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When Musk first appeared I was hugely supportive. Definitely a fan of what he was doing both with SpaceX and Tesla. I'm still a fan of what those companies are

When Musk first appeared I was hugely supportive. Definitely a fan of what he was doing both with SpaceX and Tesla. I'm still a fan of what those companies are doing but Elon has destroyed my view of him with his own behavior and words. We should stop turning a blind eye to his labor practices. Likewise, we should give the engineers and other workers that are actually accomplishing these things more credit, vs pretending it's one lone genius. Tom Mueller in particular deserves far more credit.

tedivm 5y ago
Gwynne Shotwell deserves far more of the credit for SpaceX than Musk does.
- dylan604 5y ago
  Most large companies have people that deserve more credit than the sitting CEO. However, that's part of the role of CEO is to be the one people look to as being in "charge". Musk definitely doesn't shy away from that part to his detrement (clearly he doesn't see it that way). But I'm firmly with the previous poster in that I like what Tesla/SpaceX are doing and attempting, but think Musk is a bit of a tool. The irony is not lost on me that sometimes a calmer figurehead might not have been able to lead to success a company like Tesla and/or SpaceX.
- s5300 5y ago
  And Musk repeatedly publicly gives this to her/says this himself.
- abraae 5y ago
  I'm no fan of Musk's shitty and arrogant behaviour. His treatment of Unsworth was truly disgusting. But that's like saying after a rugby game that the left wing deserved far more of the credit than the coach or captain, since they were the one who ran in the winning try. The thing is that Musk makes things happen. Not in some lame and purely money driven field like crypto or ad tech - but genuinely moving the needle in combating climate change. I feel I have to cut him some slack and laud his achievements, even though he comes across as a person you would involuntarily punch in the face for his hideous behaviour.
  - lazyasciiart 5y ago
    No, it's more like saying the left winger deserves more credit than some stupid fan who jumped onto the pitch and got in the way.
  - tedivm 5y ago
    Gwynne Shotwell is the coach in this hypothetical, while Musk is just the mascot.
_tulpa 5y ago
I don't really see what Elon actually does beyond cultivating public image and having money.
- jamiek88 5y ago
  Let’s not go too far the other way now. He’s chief engineer at spacex for starters.
  - delecti 5y ago
    Edit: I can admit when I'm wrong. I stand by my assertion that it's absurd to call him a founder of Tesla, but his position in SpaceX seems to be legit. ~~He may be credited as chief engineer at SpaceX, but that doesn't mean he's meaningfully contributing to actual engineering efforts.~~ He's also credited as a founder of Tesla, despite not actually being involved in the founding of that company.
    - kiba 5y ago
      Elon Musk is a real engineer, especially if other engineers said he's an engineer.[1] Whatever his history is with other people or whatever his personality flaws or weakness, he's the real deal. [1]: https://www.reddit.com/r/SpaceXLounge/comments/k1e0ta/evidence_that_musk_is_the_chief_engineer_of_spacex/ https://www.reddit.com/r/SpaceXLounge/comments/k1e0ta/eviden...
      - Dah00n 5y ago
        >if other engineers said he's an engineer Nonsense! Engineer is an education, not a job title. It's no different than Musk calling himself Doctor. He either went to school for years to become an engineer or he isn't one.
        emptysongglass 5y ago
        I'm a software engineer. I do software engineering with other software engineers. But I didn't go to school for it, I was self-taught. That doesn't make me less of an engineer. It's ok to express an opinion about Musk either way. You can not like him for all kinds of reasons. But he actually wrote video games as a kid growing up. He wrote code at his earliest startups and a lot of it.
heavyset_go 5y ago
> We should stop turning a blind eye to his labor practices. Likewise, we should give the engineers and other workers that are actually accomplishing these things more credit, vs pretending it's one lone genius. We also need to hold him to account when Musk tries to ruin the lives of his employees who speak up about what goes on in his companies. He even tried to frame one of them as a mass shooter to police[1] in an effort to get them SWAT'd. [1] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2019-03-13/when-elon-musk-tried-to-destroy-tesla-whistleblower-martin-tripp https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2019-03-13/when-elon...
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- NavinF 5y ago
  Source does not support your claim. It says that an anonymous tip got the employee swatted.
  - yarcob 5y ago
    Musk has a history of going after people who critisize him in public. He (and his staff) have again and again attacked journalists, former employees, and anyone else who said anything bad about Tesla or Musk. A common thread is that they always try to present critics as liars and try to destroy their reputation. It's happened so often, that we must assume it's their standard method of operation. And whether that call was made by Musk himself or someone he instructed to ruin that persons life doesn't really make a difference. The fact is that Musk himself or one of his bullies lied to the police and they got away with it.
    - TeMPOraL 5y ago
      > Musk has a history of going after people who critisize him in public. Does he? Can you name three cases? > He (and his staff) have again and again attacked journalists, former employees, and anyone else who said anything bad about Tesla or Musk. Again, can you name three cases where Musk went after a journalist or former employees, and we know, beyond reasonable doubt, that the victim was right - and not, in fact, lying through their teeth? I ask because there is documented history of the reverse happening. Consider: 1. Top Gear did a hit piece on their first car, lying about its range (55 vs. 200 miles). This doesn't sound serious until you realize that, back then, people didn't believe in electric cars, mostly because of range worries. This kind of bullshit was arguably life-threatening not just to Tesla, but to the entire EV industry. Anyway, Tesla sued for libel and lost[0]. Here's a kicker: they lost because the judge deemed Top Gear is an entertainment show and not documentary, therefore they're not obliged to be factually accurate. 2. The incident with Top Gear made Tesla install telemetry in the cars given out for test drives; this came in handy few years later, when John Broder from New York Times decided to publish a hit piece on Model S[1]. Tesla then released data from the logs, directly contradicting the story, and demonstrating that Broder put in extensive effort to fabricate the bad results he then reported on. I can't blame them from being a bit sensitive after situations like these. For the past decade, there were, and still are, a lot of people standing to make boatloads of money from bringing Tesla and the EV market down. -- [0] - https://www.wired.com/2012/02/tesla-vs-top-gear/ https://www.wired.com/2012/02/tesla-vs-top-gear/ [1] - https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2013/feb/14/tesla-post-data-times-review https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2013/feb/14/tesla-pos...
jimbob45 5y ago
No one here turns a blind eye to his labor practices. Everyone here at HN knows to steer clear. It’s everyone that doesn’t frequent this website that needs enlightening.
exporectomy 5y ago
> We should stop turning a blind eye to his labor practices. Aren't there legal systems to make sure that's being done right? Is "we" some labor inspectors? If you want to give credit to engineers, where does it end? There are millions of engineers in the world doing important things. Crediting that many people will dilute the value of it all.
- heavyset_go 5y ago
  > Aren't there legal systems to make sure that's being done right? Is "we" some labor inspectors? "We" can be past, current and future employees, who might not contact or work with labor inspectors out of reverence to "the mission" or Musk himself.
sx_throwaway 5y ago
I used to work at one of the Musk companies. He was a huge mark in the "cons" column when I was deciding whether or not to take the job. He is embarrassing and he made me a little ashamed to say where I worked. I did my best to ignore him and I suspect others did too. No one ever talked about him.
mcguire 5y ago
Musk first appeared as what eventually became that universally loved company, PayPal. Which he was booted out of. Twice.

