Elon Musk: Officially a fraud and piece of shit. Official or unofficial war criminal?

[Goredho 17,401]

On 4/8/2023 at 8:07 AM, Captain Ron said:

Guess how I know that Elon Musk doesn’t employ system engineers?

This is generally an issue with start up dahlings, but especially so with Elon.

His primary skill is putting skilled engineers in shitty situations so that they produce something interesting quickly.  What is produced is superficially grandiose and amazeballs, but it's really just a proof of concept with a dramatic reveal.  Whatever it is, it's not hardened, not safe, and not scalable.  He is enough of a sociopath that he is able to go to market with that with no ethical or moral qualms.

Still, there has been enough promise to what he's been doing to keep the gravy train rolling while investors were dishing out gravy.  But technical debt, like all debt, is borrowing against the future for the present.  Eventually it has to be paid down.  Eventually, investors and consumers are going to want to feel like there is some standard of safety and quality for a driverless vehicle, or traveling to space, or getting a neural implant in their fucking head.

And that's where Elon is really struggling with all of his companies.  They are established enough that they are having to uphold standards, be beholden to regulation and answer questions.  All of that feels like unnecessary bullshit to someone like Elon.  Just useless red tape imposed by his enemies to introduce drag on his innovations.  To slow him down.  To make him fail.

There is no way I would consume any product from an Elon Musk run company at this point.  He is > < this close to being outted as Elizabeth Holmes 2.0.

Edited April 10, 2023 by Goredho

[C-Man 27,222]

On 4/9/2023 at 8:53 AM, atomheartbevo said:

Okay, Elon is taking 1990s angst-ridden teenage BBS SysOp to a whole other level. 

There is insecurity and then there’s Insecurity.  

Spending $44 billion to read her DMs and put your insecurity on public display is hilarious.  

 

3 hours ago, cactusflinthead said:

 

So EM really is Campus Loop(y)

[Francisco 2.0 32,389]

Every day passes, more and more evidence continues to pile up he has the maturity of an 8th grader:

 

https://gizmodo.com/elon-musk-twitter-headquarters-sign-painted-w-titter-1850318181

 

Quote

Twitter CEO Elon Musk has confirmed that he was the one responsible for covering up the “w” in Twitter’s name with a white tarp a few days ago—and he’s done it again. This is how new “Titter” was born.

Longtime Musk watchers are well-aware that the tech billionaire, one of the richest people on Earth, has the humor of a small child. Given that one of his favorite jokes revolves around the word “tits,” it came as no surprise when pictures of the Twitter headquarters sign in San Francisco popped up online with the “w” covered with a white tarp. Musk didn’t claim responsibility for the sign at the time, but his influence was palpable.

 

Quote

While the new “Titter” sign debuted to praise from Musk fans, Twitter’s landlord was not amused. As told by Musk, Twitter’s landlord said the company was legally required to keep the name “Twitter” on its sign. The billionaire’s solution: Paint the “w” a background color. “Problem solved!” Musk declared on Sunday night.

And then, of course, came the punchline.

“They tried to muffle our titter 🤭” the head of the social media platform tweeted (titted?).

 

 

Quote

I mean, I guess. I don’t find it that funny, but to each their own. According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, “titter” means “to laugh in a nervous, affected, or partly suppressed manner.” However, considering Musk’s track record with making dumb jokes, Gizmodo believes it is highly unlikely that the Twitter CEO wants us to take the word at face value.

Other jokes Musk has made on Twitter on this subject include creating a new university called the “Texas Institute of Technology & Science,” whose acronym would be, of course, “TITS.”

“It will have epic merch,” Musk said on Oct. 29, 2021 in reference to his new school. “Universally admired.” (The new school never materialized, like many of Musk’s ideas).

 

Spoiler

 

In addition, last year Musk polled his followers over whether he should change Twitter’s name to “Titter.”

Renaming Twitter as “Titter” and going against his landlord’s wishes doesn’t exactly sound like the best plan right now, though. Back in January, landlord SRI Nine Market Square LLC sued Twitter for $6.7 million in unpaid rent for its San Francisco headquarters and other damages. That same month, Twitter got sued in the U.K. by the Crown Estate, which manages the properties owned by King Charles III, for not paying rent on its London offices.

Since Musk completed his $44 billion purchase of Twitter last October, the company has become known for not paying its bills and haggling to reduce the costs of its contracts. At one point in “new” Twitter’s recent history, employees were forced to bring in their own toilet paper to the company’s rank offices after Musk laid off all the janitors.

While all of those incidents shocked people familiar with old Twitter, they come as no surprise to those familiar with the “new” Titter, which is unfortunately becoming known as a big joke.

 

[DefinitelyNotHollywoodColt 12,301]

Harry Bolz?

[Storm the Field 5,294]

Another day, another perfect opportunity to repost this:

 

 

[wildcat09 29,353]

On 12/10/2022 at 7:30 PM, jkates said:

God bless, Elon. He's exposing what many knew to be true. Sure, ideologues will spin it or act like it's nothing, but that's par for the course.

