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Nowhere in the emails do the Saudi investors pledge funding. At best, they say they might be interested in investing. Therefore, "funding secured" was absolute

Nowhere in the emails do the Saudi investors pledge funding. At best, they say they might be interested in investing. Therefore, "funding secured" was absolutely an outright lie, unless words don't have meaning anymore.

matthewdgreen 5y ago
It’s much worse than that. I had previously assumed Musk knew what he was doing and was fooling around on Twitter in an effort to (unethically) crush short sellers. Now it appears like he’s an utterly inept businessman who took the first verbal sign of interest, rushed it to Twitter as though the deal was complete, and then blew up the deal in a hissy fit. I still think what he’s done at SpaceX and Tesla is admirable, but after reading those emails I’m definitely a few percent less confident that there will still be a Tesla to service my Model 3 in the future.
- mlindner 5y ago
  He's not an inept businessman. He's someone with aspergers who takes someone at face value at all times. If someone says something is the case he believes them. He doesn't handle being deceived well nor does he know when it's happening. And actually he's not a "businessman" at all. He's an engineer at heart. "Businessman" would require strong social skills, not something someone with aspergers has good ability at.
  - fxtentacle 5y ago
    Very interesting theory. But do you have a source?
    - hoseja 5y ago
      Watch any of his speeches.
  - lozenge 5y ago
    Sounds like you're agreeing disagreeably. He's inept as a businessman.
  - ohgodplsno 5y ago
    >He's an engineer at heart. He has not built anything.
    - andruby 5y ago
      He did code on Zip2 and sold that startup successfully. Also, his official title at SpaceX is "Chief Engineer" [0] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elon_Musk https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elon_Musk
      - hnbad 5y ago
        > He did code on Zip2 and sold that startup successfully. Selling a startup is not an engineering achievment but a business achievment. > Also, his official title at SpaceX is "Chief Engineer" Owning a company means you can give yourself whatever titles you want. So your entire argument seems to boil down to "he wrote code for Zip2", which happened a quarter of a century ago.
        hef19898 5y ago
        Oh, I know some of those self-appoined chief engineers (cool title, I get it, one should earn it so). They almost drove the comoany into the ground. And they never shipped anything in their whole lives neither. EDIT: And they think they are Musk as well. Without the same ability to raise money that's incredible dangerous so.
        andruby 5y ago
        I'm not really trying to make a strong case. I'm just a little disappointed when people say "He has not built anything". Isn't that a little mean, and elitist? No person is perfect. And Elon Musk certainly has flaws. But saying he's not built anything about someone playing a crucial role in 3+ huge companies just feels wrong. If we compare him to the CEO's of the other Fortune 50 companies, he seems like one of the most engineering-minded.
        hnbad 5y ago
  - hnbad 5y ago
