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> He has a long track record of making bets that look crazy-stupid in the moment but turn out to be crazy-brilliant in hindsight. Like Cybertruck? Tesla Semi?

> He has a long track record of making bets that look crazy-stupid in the moment but turn out to be crazy-brilliant in hindsight. Like Cybertruck? Tesla Semi? Full self driving in 2017? Robotic snake to automatically plug into your car and charge it? Dojo? Hyperloop? Solar roofs? Battery Swap? Dogecoin? Tesla Roadster? Twitter?

thejazzman 3y ago
That snake was bad ass I heard Elon designed and built it himself in his garage They didn't commercialize it because no one else was capable of making one and it was too much work for one person to mass produce
- potatochup 3y ago
  Definitely not true. Source: I worked at Tesla at the time of the Snake robot.
  - dragontamer 3y ago
    The above post looks like carefully constructed satire, mostly there to make fun of people who hero-worship Elon Musk into thinking that Elon Musk personally handled all tasks at Tesla like Tony Stark / Ironman.
    - ImPostingOnHN 3y ago
      Poe's law strikes again
- orwin 3y ago
  People really believe that? He seems he would have troubles changing a tire, but maybe he's a great mechanic?
treme 3y ago
Tesla and SpaceX alone gives him enough credibilty for life as CEO
- TheCleric 3y ago
  For the immense returns that he's been getting for over 40 years, that alone gives Bernie Madoff credibility for life in investing.
  - Terr_ 3y ago
    "The 8 years of the Bill Cosby show alone give Bill Cosby enough credibility for life as a wholesome family man."
- lenerdenator 3y ago
  SpaceX, maybe. He’s actively sinking Tesla and that’s his cash cow.
- dragontamer 3y ago
  What decision did Elon make at Tesla was good for Tesla in the last 10 years? I listed off the big stuff I can remember above. I'll go add "Alien Dreadnaught" and full automation of the Model 3 as another failure. Turns out that humans are way better than machines for the assembly line still, even today. ------ So far, the best thing for Tesla so far has been Elon Musk losing focus and thinking about Twitter for a few years instead of sending Tesla down another $inkhole to lose another $billion on an insane, underdeveloped idea. Well, aside from Optimus I guess.
- sanderjd 3y ago
  This is, frankly, a very silly way of thinking. Tesla and SpaceX are very admirable businesses that Musk deserves a lot of credit for, I'm totally with you there. But that someone made good decisions at one point in time does not imply that decisions made later are also good. Businesses change, people change, the world changes.
Avshalom 3y ago
Oh on the battery swap note I heard recently that may have been a ... scam? Apparently there was an increased credit available for EVs that could be fully charged in under x-time and by claiming that they could battery swap tesla got a bunch of extra money.
cs702 3y ago
Thank you for that. It made me chuckle! Here are some counter-examples: * A new car company making a new kind of vehicle. The first time I heard he wanted to build a new car company that would sell EVs, I dismissed it as crazy. Tesla now sells close to 2M vehicles a year, roughly comparable to BMW. * A new network of EV charging stations. The first time I heard about it I thought the company would never recoup the capital cost. * A new rocket company. The first time I heard about SpaceX's early days I dismissed it as crazy. SpaceX now sends 10x more cargo to orbit than everyone else, public and private, combined. * A new satellite-Internet service. Prior to Starlink, every previous attempt to offer cheap and reliable Internet service via satellite had gone bankrupt. * A new brain-machine interface. The first time I heard about Neuralink I dismissed it as "way too early." The company just showed a disabled man using a computer with his thoughts. * The latest beta version of the self-driving software (FSD Beta >= 12.3.6). I've tested it and I am... impressed. Even though it happened much later than Musk predicted. Here's what it's like: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eIjOs1Gum2M https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eIjOs1Gum2M * Dojo, which is now online. There's a picture of it on the last quarterly deck: https://digitalassets.tesla.com/tesla-contents/image/upload/IR/TSLA-Q1-2024-Update.pdf https://digitalassets.tesla.com/tesla-contents/image/upload/... -- though I don't know if it will be able to keep up with Nvidia's offerings, which are always improving. Some things you mention failed, and the jury is still out on Cybertruck, Roadster, Solar Roof, and X (Twitter). But the track record is there.
- sanderjd 3y ago
  It is an impressive track record. And something that does frustrate me is people who want to entirely dismiss his track record in order to bolster their current criticisms of him. I think that is motivated reasoning. But I think your benefit of the doubt in his judgement is similarly misguided. What I think is that he has been very adept in having a bold vision, using his showmanship to get the funding, talent, and visibility to get it off the ground, and then leveraging that into a feedback loop that bolsters his credibility for the next bold vision. I think it's very admirable that he has executed that playbook so well for so long! (And I think it's good for society that Tesla and SpaceX and Starlink and Neuralink exist, and I certainly appreciate his role in that.) But I think his track record for things that aren't part of that playbook is pretty bad. Buying Twitter was not a bold vision, it was dumb very-online pettiness. And there's now a history of specific business decisions that seem to come directly from him, which I think have just been bad. Not bold visionary risks that didn't work out, just foreseeable bad outcomes from bad, impulsive, ego-driven decisions. So sure, next time he's spinning up something visionary in AI or biotech or energy or who-knows-what, I'll pay attention and suspend my disbelief. But on the boring day to day executive decision making that every company has to do, I think he has earned less credibility than most (maybe all) leaders of businesses of similar scale.
1970-01-01 3y ago
Are you saying he isn't allowed to have some failures on his very long list of ideas? SpaceX and Tesla are very likely his biggest successes, by all measures of the word. The amount of success these obtained easily tower over the failures by several orders of magnitude.
- browningstreet 3y ago
  Except when you factor in timelines.. his successes are from before, not lately. From a trend perspective, he's disrupting continuities that don't seem rational to disrupt and shouldn't prevent him from moonshot-ing separately.
Fricken 3y ago
Also, the "Alien Dreadnaught", a fully automated Model 3 production line with robots that move so fast you won't even be able to see them! It was when he tried to pass that one off with a straight face that drove the final nail into the coffin containing any delusions I may have entertained about Elon's competence.
JojoFatsani 3y ago
Don’t forget the boring company! Let’s invent the subway but worse