Where'd this dude go?

[Brisketexan 105,119]

6 minutes ago, wildcat09 said:

Where'd this dude go?

I'm presuming he eventually went so far up Elon's butthole that Elon's digestive tract absorbed him for nutritional value.

[Pig Bellmont 8,717]

7 minutes ago, wildcat09 said:

Where'd this dude go?

Probably to a new username

[Post Oak 20,213]

1 hour ago, wildcat09 said:

Where'd this dude go?

Listening to Joe Rogan and Matt Walsh.  He's laying low because he went to protest drag shows and got punched in the nose by someone who goes by the name Madame Ophelia Bang Bang.

 

[Chopper 17,230]

3 hours ago, wildcat09 said:

Where'd this dude @jkates go?

Same place his idiotic ideas went. Down the drain.

 

[Chopper 17,230]

Rumor is @jkates is the one who was given the honor of painting the twitter 'w' white, apartheid clyde's favorite 'color'

 

[Bookman 4,639]

I don't understand these last few pages and I don't care enough to put in any effort.

[Chopper 17,230]

7 minutes ago, Bookman said:

I don't understand these last few pages and I don't care enough to put in any effort.

Thank you for the update? I don't care enough to put in any effort to understand your confusion. So we're good, yeah?

[Bookman 4,639]

Just now, Chopper said:

Thank you for the update? I don't care enough to put in any effort to understand your confusion. So we're good, yeah?

Yeah but who the fuck are you?

[atomheartbevo 89,657]

7 minutes ago, Bookman said:

I don't understand these last few pages and I don't care enough to put in any effort.

He covered up the "W" in Twitter on the SF building, it pissed the landlord off who doesn't want "Titter" on their building, so he uncovered the "W" and had it painted white, which has still pissed off the landlord, much to Musk's confusion.

In response to people mocking him for being juvenile, Musk changed his profile name to "Harry Bolz", because that's exactly what a 14 year-old would do when he's trying to make a $10 billion company profitable.

These are all the kinds of stable business moves that banks and investment firms look for when backing people or companies - they want to trust their money to a 14 year-old.

[Gene Parmesan 4,006]

2 minutes ago, Chopper said:

Thank you for the update? I don't care enough to put in any effort to understand your confusion. So we're good, yeah?

[Chopper 17,230]

3 minutes ago, Bookman said:

Yeah but who the fuck are you?

[Schulz2.0 28,951]

17 minutes ago, Bookman said:

I don't understand these last few pages and I don't care enough to put in any effort.

Elon?

[atomheartbevo 89,657]

8 minutes ago, atomheartbevo said:

He covered up the "W" in Twitter on the SF building, it pissed the landlord off who doesn't want "Titter" on their building, so he uncovered the "W" and had it painted white, which has still pissed off the landlord, much to Musk's confusion.

And in thinking about his confusion about the landlord being pissed, I bet he's confused about why all of his personal relationships have fallen apart.

Edit: And I wouldn't be pissing off high-dollar landlords when he has already caused twitter to miss a bunch of payments on rent out there.

Edited April 10, 2023 by atomheartbevo

['stache 21,812]

I don't even know what "substack" is, buncha nerds in here. 

[Bookman 4,639]

I thought they were talking about sump pumps. I know it's been raining a lot in California.

[wildcat09 29,353]

When I predicted a few months ago that he’d use Twitter to aid authoritarian regimes like China and India, even I didn’t think he’d help them censor tweets outside their own borders:

 

[Francisco 2.0 32,389]

So, Musk agreed to indemnify the former execs at Twitter as part of the acquisition.   But that's something for suckers to do, so fuck 'em, right Elon?  

Today, they sued.  

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2023/04/ex-twitter-ceo-who-was-fired-by-musk-sues-company-over-unpaid-legal-expenses/?comments=1&comments-page=1

 

Quote

Former Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal and two other ex-executives sued the company today, saying they haven't been reimbursed for over $1 million in expenses related to federal investigations and other legal matters. The lawsuit said former executives had to respond to investigations launched by the Securities and Exchange Commission and Department of Justice, and requested "an expedited ruling requiring Defendant to comply with its obligations to advance legal fees and expenses relating to ongoing litigation and investigations."

Twitter "has breached its obligations... by refusing to advance Plaintiffs' Expenses," according to the lawsuit, which was filed in the Delaware Court of Chancery and reported by The New York Times. The plaintiffs "have incurred significant expenses, including but not limited to attorneys' fees and costs, in connection with several proceedings," the lawsuit said.

 

Quote

The lawsuit against Twitter was filed by Agrawal, former Chief Legal Officer Vijaya Gadde, and former Chief Financial Officer Ned Segal, all of whom were fired by current CEO Elon Musk right after he bought Twitter in October 2022. Musk reportedly fired the executives "for cause" in a possible attempt to avoid payinggolden parachute deals.

