5 ms·

If his popularity is due to what he posts on twitter it would appear that a large proportion of the human race are deranged morons.

by iasay 4y ago

HeXetic 4y ago
With everything that's happened in the past decade, don't we know that already by know?
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
ctvo 4y ago
He can be popular due to Twitter and people can also not be deranged morons. Twitter is very popular with a few niche groups: Journalists and people in tech for example. The former is influenced by Elon's antics on Twitter and end up writing news stories or making documentaries [1] about him. People learn about Musk through these respectable publications. The latter group spreads the gospel of Elon's TED talks and press conferences to their friends and family. Being subject matter experts, they're more likely to be believed. Previously the coverage was mostly positive, but Musk's antics on Twitter have caused both the former and some of the latter to turn slightly negative from what I can tell. For example, it's now a common joke that Elon's wealth is partially due to being born wealthy. His family owned emerald mines. I didn't notice that in the popular consciousness until very recently. Phoney Starks is also making it's way into popular usage. 1 - https://www.nytimes.com/video/NYT-Presents/100000008464087/the-new-york-times-presents-elon-musks-crash-course.html https://www.nytimes.com/video/NYT-Presents/100000008464087/t...
- TapWaterBandit 4y ago
  The emerald mine stuff is super overblown and only matters to people who don't like Musk for other reasons. If owning some natural resource like a mine or two was all it took to become a trailblazing entrepreneur who played a key role in Paypal/Tesla/SpaceX then Musk wouldn't be as popular as he is with many because there would be so many more like him around. Musk is clearly an extraordinary individual even if he sometimes acts like a dickhead and had a small boost from owning emerald mines. But like I mentioned above if owning a profitable mine of some type was all it took to be an entrepreneur at Musk's level we would be drowning in them and he wouldn't be such a big deal in the first place. But in the case of Twitter, Musk clearly seems to be in the wrong here legally.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - sixQuarks 4y ago
    Wow, even being critical of Musk can’t prevent the downvotes if you dare mention some of his accomplishments.
  - ctvo 4y ago
    > But like I mentioned above if owning a profitable mine of some type was all it took to be an entrepreneur at Musk's level we would be drowning in them and he wouldn't be such a big deal in the first place. I don't have an opinion on how big being born wealthy plays in his success. Just curious though -- how many profitable mines do you think are in operation and how many people do you think own them as a percentage of total global population?
    - TigeriusKirk 4y ago
      What level of profit did the mine bring in? That's the real question that I've never seen an answer to. You can own a gold mine in the California mountains and come out of it with nothing but debt. It would sound like you're rich in the newspaper stories, though.
      - nyokodo 4y ago
        > What level of profit did the mine bring in? That's the real question that I've never seen an answer to. Who has time for ascertaining the facts when there are politically derived narratives to promote.
    - TapWaterBandit 4y ago
      Mines specifically? No idea. But come from backgrounds if wealth and privilege comparable to what Musk had from his families Emerald mines? A huge number. Think farms, family businesses, real estate empires, even just well known doctors or other professionals. Elon Musks family were comfortably upper middle class but really nothing special in terms of wealth. There would be hundreds of thousands of American families as rich alone.
- 2c2c2c 4y ago
  anti musk sentiment mostly stems from the post-2016 leftist surge. most of the mainstream internet was technocratic before
- kaczordon 4y ago
  Except that Musk has talked about how he had to work his way through college and basically didn’t benefit in any way from his dad. https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1211054942192119808?s=21&t=VheTOerKroAGfCerElIPsQ https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1211054942192119808?s=21...
  - ctvo 4y ago
    I don't mean to represent that I think it's a fact, only that people are increasingly repeating it, which represents more negativity than I think Elon has received in the past. Interestingly though, it was Elon who said his family owned an emerald mine: https://web.archive.org/web/20140802011449/http://www.forbes.com/sites/jimclash/2014/07/28/elon-musk-tells-me-his-secret-of-success-hint-it-aint-about-the-money/ https://web.archive.org/web/20140802011449/http://www.forbes... That was a Forbes interview in 2014. The relevant section: > JC: How do you handle fear? > EM: Company death – not succeeding with the company – causes me a lot more stress than physical danger. But I’ve been in physical danger before. The funny thing is I’ve not actually been that nervous. In South Africa, my father had a private plane we’d fly in incredibly dangerous weather and barely make it back. This is going to sound slightly crazy, but my father also had a share in an Emerald mine in Zambia. I was 15 and really wanted to go with him but didn’t realize how dangerous it was. I couldn’t find my passport so I ended up grabbing my brother’s – which turned out to be six months overdue! So we had this planeload of contraband and an overdue passport from another person. There were AK-47s all over the place and I’m thinking, “Man, this could really go bad.” Who knows what happened between when he was 15 and 17 to his family wealth that made him essentially penniless in a foreign country. Edit: https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1375212880790913025 https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1375212880790913025 This is where Elon says he arrived in Canada with only ~2500 CAD.
    - HarryHirsch 4y ago
      Elon says he arrived in Canada with only ~2500 CAD. He went to Canada and could rely on his family network.
    - bobsmooth 4y ago
      >Who knows what happened between when he was 15 and 17 to his family wealth that made him essentially penniless in a foreign country. His estrangement from his father.
whack 4y ago
Yes
percentcer 4y ago
got bad news for you
vkou 4y ago
It would definitely appear that our monkey brains aren't very good at reasoning through social interactions that happen through mass media. Whether or not this makes most of us deranged morons or not is in the eye of the beholder.
bilsbie 4y ago
Welcome to earth?
dragontamer 4y ago
A hundred years ago, you just traveled from city-to-city with your posse of 20-guys. Those 20 guys would pretend to be an interested crowd (which draws in / astroturfs fake interest) Real people then start to join the crowd. You then show off your snake oil product working ("guest#1 from the crowd", who is of course your buddy), and then the real people will get excited, and buy your snake oil. Today, you just buy a bunch of likes / retweets to perform the same astroturfing on a larger scale. Bonus points if you "meme" it and "go viral". You want all those people out there to be spreading your message at no cost to you. A little bit of astroturfing goes a long way. People want to feel as part of a community. So a bit of fake-generated content and fake-interest helps at seeding the crowd and popularity. --------- Stage magicians still do this today for entertainment purposes, rather than illegitimately hawking fake snake oil. Its a very good bit of entertainment. It does take some practice but once you get the technique, its quite repeatable. Turns out that human psychology / group dynamics are in fact, predictable and consistent.
- lupire 4y ago
  On TV it's the Laugh Track
jollybean 4y ago
Most people don't pay that much attention. They like the 'vibe' and that's that. They may not specifically clue into the mapping of 'vaccine hesitation / conspiracy' to 'health outcomes', they might just view it as 'opinion' - which it is of course, but most responsible people understand the 'dots have to be connected'. I think it's a bit part of the reason why a place like HN won't grasp populism: we are almost by definition 'anti populist' by our very outlook. Even smart young people are usually busy with school, partying, social things, they don't all have time to parse all of the shifting nonsense, and those that do are more often than not trapped down rabbit holes, I think searching for 'an identity' more than they realize it. This is populism. We (the crowd) make decisions on rough statements, headlines, a few words here and there, prejudices, assumptions etc.. Some of use a bit smarter than others, almost none of us see our blindspots.