thejazzman 3y ago

That snake was bad ass I heard Elon designed and built it himself in his garage They didn't commercialize it because no one else was capable of making one and it was too much work for one person to mass produce

potatochup 3y ago
Definitely not true. Source: I worked at Tesla at the time of the Snake robot.
- dragontamer 3y ago
  The above post looks like carefully constructed satire, mostly there to make fun of people who hero-worship Elon Musk into thinking that Elon Musk personally handled all tasks at Tesla like Tony Stark / Ironman.
  - ImPostingOnHN 3y ago
    Poe's law strikes again
orwin 3y ago
People really believe that? He seems he would have troubles changing a tire, but maybe he's a great mechanic?

treme 3y ago

Tesla and SpaceX alone gives him enough credibilty for life as CEO

TheCleric 3y ago
For the immense returns that he's been getting for over 40 years, that alone gives Bernie Madoff credibility for life in investing.
- Terr_ 3y ago
  "The 8 years of the Bill Cosby show alone give Bill Cosby enough credibility for life as a wholesome family man."
lenerdenator 3y ago
SpaceX, maybe. He’s actively sinking Tesla and that’s his cash cow.
dragontamer 3y ago
What decision did Elon make at Tesla was good for Tesla in the last 10 years? I listed off the big stuff I can remember above. I'll go add "Alien Dreadnaught" and full automation of the Model 3 as another failure. Turns out that humans are way better than machines for the assembly line still, even today. ------ So far, the best thing for Tesla so far has been Elon Musk losing focus and thinking about Twitter for a few years instead of sending Tesla down another $inkhole to lose another $billion on an insane, underdeveloped idea. Well, aside from Optimus I guess.
sanderjd 3y ago
This is, frankly, a very silly way of thinking. Tesla and SpaceX are very admirable businesses that Musk deserves a lot of credit for, I'm totally with you there. But that someone made good decisions at one point in time does not imply that decisions made later are also good. Businesses change, people change, the world changes.