An attorney for Agrawal, Gadde, and Segal provided Twitter an invoice for legal expenses "which reasonably evidence that Plaintiffs have incurred Expenses in excess of $1 million, all of which is required to be advanced to Plaintiffs," the lawsuit filed today said.

 

Quote

The lawsuit seeks an order requiring Twitter to advance all expenses the plaintiffs have incurred so far. Plaintiffs also want reimbursement for expenses incurred while suing Twitter to get reimbursement for the earlier expenses and an order "declaring that Plaintiffs are entitled to advancement of any future attorneys' fees, costs, and expenses incurred in connection with the Proceedings."

Twitter's bylaws and agreements with executives require it "to indemnify Plaintiffs and advance all Expenses incurred in connection with any Proceeding in which Plaintiffs are involved by reason of their Corporate Status," the lawsuit said. The bylaws say that payments are to be made by Twitter "in advance of the final disposition" of each proceeding, and would have to be repaid to Twitter if it turns out the executives aren't entitled to indemnification.

 

 

 

Spoiler

Twitter “refused to acknowledge” obligation

When still working for Twitter, Agrawal and Segal were contacted by federal authorities about the SEC and DOJ inquiries, the lawsuit said. Agrawal wrote in a letter to Twitter on January 13 that "I recently was contacted by the US Securities and Exchange Commission Division of Enforcement and the US Department of Justice in connection with certain inquiries into the Company and into Elon Musk."

"Agrawal and Segal retained counsel, provided testimony to the SEC in 2022, and their counsel have continued to engage with federal authorities," the complaint said. "Additionally, Agrawal received requests before and after he left Twitter to take measures to preserve certain documents, which likewise relate to his prior service as an officer of Twitter."

Agrawal, Gadde, and Segal are all defendants in a securities class action filed in September against the company and its top executives on behalf of Twitter stock owners. Gadde also had expenses from being a defendant along with Twitter in a different civil case, and from being subpoenaed to testify at a Congressional hearing on alleged "social media bias," the lawsuit said.

"Despite timely written demand along with documentation from Plaintiffs through their counsel, the Company has not advanced to Plaintiffs their Expenses actually and reasonably incurred related to the various Proceedings," the lawsuit said. "Over two months after Plaintiffs' initial written demand, the Company offered only a cursory acknowledgment of receipt, but still refused to acknowledge its obligations and to remit payment of any invoices."

Federal investigations into Twitter and Musk

When Musk was trying to get out of his deal to buy Twitter, the company told the Delaware Court of Chancery that "Elon Musk is presently under investigation by federal authorities for his conduct in connection with the acquisition of Twitter."

The SEC was investigating Musk's late disclosure of the 9.2 percent stake in Twitter he bought before purchasing the company outright, and separately questioned Musk over his attempt to exit the merger contract. Meanwhile, the Federal Trade Commission is investigating Twitter's privacy and data practices.

The lawsuit filed by the executives fired by Musk doesn't say what the Justice Department was looking into. But as the New York Times noted, the DOJ has helped the FTC with previous investigations into Twitter and "often assists the SEC in criminal investigations."

We contacted Twitter about the lawsuit today. The company continues to auto-reply with a poop emoji to all requests sent to its public relations email address.

Musk's Twitter was already facing numerous lawsuits from vendors, landlords, and consultants who say they haven't been paid. Four more companies sued Twitter last week with allegations of unpaid bills.

 

[Chopper 17,230]

25 minutes ago, Bookman said:

I thought they were talking about sump pumps. I know it's been raining a lot in California.

[Captain Ron 12,876]

Btw I also wanted to say that I don’t care that much about this page and spend 40+ word and 3 posts to say so. 

[HenryJames 66,048]

 

[Captain Ron 12,876]

 

[ultimaton 2,978]

 

[Slacks 6,819]

13 hours ago, longhornmatt said:

Putting aside his missing that the joke was about him, I love that he thinks “talented entrepreneur” tech bros can just automatically be epically successful in heavy industry.  Granted, the fact that he’s a trust fund baby idiot who has been epically successful in the auto industry does lend credence to the idea, but we’ve discussed how that happened plenty as well as how out of whack Tesla’s valuation is.  

But tech bros, by all means, try your hand at oil & gas, mining, steel, heavy manufacturing - maybe take on Procter & Gamble and J&J.    I need some more entertaining threads like this one for schadenfreude.

I think the dude is whacky as hell, but he did figure out how to land rockets for reuse, launch a satellite internet network, and make electric cars mainstream... So, to him, it makes sense to think this way.

He's a smart dude with no social skills. He needs a handler or two.

[Slacks 6,819]

6 hours ago, atomheartbevo said:

He covered up the "W" in Twitter on the SF building, it pissed the landlord off who doesn't want "Titter" on their building, so he uncovered the "W" and had it painted white, which has still pissed off the landlord, much to Musk's confusion.

