Elon Musk now owns 9.2% of twitter...update.. will soon be the sole owner as Board of Directors accepts his purchase offer

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Zorba

Lifer
Oct 22, 1999
15,282
10,879
136
I have inserted myself into right wing media on Facebook and I shit you not, these, say 10+, different outlets is broadcasting in tune, lockstep, and this is the marching orders right now: Elon Musk is a right wing hero playing 71D chess with Twitter -the weak woke end of days lgbtq big tech globalist- platform.
*SOME ENTITY* is making a concerted propagandist effort to flood the zone with shit. And its WORKING.
I am halfway suspecting that some of this is an effort to twart feed algorithms, if you have 10+ outlets more or less broadcast the same shit you can flood an persons feed/info silo with exclusively just that same shit.
Yeah, this is the right wing media play book. You see it working here, where some right winger will say "If you don't like the source, Google it it's all over." Then you Google it and it's 50 websites with the identical story, all right wing crazy places.
 

Vic

Elite Member
Jun 12, 2001
50,422
14,336
136
I have inserted myself into right wing media on Facebook and I shit you not, these, say 10+, different outlets is broadcasting in tune, lockstep, and this is the marching orders right now: Elon Musk is a right wing hero playing 71D chess with Twitter -the weak woke end of days lgbtq big tech globalist- platform.
*SOME ENTITY* is making a concerted propagandist effort to flood the zone with shit. And its WORKING.
I am halfway suspecting that some of this is an effort to twart feed algorithms, if you have 10+ outlets more or less broadcast the same shit you can flood an persons feed/info silo with exclusively just that same shit.

That "some entity" is Musk's propanganda machine.

Kinda replying to your other post as well, something most people don't realize is that Musk is a con man a la Harold Hill the Music Man and always has been. He doesn't actually care about going to Mars except that it's a long con so lofty and grandiose that, as long as he can keep it going, he can suck up massive quantities of investor and govt monies forever. Just like the Tesla full self driving con. FFS, his cons are contradictory even, as Starlink is more likely to trigger a Kessler event (thus preventing us from reaching space and Mars) than it is to be profitable.
And to keep his Ponzi scheme of impossible ideas going, Musk has a marketing machine running 24/7. This is one reason why he wanted Twitter, so he could own a social media platform. And because, even as he's reached new highs of fame and fortune, he's heavily leveraged, has too many projects going on at once, and his cons are slowly unwinding. FSD doesn't work, and TSLA has crashed 40% YTD. Starship isn't going to make this year's Hohmann Transfer window to Mars (or likely the rest this decade for that matter), Starlink is a mess, Boring Co is a joke, and so forth. So he's doubling down on the marketing and cult of personality.
 
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Vic

Elite Member
Jun 12, 2001
50,422
14,336
136
Yeah, this is the right wing media play book. You see it working here, where some right winger will say "If you don't like the source, Google it it's all over." Then you Google it and it's 50 websites with the identical story, all right wing crazy places.
This works on right-wingers because they care more about confirmation bias than facts. They care more about the sources of their information than they do about whether that information is truthful.
And the reason they do that is because they want to appear knowledgeable about subjects they actually know very little about (particularly with regards to core concepts). Which makes them very suspectible to emotion-based tribalist propaganda.
 

cytg111

Lifer
Mar 17, 2008
24,027
13,536
136
That "some entity" is Musk's propanganda machine.

Kinda replying to your other post as well, something most people don't realize is that Musk is a con man a la Harold Hill the Music Man and always has been. He doesn't actually care about going to Mars except that it's a long con so lofty and grandiose that, as long as he can keep it going, he can suck up massive quantities of investor and govt monies forever. Just like the Tesla full self driving con. FFS, his cons are contradictory even, as Starlink is more likely to trigger a Kessler event (thus preventing us from reaching space and Mars) than it is to be profitable.
And to keep his Ponzi scheme of impossible ideas going, Musk has a marketing machine running 24/7. This is one reason why he wanted Twitter, so he could own a social media platform. And because, even as he's reached new highs of fame and fortune, he's heavily leveraged, has too many projects going on at once, and his cons are slowly unwinding. FSD doesn't work, and TSLA has crashed 40% YTD. Starship isn't going to make this year's Hohmann Transfer window to Mars (or likely the rest this decade for that matter), Starlink is a mess, Boring Co is a joke, and so forth. So he's doubling down on the marketing and cult of personality.