    > He's someone with aspergers who takes someone at face value at all times. He doesn't handle being deceived well nor does he know when it's happening. > "Businessman" would require strong social skills, not something someone with aspergers has good ability at. This exact nonsense is why the autistic community was so displeased when he made a big show of having "asperger's" (which in the US under DSM-V is just autism, btw). Can we please stop justifying toxic and reckless behavior with "oh but they're autistic" as if we're talking about naive children not grown adults? Autistics tend to struggle with ambiguity and social cues, yes, but many of us are even more sensitive to social cues than allistics because we literally had to learn to pick up on this shit to survive. A lot of autistics report actually being hyper-empathetic to the point where it can be debilitating because it's hard to filter out the noise and determine which cues you're supposed to pick up on and which ones you're supposed to ignore. Elon Musk is a dickhead AND autistic. He's not a dickhead because he's autistic. He's naive because he got extremely lucky (like all billionaires do, even if it's only winning the lottery of being born into wealthy families with ample of business opportunities) and overestimates his own intelligence (which isn't helped by his massive fanbase thinking he's the best thing since sliced bread because he bought and funded some companies developing tech he thought was cool), not because he's autistic.
    - mlindner 5y ago
      > This exact nonsense is why the autistic community was so displeased when he made a big show of having "asperger's" (which in the US under DSM-V is just autism, btw). Can we please stop justifying toxic and reckless behavior with "oh but they're autistic" as if we're talking about naive children not grown adults? There's no such thing as "the autistic community" (though I won't deny some people may self-proclaim themselves as part of some non-existent community) and I'm not justifying anything by what I said. It's just how he thinks.
      - hnbad 5y ago
        > It's just how he thinks. And I, as an autist, am telling you that this is a farcical caricature that is routinely used to excuse shitty behavior and at the same time deny us autonomy.
- hackerfromthefu 5y ago
  The chutzpah of your armchair analysis! You just called the most successful businessman in the world an 'utterly inept businessman'. Literally the wealthiest person in the world and all achieved through business success! Defined and successfully delivering on multiple new markets, with a string of serial successes.
  - hef19898 5y ago
    Which new markets, after paypal? Cars? Rockets that go into space? Solar on roofs? Things carrying people through tunnels? And in all the successful cases he had massive contributions by others. He provided the money, which is huge in itself. The actual work eas done by others, and the fact the Musk fails to properly say so, and that his fanboys believe every single of his claims, truely makes him the Steve Jobs of 2020s we deserve.
    - shafyy 5y ago
      > The actual work eas done by others, and the fact the Musk fails to properly say so This is not true. He often mentions and emphasizes that the success is the work of his great teams. He also publicly acknowledged that he failed to do so in the past, but he is certainly doing it now.
    - raspberry1337 5y ago
      >Which new markets, after paypal? Cars? Rockets that go into space? Yes and yes >The actual work eas done by others, and the fact the Musk fails to properly say so, Give me one instance where Musk denies the work of his friends and colleagues at SpaceX and Tesla please, because this post reek of bad sentiment and an awful take.
      - hef19898 5y ago
        I never said he denies it, did I? I sadi, quote, "and the fact the Musk fails to properly say so". To elaborate, Musk takes all the line light in the public for himself, he gets all the hype. Shotwell gets a little bit of it, and that's it then.
- bigmealbigmeal 5y ago
  I am genuinely interested to hear your reasoning for how someone can be an "utterly inept businessman" and also become the richest man in the world. How is that possible?
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
panick21_ 5y ago
Do we know this is all communication that ever happened? I don't think so.

