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Elon just learned that BTC is bad for the environment? Should have googled it before he bought $1.5 billion of it! Honest mistake I suppose.

unstatusthequo 5y ago
He wants people to buy solar panels and battery power walls. High legacy-created energy cost is good for business, no?
hinkley 5y ago
I mean, in theory someone who owns a big part of a resource distribution system with a high potential waste factor could start a side business that makes use of that resource when it's about to 'spoil'. Be that a condiment factory or BTC mining next to your cubes of lithium. Building battery backup near solar farms and then burning the surplus as BTC mining whenever the batteries get full but it's a windy, sunny day would reduce the footprint of BTC a bit. But like the rest of the grid, those happy stories are built on a bed of lies/coal/natural gas. You can change the ratios all you want but at the end of the day those don't shrink the bad parts very much, and dilution is not the solution. Also, the sad fact is that as much as I wish it were different, having hardware sitting idle is super expensive, both financially and embodied cost. Mining hardware and the buildings to store them have a carbon - and water - footprint even when they are off.
Ekaros 5y ago
Looking at hyper loop his technical chops might not be what some people make them to be... So it might have been...
- nickik 5y ago
  Have you actually read his paper? Not the bunch of nonsense later published by people like Hyperloop One and other basically scam companies? What is your bases for dismissing it? Is it videos by one youtuber (who gets reference literally by everybody on this topic)? And even if its not the best possible solution, he basically spent some amount of time on an idea did some validation on it with teams at Tesla and SpaceX and said he thinks its a good idea and made it public. Like even if its not the best idea ever, does that prove he is not a good engineer? Some of the greatest engineers ever had ideas that were not actually workable in practice or were wrong about some major thing.
  - imtringued 5y ago
    >What is your bases for dismissing it? My base is Elon Musk. Even Elon Musk himself doesn't believe in his own ideas. He constantly winds them down. Even his Vegas Loop is just Tesla's in tunnels. Yes it wasn't meant to be a Hyperloop but he didn't even get self driving working in a damn tunnel, all you need for this is line following and collision detection for cars and pedestrians. He told us he was going to build pods that can hold a dozen people, he didn't. If he can't even do the Vegas Loop properly then how is he going to build something more complicated than that? He said the Hyperloop will have air cushion suspension and then "downgrades" it to ... wheels? All he did is create a sales pitch. He's not going to build the hyperloop he promised, the same way he is not going to create the Vegas loop in the way he promised. > Not the bunch of nonsense later published by people like Hyperloop One and other basically scam companies? Well, that is sad because those companies were actually building Hyperloops. If they are scam companies, then the concept is essentially a scam and Elon Musk avoids being associated with the scam by never building one.
    - nickik 5y ago
      So basically a bunch of non technical opinion about Elon Musk and your partly nonsensical interpretations of his actions? Color me unconvinced. Las Vegas is literally a first of a kind minimal application. Self-Driving is still planned. > If he can't even do the Vegas Loop properly then how is he going to build something more complicated than that? So when Falcon 1 failed were you like 'They can't even do Falcon 1 probably how can they do Starship'. This is just a terrible argument. The question is not if the first of its kind minimal test is perfect but rather if the overall idea and concept holds up. I have yet to see any actual sensible analysis of why it doesn't that is not based on a totally flawed understanding of the actual design. Continuously moving public transport based on mass produced electric drive train threw slim tunnels is sensible and cost effective. > He said the Hyperloop will have air cushion suspension and then "downgrades" it to ... wheels? You said it yourself. A loop is not a hyperloop. A hyperloop is a connection between two high density areas over a long distance. A loop is for within one city or maybe region and was literally always designed to be used with cheap mass produced electric drive trains. > All he did is create a sales pitch. He's not going to build the hyperloop he promised, the same way he is not going to create the Vegas loop in the way he promised. He created a sales pitch and then didn't sell anything? So what makes it a sales pitch? He quite literally said he was gone release a technical blue paper of something he found interesting and did as a personal hobby and that's all he was gone do. And that exactly what he did. Do you get mad at any company that releases a blue paper without a product? You are just making up your own version of the story. He literally never promised a hyperloop. Please find me one bit of evidence that Musk ever actually promised anything to anybody. In fact, literally the opposite is true. He said 'I don't have time for this', he literally anti-promised it but somehow because people prefer to read media reports 5x removed missed this point. It was many years later when he started the Boring company with a different goal of solving a totally different problem. > Well, that is sad because those companies were actually building Hyperloops. If they are scam companies, then the concept is essentially a scam and Elon Musk avoids being associated with the scam by never building one. No they were not, please actually compare their concepts to Musk Hyperloop paper. Technically they are quite different and often do things specifically pointed out in Musk paper as things that he considers not viable. They were just people trying to get investment by associating their ideas with Musk because of his popularity. You hardly blame Musk for being popular and people trying to do that sort of thing. Its exactly because of people like you who say things like 'Musk promised Hyperloop' or associate literally any company that uses the term 'Hyperloop' and associate them with Musk.

