Thunderf00t has lost last of his marbles and remaining bits of credibility

[Zero999]

That is only so far. Trump has just ordered everyone to defer to Musk.

FAA is in Musk's bad books for fining him over unlicensed rocket launches. There is a stupendous conflict of interests here, and given Musk's super-thin skin and emotions of a six-year-old, do you expect him to say, "OK, fair cop, gov, I'll mend my ways"? Not a bleeding chance!

The FAA is an important example.  They had the unmitigated audacity to fine Musk’s enterprise for a violation of regulations.  The head was forced out (resigned on Inauguration Day), leaving the agency unheaded in time for the DCA collision.
But don’t worry: it has been announced that Musk will self-report any conflicts of interest.

He was going to be forced out anyway. Nothing to do with Musk.
Your issue is that a Republican president appoints another Republican as head of a agency. Unlike last time this was always going to happen, as you cannot have an entire administration that's working against you.

Under “settled” US law, many technical agencies were established with terms for directors that straddled terms for Presidents to afford some independence from political control.  This is inconvenient for some. 

I can't speak for the US, but I know in the UK, most civil servants support parties/politicians who support increased public spending, which results in a certain bias in government funded agencies.

[TimFox]

That’s why the appropriation of funds and raising of revenue through taxation and tariffs are assigned by the US constitution to the Congress, subject to overridable veto of the President.
That, of course, is a political process.

[EEVblog]

Ok, that's enough off-topic stuff.

[MK14]

Thunderf00t, has released another new video.
I bet no one, can guess, the person or subject area?

[tszaboo]

Thunderf00t, has released another new video.
I bet no one, can guess, the person or subject area?

All right, new theory. I don't think Thunderfoot went crazy, he is getting paid to release these videos. We saw all these crypto YouTubers that you can buy content for very cheap, they will absolutely screw over their own audience for payments. So he must be getting money to make these videos, because there is no way an intelligent person to be this dumb.

[MK14]

All right, new theory. I don't think Thunderfoot went crazy, he is getting paid to release these videos. We saw all these crypto YouTubers that you can buy content for very cheap, they will absolutely screw over their own audience for payments. So he must be getting money to make these videos, because there is no way an intelligent person to be this dumb.

As I see it, Elon Musk, seems to have triggered, some kind of obsessive "this person is WRONG as regards engineering/scientific/truth" feelings (extremely strong), with the Thunderf00t YouTube channel (although a YouTube channel, may appear to be mainly created by one person, in some cases, behind the scenes, there can be others, such as friends, helpers, colleagues, family and so on, who also partly or fully, share the same views).

Which seems to be the theme, of many of his recent (but going back years), videos.

But at some level, Elon Musk's, massive investments, in so many different products/businesses and concepts.  Means that some of them, have had various levels of successes or failures, partly depending on peoples opinions.

E.g. Was a massive rocket, that traveled, thousands of miles, for many hours, successfully completing 95% of its planned mission targets.  But then, in the last 5% of the mission, have some kind of technical failure, loses control and ends up exploding.

A partial or near perfect, mission, or a terrible disaster?  Opinions can vary.

Without me starting political or off-topic.  Let me just say that Elon Musk, was a big target area, of Thunderf00t's, a long time before Elon moved into serious political, circles, within America.  Which hugely complicates the issues.

Elon Musk, seems to be what we call in the UK, 'Marmite'.

Because, some people really love the taste (person), and others think the taste is awful, hence 'Marmite'.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marmite

Love/hate polarisation
By the 1990s Marmite's distinctive and powerful flavour had earned it as many detractors as it had fans, and it was known for producing a polarised "love/hate" reaction amongst consumers. Marmite began a "Love it or Hate it" campaign in October 1996, and this resulted in the inventing of the phrase "Marmite effect" or "Marmite reaction" for anything which provoked controversy.

In the same way, some people seem to think Elon Musk is great, and others think they are terrible.  So, it is a tricky subject area.

I.e. Is a glass half-empty or half-full?

Approx half the American population, (who got round to actually voting), went for Elon Musks side (politically, without mentioning the T word).

But approximately half, went the other way.

So even America itself, is conflicted/unsure, i.e. in disagreement, with the 'best' choice.

[TimFox]

Musk was not on the ballot.

[MK14]

Musk was not on the ballot.

You're right, but to avoid going political and/or off-topic, I can't really discuss it, in a way that leads the thread off-course.

My understanding (at least in the UK), is that leaders, such as the UK Prime Minister.  Really, have senior advisor(s), who are the real ones, coming up with the policies, and ideas for what to do next.

I.e. The man at the top, is more of a puppet/leader, than the person/people, really in control, in a conceptual sense.

E.g. Although Elon Musk, is the public facing leader of his business portfolio.  Behind the scenes, there are leaders at the top of the company, who are really running/controlling the business, on a day to day basis.