matthewdgreen 5y ago

It’s much worse than that. I had previously assumed Musk knew what he was doing and was fooling around on Twitter in an effort to (unethically) crush short sellers. Now it appears like he’s an utterly inept businessman who took the first verbal sign of interest, rushed it to Twitter as though the deal was complete, and then blew up the deal in a hissy fit. I still think what he’s done at SpaceX and Tesla is admirable, but after reading those emails I’m definitely a few percent less confident that there will still be a Tesla to service my Model 3 in the future.

mlindner 5y ago
He's not an inept businessman. He's someone with aspergers who takes someone at face value at all times. If someone says something is the case he believes them. He doesn't handle being deceived well nor does he know when it's happening. And actually he's not a "businessman" at all. He's an engineer at heart. "Businessman" would require strong social skills, not something someone with aspergers has good ability at.
- fxtentacle 5y ago
  Very interesting theory. But do you have a source?
  - hoseja 5y ago
    Watch any of his speeches.
- lozenge 5y ago
  Sounds like you're agreeing disagreeably. He's inept as a businessman.
- ohgodplsno 5y ago
  >He's an engineer at heart. He has not built anything.
  - andruby 5y ago
    He did code on Zip2 and sold that startup successfully. Also, his official title at SpaceX is "Chief Engineer" [0] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elon_Musk https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elon_Musk
    - hnbad 5y ago
      > He did code on Zip2 and sold that startup successfully. Selling a startup is not an engineering achievment but a business achievment. > Also, his official title at SpaceX is "Chief Engineer" Owning a company means you can give yourself whatever titles you want. So your entire argument seems to boil down to "he wrote code for Zip2", which happened a quarter of a century ago.
      - hef19898 5y ago
        Oh, I know some of those self-appoined chief engineers (cool title, I get it, one should earn it so). They almost drove the comoany into the ground. And they never shipped anything in their whole lives neither. EDIT: And they think they are Musk as well. Without the same ability to raise money that's incredible dangerous so.
      - andruby 5y ago
        I'm not really trying to make a strong case. I'm just a little disappointed when people say "He has not built anything". Isn't that a little mean, and elitist? No person is perfect. And Elon Musk certainly has flaws. But saying he's not built anything about someone playing a crucial role in 3+ huge companies just feels wrong. If we compare him to the CEO's of the other Fortune 50 companies, he seems like one of the most engineering-minded.
        hnbad 5y ago
- hnbad 5y ago
  > He's someone with aspergers who takes someone at face value at all times. He doesn't handle being deceived well nor does he know when it's happening. > "Businessman" would require strong social skills, not something someone with aspergers has good ability at. This exact nonsense is why the autistic community was so displeased when he made a big show of having "asperger's" (which in the US under DSM-V is just autism, btw). Can we please stop justifying toxic and reckless behavior with "oh but they're autistic" as if we're talking about naive children not grown adults? Autistics tend to struggle with ambiguity and social cues, yes, but many of us are even more sensitive to social cues than allistics because we literally had to learn to pick up on this shit to survive. A lot of autistics report actually being hyper-empathetic to the point where it can be debilitating because it's hard to filter out the noise and determine which cues you're supposed to pick up on and which ones you're supposed to ignore. Elon Musk is a dickhead AND autistic. He's not a dickhead because he's autistic. He's naive because he got extremely lucky (like all billionaires do, even if it's only winning the lottery of being born into wealthy families with ample of business opportunities) and overestimates his own intelligence (which isn't helped by his massive fanbase thinking he's the best thing since sliced bread because he bought and funded some companies developing tech he thought was cool), not because he's autistic.
  - mlindner 5y ago
    > This exact nonsense is why the autistic community was so displeased when he made a big show of having "asperger's" (which in the US under DSM-V is just autism, btw). Can we please stop justifying toxic and reckless behavior with "oh but they're autistic" as if we're talking about naive children not grown adults? There's no such thing as "the autistic community" (though I won't deny some people may self-proclaim themselves as part of some non-existent community) and I'm not justifying anything by what I said. It's just how he thinks.
    - hnbad 5y ago
      > It's just how he thinks. And I, as an autist, am telling you that this is a farcical caricature that is routinely used to excuse shitty behavior and at the same time deny us autonomy.
hackerfromthefu 5y ago
The chutzpah of your armchair analysis! You just called the most successful businessman in the world an 'utterly inept businessman'. Literally the wealthiest person in the world and all achieved through business success! Defined and successfully delivering on multiple new markets, with a string of serial successes.
- hef19898 5y ago
  Which new markets, after paypal? Cars? Rockets that go into space? Solar on roofs? Things carrying people through tunnels? And in all the successful cases he had massive contributions by others. He provided the money, which is huge in itself. The actual work eas done by others, and the fact the Musk fails to properly say so, and that his fanboys believe every single of his claims, truely makes him the Steve Jobs of 2020s we deserve.
  - shafyy 5y ago
    > The actual work eas done by others, and the fact the Musk fails to properly say so This is not true. He often mentions and emphasizes that the success is the work of his great teams. He also publicly acknowledged that he failed to do so in the past, but he is certainly doing it now.
  - raspberry1337 5y ago
    >Which new markets, after paypal? Cars? Rockets that go into space? Yes and yes >The actual work eas done by others, and the fact the Musk fails to properly say so, Give me one instance where Musk denies the work of his friends and colleagues at SpaceX and Tesla please, because this post reek of bad sentiment and an awful take.
    - hef19898 5y ago
      I never said he denies it, did I? I sadi, quote, "and the fact the Musk fails to properly say so". To elaborate, Musk takes all the line light in the public for himself, he gets all the hype. Shotwell gets a little bit of it, and that's it then.
bigmealbigmeal 5y ago
I am genuinely interested to hear your reasoning for how someone can be an "utterly inept businessman" and also become the richest man in the world. How is that possible?

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

panick21_ 5y ago

Do we know this is all communication that ever happened? I don't think so.