Elon Musk (No Politics)

[BradC]

He does work 100 hours+ a week.

Personally I'm not a fan, but there is no denying he worked/works hard to get to where he wants to get to. My old man used to paraphrase Edison with "Success is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration" and that is what he lived by. Love him or hate him, Musk puts in the hard yards.

[free_electron]

One needs a place to not only sleep, but shower, shave, store clothing, eat, do all those "little" things. It is fairytales to me that he lives in his offices.

If Mrs EEVblog ever booted me out, I'd sleep at the lab.

He frequently slept in the office or factory in one of the breakrooms. The offices had a gym with showers. He had a go-bag. Food : the company restaurant provides all meals and there's things like doordash and uber-eats. Plenty of restaurants in Palo-Alto and Fremont

Don't underestimate the resources he has, including his jets (he's got like 4 or 5) that also have on-board showers and bedrooms. They are not the little business jets that can carry 6 people short-haul. O
he wants for nothing. All he has to do is ask for something and it gets done. there's a whole crew that makes sure he doesn't have to deal with life's little distractions.

[brucehoult]

That is what i was saying - where are you going to do all other things beside sleeping? Inevitably converting you lab into a living space. Then it is not a (dedicated) lab anymore.

I've worked plenty of places that had not only a kitchen in the office but also a shower or two. A whole lot went in in the mid to late 80s when it started to be quite popular for people to bicycle to work, for obvious reasons. Also dedicated bicycle parking rooms. If there's a gym in the building then that serves.

[Cyclotron]

That is what i was saying - where are you going to do all other things beside sleeping? Inevitably converting you lab into a living space. Then it is not a (dedicated) lab anymore.

Every company I've worked at for the last nearly 30 years had onsite showers, food, gym, game room, TV, and pickup/delivery cleaning services. It's not that I want to live there but I have spent a few days at the office.  One of the longest stings was Y2K which turned out to just be a nice bonus check without any real problems.

[EEVblog]

That is what i was saying - where are you going to do all other things beside sleeping? Inevitably converting you lab into a living space. Then it is not a (dedicated) lab anymore.

There is already a (very spacious) shower on my floor which I use for showing after the gym.
Could go to the laundromat for washing and drying clothes.
Air mattress.
I'd survive.

[EEVblog]

Google must be spying on me, this just popped up in my recommendations.

[tszaboo]

He does work 100 hours+ a week.

Personally I'm not a fan, but there is no denying he worked/works hard to get to where he wants to get to. My old man used to paraphrase Edison with "Success is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration" and that is what he lived by. Love him or hate him, Musk puts in the hard yards.

People tend to forget that he has Asperger's syndrome. That changes what is normal for you as a person. In one way it's a superpower, while in other ways it's a disability.

[Psi]

People tend to forget that he has Asperger's syndrome. That changes what is normal for you as a person. In one way it's a superpower, while in other ways it's a disability.

Definitely

[jonovid]

If I was Elon Musk I would ___ ?
A develop a low G holiday resort on the Moon using its dust to make concrete like lunar building materials with lunar greenhouses.
B develop a closed-loop end of life return to manufacturer system for e waste on an industrial scale. return shipping. (on earth).
C develop long distance underwater train tunnels between nations.  avoiding rough surface sea conditions.
D develop robotic farm machinery & automated modular agricultural strip farming system. also better human waste reuse.
E develop robotic cube elevators that move people between levels but also both vertical or horizontally between buildings.  (at safe speeds) NOT a hyperloop or amusement ride.
any better suggestions

[EEVblog]

If I was Elon Musk I would ___ ?
A develop a low G holiday resort on the Moon using its dust to make concrete like lunar building materials with lunar greenhouses.

I do not understand at all his zero interest in the moon.
Yeah, yeah, "multiplanetary" blah blah, but I don't get why he can't see the value in colonising the moon first, if anything, as a tourist thing to pay for Mars.
Seriously, retirees will spend their life savings to go to the moon for a few weeks.

[brucehoult]

I do not understand at all his zero interest in the moon.

I do not believe Elon has ever said he has zero interest in the Moon. He's certainly said that Mars is the priority, but Mars capability means you also have Moon capability, whereas the reverse is not true.

SpaceX is obviously happy to provide services to send things to the Moon if someone wants to go there, build hardware for it etc.

Also: "a self-sustaining city on the Moon, while not as resilient to calamities that affect Earth as Mars (due to its proximity to Earth), is probably nonetheless worth the doing, in addition to Mars"

https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1985544275787202877

[Psi]

I do not understand at all his zero interest in the moon.
Yeah, yeah, "multiplanetary" blah blah, but I don't get why he can't see the value in colonising the moon first, if anything, as a tourist thing to pay for Mars.
Seriously, retirees will spend their life savings to go to the moon for a few weeks.