tedivm 5y ago

Gwynne Shotwell deserves far more of the credit for SpaceX than Musk does.

dylan604 5y ago
Most large companies have people that deserve more credit than the sitting CEO. However, that's part of the role of CEO is to be the one people look to as being in "charge". Musk definitely doesn't shy away from that part to his detrement (clearly he doesn't see it that way). But I'm firmly with the previous poster in that I like what Tesla/SpaceX are doing and attempting, but think Musk is a bit of a tool. The irony is not lost on me that sometimes a calmer figurehead might not have been able to lead to success a company like Tesla and/or SpaceX.
s5300 5y ago
And Musk repeatedly publicly gives this to her/says this himself.
abraae 5y ago
I'm no fan of Musk's shitty and arrogant behaviour. His treatment of Unsworth was truly disgusting. But that's like saying after a rugby game that the left wing deserved far more of the credit than the coach or captain, since they were the one who ran in the winning try. The thing is that Musk makes things happen. Not in some lame and purely money driven field like crypto or ad tech - but genuinely moving the needle in combating climate change. I feel I have to cut him some slack and laud his achievements, even though he comes across as a person you would involuntarily punch in the face for his hideous behaviour.
- lazyasciiart 5y ago
  No, it's more like saying the left winger deserves more credit than some stupid fan who jumped onto the pitch and got in the way.
- tedivm 5y ago
  Gwynne Shotwell is the coach in this hypothetical, while Musk is just the mascot.