I get it but I dont see it to that extreme. Trump is a con man. To put energy and work hours into something that Elon does and then call it a con.. well then its a stupid con. Paypal put digital money on the map. Tesla brought EV forth a decade or more? Cheap access to space? Sure some of his shit is not panning out and FSD may turn out to meet the reality that it just wont work, cant work.. and looking into that fact after billions of dollars spend and with 20/20 hindsight vision, then yea, maybe that was evident from the get-go. There is gonna be problems that an AI cant handle unless its a *true* AI. Anyway. I associate "con man" with someone like Trump... For all his faults, I dont put Elon in that basket.
 

cytg111

Lifer
Mar 17, 2008
24,027
13,536
136
Yeah, this is the right wing media play book. You see it working here, where some right winger will say "If you don't like the source, Google it it's all over." Then you Google it and it's 50 websites with the identical story, all right wing crazy places.
100%. Yep. In concert. Its sneaky bitchy convoluted brainwash is what it is.
 

Vic

Elite Member
Jun 12, 2001
50,422
14,336
136
I get it but I dont see it to that extreme. Trump is a con man. To put energy and work hours into something that Elon does and then call it a con.. well then its a stupid con. Paypal put digital money on the map. Tesla brought EV forth a decade or more? Cheap access to space? Sure some of his shit is not panning out and FSD may turn out to meet the reality that it just wont work, cant work.. and looking into that fact after billions of dollars spend and with 20/20 hindsight vision, then yea, maybe that was evident from the get-go. There is gonna be problems that an AI cant handle unless its a *true* AI. Anyway. I associate "con man" with someone like Trump... For all his faults, I dont put Elon in that basket.

Musk belongs squarely in that basket. Almost everything most people believe about him are actually lies. He had nothing to do with Paypal's success. He never had any student loans and he comes from one of South Africa's wealthiest families. He did do a lot to help push forward EV tech, but that was coming anyway, and his motives were purely his ambition. While his promises for Mars have literally no scientific basis whatsoever.
The only reason people believe that Musk isn't a con man is because of his well-oiled social media propaganda machine. You even saw it but still don't believe.
 
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Vic

Elite Member
Jun 12, 2001
50,422
14,336
136
100%. Yep. In concert. Its sneaky bitchy convoluted brainwash is what it is.
It works because of this. An individual person's capacity for knowledge is actually quite limited (quite shockingly so), even for the most intelligent people, and so we all derive our knowledge from shared sources. If you think about it, it makes sense. Knowledge is highly specialized in our complex modern world, and most people don't actually know what they think they know.
What right-wing media does is manipulate people into accepting them as their primary knowledge source, by providing the latest talking points (so that right-wingers can appear knowledgeable) while sowing doubt about legitimate sources of knowledge (aka why anti-vaxxers get their medical advice from the right-wing media and not their doctors, for example).

 
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Zorba

Lifer
Oct 22, 1999
15,282
10,879
136
Musk belongs squarely in that basket. Almost everything most people believe about him are actually lies. He had nothing to do with Paypal's success. He never had any student loans and he comes from one of South Africa's wealthiest families. He did do a lot to help push forward EV tech, but that was coming anyway, and his motives were purely his ambition. While his promises for Mars have literally no scientific basis whatsoever.
The only reason people believe that Musk isn't a con man is because of his well-oiled social media propaganda machine. You even saw it but still don't believe.
I agree with most of what you're saying, but SpaceX has legitimately pushed the launch industry forward. Doesn't mean Mars is reality or that Starlink is a good idea, though.
 

cytg111

Lifer
Mar 17, 2008
24,027
13,536
136
Yea I guess NASA has fallen for his con too… Remove the emotional component from your reality filters, I think you’ll find it hard to prosecute a 100% con conviction.
 

