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I suspect that NASA may want to keep Starliner around, given that SpaceX is owned by a man who seems to be getting ever more unhinged by the day and has a histo

I suspect that NASA may want to keep Starliner around, given that SpaceX is owned by a man who seems to be getting ever more unhinged by the day and has a history of making highly questionable business decisions.

big-green-man 2y ago
Hopefully that doesn't factor into their calculus at all. I'd like space programs to be run by practical people who value merit over noise, and I personally don't care if a space transport system is owned by Ronald McDonald as long as it works right. Boeing is a very respectable company or so I've heard. I'm sure their executives watch what they say in public and wear the proper in fashion business suits as expected. I would still rather hop on a spacex vehicle right about now. If you're right and they care about Musk owning Twitter and saying inappropriate shit out loud, I'd say that would reduce my trust in NASA.
- Wytwwww 2y ago
  > practical people who value merit over noise, How wouldn't that be a part of a perfectly rational risk analysis though? It's like saying (of course on a very different scale) that NASA should be buying rockets from Russian/Chinese/etc. companies/government as long as they offer a good price/quality ratio etc. Which would be an immensely stupid thing to do regardless of how good the actual rockets were. > Twitter and saying inappropriate shit out loud Or possibly more importantly doing inappropriate shit both publicly and not. In general companies that are purely driven by their management's desire to maximize profits/shareholder value/their bonuses are fairly predictable and can be expected to behave rationally under most circumstances. However you might not want to rely too much on company owned by someone (hard to tell which ones are correct so pick any): - willing to burn billions to either to prove some bizarre point - makes impulsive decisions worth billions under the influence of drugs - is willing to spend large amounts of money to manipulate public opinion (and/or undermine democracy and the rule of law) (at least long-term anyway...)
- mopenstein 2y ago
  If you disagree with someone's political opinion, obviously they aren't fit to do anything of constructive value.
  - wwtrv 2y ago
    Why? It would just seem silly not to take include the fact the CEO of the company you are relying on continuously behaves in an erratic and unpredictable manner (and is also trying to undermine democratic institutions but that's besides the point...) into your risk estimates.
naasking 2y ago
> SpaceX is owned by a man who seems to be getting ever more unhinged by the day How so? Surely you're not claiming that shitposting on Twitter/X is some kind of objective assessment of a person's mentality?
- kube-system 2y ago
  I agree in that his shitposting isn't indicative of any change. Musk has always been a wildcard. That's part of the reason how he's made it to the position he's in now to begin with.
- michaelt 2y ago
  Even if the tweets are just locker room talk if the CEO of a business whose primary revenue source is money from advertisers tells advertisers to fuck off and when they do instead of apologising or rolling anything back, sues them over it and if this is part of a pattern of unpredictable behaviour covering everything from calling a cave rescue diver a paedophile to accidentally buying a $44 billion company while trying to prank the SEC to make a point some would say that is not the level of boring, levelheaded rationality you want from the man who can decide whether your astronauts get home or not
  - naasking 2y ago
    > and if this is part of a pattern of unpredictable behaviour This is just re-asserting the opinion that he's unhinged rather than shitposting for entertainment. Nothing you've presented suggests anything "unhinged", and investors can decide for themselves if his "risky behaviour" warrants their money. > from the man who can decide whether your astronauts get home or not If you seriously think Musk would decide to not assist, you're deluded. Not only would he not do this for personal ethical reasons and his interest in space exploration, he knows most of his staff would resign in protest, and that would also be the end of SpaceX's government contracts, and thus basically the end of SpaceX. If he's truly unhinged as you claim, then you can expect that this will happen sometime soon. I won't hold my breath.
    - 2y ago
rangestransform 2y ago
I hope the astronauts are completely intolerant of their lives being risked for political points
hersko 2y ago
> has a history of making highly questionable business decisions. I get people don't like Musk, fine. But pretending that he has a history of making bad business decisions is ludicrous. He is by far the most successful business man alive (and maybe in history). This is just a fact. You can point out plenty of his faults, but his business acumen is clearly not one of them. Just as an example: I'm old enough to remember when everyone said Twitter was going to completely break in a week after he fired >50% of the engineers to cut costs. How long ago was that? Also, whether you like the changes or not, there seems to be far more productivity and new features since Musk bought Twitter than the previous years with the old management and far larger headcount.
- zarzavat 2y ago
  He’s currently suing his own customers for alleged antitrust violations after they stopped doing business with him because they judged that being associated with his platform was bad PR. Twitter also triggered race riots in the UK and instead of being halfway apologetic about this, he has been spreading conspiracy theories on his personal account. This is likely to lead to a significantly more hostile legal environment in the future. He is also being sued by the EU for changing blue checkmarks from a badge of verification to a paid feature, confusing users. and that’s just this week!
  - hersko 2y ago
    That's not why he is suing them. It is an anti trust suit where he is alleging illegal conspiracy. The man runs 3 multibillion dollar businesses that are being sued all the time. I don't think any of these will have large or even noticeable impacts on the companies.
  - indoordin0saur 2y ago
    He's suing an NGO-like agency (Global Alliance for Responsible Media) that includes a lot of advertisers who coordinated to prevent the purchasing of buying ad space on the platform. So not exactly his customers but someone that should have been representing the interests of potential customers. People are getting thrown in prison for years for things like throwing a trash can at a police officer. Like thrown directly in prison: arrest->trial->sentencing->appeal->incarceration is all happening in the span of a few days and the UK is actually attempting to make it illegal to talk about on social media! This is in addition to giving actual rape and murder perpetrators slow-walked trials, house arrest or just non-investigations. The EU lawsuit just seems weird. I'm not sure why they would care so much about that one. The checkmark change was highly publicized and I don't think it mattered to anyone but celebrities and attention-seeking figures anyways. Government officials and other critically important people/organizations still get a verification.

big-green-man 2y ago

Hopefully that doesn't factor into their calculus at all. I'd like space programs to be run by practical people who value merit over noise, and I personally don't care if a space transport system is owned by Ronald McDonald as long as it works right. Boeing is a very respectable company or so I've heard. I'm sure their executives watch what they say in public and wear the proper in fashion business suits as expected. I would still rather hop on a spacex vehicle right about now. If you're right and they care about Musk owning Twitter and saying inappropriate shit out loud, I'd say that would reduce my trust in NASA.

