5 ms·

>I always wonder how people say Musk is a failure with a straight face. Show me somewhere, anywhere, where someone of any relevance says Musk is a "failure".

>I always wonder how people say Musk is a failure with a straight face. Show me somewhere, anywhere, where someone of any relevance says Musk is a "failure". What people actually say is that he's not the uber-genius, gods-gift-to-humanity that he and his super supporters extoll.

WalterBright 4y ago
I've seen it frequently on HN, that he's a fraud and failure. Here's one: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33390278 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33390278 As for gods-gift-to-humanity, there are very, very, very few people who have contributed to humanity like he has.
- vkou 4y ago
  That poster is correct, SolarCity was an utter disaster, with a generous helping of self-dealing. People aren't pissing on him when he's right, they are pissing on him when he's wildly, wildly wrong, because he can't stay in his lane. Pedo guy submarine cave rescue is a great example of that. Covid will go away by April 2020 was another. Full Self-driving Tesla robotaxi that makes you money while you sleep in 201? is a third...
  - Retric 4y ago
    It’s absolutely true he had used more companies to support others, most recently using Tesla workers to look at Twitter. However that argument alone doesn’t support the posts conclusion: “he's simply a highly privileged technocrat who has quite successfully failed upwards his entire career”
  - marcusverus 4y ago
    I find it odd that Elon’s imperfections are a cause of such strong feelings. Imagine how suffocating life would be for him if he endeavored to live up to the expectations of his detractors. He would never start a company without being certain of success. He’d be super nice to the diver (who told Elon to stick a submarine up his ass). He’d never speculate about anything or discuss his vision for the future, because imperfect foresight makes people mad! …and the haters would still hate. Happily for Elon, he seems content to be himself and deal with the silly complaints.
    - waste_monk 4y ago
      >He’d be super nice to the diver (who told Elon to stick a submarine up his ass). Pulling a publicity stunt while people's lives were literally on a deadline was not helpful, and only served to distract the professionals involved in the rescue. Throwing a tantrum and calling the diver a paedophile when they declined (on the basis that the submarine would not be able to fit into the caves and thus would be unfit for purpose, assuming it could even be built before the trapped group were killed by the monsoon) was a spectacularly awful move. And that's just one of the many fiascos he's been involved in. Elon may be a successful businessman but he is also a disaster of a human being and has thoroughly earned any "haters" he may possess.
      - marcusverus 4y ago
        > Pulling a publicity stunt while people's lives were literally on a deadline was not helpful, and only served to distract the professionals involved in the rescue. So was everyone who offered to help the trapped kids presumed to be a self-serving asshole for doing so, or only Elon? > Throwing a tantrum and calling the diver a paedophile when they declined (on the basis that the submarine would not be able to fit into the caves and thus would be unfit for purpose, assuming it could even be built before the trapped group were killed by the monsoon) was a spectacularly awful move. But the diver didn't just decline. He declined and told Elon to stick the submarine up his ass on national television. In that context, Elon's reply is childish, sure, but you'll have to explain what makes it "spectacularly awful" and/or a "fiasco". > Elon may be a successful businessman but he is also a disaster of a human being Help me to understand the standard by which I can judge whether someone is a "disaster of a human being". Is one bad tweet sufficient? Or one bad tweet and one bad prediction regarding future tech? How many judgmental internet posts would be required to hit the standard? I'm genuinely curious.
        rlt 4y ago
        > Help me to understand the standard by which I can judge whether someone is a "disaster of a human being" From the abrupt change in discourse about Elon in the last couple years, I assume most are judging him by his politics he recently started expressing.
- daveslash 4y ago
  Pogue Colonel: You write "Born to Kill" on your helmet and you wear a peace button. What's that supposed to be, some kind of sick joke? Private Joker: I think I was trying to suggest something about the duality of man, sir.
- Jerrrry 4y ago
  It is best to not feed the trolls at this point. Disingenuous, bad-faith half-truths are the most you will get out of the anti-Musk crowd. It is simply too fashionable; and any iota of defense will get you labeled a boot-licking puppet. It is just raw, distillable jealousy, combined with the new social paradigm of "this man is uber-bad and the single point of all problems" that long-Trump-Derangement-Syndrome has left ingrained into the thoughtless, NPC-eqsue masses. Elon Musk is no worse than any other billionaire, and by many objective counts, the best yet for humanity. You will be forgotten, he won't - and that pisses most off at a mammalian level.
- lynndotpy 4y ago
  Your link (to another HN argument you were in?) does not support your argument here. Your link brings us to a 3-day old comment which argues SolarCity failed (which, yeah, nobody disagrees there) and that Musk "failed upwards" and is not a "tech deity". This is not claiming Musk is overall a "fraud and failure."
  - WalterBright 4y ago
    LOL. "failure" and "failed upward" are plenty close enough.
    - matthewmacleod 4y ago
      Well, no - they’re almost entirely opposed. To “fail upward” inherently requires one to have succeeded - if only on terms the writer thinks are lacking merit! It’s totally legitimate for you to think that Musk is the target of unfair criticism, particularly around the influence he’s had on his businesses’ obvious successes. But you don’t have to build a straw man to make this argument. Virtually nobody would describe Musk as a failure - but they will argue frequently that he’s an arrogant narcissist, or that his success is unjustified. There’s plenty of criticism like that out there—justified and not—and it’s weird to make stuff up to get all “lol u mad bro” about.
api 4y ago
He's not. He's a pretty solid engineer with a lot of resources and a crazy work ethic. He's also done very well recruiting smart people and at least keeping enough of them motivated to get stuff done. Sometimes I think that the fact that he looks so superhuman sort of proves that wealth is not a meritocracy. If it were, Musk would be an average billionaire at best.