_tulpa 5y ago

I don't really see what Elon actually does beyond cultivating public image and having money.

jamiek88 5y ago
Let’s not go too far the other way now. He’s chief engineer at spacex for starters.
- delecti 5y ago
  Edit: I can admit when I'm wrong. I stand by my assertion that it's absurd to call him a founder of Tesla, but his position in SpaceX seems to be legit. ~~He may be credited as chief engineer at SpaceX, but that doesn't mean he's meaningfully contributing to actual engineering efforts.~~ He's also credited as a founder of Tesla, despite not actually being involved in the founding of that company.
  - kiba 5y ago
    Elon Musk is a real engineer, especially if other engineers said he's an engineer.[1] Whatever his history is with other people or whatever his personality flaws or weakness, he's the real deal. [1]: https://www.reddit.com/r/SpaceXLounge/comments/k1e0ta/evidence_that_musk_is_the_chief_engineer_of_spacex/ https://www.reddit.com/r/SpaceXLounge/comments/k1e0ta/eviden...
    - Dah00n 5y ago
      >if other engineers said he's an engineer Nonsense! Engineer is an education, not a job title. It's no different than Musk calling himself Doctor. He either went to school for years to become an engineer or he isn't one.
      - emptysongglass 5y ago
        I'm a software engineer. I do software engineering with other software engineers. But I didn't go to school for it, I was self-taught. That doesn't make me less of an engineer. It's ok to express an opinion about Musk either way. You can not like him for all kinds of reasons. But he actually wrote video games as a kid growing up. He wrote code at his earliest startups and a lot of it.

heavyset_go 5y ago

> We should stop turning a blind eye to his labor practices. Likewise, we should give the engineers and other workers that are actually accomplishing these things more credit, vs pretending it's one lone genius. We also need to hold him to account when Musk tries to ruin the lives of his employees who speak up about what goes on in his companies. He even tried to frame one of them as a mass shooter to police[1] in an effort to get them SWAT'd. [1] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2019-03-13/when-elon-musk-tried-to-destroy-tesla-whistleblower-martin-tripp https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2019-03-13/when-elon...

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
NavinF 5y ago
Source does not support your claim. It says that an anonymous tip got the employee swatted.
- yarcob 5y ago
  Musk has a history of going after people who critisize him in public. He (and his staff) have again and again attacked journalists, former employees, and anyone else who said anything bad about Tesla or Musk. A common thread is that they always try to present critics as liars and try to destroy their reputation. It's happened so often, that we must assume it's their standard method of operation. And whether that call was made by Musk himself or someone he instructed to ruin that persons life doesn't really make a difference. The fact is that Musk himself or one of his bullies lied to the police and they got away with it.
  - TeMPOraL 5y ago
    > Musk has a history of going after people who critisize him in public. Does he? Can you name three cases? > He (and his staff) have again and again attacked journalists, former employees, and anyone else who said anything bad about Tesla or Musk. Again, can you name three cases where Musk went after a journalist or former employees, and we know, beyond reasonable doubt, that the victim was right - and not, in fact, lying through their teeth? I ask because there is documented history of the reverse happening. Consider: 1. Top Gear did a hit piece on their first car, lying about its range (55 vs. 200 miles). This doesn't sound serious until you realize that, back then, people didn't believe in electric cars, mostly because of range worries. This kind of bullshit was arguably life-threatening not just to Tesla, but to the entire EV industry. Anyway, Tesla sued for libel and lost[0]. Here's a kicker: they lost because the judge deemed Top Gear is an entertainment show and not documentary, therefore they're not obliged to be factually accurate. 2. The incident with Top Gear made Tesla install telemetry in the cars given out for test drives; this came in handy few years later, when John Broder from New York Times decided to publish a hit piece on Model S[1]. Tesla then released data from the logs, directly contradicting the story, and demonstrating that Broder put in extensive effort to fabricate the bad results he then reported on. I can't blame them from being a bit sensitive after situations like these. For the past decade, there were, and still are, a lot of people standing to make boatloads of money from bringing Tesla and the EV market down. -- [0] - https://www.wired.com/2012/02/tesla-vs-top-gear/ https://www.wired.com/2012/02/tesla-vs-top-gear/ [1] - https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2013/feb/14/tesla-post-data-times-review https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2013/feb/14/tesla-pos...

jimbob45 5y ago

No one here turns a blind eye to his labor practices. Everyone here at HN knows to steer clear. It’s everyone that doesn’t frequent this website that needs enlightening.

exporectomy 5y ago

> We should stop turning a blind eye to his labor practices. Aren't there legal systems to make sure that's being done right? Is "we" some labor inspectors? If you want to give credit to engineers, where does it end? There are millions of engineers in the world doing important things. Crediting that many people will dilute the value of it all.

heavyset_go 5y ago
> Aren't there legal systems to make sure that's being done right? Is "we" some labor inspectors? "We" can be past, current and future employees, who might not contact or work with labor inspectors out of reverence to "the mission" or Musk himself.

sx_throwaway 5y ago

I used to work at one of the Musk companies. He was a huge mark in the "cons" column when I was deciding whether or not to take the job. He is embarrassing and he made me a little ashamed to say where I worked. I did my best to ignore him and I suspect others did too. No one ever talked about him.

mcguire 5y ago

Musk first appeared as what eventually became that universally loved company, PayPal. Which he was booted out of. Twice.