If his popularity is due to what he posts on twitter it would appear that a large proportion of the human race are deranged morons.

by iasay 4y ago

If his popularity is due to what he posts on twitter it would appear that a large proportion of the human race are deranged morons.

HeXetic 4y ago

With everything that's happened in the past decade, don't we know that already by know?

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

ctvo 4y ago

He can be popular due to Twitter and people can also not be deranged morons. Twitter is very popular with a few niche groups: Journalists and people in tech for example. The former is influenced by Elon's antics on Twitter and end up writing news stories or making documentaries [1] about him. People learn about Musk through these respectable publications. The latter group spreads the gospel of Elon's TED talks and press conferences to their friends and family. Being subject matter experts, they're more likely to be believed. Previously the coverage was mostly positive, but Musk's antics on Twitter have caused both the former and some of the latter to turn slightly negative from what I can tell. For example, it's now a common joke that Elon's wealth is partially due to being born wealthy. His family owned emerald mines. I didn't notice that in the popular consciousness until very recently. Phoney Starks is also making it's way into popular usage. 1 - https://www.nytimes.com/video/NYT-Presents/100000008464087/the-new-york-times-presents-elon-musks-crash-course.html https://www.nytimes.com/video/NYT-Presents/100000008464087/t...

TapWaterBandit 4y ago
The emerald mine stuff is super overblown and only matters to people who don't like Musk for other reasons. If owning some natural resource like a mine or two was all it took to become a trailblazing entrepreneur who played a key role in Paypal/Tesla/SpaceX then Musk wouldn't be as popular as he is with many because there would be so many more like him around. Musk is clearly an extraordinary individual even if he sometimes acts like a dickhead and had a small boost from owning emerald mines. But like I mentioned above if owning a profitable mine of some type was all it took to be an entrepreneur at Musk's level we would be drowning in them and he wouldn't be such a big deal in the first place. But in the case of Twitter, Musk clearly seems to be in the wrong here legally.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- sixQuarks 4y ago
  Wow, even being critical of Musk can’t prevent the downvotes if you dare mention some of his accomplishments.
- ctvo 4y ago
  > But like I mentioned above if owning a profitable mine of some type was all it took to be an entrepreneur at Musk's level we would be drowning in them and he wouldn't be such a big deal in the first place. I don't have an opinion on how big being born wealthy plays in his success. Just curious though -- how many profitable mines do you think are in operation and how many people do you think own them as a percentage of total global population?
  - TigeriusKirk 4y ago
    What level of profit did the mine bring in? That's the real question that I've never seen an answer to. You can own a gold mine in the California mountains and come out of it with nothing but debt. It would sound like you're rich in the newspaper stories, though.
    - nyokodo 4y ago
      > What level of profit did the mine bring in? That's the real question that I've never seen an answer to. Who has time for ascertaining the facts when there are politically derived narratives to promote.
  - TapWaterBandit 4y ago
    Mines specifically? No idea. But come from backgrounds if wealth and privilege comparable to what Musk had from his families Emerald mines? A huge number. Think farms, family businesses, real estate empires, even just well known doctors or other professionals. Elon Musks family were comfortably upper middle class but really nothing special in terms of wealth. There would be hundreds of thousands of American families as rich alone.
2c2c2c 4y ago
anti musk sentiment mostly stems from the post-2016 leftist surge. most of the mainstream internet was technocratic before
kaczordon 4y ago
Except that Musk has talked about how he had to work his way through college and basically didn’t benefit in any way from his dad. https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1211054942192119808?s=21&t=VheTOerKroAGfCerElIPsQ https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1211054942192119808?s=21...
- ctvo 4y ago