Vic

Elite Member
Jun 12, 2001
50,422
14,336
136
I agree with most of what you're saying, but SpaceX has legitimately pushed the launch industry forward. Doesn't mean Mars is reality or that Starlink is a good idea, though.
I will grant that SpaceX scored big with reusable rockets. Musk does seem to have a talent for concentrating money and talent towards a goal. He's quite the risk taker, and occasionally he succeeds. But where he fails is in not recognizing when his goals are infeasable or downright unachievable. That's when he doubles down, and takes the rest of us with him, spinning one big lie after another to keep us on the hook.
Musk likes to make promises that play well to the crowd that believe Star Trek is based on actual science and that anything is possible as long you believe hard enough. And real science just doesn't work like that.
 
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Vic

Elite Member
Jun 12, 2001
50,422
14,336
136
Yea I guess NASA has fallen for his con too… Remove the emotional component from your reality filters, I think you’ll find it hard to prosecute a 100% con conviction.
People forget that NASA is just as invested in ULA as SpaceX, and that ULA has a better track record. Plus SpaceX isn't just Musk. There are talented people there who do the real making it happen. And I feel bad for them that their talents are being squandered on his personal glory projects.
 

Vic

Elite Member
Jun 12, 2001
50,422
14,336
136
Look guys, the proof of Musk's cons lie in his plans to colonize Mars using the same craft (Starship) from earth launch to Mars landing. This is absolutely the wrong way to get humans to any destination in the solar system. Apollo didn't even go to the Moon that way.
The more feasible (and safer) method would be an earth launch vehicle to a space station in LEO, then a transit vehicle from LEO to a station in moon orbit, then the interplanetary vehicle from moon orbit to Mars orbit, and then a landing craft. And when we do get to Mars, that's how we're going to get there. One step at a time in a decades long process of building those steps. Because space and rocket fuel are deadly.
Putting all your fuel, passengers, and supplies in one ship (or fleet of ships for that matter) is simply not feasible (or wise) with current technology. But to those who want to get to Mars "in our lifetimes," it has a really strong appeal.
 
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Zorba

Lifer
Oct 22, 1999
15,282
10,879
136
People forget that NASA is just as invested in ULA as SpaceX, and that ULA has a better track record. Plus SpaceX isn't just Musk. There are talented people there who do the real making it happen. And I feel bad for them that their talents are being squandered on his personal glory projects.
SpaceX has a terrible environment and treats their people like shit, or at least did when back in the day. But like you said Musk is a big risk taker and he actually lets the engineers be engineers and he is willing to blow shit up to figure it out. A decade ago no one thought turning around a rocket and landing it back at the pad or on a ship was realistic, but Musk was willing to let his engineers fail until they succeeded. Really, I am sure ULA or Boeing could do the exact same thing if their management would let the engineers just be engineers and accept some risk of failure to push the technology.

Now on self driving or star link I think some of that risk taking is very excessive, so there are definitely pros and cons.
 

Heartbreaker

Diamond Member
Apr 3, 2006
4,340
5,464
136
Musk belongs squarely in that basket. Almost everything most people believe about him are actually lies. He had nothing to do with Paypal's success. He never had any student loans and he comes from one of South Africa's wealthiest families. He did do a lot to help push forward EV tech, but that was coming anyway, and his motives were purely his ambition. While his promises for Mars have literally no scientific basis whatsoever.
The only reason people believe that Musk isn't a con man is because of his well-oiled social media propaganda machine. You even saw it but still don't believe.

It's possible for Musk to be both a repugnant human being (he is), and a very capable and accomplished one (he is).

IMO, without Musk, there would be no Tesla, and no SpaceX today. These are important companies that moved the state of the art forward. They aren't a con.
 

Mai72

Lifer
Sep 12, 2012
11,562
1,741
126
Musk belongs squarely in that basket. Almost everything most people believe about him are actually lies. He had nothing to do with Paypal's success. He never had any student loans and he comes from one of South Africa's wealthiest families. He did do a lot to help push forward EV tech, but that was coming anyway, and his motives were purely his ambition. While his promises for Mars have literally no scientific basis whatsoever.
The only reason people believe that Musk isn't a con man is because of his well-oiled social media propaganda machine. You even saw it but still don't believe.

