5 ms·

At what point is he obligated to provide services and capabilities gratis? By that same argument shouldn't other defense contractors be providing weapons gratis

At what point is he obligated to provide services and capabilities gratis? By that same argument shouldn't other defense contractors be providing weapons gratis instead of receiving money / new orders? The state department clearly wants to have weapons sent to ukraine, why should starlink not be compensated properly?

pmyteh 4y ago
He's not obliged to do anything. He got good PR from the initial commitment, and is now getting bad PR resiling from it. Which seems entirely straightforward.
- ganoushoreilly 4y ago
  Op implied Elon's goal is soley to undermine the State Department. I'm arguing none of that matters if at the end of the day, he's providing a capability and service, that has and will continue to lose money for his company. $80 million is no small amount. We also don't know what he asked for behind doors, given the anti elon nature of things these days, what's to say they're not just trying to take advantage of the situation?
katmannthree 4y ago
If he just wanted money he would have asked (privately) and he would have gotten it. Instead he called Putin to talk about "peace" (read: appeasement) and then posts literal Kremlin talking points to Twitter and only mentioned getting money to maintain starlink after getting a ton of people telling him to fuck off.
- ganoushoreilly 4y ago
  Do you have proof of this call? He's refuted it in public.
  - n8cpdx 4y ago
    https://www.newsweek.com/russia-kremlin-peskov-details-musk-phone-call-putin-1751071 https://www.newsweek.com/russia-kremlin-peskov-details-musk-... Literally first DuckDuckGo result. Third: https://www.forbes.com/sites/dereksaul/2022/10/12/kremlin-denies-musk-putin-war-chat-ever-took-place/?sh=1ca4a62a507e https://www.forbes.com/sites/dereksaul/2022/10/12/kremlin-de... He has access, has talked in the past, repeats kremlin talking points, threatens to withhold access to strategic technology from the kremlin’s victims, and then claims to not be involved when he starts taking heat for it. Musk is notoriously dishonest, I don’t know why his claims are seen as trustworthy given the surrounding context.
    - ganoushoreilly 4y ago
      "their conversation took place a year and a half ago." Pay attention to the details. A year and half ago he was not engaged in a conflict with Ukraine. Plenty of people send letters and or talk with heads of state. You think Bill gates hasn't spoken with numerous heads of state? Sure has, otherwise microsoft wouldn't have been in Russia, China, and other nations. So proof of this peace call is where? EDIT: I think you editing your post after being proven wrong is just as dishonest. Further your second post does nothing to help your argument. The kremlin will say what ever they need to for their agenda regardless. In this case they deny it and there is no way to prove it happened.
phillipcarter 4y ago
> At what point is he obligated to provide services and capabilities gratis? Not a whole lot of gratis. https://www.theverge.com/2022/10/14/23404069/spacex-ukraine-starlink-funding-elon-musk-internet-satellite-connectivity-us-government-funding https://www.theverge.com/2022/10/14/23404069/spacex-ukraine-... > CNN’s report also sheds light on who’s been footing the bill for Ukraine’s Starlink connectivity until now, and says that around 85 percent of the terminals were at least partially paid for by American, Polish, and British governments, as well as other organizations like NGOs.
- ganoushoreilly 4y ago
  $80 million in costs already outside of the purchase of terminals. Right there in your article.
  - CogitoCogito 4y ago
    Yes the article quotes Musk’s claim that this has cost SpaceX $80 million. Many outsiders think that number is complete bullshit. Unless SpaceX plans on releasing its internal accounting, it might just come down to whether you consider Musk trustworthy. I personally find it a bit odd that Musk would suddenly publicly make these demands instead of just having SpaceX call their contacts in the DOD. I presume it makes the DOD question future involvement with companies controlled by Musk.
    - ganoushoreilly 4y ago
      I would counter that I bet they have been having these discussions for some time and this is all being used to sway opinion against him. Like him or not, the cool thing now is to hate on musk and worry about what could happen with twitter and this helps build that negative sentiment. The state department doesn't benefit from that transaction either and the federal government poking at him over the deal has left as sour taste i'm sure. From the outside the only fact we can ascertain is that we know his services are not net 0 in cost, so by that assumption any expense is one he can argue he deserves support on.
papito 4y ago
There is more going on here. This is beyond just some pragmatic accounting on Musk's part. He literally fell for Russian disinfo claiming that he was on some "Ukrainian hitlist": https://twitter.com/uamemesforces/status/1581068904021241857 https://twitter.com/uamemesforces/status/1581068904021241857 The guy cannot do basic due diligence on easily verifiable crap spewed out on the platform that he is buying.