In response to people mocking him for being juvenile, Musk changed his profile name to "Harry Bolz", because that's exactly what a 14 year-old would do when he's trying to make a $10 billion company profitable.

These are all the kinds of stable business moves that banks and investment firms look for when backing people or companies - they want to trust their money to a 14 year-old.

As a father of a 14 year old and 16 year old, I can confirm that "Harry Bolz" is on the list of Twitter names under consideration on any given day. 

[atomheartbevo 89,657]

1 hour ago, Slacks said:

I think the dude is whacky as hell, but he did figure out how to land rockets for reuse, launch a satellite internet network, and make electric cars mainstream... So, to him, it makes sense to think this way.

Technically he did none of that - other people he hired did, and there was already satellite internet long before he came along and bought the company that became Starlink, and arguably Toyota got the ball rolling with mainstream interest in EVs with the Prius (even though it was a Hybrid, it got people thinking EV can work for them).

But in his mind he did all of that.

As a business leader...

https://www.cnn.com/2023/04/10/tech/elon-musk-twitter-antics-turnaround/index.html

Quote

Under Elon Musk, Twitter has antagonized multiple major news organizations by labeling them state-funded media, appears to have eased restrictions on Russian government accounts and made crude jokes on the front of its headquarters and on Musk’s own Twitter display name. 

And that’s just this weekend. 

Quote

Musk’s antics, which only seem to have escalated this month, threaten to further erode Twitter’s brand value. For months, the company has struggled to retain advertisers and supplement its declining ad business — which previously comprised 90% of its annual revenue — by convincing users to pay up for its Twitter Blue subscription service.

Musk, who is on the hook for large payments to lenders after buying the company for $44 billion, including with significant debt, must either coax hesitant advertisers back to the platform or boost its subscription business -— or both. But his recent erratic moves may only complicate those turnaround efforts.

Quote

While Twitter labeled some news accounts as state-funded, it also appears to have removed some restrictions on Russian government accounts that had been put in place following the outset of Russia’s war in Ukraine, again prompting outrage among some users. 

Musk commented on the decision in a tweet Sunday saying: “I’m told Putin called me a war criminal for helping Ukraine, so he’s not exactly my best friend. All news is to some degree propaganda. Let people decide for themselves.”

Elonspeak: Let people decide for themselves = give a platform to people committing war crimes.

And none of that touched on the fact that he's cracking down on what the Indian and Chinese governments are telling him to crack down on.

[Brian Fantana 6,685]

2 hours ago, Slacks said:

I think the dude is whacky as hell, but he did figure out how to land rockets for reuse, launch a satellite internet network, and make electric cars mainstream... So, to him, it makes sense to think this way.

He's a smart dude with no social skills. He needs a handler or two.

You're fucking delusional. Elon Musk is not an engineer, he did not figure out any of that. He does not run SpaceX, Gwynne Shotwell runs SpaceX. If you said any of that to an actual aerospace engineer, they would laugh in your face. Satellite internet network technology, including LEO satellite constellations, has existed since the 90s. Even Tesla he simply bought out and marketed. He gets credit for pushing electric cars into the mainstream a little earlier than they would have, but even with that, Tesla is a poorly run operation that lacks the ability to innovate or improve their product in any measurable way and is quickly being usurped by legacy automakers and new competitors with better products.

He is not smart, in any way, and in fact is demonstrating daily how incredibly dumb he is to the entire world with his antics post-Twitter acquisition.

[Brian Fantana 6,685]

I would love to be a fly on the wall when Elon sits in on technical discussions, or anything really, where Gwynne Shotwell is involved.

I have many friends that either have or do currently work for either Boeing, Blue Origin, or SpaceX, and all of them sing her praises as an absolute legend with regard to spaceflight and engineering. The ones that work at Blue genuinely seem sad when they talk about Bezos failing to hire her away from SpaceX.

I can say with absolute certainly that she runs SpaceX her way, not Elon's. She is probably the only person in the world that Elon straight up cannot fire. There is no one else that can do what she does as well as she does and SpaceX would not be in their position without her.

The idea that people believe Elon is responsible for all this is not just laughable to me, it's actually insulting. Moron billionaires that fail upward do not deserve praise.

[atomheartbevo 89,657]

Why does Elon bend over backwards for the Chinese government?

https://www.cnn.com/2023/04/09/business/tesla-megafactory-shanghai/index.html

Quote

Tesla will open a Megapack battery factory in Shanghai, it said on Sunday, as it doubles down on its investment in China even as political tension rises between Beijing and Washington.

The Tesla factory will be able to produce 10,000 Megapacks, which are very large batteries used to store huge amounts of electricity, the company said in a tweet. It announced the new factory with a picture of a signing ceremony in China.

Quote

“Tesla opening Megapack factory in Shanghai to supplement output of Megapack factory in California,” Elon Musk said on Twitter.

