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How the Elon Musk Biography Exposes Walter Isaacson

28 points by webmaven 3y ago

Zigurd 3y ago
I like Walter Isaacson's previous books and am disappointed with some of what's been said about this one. One of the first articles I read complained that Isaacson never contacted a person accused by Musk of bullying and injuring him when they were both young. That is an odd omission.
alphabettsy 3y ago
This is unfortunate. A reminder that amazing stories and claims require verification even from well known writers.
thenerdhead 3y ago
I'm sure Isaacson expected the same slander similar to what happened with the Jobs book posthumously. I thought back then he "lost" his credibility too? I have seen two of these type of book reviews this week. Both are very politically charged due to the subject still being alive and active in politics themselves. > Do we — the readers of Isaacson’s book — want this particular man’s vision of the future at all? No, but I can enjoy reading a book about a prominent/controversial figure in our history that I can learn something from(what to do or what not to do). The same is true for every Isaacson book.
- throwoutway 3y ago
  > that I can learn something from Is the problem not that you've learned a fiction as the author cannot get his 'facts' to be true?
- inemesitaffia 3y ago
  What's the other review?
- throw0101a 3y ago
  > No, but I can enjoy reading a book about a prominent/controversial figure in our history that I can learn something from(what to do or what not to do). The same is true for every Isaacson book. Except in the instances where he misses the point: > Note that my complaints here are not about Isaacson being insufficiently deferential. That the book is not a hagiography is to its credit. The personal stuff — documentation of Jobs’s cruelty (and his talent for cruelty), his tantrums, his tendency to claim for himself the ideas of others — that’s not problematic. Isaacson handles that well, and what he reports in that regard jibes with everything we know about the man. My complaints are about outright technical inaccuracies, and getting the man’s work wrong. The design process, the resulting products, the centrality of software — Isaacson simply misses the boat. > You could learn more about Steve Jobs’s work by reading Rob Walker’s 2003 New York Times Magazine piece than by reading Isaacson’s book, but even then we’re left wanting for the stories behind any of Apple’s products after the iPod. Isaacson’s book may well be the defining resource for Jobs’s personal life — his childhood, youth, eccentricities, cruelty, temper, and emotional outbursts. But as regards Jobs’s work, Isaacson leaves the reader profoundly and tragically misinformed. > Isaacson gives us the story of an asshole. But the world is full of assholes. What we need is the story of the one man who spearheaded so many remarkable products and who built an amazing and unique company. * https://daringfireball.net/2012/02/walter_isaacson_steve_jobs https://daringfireball.net/2012/02/walter_isaacson_steve_job...
sidibe 3y ago
Isaacson went for the story being about a brilliant visionary and his big flaws without really questioning the first part. That's part of the price of access it can't be too negative on what the subject actually values. Elon is alright with controversy and being seen as an asshole, his main goal is to be seen as IRL Tony Stark super-engineer, and Isaacson didn't question that.

28 points by webmaven 3y ago

I like Walter Isaacson's previous books and am disappointed with some of what's been said about this one. One of the first articles I read complained that Isaacson never contacted a person accused by Musk of bullying and injuring him when they were both young. That is an odd omission.

alphabettsy 3y ago

This is unfortunate. A reminder that amazing stories and claims require verification even from well known writers.

thenerdhead 3y ago

I'm sure Isaacson expected the same slander similar to what happened with the Jobs book posthumously. I thought back then he "lost" his credibility too? I have seen two of these type of book reviews this week. Both are very politically charged due to the subject still being alive and active in politics themselves. > Do we — the readers of Isaacson’s book — want this particular man’s vision of the future at all? No, but I can enjoy reading a book about a prominent/controversial figure in our history that I can learn something from(what to do or what not to do). The same is true for every Isaacson book.

throwoutway 3y ago
> that I can learn something from Is the problem not that you've learned a fiction as the author cannot get his 'facts' to be true?
inemesitaffia 3y ago
What's the other review?
throw0101a 3y ago
> No, but I can enjoy reading a book about a prominent/controversial figure in our history that I can learn something from(what to do or what not to do). The same is true for every Isaacson book. Except in the instances where he misses the point: > Note that my complaints here are not about Isaacson being insufficiently deferential. That the book is not a hagiography is to its credit. The personal stuff — documentation of Jobs’s cruelty (and his talent for cruelty), his tantrums, his tendency to claim for himself the ideas of others — that’s not problematic. Isaacson handles that well, and what he reports in that regard jibes with everything we know about the man. My complaints are about outright technical inaccuracies, and getting the man’s work wrong. The design process, the resulting products, the centrality of software — Isaacson simply misses the boat. > You could learn more about Steve Jobs’s work by reading Rob Walker’s 2003 New York Times Magazine piece than by reading Isaacson’s book, but even then we’re left wanting for the stories behind any of Apple’s products after the iPod. Isaacson’s book may well be the defining resource for Jobs’s personal life — his childhood, youth, eccentricities, cruelty, temper, and emotional outbursts. But as regards Jobs’s work, Isaacson leaves the reader profoundly and tragically misinformed. > Isaacson gives us the story of an asshole. But the world is full of assholes. What we need is the story of the one man who spearheaded so many remarkable products and who built an amazing and unique company. * https://daringfireball.net/2012/02/walter_isaacson_steve_jobs https://daringfireball.net/2012/02/walter_isaacson_steve_job...

sidibe 3y ago

Isaacson went for the story being about a brilliant visionary and his big flaws without really questioning the first part. That's part of the price of access it can't be too negative on what the subject actually values. Elon is alright with controversy and being seen as an asshole, his main goal is to be seen as IRL Tony Stark super-engineer, and Isaacson didn't question that.