Avshalom 3y ago

Oh on the battery swap note I heard recently that may have been a ... scam? Apparently there was an increased credit available for EVs that could be fully charged in under x-time and by claiming that they could battery swap tesla got a bunch of extra money.

cs702 3y ago

Thank you for that. It made me chuckle! Here are some counter-examples: * A new car company making a new kind of vehicle. The first time I heard he wanted to build a new car company that would sell EVs, I dismissed it as crazy. Tesla now sells close to 2M vehicles a year, roughly comparable to BMW. * A new network of EV charging stations. The first time I heard about it I thought the company would never recoup the capital cost. * A new rocket company. The first time I heard about SpaceX's early days I dismissed it as crazy. SpaceX now sends 10x more cargo to orbit than everyone else, public and private, combined. * A new satellite-Internet service. Prior to Starlink, every previous attempt to offer cheap and reliable Internet service via satellite had gone bankrupt. * A new brain-machine interface. The first time I heard about Neuralink I dismissed it as "way too early." The company just showed a disabled man using a computer with his thoughts. * The latest beta version of the self-driving software (FSD Beta >= 12.3.6). I've tested it and I am... impressed. Even though it happened much later than Musk predicted. Here's what it's like: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eIjOs1Gum2M https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eIjOs1Gum2M * Dojo, which is now online. There's a picture of it on the last quarterly deck: https://digitalassets.tesla.com/tesla-contents/image/upload/IR/TSLA-Q1-2024-Update.pdf https://digitalassets.tesla.com/tesla-contents/image/upload/... -- though I don't know if it will be able to keep up with Nvidia's offerings, which are always improving. Some things you mention failed, and the jury is still out on Cybertruck, Roadster, Solar Roof, and X (Twitter). But the track record is there.

sanderjd 3y ago
It is an impressive track record. And something that does frustrate me is people who want to entirely dismiss his track record in order to bolster their current criticisms of him. I think that is motivated reasoning. But I think your benefit of the doubt in his judgement is similarly misguided. What I think is that he has been very adept in having a bold vision, using his showmanship to get the funding, talent, and visibility to get it off the ground, and then leveraging that into a feedback loop that bolsters his credibility for the next bold vision. I think it's very admirable that he has executed that playbook so well for so long! (And I think it's good for society that Tesla and SpaceX and Starlink and Neuralink exist, and I certainly appreciate his role in that.) But I think his track record for things that aren't part of that playbook is pretty bad. Buying Twitter was not a bold vision, it was dumb very-online pettiness. And there's now a history of specific business decisions that seem to come directly from him, which I think have just been bad. Not bold visionary risks that didn't work out, just foreseeable bad outcomes from bad, impulsive, ego-driven decisions. So sure, next time he's spinning up something visionary in AI or biotech or energy or who-knows-what, I'll pay attention and suspend my disbelief. But on the boring day to day executive decision making that every company has to do, I think he has earned less credibility than most (maybe all) leaders of businesses of similar scale.

1970-01-01 3y ago

Are you saying he isn't allowed to have some failures on his very long list of ideas? SpaceX and Tesla are very likely his biggest successes, by all measures of the word. The amount of success these obtained easily tower over the failures by several orders of magnitude.

browningstreet 3y ago
Except when you factor in timelines.. his successes are from before, not lately. From a trend perspective, he's disrupting continuities that don't seem rational to disrupt and shouldn't prevent him from moonshot-ing separately.

Fricken 3y ago

Also, the "Alien Dreadnaught", a fully automated Model 3 production line with robots that move so fast you won't even be able to see them! It was when he tried to pass that one off with a straight face that drove the final nail into the coffin containing any delusions I may have entertained about Elon's competence.

JojoFatsani 3y ago

Don’t forget the boring company! Let’s invent the subway but worse