Megapacks are meant to be used as massive batteries to help stabilize energy grids. Each unit can store enough energy to power an average of 3,600 homes for one hour, the company says. They are designed for utilities and large-scale commercial projects, not vehicles.

Quote

Chinese state media outlet Xinhua was the first to report the news, saying the electric automaker will break ground in this year’s third quarter and begin production in the second quarter of 2024.

The Shanghai facility would have the same level of production capacity as Tesla’s Megafactory in Lathrop, California— equivalent to 40 gigawatt-hours of energy storage.

 

[Francisco 2.0 32,389]

Twitter, Inc. no longer exists; it was merged into X Corp.  Also, Musk moved the company from Delaware to Nevada.

 

https://slate.com/technology/2023/04/twitter-inc-x-corp-elon-musk-x-nevada.html

 

Quote

In a court filing on Tuesday, April 4, Twitter Inc. quietly revealed a major development: It no longer exists. The company is currently being sued by right-wing provocateur Laura Loomer, who accused it of violating federal racketeering laws when it banned her account in 2019. Loomer has a Twitter account again, and her absurd lawsuit is bound to fail—but until it does, Twitter, as a defendant, must continue to submit corporate disclosure statements to the court. And so, in its most recent filing, the company provided notice that “Twitter, Inc. has been merged into X Corp. and no longer exists.” As the “successor in interest” to Twitter Inc.—that is, the survivor of the merger—X Corp. is now the defendant in Loomer’s suit. Its parent corporation is identified as X Holdings Corp.

 

 

Quote

It’s hard to know what to make of Musk’s transformation of Twitter into X Corp. (When asked for comment, Twitter responded with a poop emoji, as is its recent custom.) Elon Musk, who owns Twitter as well as X Holdings Corp., has not yet revealed this merger to the public. But it appears to have been on his mind since he first plotted his purchase of the social media company. In April 2022, Musk registered X Holdings I, II, and III in Delaware, three separate companies designed to facilitate his purchase of Twitter. According to that deal, Twitter would merge with X Holdings II, but keep its name and general corporate structure while continuing to operate under Delaware law. X Holdings I, controlled by Musk, would then serve as the merged entity’s parent company, while X Holdings III would take on the $13 billion loan that a group of big banks provided Musk to help cover the $44 billion purchase. (According to Twitter’s demands in its litigation against Musk, X Holdings I would be intended “solely for the purpose of engaging in, and arranging financing for, the transactions.”)

Quote

Here’s where things get interesting. As the merger agreement stated, X Holdings II would cease to exist as a functioning entity after merging with Twitter. So the official structure after Musk’s takeover was: X Holdings I oversees Twitter Inc., while X Holdings III handles the cash. The Nevada filings show this exact arrangement is no longer in effect.

 

 

Spoiler

According to the Nevada secretary of state’s online business portal, Elon Musk registered two new businesses in the state on March 9: X Holdings Corp., and X Corp. Then, on March 15, Musk applied to merge those Nevada businesses with two of his existing companies: X Holdings I with X Holdings Corp., and Twitter Inc. with X Corp. In the latter’s case, the articles of the merger mandate that X Corp. fully acquire Twitter—meaning that, for all intents and purposes, “Twitter Inc.” no longer exists as a Delaware-based company. Now it’s part of X Corp., whose parent company is the $2 million X Holdings Corp. And that means X Holdings I no longer exists, either. Both X Holdings Corp. and X Corp. now fall under Nevada’s jurisdiction instead of Delaware’s. (It seems an anonymous SPAC-trader tracker first broke this news.)

 

The structural overhaul was acknowledged in the Loomer case about three weeks after X Corp. was registered in Carson City. So far, it doesn’t appear that the changeover has been noted in other legal documents, much less announced to the public. Currently, the company known as “Twitter Inc.” is involved in a host of litigation: against the entire country of India over censorship concerns, against vendors who claim Twitter is not paying them what they’re owed, and against former Twitter employees who claim Musk violated labor laws when he fired them en masse last fall. As far as we can tell, there are no updates in any of those cases regarding Twitter’s transformation into X Corp.

 

So why is X Corp. now a thing, and why is it established in Nevada? Some vintage Musk lore may provide insight here.

Elon Musk has long been attached to the letter X, even outside of his kids’ names. In 1999, he founded X.com, an online bank that soon merged with another company to become PayPal. The letter appeared in other business ventures over the years: SpaceX, Tesla’s Model X car, the three X Holdings corporations, and “Project X,” the official SEC-recognized name for the Twitter purchase’s $13 billion bank loan. After completing the Twitter takeover in October, Musk claimed this purchase would “accelerate” the creation of an “everything app” that would be named—you guessed it—after the letter X. Such a “super app,” Musk has stated, could resemble something like China’s WeChat, the combination messaging/social networking/payment app that boasts a billion users; Twitter’s functions would play an important role in this megasize app.