  I don't mean to represent that I think it's a fact, only that people are increasingly repeating it, which represents more negativity than I think Elon has received in the past. Interestingly though, it was Elon who said his family owned an emerald mine: https://web.archive.org/web/20140802011449/http://www.forbes.com/sites/jimclash/2014/07/28/elon-musk-tells-me-his-secret-of-success-hint-it-aint-about-the-money/ https://web.archive.org/web/20140802011449/http://www.forbes... That was a Forbes interview in 2014. The relevant section: > JC: How do you handle fear? > EM: Company death – not succeeding with the company – causes me a lot more stress than physical danger. But I’ve been in physical danger before. The funny thing is I’ve not actually been that nervous. In South Africa, my father had a private plane we’d fly in incredibly dangerous weather and barely make it back. This is going to sound slightly crazy, but my father also had a share in an Emerald mine in Zambia. I was 15 and really wanted to go with him but didn’t realize how dangerous it was. I couldn’t find my passport so I ended up grabbing my brother’s – which turned out to be six months overdue! So we had this planeload of contraband and an overdue passport from another person. There were AK-47s all over the place and I’m thinking, “Man, this could really go bad.” Who knows what happened between when he was 15 and 17 to his family wealth that made him essentially penniless in a foreign country. Edit: https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1375212880790913025 https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1375212880790913025 This is where Elon says he arrived in Canada with only ~2500 CAD.
  - HarryHirsch 4y ago
    Elon says he arrived in Canada with only ~2500 CAD. He went to Canada and could rely on his family network.
  - bobsmooth 4y ago
    >Who knows what happened between when he was 15 and 17 to his family wealth that made him essentially penniless in a foreign country. His estrangement from his father.

whack 4y ago

Yes

percentcer 4y ago

got bad news for you

vkou 4y ago

It would definitely appear that our monkey brains aren't very good at reasoning through social interactions that happen through mass media. Whether or not this makes most of us deranged morons or not is in the eye of the beholder.

bilsbie 4y ago

Welcome to earth?

dragontamer 4y ago

A hundred years ago, you just traveled from city-to-city with your posse of 20-guys. Those 20 guys would pretend to be an interested crowd (which draws in / astroturfs fake interest) Real people then start to join the crowd. You then show off your snake oil product working ("guest#1 from the crowd", who is of course your buddy), and then the real people will get excited, and buy your snake oil. Today, you just buy a bunch of likes / retweets to perform the same astroturfing on a larger scale. Bonus points if you "meme" it and "go viral". You want all those people out there to be spreading your message at no cost to you. A little bit of astroturfing goes a long way. People want to feel as part of a community. So a bit of fake-generated content and fake-interest helps at seeding the crowd and popularity. --------- Stage magicians still do this today for entertainment purposes, rather than illegitimately hawking fake snake oil. Its a very good bit of entertainment. It does take some practice but once you get the technique, its quite repeatable. Turns out that human psychology / group dynamics are in fact, predictable and consistent.

lupire 4y ago
On TV it's the Laugh Track

jollybean 4y ago

Most people don't pay that much attention. They like the 'vibe' and that's that. They may not specifically clue into the mapping of 'vaccine hesitation / conspiracy' to 'health outcomes', they might just view it as 'opinion' - which it is of course, but most responsible people understand the 'dots have to be connected'. I think it's a bit part of the reason why a place like HN won't grasp populism: we are almost by definition 'anti populist' by our very outlook. Even smart young people are usually busy with school, partying, social things, they don't all have time to parse all of the shifting nonsense, and those that do are more often than not trapped down rabbit holes, I think searching for 'an identity' more than they realize it. This is populism. We (the crowd) make decisions on rough statements, headlines, a few words here and there, prejudices, assumptions etc.. Some of use a bit smarter than others, almost none of us see our blindspots.