Wytwwww 2y ago
> practical people who value merit over noise, How wouldn't that be a part of a perfectly rational risk analysis though? It's like saying (of course on a very different scale) that NASA should be buying rockets from Russian/Chinese/etc. companies/government as long as they offer a good price/quality ratio etc. Which would be an immensely stupid thing to do regardless of how good the actual rockets were. > Twitter and saying inappropriate shit out loud Or possibly more importantly doing inappropriate shit both publicly and not. In general companies that are purely driven by their management's desire to maximize profits/shareholder value/their bonuses are fairly predictable and can be expected to behave rationally under most circumstances. However you might not want to rely too much on company owned by someone (hard to tell which ones are correct so pick any): - willing to burn billions to either to prove some bizarre point - makes impulsive decisions worth billions under the influence of drugs - is willing to spend large amounts of money to manipulate public opinion (and/or undermine democracy and the rule of law) (at least long-term anyway...)
mopenstein 2y ago
If you disagree with someone's political opinion, obviously they aren't fit to do anything of constructive value.
- wwtrv 2y ago
  Why? It would just seem silly not to take include the fact the CEO of the company you are relying on continuously behaves in an erratic and unpredictable manner (and is also trying to undermine democratic institutions but that's besides the point...) into your risk estimates.

naasking 2y ago

> SpaceX is owned by a man who seems to be getting ever more unhinged by the day How so? Surely you're not claiming that shitposting on Twitter/X is some kind of objective assessment of a person's mentality?

kube-system 2y ago
I agree in that his shitposting isn't indicative of any change. Musk has always been a wildcard. That's part of the reason how he's made it to the position he's in now to begin with.
michaelt 2y ago
Even if the tweets are just locker room talk if the CEO of a business whose primary revenue source is money from advertisers tells advertisers to fuck off and when they do instead of apologising or rolling anything back, sues them over it and if this is part of a pattern of unpredictable behaviour covering everything from calling a cave rescue diver a paedophile to accidentally buying a $44 billion company while trying to prank the SEC to make a point some would say that is not the level of boring, levelheaded rationality you want from the man who can decide whether your astronauts get home or not
- naasking 2y ago
  > and if this is part of a pattern of unpredictable behaviour This is just re-asserting the opinion that he's unhinged rather than shitposting for entertainment. Nothing you've presented suggests anything "unhinged", and investors can decide for themselves if his "risky behaviour" warrants their money. > from the man who can decide whether your astronauts get home or not If you seriously think Musk would decide to not assist, you're deluded. Not only would he not do this for personal ethical reasons and his interest in space exploration, he knows most of his staff would resign in protest, and that would also be the end of SpaceX's government contracts, and thus basically the end of SpaceX. If he's truly unhinged as you claim, then you can expect that this will happen sometime soon. I won't hold my breath.
  - 2y ago

rangestransform 2y ago

I hope the astronauts are completely intolerant of their lives being risked for political points

hersko 2y ago

> has a history of making highly questionable business decisions. I get people don't like Musk, fine. But pretending that he has a history of making bad business decisions is ludicrous. He is by far the most successful business man alive (and maybe in history). This is just a fact. You can point out plenty of his faults, but his business acumen is clearly not one of them. Just as an example: I'm old enough to remember when everyone said Twitter was going to completely break in a week after he fired >50% of the engineers to cut costs. How long ago was that? Also, whether you like the changes or not, there seems to be far more productivity and new features since Musk bought Twitter than the previous years with the old management and far larger headcount.

zarzavat 2y ago
He’s currently suing his own customers for alleged antitrust violations after they stopped doing business with him because they judged that being associated with his platform was bad PR. Twitter also triggered race riots in the UK and instead of being halfway apologetic about this, he has been spreading conspiracy theories on his personal account. This is likely to lead to a significantly more hostile legal environment in the future. He is also being sued by the EU for changing blue checkmarks from a badge of verification to a paid feature, confusing users. and that’s just this week!
- hersko 2y ago
  That's not why he is suing them. It is an anti trust suit where he is alleging illegal conspiracy. The man runs 3 multibillion dollar businesses that are being sued all the time. I don't think any of these will have large or even noticeable impacts on the companies.
- indoordin0saur 2y ago
  He's suing an NGO-like agency (Global Alliance for Responsible Media) that includes a lot of advertisers who coordinated to prevent the purchasing of buying ad space on the platform. So not exactly his customers but someone that should have been representing the interests of potential customers. People are getting thrown in prison for years for things like throwing a trash can at a police officer. Like thrown directly in prison: arrest->trial->sentencing->appeal->incarceration is all happening in the span of a few days and the UK is actually attempting to make it illegal to talk about on social media! This is in addition to giving actual rape and murder perpetrators slow-walked trials, house arrest or just non-investigations. The EU lawsuit just seems weird. I'm not sure why they would care so much about that one. The checkmark change was highly publicized and I don't think it mattered to anyone but celebrities and attention-seeking figures anyways. Government officials and other critically important people/organizations still get a verification.