It’s also possible that X is meant to be more of an everything company than an everything app. In late 2020, YouTuber and longtime Tesla investor Dave Lee tweeted that Musk should “form a holding company called X” to serve as the “parent company of Tesla, SpaceX, Neuralink and Boring Company.” (Musk’s response: “Good idea.”) In that light, Musk’s choice of Nevada as home base for X Corp. takes on extra significance, considering the entrepreneur has established some of his largest ventures in the Silver State. In 2016, he opened a Tesla Gigafactory near Reno to produce electric vehicle batteries; earlier this year, he announced a $3.6 billion expansion of the facility in order to manufacture electric trucks. Nevada also hosts a few projects from Musk’s Boring Company, like the transit tunnel built under the Las Vegas Convention Center in 2021, and the still-in-development Vegas Loop. In 2020, when Musk threatened to move Tesla headquarters out of California in response to the state’s pandemic-shutdown measures, he proposed Nevada as a potential option before settling on Texas. With the new filing, Musk now operates at least three businesses in Nevada, one of which is now part of an overarching X company.

No matter which path he chooses, Musk’s X faces a difficult future. A now-tech-skeptical Congress would undoubtedly cast a close eye over an American version of WeChat, as would regulatory agencies like the Federal Trade Commission now taking a firmer stance against tech monopolies. And investors might not be happy if Musk tries to stuff each of his separate companies into X Holdings Corporation. For now, his Twitter is likely to garner only more scrutiny, making the big X he just put on it all the more fitting.

 

 

[Captainant 27,660]

7 hours ago, Slacks said:

I think the dude is whacky as hell, but he did figure out how to land rockets for reuse, launch a satellite internet network, and make electric cars mainstream... So, to him, it makes sense to think this way.

He's a smart dude with no social skills. He needs a handler or two.

Point of order: Elmo didn't design any of that. He had an idea and threw it at his highly paid and crack engineering team to solve it. Specifically, Gwynne Shotwell is the actual steady hand on the wheel at SpaceX that's doing the work. 

He's a savvy business man with few scruples and is more than happy to claim full credit for the work that other people did and he paid for

Edited April 11, 2023 by Captainant

[wildcat09 29,353]

I wouldn’t even say he’s a savvy businessman. He’s about as savvy at business as Trump is. They both just happened to be born wealthy and without shame, making them very good at bullshitting. Their only business “talent” is self-promotion, which is the same talent that Kim Kardashian has. Does anyone think she’s a business expert?

[Captainant 27,660]

8 minutes ago, wildcat09 said:

I wouldn’t even say he’s a savvy businessman. He’s about as savvy at business as Trump is. They both just happened to be born wealthy and without shame, making them very good at bullshitting. Their only business “talent” is self-promotion, which is the same talent that Kim Kardashian has. Does anyone think she’s a business expert?

I mean, she runs more billion dollar businesses than me lol. Frankly, much of business is just self promotion, especially in the corporate world. Being a high performer doesn't mean much if people don't know about it. Likewise as well to see slick talkers that are as deep as a puddle make large strides into leadership - they're able to play the social game and promote their image, so they get the baton. It's how you get stupid bosses who don't know shit about fuck, but are still core decision makers. 

 

Not knowing shit about fuck, but still making decisions on everything is EXACTLY elmos game

['stache 21,812]

Gotta say, Titter and Harry Bolz is pretty funny, except for, you know, that he’s otherwise a dumbass troll. So when does this whole house of cards collapse for him? Like someone said, Tesla brought EVs to the market earlier but is about to get out innovated by the legacy makers. Twitter is gonna tank to the point the billion dollar interest payments will be problematic. Space X isn’t his own work and I can see them finding a way to oust him if everything else around him crumbles. But he’s still in and out of the top spot of rich assholes. It’s gotta give eventually, right?

Edited April 11, 2023 by 'stache

[NoName 16,351]

9 hours ago, Slacks said:

I think the dude is whacky as hell, but he did figure out how to land rockets for reuse, launch a satellite internet network, and make electric cars mainstream... So, to him, it makes sense to think this way.

He's a smart dude with no social skills. He needs a handler or two.

i mean, no. he did not.

he has no history with aerospace. he didn't develop any of the early engines (that was led by Tom Mueller who has worked in aerospace for basically his whole career.) he didn't develop the thrusters (see Mueller and team again.)

stop buying into the PR.

this was all covered earlier in this thread:

Quote

 

here's the thing though...he didn't actually make any of the cool products.

Zip2 used free databases when it started and connected them to the internet for city guides. he was not a travel person, he didn't visit all those cities. it was basically an internet yellow pages. he was demoted from CEO by the board.

there were 5 other co founders of x.com before they all left but him. it was a bank...online. he had no history with banks, although his co-founders did. they launched in December 99. they merged with confinity 3 months later. paypal was a confinity project that started in 1998. he was fired as CEO while on vacation by the board.

