5 ms·

Lightly mentioned in the article, but I think a key part of Musk's success comes down to two traits: he's willing to take large risks if he thinks the "right an

Lightly mentioned in the article, but I think a key part of Musk's success comes down to two traits: he's willing to take large risks if he thinks the "right answer" requires it and he's willing to put significant capital up to do so. For Tesla, things like the aluminum bodies mentioned in the article or the "gigacasting" later took the kind of significant investment that most companies aren't comfortable making; SpaceX, for its part, blew up enough rockets to have put most companies off their lunches. There's shades of Jobs, who would not accept an inferior product made for expediency, and of Bezos, who's one of the few other company leaders with a history of gambling like that, but really, I think the willingness to aggressively deploy the capital required to achieve the answer he thinks is the right one is the core trait underpinning his success. (I think the article's also broadly correct in the diagnosis of his failings, too - the gods don't give with both hands, as they say.)

BobaFloutist 3y ago
I think Elon Musk is a very rich guy who's easily persuadable with the argument "Wouldn't it be super cool if...?" This works well for him when the people trying to persuade him are engineers, accountants, and other professionals that have an idea that could benefit from having a lot of money thrown at it. It doesn't work as well when he gets surrounded by people caught up in his cult of personality that are no longer trying to persuade him, but rather following his visions. And it certainly doesn't go well for him when he's trying to impress his various social media followers.
- leetharris 3y ago
  Can you give any examples to back up what you're saying? I'm genuinely interested in understanding what you mean.
- roughly 3y ago
  The article and book it’s sourced from make a pretty compelling claim that he does actually know the technical details of the things he’s working on, and that jives with other things I’ve read. I think a lot of what he’s doing is the kind of first-principles argument that can drive seasoned engineers nuts (“factor X is the root problem, so what if we just changed factor X?” “Yeah gee golly nobody’s ever thought of that”), but it turns out if you’ve got enough money, patience, and latitude, there’s a lot of meat on that bone. Agree though that the echo chamber around him really does feed into his worst instincts - I feel like it’s similar to George Lucas, who, with constraints, made the first Star Wars trilogy, and without constraints made the second. And, yeah, he’s got a strong engineering affinity and what looks like a strong anti-affinity for anything involving people. I don’t mean any of this to gas up Musk. I don’t particularly like him, I don’t think he’s a good person, and I think the fact that he’s as influential as he is is an indictment of our society broadly. I do think he’s had some outlier successes, and with both Tesla and SpaceX he’s shifted the world in what I’d consider a positive direction, so I think it’s worth taking a dispassionate look at how he’s done it, both the positives and negatives.
  - BobaFloutist 3y ago
    That's fair, but I don't think it necessarily contradicts my perspective. He could have a strong engineering background and still throw money at the rule of cool, and it could still turn out to be not the worst strategy in a country that's looking to innovate and to subsidize innovation.

BobaFloutist 3y ago

I think Elon Musk is a very rich guy who's easily persuadable with the argument "Wouldn't it be super cool if...?" This works well for him when the people trying to persuade him are engineers, accountants, and other professionals that have an idea that could benefit from having a lot of money thrown at it. It doesn't work as well when he gets surrounded by people caught up in his cult of personality that are no longer trying to persuade him, but rather following his visions. And it certainly doesn't go well for him when he's trying to impress his various social media followers.

leetharris 3y ago
Can you give any examples to back up what you're saying? I'm genuinely interested in understanding what you mean.
roughly 3y ago
The article and book it’s sourced from make a pretty compelling claim that he does actually know the technical details of the things he’s working on, and that jives with other things I’ve read. I think a lot of what he’s doing is the kind of first-principles argument that can drive seasoned engineers nuts (“factor X is the root problem, so what if we just changed factor X?” “Yeah gee golly nobody’s ever thought of that”), but it turns out if you’ve got enough money, patience, and latitude, there’s a lot of meat on that bone. Agree though that the echo chamber around him really does feed into his worst instincts - I feel like it’s similar to George Lucas, who, with constraints, made the first Star Wars trilogy, and without constraints made the second. And, yeah, he’s got a strong engineering affinity and what looks like a strong anti-affinity for anything involving people. I don’t mean any of this to gas up Musk. I don’t particularly like him, I don’t think he’s a good person, and I think the fact that he’s as influential as he is is an indictment of our society broadly. I do think he’s had some outlier successes, and with both Tesla and SpaceX he’s shifted the world in what I’d consider a positive direction, so I think it’s worth taking a dispassionate look at how he’s done it, both the positives and negatives.
- BobaFloutist 3y ago
  That's fair, but I don't think it necessarily contradicts my perspective. He could have a strong engineering background and still throw money at the rule of cool, and it could still turn out to be not the worst strategy in a country that's looking to innovate and to subsidize innovation.