I.e. The 'ballot' is choosing, the apparent person at the top of the chain of command, but many others, will do the actual running of things.

So, Mr T... is the top person, but there are others, such as Elon Musk, below them.

[TimFox]

Actual employees of the Federal Government who do things are not supposed to have blatant, undeclared, and unaudited conflicts of interest with their personal business.
Of course, the President can ask advice from anyone he chooses.

[tszaboo]

Actual employees of the Federal Government who do things are not supposed to have blatant, undeclared, and unaudited conflicts of interest with their personal business.
Of course, the President can ask advice from anyone he chooses.

Can you get over it, not to derail the topic again?

[PlainName]

Why not just delete the text. Leaving it in, even struck out, is basically saying "I want to have my say but you can't reply, so nah nah."

[MK14]

Why not just delete the text. Leaving it in, even struck out, is basically saying "I want to have my say but you can't reply, so nah nah."

You're right!
On reflection, I decided to delete the post, to help keep the thread on course.

[MK14]

Thunderf00ts, latest video (linked to a bit earlier, in this thread, by me).  Reminds me of the sort of conversations, one might hear, while standing around the Coffee/Tea-break/hot-drinks, section of a place.  Where an engineer, heavily criticizes, the senior boss/manager/leader, on various grounds.

On the one hand, yes they are technically right.  But on the other, whatever that leader seems to do/decide, it is always 'wrong'.

E.g. They don't agree to allow purchase of a new £20,000 oscilloscope, harming the project, which needs a decent one, to get the project done on time.

Alternatively, they do agree, to get the £20,000 oscilloscope, but what a waste of money,  the old one, was still working just fine.

I.e. There seems to be some unfair psychological effects, where the leader(s), are always wrong, somehow.

[Siwastaja]

People already complain about how long it gets to the airport, and how it takes for boarding screening, and is is for airports that have spent 80+ years being optimised for passenger movement efficiency.

This could become one of those mis-predictions; one of those "failure to see an opportunity" cases. I mean, is that true? In my opinion airports have not spent 80 years optimising for passenger movement efficiency. Quite the opposite, you can see 80 years of weight. Especially the increasing safety burden since 1990's, and recent cost-cutting in processing passengers, combined with increase in air travel with not much increase in number of airports but instead their size has led to the fact that no one gets in a plane in 45 minutes anymore, while it was possible 40 years ago. Now from city center it is like 3 hours until the plane gets in the air. Add another 3 hours at destination. And that's for direct flights.

Exactly the way how Musk's plan could succeed is re-thinking of this boarding process and since it's totally different, it is entirely possible debunkers miss some opportunity for optimization which is obvious only in hindsight. And for Musk to succeed, all that is needed is that it's not significantly worse than the current situation. Which is unnecessary bloated horrible crap process which I would never call "optimized for 80 years"; it's the opposite, "more and more crap on top of crap for 80 years with only small optimizations that get stuck in local minima".

Just like EVs were supposedly impractical because of <a lot of good reasons>, they ended up desirable by consumers because the accepted norm was so obviously crappy (to anyone else except fuel burning enthusiasts suffering from Stockholm syndrome). Similarly, current air travel totally and utterly sucks, it is just hard to see to some because it's been that way for a long time, and alternatives seem incomplete lunatic ideas so far. But some of them might still succeed, one day. And actually will succeed; believing that the current situation is eternal is like believing that the imperium of Rome is eternal.

[Refrigerator]

Thunderf00ts, latest video (linked to a bit earlier, in this thread, by me).  Reminds me of the sort of conversations, one might hear, while standing around the Coffee/Tea-break/hot-drinks, section of a place.  Where an engineer, heavily criticizes, the senior boss/manager/leader, on various grounds.

On the one hand, yes they are technically right.  But on the other, whatever that leader seems to do/decide, it is always 'wrong'.

For the average engineer when nothing goes wrong it's "usual" and "normal" and "every day whatever".
But when something wrong happens and, god forbid, the manager has any involvement, then it's the manager's fault because he did this thing wrong and all these thing prior. Even the little things.
There's a natural bias to criticize anything bad that happens, because anything good is considered "normal".
Managers get more heat because they're:
A. above you so they make the decisions.
B. their decisions are bigger financially and in other ways (as your 20k scope example shows right?)

[SiliconWizard]

Thunderf00t, has released another new video.
I bet no one, can guess, the person or subject area?

Indeed, I wasn't seeing that coming.

[coppercone2]

Thunderf00ts, latest video (linked to a bit earlier, in this thread, by me).  Reminds me of the sort of conversations, one might hear, while standing around the Coffee/Tea-break/hot-drinks, section of a place.  Where an engineer, heavily criticizes, the senior boss/manager/leader, on various grounds.

On the one hand, yes they are technically right.  But on the other, whatever that leader seems to do/decide, it is always 'wrong'.