unstatusthequo 5y ago

He wants people to buy solar panels and battery power walls. High legacy-created energy cost is good for business, no?

hinkley 5y ago

I mean, in theory someone who owns a big part of a resource distribution system with a high potential waste factor could start a side business that makes use of that resource when it's about to 'spoil'. Be that a condiment factory or BTC mining next to your cubes of lithium. Building battery backup near solar farms and then burning the surplus as BTC mining whenever the batteries get full but it's a windy, sunny day would reduce the footprint of BTC a bit. But like the rest of the grid, those happy stories are built on a bed of lies/coal/natural gas. You can change the ratios all you want but at the end of the day those don't shrink the bad parts very much, and dilution is not the solution. Also, the sad fact is that as much as I wish it were different, having hardware sitting idle is super expensive, both financially and embodied cost. Mining hardware and the buildings to store them have a carbon - and water - footprint even when they are off.

Ekaros 5y ago

Looking at hyper loop his technical chops might not be what some people make them to be... So it might have been...

nickik 5y ago
Have you actually read his paper? Not the bunch of nonsense later published by people like Hyperloop One and other basically scam companies? What is your bases for dismissing it? Is it videos by one youtuber (who gets reference literally by everybody on this topic)? And even if its not the best possible solution, he basically spent some amount of time on an idea did some validation on it with teams at Tesla and SpaceX and said he thinks its a good idea and made it public. Like even if its not the best idea ever, does that prove he is not a good engineer? Some of the greatest engineers ever had ideas that were not actually workable in practice or were wrong about some major thing.
- imtringued 5y ago
  >What is your bases for dismissing it? My base is Elon Musk. Even Elon Musk himself doesn't believe in his own ideas. He constantly winds them down. Even his Vegas Loop is just Tesla's in tunnels. Yes it wasn't meant to be a Hyperloop but he didn't even get self driving working in a damn tunnel, all you need for this is line following and collision detection for cars and pedestrians. He told us he was going to build pods that can hold a dozen people, he didn't. If he can't even do the Vegas Loop properly then how is he going to build something more complicated than that? He said the Hyperloop will have air cushion suspension and then "downgrades" it to ... wheels? All he did is create a sales pitch. He's not going to build the hyperloop he promised, the same way he is not going to create the Vegas loop in the way he promised. > Not the bunch of nonsense later published by people like Hyperloop One and other basically scam companies? Well, that is sad because those companies were actually building Hyperloops. If they are scam companies, then the concept is essentially a scam and Elon Musk avoids being associated with the scam by never building one.
  - nickik 5y ago
    So basically a bunch of non technical opinion about Elon Musk and your partly nonsensical interpretations of his actions? Color me unconvinced. Las Vegas is literally a first of a kind minimal application. Self-Driving is still planned. > If he can't even do the Vegas Loop properly then how is he going to build something more complicated than that? So when Falcon 1 failed were you like 'They can't even do Falcon 1 probably how can they do Starship'. This is just a terrible argument. The question is not if the first of its kind minimal test is perfect but rather if the overall idea and concept holds up. I have yet to see any actual sensible analysis of why it doesn't that is not based on a totally flawed understanding of the actual design. Continuously moving public transport based on mass produced electric drive train threw slim tunnels is sensible and cost effective. > He said the Hyperloop will have air cushion suspension and then "downgrades" it to ... wheels? You said it yourself. A loop is not a hyperloop. A hyperloop is a connection between two high density areas over a long distance. A loop is for within one city or maybe region and was literally always designed to be used with cheap mass produced electric drive trains. > All he did is create a sales pitch. He's not going to build the hyperloop he promised, the same way he is not going to create the Vegas loop in the way he promised. He created a sales pitch and then didn't sell anything? So what makes it a sales pitch? He quite literally said he was gone release a technical blue paper of something he found interesting and did as a personal hobby and that's all he was gone do. And that exactly what he did. Do you get mad at any company that releases a blue paper without a product? You are just making up your own version of the story. He literally never promised a hyperloop. Please find me one bit of evidence that Musk ever actually promised anything to anybody. In fact, literally the opposite is true. He said 'I don't have time for this', he literally anti-promised it but somehow because people prefer to read media reports 5x removed missed this point. It was many years later when he started the Boring company with a different goal of solving a totally different problem. > Well, that is sad because those companies were actually building Hyperloops. If they are scam companies, then the concept is essentially a scam and Elon Musk avoids being associated with the scam by never building one. No they were not, please actually compare their concepts to Musk Hyperloop paper. Technically they are quite different and often do things specifically pointed out in Musk paper as things that he considers not viable. They were just people trying to get investment by associating their ideas with Musk because of his popularity. You hardly blame Musk for being popular and people trying to do that sort of thing. Its exactly because of people like you who say things like 'Musk promised Hyperloop' or associate literally any company that uses the term 'Hyperloop' and associate them with Musk.