elon has contributed nothing to Tesla besides being an investor. WombaT said he thinks at least 10 people on TL.net could have been successful as Elon if they had some some seed money to bankroll their endeavors. It's a level of delusion no less than Elon's belief in his gaming ability.
Also confused on your point about micromanaging in regards to the cybertruck. Elon has been a notorious micromanager from day 1, demanding redesigns of Tesla's first vehicle when everyone around him was telling him they just need to complete the thing to put something out. My post from earlier in this thread:
On November 09 2024 00:26 BlackJack wrote: I don’t know what that means that the cybertruck is “the car that Elon built.” Elon is notoriously known as a micromanager. Even designing the original Roadster which was on a Lotus chassis with outsourced parts, Elon demanded the doors be larger, the seats be wider, the headlights be different etc.
With the Model S Tesla had employed Henrik Fisker of Fisker automotive fame to design the car. All the designs made the car look too bubbly, which was necessary to allow for enough headroom since the battery pack was in the floor unlike in the Roadster. When Fisker wouldn't accommodate Musk’s desires on the look of the Model S Tesla cancelled his contract and then hired Franz and Musk worked with the engineers to get them to make the battery pack thinner to make the car look the way he wanted.
"Magic Powers has said that Elon has contributed nothing to Tesla besides being an investor." Which is true. No one has refuted that whatsoever.
The example you give of Elon being a "micromanager" is not a praise, it's a condemnation. Because he doesn't manage, he demands. He micro-demands. That approach is lucky when it succeeds instead of resulting in crashing and burning. Why you may ask? Because Elon has no expertise. His demands are fantasy and he provides no solutions. Other people have to find solutions for him. It's the exact same thing he's done with his laughable DOGE fantasy. Cutting 2 trillion from 6.5 trilion. It's not only impossible, it's stupid. He's a joke.
He's nothing but an investor but also a notorious micromanager.
oBlade blew up your beliefs on the last page. If all it takes is throwing money at something then Richard Branson and Jeff Bezos or any of the other space and EV startups would have already blown past Elon's endeavors. Afterall, he is a "net-negative."
I didn't say anywhere that he micromanages SpaceX? That was a suggestion you made in the Tesla discussion.
Also no, oBlade blew up nothing. I don't even bother to respond to his arguments because they're absurd.
EPT