For the average engineer when nothing goes wrong it's "usual" and "normal" and "every day whatever".
But when something wrong happens and, god forbid, the manager has any involvement, then it's the manager's fault because he did this thing wrong and all these thing prior. Even the little things.
There's a natural bias to criticize anything bad that happens, because anything good is considered "normal".
Managers get more heat because they're:
A. above you so they make the decisions.
B. their decisions are bigger financially and in other ways (as your 20k scope example shows right?)

their also paid very highly to basically scrutinize basic decisions that are not very complex

[Refrigerator]

Thunderf00ts, latest video (linked to a bit earlier, in this thread, by me).  Reminds me of the sort of conversations, one might hear, while standing around the Coffee/Tea-break/hot-drinks, section of a place.  Where an engineer, heavily criticizes, the senior boss/manager/leader, on various grounds.

On the one hand, yes they are technically right.  But on the other, whatever that leader seems to do/decide, it is always 'wrong'.

For the average engineer when nothing goes wrong it's "usual" and "normal" and "every day whatever".
But when something wrong happens and, god forbid, the manager has any involvement, then it's the manager's fault because he did this thing wrong and all these thing prior. Even the little things.
There's a natural bias to criticize anything bad that happens, because anything good is considered "normal".
Managers get more heat because they're:
A. above you so they make the decisions.
B. their decisions are bigger financially and in other ways (as your 20k scope example shows right?)

their also paid very highly to basically scrutinize basic decisions that are not very complex

A CEO form a company i worked at once said "i make the decisions, but we all share the responsibility".
And it came off like "i make the mistake and you all pay for it"
I'm sure he didn't mean anything bad by saying that though.

[coppercone2]

sometimes they say they don't pay you because you can't get blamed

but then they really dont pay you

oddly enough, it can be a death sentence for the highly paid if someone keeps changing requirements though, because magically the projects you approved have been useless lol

[MK14]

For the average engineer when nothing goes wrong it's "usual" and "normal" and "every day whatever".
But when something wrong happens and, god forbid, the manager has any involvement, then it's the manager's fault because he did this thing wrong and all these thing prior. Even the little things.
There's a natural bias to criticize anything bad that happens, because anything good is considered "normal".
Managers get more heat because they're:
A. above you so they make the decisions.
B. their decisions are bigger financially and in other ways (as your 20k scope example shows right?)

Thanks, yes that makes a lot of sense.

Putting that concept, into the Elon Musk situation, as regards them being a very high level manager, i.e. owner of one or more, multi-billion dollar (typically), business(s).

It can be perfectly normal, for such a person.  To invest/create/buy a number of such businesses, some or all of which may be significantly risky.  In the hope that when/if, at least one of them works out well, and becomes an extremely valuable company.

They can, sooner or later, sell the company or some of their shares in it, for substantially more than was originally paid/invested.

I'm NOT sure, Thunderf00t, properly understands that concept.

Also, in some cases, the business(s), may be purchased, to help with other businesses, rather than to make a profit.

E.g. If I was going to start up, from scratch, a very big car manufacturer.  It might make sense, to also buy up a large worldwide, car dealership.

NOT to make extra profit, from the car dealerships.  But to use the dealerships, as a platform, to grow the new car manufacturing plants (by massively increased sales).

[jnk0le]

again
https://youtu.be/oaGV9WrBIAs?si=uo8XN_nh6yk7tUSY

Did kickstarter run out of fresh scams to debunk?

[Zero999]

Musk was not on the ballot.

So what?

Politicians are free to choose whoever they like to advise and work for them. In this case the public knew Musk was going to be part of the Trump team before the election. It wasn't a big secret, so he might as well have been on the ballot.

Now, of course I'm not saying Musk is good or bad, just stating facts.

[wraper]

Musk was not on the ballot.

Neither were those whom he fired. Not to say in Musk's case, voters actually knew he'll be on the team and what was going to happen.

[Zero999]

Musk was not on the ballot.

Neither were those whom he fired. Not to say in Musk's case, voters actually knew he'll be on the team and what was going to happen.

Indeed. There are many unelected people who wield great power. The same could be said about Dr Fauci and Bill Gates.

[coppice]

Musk was not on the ballot.

Neither were those whom he fired. Not to say in Musk's case, voters actually knew he'll be on the team and what was going to happen.

Indeed. There are many unelected people who wield great power. The same could be said about Dr Fauci and Bill Gates.

There is no problem with people being unelected. Problems stem from people being unaccountable. If you elect a president, you are trusting them to build a team. They all either stand or fall at the next election, based on the public's level of consent to their actions. The permanent civil service has become largely unaccountable in many countries, and a hive of its worst elements. The lazy. The bureaucratic, for whom procedure is everything, and results irrelevant. The self servicing. The activists.