He bought his way into TSLA, he had zero experience in vehicle development, manufacturing, battery technology or motor development. he became chairman of the board, then CEO.

the initial brain behind SpaceX was a guy who worked basically exclusively in aerospace/propulsion before it was founded and led the teams who did basically everything there. he had no experience with space propulsion or technology.

the Starlink idea came out of SDI in the 90s and SpaceX acquired Surrey Satellite Technology which was already doing internet + space stuff in the early 00s - they sold it in 08, then started re-developing Starlink in 2014.

somehow he gets the idea for "concepting" Solar City - pretty sure the idea of solar roofs was already out there in 2006. he gave them the startup money, then paid $2.6b to re-acquire it, great business job there.

Neuralink was founded with 7 other scientists and engineers in 2016. He didn't really have shit to do with the science, because he isn't a scientist.

...I will give him credit for the Boring Co. which is the biggest joke of a company ever. Founded in 2016. 1 project in existence, 1.7 mile loop in the Vegas Convention Center. Operates on limited days. the other 5 publicly announced projects never were built. cars go 30 miles an hour, driven by an employee. it's literally a car driving in a tunnel. they did develop their own boring machines. they are smaller than conventional machines and tunnel at about the same speed as conventional machines.

I will also give him credit for Thud! he tried to buy The Onion, but they didn't want to sell so he brought on 2 former onion editors to start a website called Thud!. he sold the company 4 years later because he was worried about them making fun of his own companies. they couldn't find any more investors and closed down like 6 months later.

 

let's say you genuinely believe he was the brainpower behind TSLA, SpaceX, Paypal and everything else.

why is he wasting his brilliance on running Twitter literally into the ground? if he did all that, he is one of the smartest humans ever to walk this earth. and he is choosing to waste his brilliance on...twitter?

instead of pushing forward EVs or even a new model for the first time in years, instead of his chasing his stated personal goal of "enabling human exploration and settlement of Mars", instead of working to get high speed internet across the world to all people at a low cost...he is shitposting on Twitter, buying a company for $40+ billion, burning half it's value, making the company (Twitter Inc) literally not exist anymore, firing like 80% of the staff, etc.

Edited April 11, 2023 by NoName

[GopherRock 1,765]

9 hours ago, Slacks said:

As a father of a 14 year old and 16 year old, I can confirm that "Harry Bolz" is on the list of Twitter names under consideration on any given day. 

 

 

[Captain Ron 12,876]

9 hours ago, Slacks said:

I think the dude is whacky as hell, but he did figure out how to land rockets for reuse, launch a satellite internet network, and make electric cars mainstream... So, to him, it makes sense to think this way.

He's a smart dude with no social skills. He needs a handler or two.

Rockets - A. He didn't figure it out. He hired an engineering team and demanded they figured it out. B. The work had already been done by McDonald Douglas in the 90s and those engineers (not Musk himself) just continued the process to bring it to the state we see it today.

 

 

Satellite Internet - huh? Hughsnet and Viasat have both been in the game much longer than Starlink. And satelite communication has been done for decades before that. He just created his own service. And don't get me wrong - it's better than other offerings, but just read the Starlink thread and you know it also has issues.

 

EVs - No question he probably accelerated EVs timetable up 20 or so years. That is amazing. But at the same time let's not forget that while he INVESTED in Tesla, he WAS NOT (despite his claims) a founder and because they haven't really moved the needle in recent years and are quickly getting caught/passed by mainstream companies in the modern game. 

[Captain Ron 12,876]

7 hours ago, Brian Fantana said:

You're fucking delusional. Elon Musk is not an engineer, he did not figure out any of that. He does not run SpaceX, Gwynne Shotwell runs SpaceX. If you said any of that to an actual aerospace engineer, they would laugh in your face. Satellite internet network technology, including LEO satellite constellations, has existed since the 90s. Even Tesla he simply bought out and marketed. He gets credit for pushing electric cars into the mainstream a little earlier than they would have, but even with that, Tesla is a poorly run operation that lacks the ability to innovate or improve their product in any measurable way and is quickly being usurped by legacy automakers and new competitors with better products.

He is not smart, in any way, and in fact is demonstrating daily how incredibly dumb he is to the entire world with his antics post-Twitter acquisition.

To be fair, he is an intelligent man. The problem is that he's too smart for his own good.

 

7 hours ago, Brian Fantana said:

I would love to be a fly on the wall when Elon sits in on technical discussions, or anything really, where Gwynne Shotwell is involved.

I have many friends that either have or do currently work for either Boeing, Blue Origin, or SpaceX, and all of them sing her praises as an absolute legend with regard to spaceflight and engineering. The ones that work at Blue genuinely seem sad when they talk about Bezos failing to hire her away from SpaceX.

I can say with absolute certainly that she runs SpaceX her way, not Elon's. She is probably the only person in the world that Elon straight up cannot fire. There is no one else that can do what she does as well as she does and SpaceX would not be in their position without her.

The idea that people believe Elon is responsible for all this is not just laughable to me, it's actually insulting. Moron billionaires that fail upward do not deserve praise.