The moon feel dead and mars feels alive.
But I think he will go to the moon, probably start a base on both the moon and mars around the same time. Once you are mass producing the things needed for a mars base you might as well do both.
Also possible they will test things on the moon first.  He doesnt have that much interest in the moon but that doesnt mean he wont use it when it makes sense.

As you say, lots of money to be made for moon holidays and he probably will need that money to scale up the mars base to what he is imagining.

[tszaboo]

If I was Elon Musk I would ___ ?
A develop a low G holiday resort on the Moon using its dust to make concrete like lunar building materials with lunar greenhouses.

I do not understand at all his zero interest in the moon.
Yeah, yeah, "multiplanetary" blah blah, but I don't get why he can't see the value in colonising the moon first, if anything, as a tourist thing to pay for Mars.
Seriously, retirees will spend their life savings to go to the moon for a few weeks.

Having Jamestown-like colony like in the For all mankind. It would be awesome.
I think the cost doesn't really matter, the benefits are inspiring another generation (instead of watching tiktok).
There hasn't been anyone on the moon in my lifetime, and people seem to be busy with completely irrelevant bullshit instead of being inspired by engineering and science. Like someone said, people look down on their phone screens instead of up to the stars.

[PlainName]

If I was Elon Musk I would ___ ?
A develop a low G holiday resort on the Moon using its dust to make concrete like lunar building materials with lunar greenhouses.

I do not understand at all his zero interest in the moon.

World+dog are doing it. He doesn't want to be one of the crowd.

[Psi]

I do not understand at all his zero interest in the moon.

World+dog are doing it. He doesn't want to be one of the crowd.

I think its more that he is playing the very long game. Well past his lifespan.
Mars is much more suitable for a second permanent colony than the moon. The moon will probably only ever be a base rather than a colony. But it could be a very big base though.

[PlainName]

I do not understand at all his zero interest in the moon.

World+dog are doing it. He doesn't want to be one of the crowd.

I think its more that he is playing the very long game. Well past his lifespan.
Mars is much more suitable for a second permanent colony than the moon. The moon will probably only ever be a base rather than a colony. But it could be a very big base though.

No, I think it is still because no-one else has thought it feasible, but everyone is doing something on the moon.

Reasoning for that is because it is all about how to get there. Has he done anything about building a colony, how the are going to survive, any of that stuff? Does he even know what might be required? That should be going on in parallel right now, but it's all about the rockets and he doesn't know what cargo will be needed. Just that BFO rockets that no-one else can do will be it.

[paulca]

I was digging around trying to find the documentary where Elon is "side lined" and kept "out of way" or " at arms length" during launches etc.

Using the AI to search broad questions however seemed to lead to a "different framing" of existing SpaceX footage I was referring to.  What I refer to as "arms length" and "side lined", was not to keep him out of proceeding "as such", but rather because when Elon was previous allowed to operate under his own during launches he would become too involved, too excited, too chaotic trying to get involved everywhere all at once causing chaos when "calm order and process" was required.

The term "Over involvement" or "Helicoptering".

It was this that led them to assign Elon a "handler" for future launches.  Someone with enough information (a Tech lead) to keep him in the loop, but also someone to keep him occupied, engaged and feeling part of the process, without letting him roam the control room floor over excited.

[Electrodynamic]

I was digging around trying to find the documentary where Elon is "side lined" and kept "out of way" or " at arms length" during launches etc.

Using the AI to search broad questions however seemed to lead to a "different framing" of existing SpaceX footage I was referring to.  What I refer to as "arms length" and "side lined", was not to keep him out of proceeding "as such", but rather because when Elon was previous allowed to operate under his own during launches he would become too involved, too excited, too chaotic trying to get involved everywhere all at once causing chaos when "calm order and process" was required.

The term "Over involvement" or "Helicoptering".

It was this that led them to assign Elon a "handler" for future launches.  Someone with enough information (a Tech lead) to keep him in the loop, but also someone to keep him occupied, engaged and feeling part of the process, without letting him roam the control room floor over excited.

Indeed, it's important to understand Musk doesn't "own" any companies any more than most share holders do. For example, Musk is a just a minority share holder in Tesla only holding 12.4% of the stock. In fact, many other share holders wanted to fire Musk for running the Tesla stock price into the ground recently. More so after his erratic behavior and supposed drug addiction.