pmyteh 4y ago

He's not obliged to do anything. He got good PR from the initial commitment, and is now getting bad PR resiling from it. Which seems entirely straightforward.

ganoushoreilly 4y ago
Op implied Elon's goal is soley to undermine the State Department. I'm arguing none of that matters if at the end of the day, he's providing a capability and service, that has and will continue to lose money for his company. $80 million is no small amount. We also don't know what he asked for behind doors, given the anti elon nature of things these days, what's to say they're not just trying to take advantage of the situation?

katmannthree 4y ago

If he just wanted money he would have asked (privately) and he would have gotten it. Instead he called Putin to talk about "peace" (read: appeasement) and then posts literal Kremlin talking points to Twitter and only mentioned getting money to maintain starlink after getting a ton of people telling him to fuck off.

ganoushoreilly 4y ago
Do you have proof of this call? He's refuted it in public.
- n8cpdx 4y ago
  https://www.newsweek.com/russia-kremlin-peskov-details-musk-phone-call-putin-1751071 https://www.newsweek.com/russia-kremlin-peskov-details-musk-... Literally first DuckDuckGo result. Third: https://www.forbes.com/sites/dereksaul/2022/10/12/kremlin-denies-musk-putin-war-chat-ever-took-place/?sh=1ca4a62a507e https://www.forbes.com/sites/dereksaul/2022/10/12/kremlin-de... He has access, has talked in the past, repeats kremlin talking points, threatens to withhold access to strategic technology from the kremlin’s victims, and then claims to not be involved when he starts taking heat for it. Musk is notoriously dishonest, I don’t know why his claims are seen as trustworthy given the surrounding context.
  - ganoushoreilly 4y ago
    "their conversation took place a year and a half ago." Pay attention to the details. A year and half ago he was not engaged in a conflict with Ukraine. Plenty of people send letters and or talk with heads of state. You think Bill gates hasn't spoken with numerous heads of state? Sure has, otherwise microsoft wouldn't have been in Russia, China, and other nations. So proof of this peace call is where? EDIT: I think you editing your post after being proven wrong is just as dishonest. Further your second post does nothing to help your argument. The kremlin will say what ever they need to for their agenda regardless. In this case they deny it and there is no way to prove it happened.

phillipcarter 4y ago

> At what point is he obligated to provide services and capabilities gratis? Not a whole lot of gratis. https://www.theverge.com/2022/10/14/23404069/spacex-ukraine-starlink-funding-elon-musk-internet-satellite-connectivity-us-government-funding https://www.theverge.com/2022/10/14/23404069/spacex-ukraine-... > CNN’s report also sheds light on who’s been footing the bill for Ukraine’s Starlink connectivity until now, and says that around 85 percent of the terminals were at least partially paid for by American, Polish, and British governments, as well as other organizations like NGOs.

ganoushoreilly 4y ago
$80 million in costs already outside of the purchase of terminals. Right there in your article.
- CogitoCogito 4y ago
  Yes the article quotes Musk’s claim that this has cost SpaceX $80 million. Many outsiders think that number is complete bullshit. Unless SpaceX plans on releasing its internal accounting, it might just come down to whether you consider Musk trustworthy. I personally find it a bit odd that Musk would suddenly publicly make these demands instead of just having SpaceX call their contacts in the DOD. I presume it makes the DOD question future involvement with companies controlled by Musk.
  - ganoushoreilly 4y ago
    I would counter that I bet they have been having these discussions for some time and this is all being used to sway opinion against him. Like him or not, the cool thing now is to hate on musk and worry about what could happen with twitter and this helps build that negative sentiment. The state department doesn't benefit from that transaction either and the federal government poking at him over the deal has left as sour taste i'm sure. From the outside the only fact we can ascertain is that we know his services are not net 0 in cost, so by that assumption any expense is one he can argue he deserves support on.

papito 4y ago

There is more going on here. This is beyond just some pragmatic accounting on Musk's part. He literally fell for Russian disinfo claiming that he was on some "Ukrainian hitlist": https://twitter.com/uamemesforces/status/1581068904021241857 https://twitter.com/uamemesforces/status/1581068904021241857 The guy cannot do basic due diligence on easily verifiable crap spewed out on the platform that he is buying.