People love to bring up the fact that he came from wealthy family. Like that negates his accomplishments, and that he doesn't deserve the positive attention and admiration he has received over the years. I disagree. Elon took some very big risk, and worked 16- 20 hrs a day to make SpaceX a reality. That is just a FACT my friend. He could had easily retired at 32 with $180m in his bank account. When people are born into money its mostly a hinderance. Drugs, alchoal abuse, parties. Most become dependent on their inheritence, and many blow through the money in a matter of years. Its only the 0.0001% like Elon who rises past the noise and nonsense. He took a huge risk and it paid off. For that, we must give him the respect he deserves.

I'm not big on legacy. I believe that everything will be forgotten, and what we do today will be lost to time. Given a long enough time line. Say in 500 years, or 1000. Elon OTOH will probably be remembered 100 years from now, while the majority of humanity will be forgotten. His work: SpaceX, Tesla and what he does moving forward will be remembered for many years after we are all gone and forgotten.
 

zinfamous

No Lifer
Jul 12, 2006
111,165
30,117
146
It works because of this. An individual person's capacity for knowledge is actually quite limited (quite shockingly so), even for the most intelligent people, and so we all derive our knowledge from shared sources. If you think about it, it makes sense. Knowledge is highly specialized in our complex modern world, and most people don't actually know what they think they know.
What right-wing media does is manipulate people into accepting them as their primary knowledge source, by providing the latest talking points (so that right-wingers can appear knowledgeable) while sowing doubt about legitimate sources of knowledge (aka why anti-vaxxers get their medical advice from Tractor Supply Store and not their doctors, for example).

Fixed.
 

cytg111

Lifer
Mar 17, 2008
24,027
13,536
136
...

I'm not big on legacy. I believe that everything will be forgotten, and what we do today will be lost to time. Given a long enough time line. Say in 500 years, or 1000. Elon OTOH will probably be remembered 100 years from now, while the majority of humanity will be forgotten. His work: SpaceX, Tesla and what he does moving forward will be remembered for many years after we are all gone and forgotten.

All these moments will be lost in time like tears in rain?
 

Zorba

Lifer
Oct 22, 1999
15,282
10,879
136
People love to bring up the fact that he came from wealthy family. Like that negates his accomplishments, and that he doesn't deserve the positive attention and admiration he has received over the years. I disagree. Elon took some very big risk, and worked 16- 20 hrs a day to make SpaceX a reality. That is just a FACT my friend. He could had easily retired at 32 with $180m in his bank account. When people are born into money its mostly a hinderance. Drugs, alchoal abuse, parties. Most become dependent on their inheritence, and many blow through the money in a matter of years. Its only the 0.0001% like Elon who rises past the noise and nonsense. He took a huge risk and it paid off. For that, we must give him the respect he deserves.

I'm not big on legacy. I believe that everything will be forgotten, and what we do today will be lost to time. Given a long enough time line. Say in 500 years, or 1000. Elon OTOH will probably be remembered 100 years from now, while the majority of humanity will be forgotten. His work: SpaceX, Tesla and what he does moving forward will be remembered for many years after we are all gone and forgotten.
I think you need to look up the stats on just how much been born into privilege helps someone. No they don't all go on to create rockets that land themselves, but way more than their fair share end up as executives.
 

Vic

Elite Member
Jun 12, 2001
50,422
14,336
136
People love to bring up the fact that he came from wealthy family. Like that negates his accomplishments, and that he doesn't deserve the positive attention and admiration he has received over the years. I disagree. Elon took some very big risk, and worked 16- 20 hrs a day to make SpaceX a reality. That is just a FACT my friend. He could had easily retired at 32 with $180m in his bank account. When people are born into money its mostly a hinderance. Drugs, alchoal abuse, parties. Most become dependent on their inheritence, and many blow through the money in a matter of years. Its only the 0.0001% like Elon who rises past the noise and nonsense. He took a huge risk and it paid off. For that, we must give him the respect he deserves.

I'm not big on legacy. I believe that everything will be forgotten, and what we do today will be lost to time. Given a long enough time line. Say in 500 years, or 1000. Elon OTOH will probably be remembered 100 years from now, while the majority of humanity will be forgotten. His work: SpaceX, Tesla and what he does moving forward will be remembered for many years after we are all gone and forgotten.