WalterBright 4y ago

I've seen it frequently on HN, that he's a fraud and failure. Here's one: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33390278 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33390278 As for gods-gift-to-humanity, there are very, very, very few people who have contributed to humanity like he has.

vkou 4y ago
That poster is correct, SolarCity was an utter disaster, with a generous helping of self-dealing. People aren't pissing on him when he's right, they are pissing on him when he's wildly, wildly wrong, because he can't stay in his lane. Pedo guy submarine cave rescue is a great example of that. Covid will go away by April 2020 was another. Full Self-driving Tesla robotaxi that makes you money while you sleep in 201? is a third...
- Retric 4y ago
  It’s absolutely true he had used more companies to support others, most recently using Tesla workers to look at Twitter. However that argument alone doesn’t support the posts conclusion: “he's simply a highly privileged technocrat who has quite successfully failed upwards his entire career”
- marcusverus 4y ago
  I find it odd that Elon’s imperfections are a cause of such strong feelings. Imagine how suffocating life would be for him if he endeavored to live up to the expectations of his detractors. He would never start a company without being certain of success. He’d be super nice to the diver (who told Elon to stick a submarine up his ass). He’d never speculate about anything or discuss his vision for the future, because imperfect foresight makes people mad! …and the haters would still hate. Happily for Elon, he seems content to be himself and deal with the silly complaints.
  - waste_monk 4y ago
    >He’d be super nice to the diver (who told Elon to stick a submarine up his ass). Pulling a publicity stunt while people's lives were literally on a deadline was not helpful, and only served to distract the professionals involved in the rescue. Throwing a tantrum and calling the diver a paedophile when they declined (on the basis that the submarine would not be able to fit into the caves and thus would be unfit for purpose, assuming it could even be built before the trapped group were killed by the monsoon) was a spectacularly awful move. And that's just one of the many fiascos he's been involved in. Elon may be a successful businessman but he is also a disaster of a human being and has thoroughly earned any "haters" he may possess.
    - marcusverus 4y ago
      > Pulling a publicity stunt while people's lives were literally on a deadline was not helpful, and only served to distract the professionals involved in the rescue. So was everyone who offered to help the trapped kids presumed to be a self-serving asshole for doing so, or only Elon? > Throwing a tantrum and calling the diver a paedophile when they declined (on the basis that the submarine would not be able to fit into the caves and thus would be unfit for purpose, assuming it could even be built before the trapped group were killed by the monsoon) was a spectacularly awful move. But the diver didn't just decline. He declined and told Elon to stick the submarine up his ass on national television. In that context, Elon's reply is childish, sure, but you'll have to explain what makes it "spectacularly awful" and/or a "fiasco". > Elon may be a successful businessman but he is also a disaster of a human being Help me to understand the standard by which I can judge whether someone is a "disaster of a human being". Is one bad tweet sufficient? Or one bad tweet and one bad prediction regarding future tech? How many judgmental internet posts would be required to hit the standard? I'm genuinely curious.
      - rlt 4y ago
        > Help me to understand the standard by which I can judge whether someone is a "disaster of a human being" From the abrupt change in discourse about Elon in the last couple years, I assume most are judging him by his politics he recently started expressing.
daveslash 4y ago
Pogue Colonel: You write "Born to Kill" on your helmet and you wear a peace button. What's that supposed to be, some kind of sick joke? Private Joker: I think I was trying to suggest something about the duality of man, sir.
Jerrrry 4y ago
It is best to not feed the trolls at this point. Disingenuous, bad-faith half-truths are the most you will get out of the anti-Musk crowd. It is simply too fashionable; and any iota of defense will get you labeled a boot-licking puppet. It is just raw, distillable jealousy, combined with the new social paradigm of "this man is uber-bad and the single point of all problems" that long-Trump-Derangement-Syndrome has left ingrained into the thoughtless, NPC-eqsue masses. Elon Musk is no worse than any other billionaire, and by many objective counts, the best yet for humanity. You will be forgotten, he won't - and that pisses most off at a mammalian level.
lynndotpy 4y ago
Your link (to another HN argument you were in?) does not support your argument here. Your link brings us to a 3-day old comment which argues SolarCity failed (which, yeah, nobody disagrees there) and that Musk "failed upwards" and is not a "tech deity". This is not claiming Musk is overall a "fraud and failure."
- WalterBright 4y ago
  LOL. "failure" and "failed upward" are plenty close enough.
  - matthewmacleod 4y ago
    Well, no - they’re almost entirely opposed. To “fail upward” inherently requires one to have succeeded - if only on terms the writer thinks are lacking merit! It’s totally legitimate for you to think that Musk is the target of unfair criticism, particularly around the influence he’s had on his businesses’ obvious successes. But you don’t have to build a straw man to make this argument. Virtually nobody would describe Musk as a failure - but they will argue frequently that he’s an arrogant narcissist, or that his success is unjustified. There’s plenty of criticism like that out there—justified and not—and it’s weird to make stuff up to get all “lol u mad bro” about.

api 4y ago

He's not. He's a pretty solid engineer with a lot of resources and a crazy work ethic. He's also done very well recruiting smart people and at least keeping enough of them motivated to get stuff done. Sometimes I think that the fact that he looks so superhuman sort of proves that wealth is not a meritocracy. If it were, Musk would be an average billionaire at best.