 

This might be the most impressive thing - Space X's massive success despite being Musk's company. The fact that they've been able to keep him out of the way and succeed is impressive.

 

2 hours ago, Captainant said:

Point of order: Elmo didn't design any of that. He had an idea and threw it at his highly paid and crack engineering team to solve it. Specifically, Gwynne Shotwell is the actual steady hand on the wheel at SpaceX that's doing the work. 

He's a savvy business man with few scruples and is more than happy to claim full credit for the work that other people did and he paid for

Hopes and dreams only go so far. My understanding is that Space X pays below market rate for his engineers.

[Brian Fantana 6,685]

11 minutes ago, Captain Ron said:

Rockets - A. He didn't figure it out. He hired an engineering team and demanded they figured it out. B. The work had already been done by McDonald Douglas in the 90s and those engineers (not Musk himself) just continued the process to bring it to the state we see it today.

 

 

Satellite Internet - huh? Hughsnet and Viasat have both been in the game much longer than Starlink. And satelite communication has been done for decades before that. He just created his own service. And don't get me wrong - it's better than other offerings, but just read the Starlink thread and you know it also has issues.

 

EVs - No question he probably accelerated EVs timetable up 20 or so years. That is amazing. But at the same time let's not forget that while he INVESTED in Tesla, he WAS NOT (despite his claims) a founder and because they haven't really moved the needle in recent years and are quickly getting caught/passed by mainstream companies in the modern game. 

In the interest of being fair and charitable, SpaceX Starlink DID launch the first LEO satellite internet network. They didn't invent the technology, but they do get credit for being the first company to actually attempt it.

[atomheartbevo 89,657]

So he uses Wikipedia to personally determine which news organizations should get the government funded label or whatever.

https://gizmodo.com/elon-musk-wikipedia-government-funded-media-label-npr-1850322323

This is what the world's richest or second richest man is sitting around doing - reading fucking wikipedia and ordering changes based on what he's read.

[texasdago 7,573]

3 hours ago, Francisco 2.0 said:

It’s hard to know what to make of Musk’s transformation of Twitter into X Corp. (When asked for comment, Twitter responded with a poop emoji, as is its recent custom.)

I need to track down the script for Idiocracy because I swear this had to be in the movie.  

On a side note, since it is impossible to convince his legion of followers that Musk is an idiot, the more this all plays out, the more he will prove it.  Then again, some of them will never abandon him, even if he were to shoot someone on 5th Avenue.  They'll never quit.

[NoName 16,351]

18 minutes ago, atomheartbevo said:

So he uses Wikipedia to personally determine which news organizations should get the government funded label or whatever.

https://gizmodo.com/elon-musk-wikipedia-government-funded-media-label-npr-1850322323

This is what the world's richest or second richest man is sitting around doing - reading fucking wikipedia and ordering changes based on what he's read.

the quote that is cut off in the embed (because of 140+ characters breaking the embed logic i guess?) is important:

Quote

“If you really think that the government has no influence on the entity they’re funding then you’ve been marinating in the Kool-Aid for too long.”

NPR funding is about 1% from government.

SpaceX got $3 billion in government contracts in the last ~24 months. LA Times says that TSLA/Solar City/SpaceX benefited from an estimated $4.9 billion in govt support.

https://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-hy-musk-subsidies-20150531-story.html

lol

Casey Newton! That man has a family (well like 2348123412 kids at least) - the Go Fund Me line is amazing and true.

edit: the embed is making the text super blurry for some reason? guess Elon unplugged something or made a change to save money. here is a direct link to the image:

Spoiler

 

Edited April 11, 2023 by NoName

[NoName 16,351]

8 minutes ago, texasdago said:

I need to track down the script for Idiocracy because I swear this had to be in the movie.  

On a side note, since it is impossible to convince his legion of followers that Musk is an idiot, the more this all plays out, the more he will prove it.  Then again, some of them will never abandon him, even if he were to shoot someone on 5th Avenue.  They'll never quit.

 

[atomheartbevo 89,657]

So the Prius, while not technically an EV, but a hybrid, just hit 25 years old, so they came out with a new design that looks very nice.  This is the kind of stuff that Tesla should be doing (new designs) and it's the kind of stuff Tesla should be worried about (lot of overlap between the EV/hybrid crowd).

Tesla can't cut prices again and again I suppose, but seems like their current market or the potential market for would-be buyers could be saturated.

 

[Pig Bellmont 8,717]

34 minutes ago, atomheartbevo said:

So he uses Wikipedia to personally determine which news organizations should get the government funded label or whatever.

https://gizmodo.com/elon-musk-wikipedia-government-funded-media-label-npr-1850322323

This is what the world's richest or second richest man is sitting around doing - reading fucking wikipedia and ordering changes based on what he's read.

 No he doesn’t. He’s just using Wikipedia after the fact to justify/blame something that appears neutral