Can you imagine if the CEO of Ford Motor Company was openly using drugs with wild eyed/slurred speech, ranting on social media all day and causing the collapse of the share price?. It's completely bizarre how so many people have normalized Musk's psychotic behavior imo.

[KE5FX]

Can you imagine if the CEO of Ford Motor Company was openly using drugs with wild eyed/slurred speech, ranting on social media all day and causing the collapse of the share price?. It's completely bizarre how so many people have normalized Musk's psychotic behavior imo.

Henry Ford was almost violently anti-Semitic, with active sympathies toward the Nazi cause.  Hitler kept a portrait of him in his study, and I wouldn't be surprised if the affection was mutual.  No one would have been shocked or upset to see Ford saluting him.

That was before the war and the Holocaust, so it wasn't seen as such a big deal at the time. 

Also, Ford's family covered for him and kept him out of the limelight towards the end of the 1930s, when it was clear where things were heading. 

I do not understand at all his zero interest in the moon. Yeah, yeah, "multiplanetary" blah blah, but I don't get why he can't see the value in colonising the moon first, if anything, as a tourist thing to pay for Mars. Seriously, retirees will spend their life savings to go to the moon for a few weeks.

That's a rational take on it, but you have to understand what a big personal deal Mars is to him.  It's what gets him up in the morning.  Just as nothing about biology makes sense except in the light of evolution, nothing about Elon Musk can be understood except in the light of Mars.

It seems likely that he realized, fairly recently, that he can't go to Mars.

[NE666]

It seems likely that he realized, fairly recently, that he can't go to Mars.

Good. Now perhaps he could find it in himself to get just a little bit excited about the prospects of using his wealth, resources and technical teams to go do something good and worthwhile in our own backyard.

[Electrodynamic]

It seems likely that he realized, fairly recently, that he can't go to Mars.

Good. Now perhaps he could find it in himself to get just a little bit excited about the prospects of using his wealth, resources and technical teams to go do something good and worthwhile in our own backyard.

It's a little creepy how so many billionaires seem to be obsessed with building bunkers or getting off planet.

The classic say one thing and do another. Hey everything is fine, nothing wrong, all is well but you stay here and I'm going to my bunker, 

[KE5FX]

The classic say one thing and do another. Hey everything is fine, nothing wrong, all is well but you stay here and I'm going to my bunker, 

With Musk, it's not about hiding from the monsters he raised.  That's Zuckerberg's thing. 

Instead, it's a manifest-destiny thing.  He sees himself as the seed of a new society.  Only on Mars will he be free to fulfill his destiny as von Braun's 'Elon' figure. 

The Moon is not enough for him... or far enough.

[Siwastaja]

Can you imagine if the CEO of Ford Motor Company was openly using drugs with wild eyed/slurred speech,

Maybe you can't, but I easily can imagine, because stuff like that happens, always happened, yellow media always enjoyed playing these stories. Your confirmation bias just distorts your vision in that it's somehow unique to Elon Musk.

You have the pieces together for understanding - just apply some common sense and introspection. You correctly point out that Musk is minority shareholder and can be replaced. Now do you really think other shareholders are idiots? Of course not. They are most interested in money - the value of their investment, like professional shareholders always are. They are wiser than you or me.

So something in your chain of logic must be incorrect because the pieces don't seem to fit, and it's this:

causing the collapse of the share price?

You really serious?


Tesla's stock value during Musk's time is nearly miraculous rise, and pretty sustainable growth despite everyone "knowing" it's only a temporary bubble that will burst "in a year", for... 15 years already? This is an undisputed fact. Now maybe it's not Musk's excellence, maybe someone else would have done even better job... but given the track record for stock value, replacing Musk with someone else seems like a huge risk. Which is why investors don't want to do it.

And eventually, yellow media cannot affect the outcome of market realities that much. They might run scandal stories about Musk taking drugs, or Musk having wrong political views, and then run another story when stock price drops by 20% 3 weeks later. Then people like you can believe that oh, due to Musk tweeting, now the stock price collapsed. But guess what? You were just being used, lied to. You did not check the stock price yourself, you just read the media, so you missed the fact that stock price rose back again 2 weeks later, and beyond. This is exactly what stock prices do, they fluctuate. Understanding why is a bit more complicated than yellow media makes it look like.

[SiliconWizard]

Google must be spying on me, this just popped up in my recommendations.
(...)

Well, there were videos about Elon in this very thread. It was enough to visit the pages of this thread that contained such videos, even if you didn't actually click on them, to have that linked to your YT account if you use it on the same browser. That's the niceties of embedded YT videos.

[TimFox]

For literary predecessors, consult the fiction of Robert Heinlein.