I brought up the fact that Musk came from a wealthy family because Musk and his propaganda machine like to tell people that he didn't.
 

Vic

Elite Member
Jun 12, 2001
50,422
14,336
136
I think you need to look up the stats on just how much been born into privilege helps someone. No they don't all go on to create rockets that land themselves, but way more than their fair share end up as executives.

Yeah, it's beyond stupid to argue that being born wealthy is some kind of a hindrance to success.
 

Vic

Elite Member
Jun 12, 2001
50,422
14,336
136
It's possible for Musk to be both a repugnant human being (he is), and a very capable and accomplished one (he is).

IMO, without Musk, there would be no Tesla, and no SpaceX today. These are important companies that moved the state of the art forward. They aren't a con.

Contrary to popular myth and the delusional teachings of Ayn Rand, no single person is ever responsible for advancements in human technology. Not in the past, and certainly not now. I can appreciate that Musk's risk taking likely sped up some advancements by a few years (if not decades), but without him, there still would have been someone else.

I also think you all are missing the point when I'm talking about what Musk's cons are. You guys think Tesla and you likely think EVs, but EV's aren't why TSLA achieved a market cap greater than all the other automakers combined. That was because Musk promised FSD. Which was a con. Tesla is nowhere near FSD. Likewise, with SpaceX, you all likely think of reusable rockets, but what's actually been driving investment into SpaceX has been Musk's "dream" of putting 100k humans on Mars in a self-sustaining permanent settlement by the end of the 2030s. Which is also a con (for a long list of reasons).
 
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Heartbreaker

Diamond Member
Apr 3, 2006
4,340
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Contrary to popular myth and the delusional teachings of Ayn Rand, no single person is ever responsible for advancements in human technology. Not in the past, and certainly not now. I can appreciate that Musk's risk taking likely sped up some advancements by a few years (if not decades), but without him, there still would have been someone else.

I also think you all are missing the point when I'm talking about what Musk's cons are. You guys think Tesla and you likely think EVs, but EV's aren't why TSLA achieved a market cap greater than all the other automakers combined. That was because Musk promised FSD. Which was a con. Tesla is nowhere near FSD. Likewise, with SpaceX, you all likely think of reusable rockets, but what's actually been driving investment into SpaceX has been Musk's "dream" of putting 100k humans on Mars in a self-sustaining permanent settlement by the end of the 2030s. Which is also a con (for a long list of reasons).

Investors aren't chasing Mars, or FSD. They are responding to practical things like Tesla being very profitable, and SpaceX successfully having a string launches and landings.
 
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Mar 11, 2004
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Musk's ideas aren't even his own. I've literally not heard a single unique idea come from him. Its all sci-fi shit that he grew up with or was stuff that wasn't pushed for (electric cars) due to entrenched interests. Which, hell I'll give him credit in that he actually pushed for that stuff and put skin (money) in the game to build it. But he's since become such a full of himself/shit assclown that he's actively causing problems.

Literally he just got lucky in that he sold a company to PayPal when it exploded in value, then he got enough investment to buy into Tesla and start SpaceX. Both also have been fortunate that they got major support from the US government (despite the bullshit narrative of them doing everything on their own) at critical points and a lot of luck. That's not to dispute that they've had a lot of talented people doing great things, but they've been ridiculously fortunate as well.

Basically none of that Musk is responsible for. He's not ignorant, but he's also not the reason SpaceX or Tesla have actually been successful (that is because of the engineers and workers), and he's often been to their detriment (see his fiascoe where he nearly put Tesla under trying to automate the production line because he didn't understand that even iPhones and other stuff far simpler than cars can't be automated to that level).

Musk is Steve Jobs. He knows some stuff, but he's grossly given credit for what others actually accomplish. He's just a shrewd businessman that is willing to put his own personal greed first and say fuck you to all else. That's why they are successful financially. The thing is, that's rewarded in American Capitalism. That's why the companies are successful financially. But they also are getting in the way of the companies being as successful as they could be. Like Jobs with his "no, a 4" phone is all anyone will need, no larger!" or skeupmorphism design insistance, etc.