4 ms·

Thank you Elon!

by neverrroot 2y ago

Thank you Elon!

electriclove 2y ago
SpaceX is pretty much America’s space program at this point - absolutely incredible!
- neverrroot 2y ago
  Kinda is, and it’s all Elon’s fault.
  - nordsieck 2y ago
    > Kinda is, and it’s all Elon’s fault. Not sure what you mean by that. Are you suggesting that Elon/SpaceX sabotaged Boeing Starliner program? Because it seems pretty obvious that Boeing did that all on their own.
    - neverrroot 2y ago
      I mean to give Elon credit for being able to deliver a viable program where nobody else can.
  - ElonChrist 2y ago
    [dead]
  - yarg 2y ago
    Or perhaps blame Boeing and NASA, rather than the single competent organisation that's managing to hold the whole damned thing together.
    - freedomben 2y ago
      Why not both? I think it's both the incompetence of the incumbents, and the impressive work of SpaceX that got us to where we are. With the vast majority of companies, especially tech companies, I think the leadership gets far too much credit. In most organizations I have been a part of, they succeed in spite of the leadership, not because of it. In the case of SpaceX though, I am less sure. Reading the Walter Isaacson biography on Elon Musk was quite fascinating and illuminating about his leadership style. I would never work for him myself, but he does have some really fascinating philosophies.
      - yarg 2y ago
        I actually don't know what we're arguing, since I already misinterpreted the dude that I responded to, but there's no one else that could have done this. No-one would've believed it possible, no-one even conceived of the notion that it was worth while to try. And there's not another billionaire around who'd've been willing to bet the house on it. I don't know how much of a roll he had in the designs (other than "make it pointy") but the fact remains that he's the man who built the team that somehow managed to achieve the hitherto impossible. My biggest concern with him is that he's pushing a pace that in some cases will go beyond the point of diminishing returns, and even beyond that into the territory that invites burnout. When you're building teams of the best minds on earth, you probably don't want to be burning through them like candles.
    - neverrroot 2y ago
      I meant to give Elon credit for being able to deliver a viable program where nobody else can.
- justin66 2y ago
  Weird way of looking at it. Was Roscosmos “America’s space program” when they were selling the rides?
  - ls612 2y ago
    Currently SpaceX makes up 90% of global launch mass in the past year. It may as well be the western world’s space program pretty soon, with China and Russia only launching their own military payloads.
    - justin66 2y ago
      What I was really driving at was that some are using the wrong definition of "space program." It's a good thing that space transportation is becoming a reliable service or utility, but that's something quite different than being the space program. If we came to think of launch as a very large part of what constitutes a space program, that's only because we allowed the costs of launch to become entirely too high, such that it dominated budgets.
  - dylan604 2y ago
    No. They were just the rescue (to stay on theme) for America's space program.
blastonico 2y ago
[flagged]
sneak 2y ago
How much of SpaceX’s boring day to day stuff (including ~all of the F9 stuff) do you think he has a hand in anymore? Isn’t he running Tesla, Twitter, Neuralink, The Boring Company, Starlink, and the Starship R&D, including its first-of-it’s-kind Raptor engine design which just hit major version 3? And also raising the remainder of his 12 kids (~8?) that are still speaking to him? I’m fairly certain that most of the “boring” stuff at SpaceX happens despite Musk, not because of him. Ms. Shotwell’s (the SpaceX COO) name doesn’t come up nearly as often as his does, and I suspect she does at least an order of magnitude more work there. Indeed, several SpaceX staff wrote an open letter complaining about him and his antics being a distraction that hinders them. https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2024/01/spacex-illegally-fired-employees-who-criticized-elon-musk-nlrb-alleges/ https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2024/01/spacex-illegally...
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- dotnet00 2y ago
  Musk is pretty clear about the fact that Shotwell handles the 'boring' operational stuff, so, F9, FH, and very likely includes Starlink now. These have customer-related constraints, which Gwynne is much better at handling. Elon does decision making for the R&D programs, i.e. Starship, where his style works better.
- panick21_ 2y ago
  In literally every thread about SpaceX people who don't like Musk (and sometimes others), people bring up Shotwell. Of course her name doesn't come up as often as Musk, Musk is literally one of the most famous people on earth, a highly controversial public figure and one of the richest people on the plant, who also owns and leads the company. For most other tech companies people done even know the Nr.2 person in the company, and that includes companies much bigger then SpaceX. So if anything Shotwell comes up more often then literally any other Nr.2 person in a major tech company. I couldn't tell you the relevant people at Nvidia, or Google, or Microsoft. Also the letter was more about the external image, that Musk reflected on them. There was no actual argument in the later work inside SpaceX was slowed down because of it. And from the continued progress SpaceX has made before and after that, there is no evidence of that it actually did. But of course its also self evident that the CEO isn't doing 'boring day to day stuff', but neither is Shotwell.

Thank you Elon!

electriclove 2y ago

SpaceX is pretty much America’s space program at this point - absolutely incredible!

neverrroot 2y ago
Kinda is, and it’s all Elon’s fault.
- nordsieck 2y ago
  > Kinda is, and it’s all Elon’s fault. Not sure what you mean by that. Are you suggesting that Elon/SpaceX sabotaged Boeing Starliner program? Because it seems pretty obvious that Boeing did that all on their own.
  - neverrroot 2y ago
    I mean to give Elon credit for being able to deliver a viable program where nobody else can.
- ElonChrist 2y ago
  [dead]
- yarg 2y ago
  Or perhaps blame Boeing and NASA, rather than the single competent organisation that's managing to hold the whole damned thing together.
  - freedomben 2y ago
    Why not both? I think it's both the incompetence of the incumbents, and the impressive work of SpaceX that got us to where we are. With the vast majority of companies, especially tech companies, I think the leadership gets far too much credit. In most organizations I have been a part of, they succeed in spite of the leadership, not because of it. In the case of SpaceX though, I am less sure. Reading the Walter Isaacson biography on Elon Musk was quite fascinating and illuminating about his leadership style. I would never work for him myself, but he does have some really fascinating philosophies.
    - yarg 2y ago
      I actually don't know what we're arguing, since I already misinterpreted the dude that I responded to, but there's no one else that could have done this. No-one would've believed it possible, no-one even conceived of the notion that it was worth while to try. And there's not another billionaire around who'd've been willing to bet the house on it. I don't know how much of a roll he had in the designs (other than "make it pointy") but the fact remains that he's the man who built the team that somehow managed to achieve the hitherto impossible. My biggest concern with him is that he's pushing a pace that in some cases will go beyond the point of diminishing returns, and even beyond that into the territory that invites burnout. When you're building teams of the best minds on earth, you probably don't want to be burning through them like candles.
  - neverrroot 2y ago
    I meant to give Elon credit for being able to deliver a viable program where nobody else can.
justin66 2y ago
Weird way of looking at it. Was Roscosmos “America’s space program” when they were selling the rides?
- ls612 2y ago
  Currently SpaceX makes up 90% of global launch mass in the past year. It may as well be the western world’s space program pretty soon, with China and Russia only launching their own military payloads.
  - justin66 2y ago
    What I was really driving at was that some are using the wrong definition of "space program." It's a good thing that space transportation is becoming a reliable service or utility, but that's something quite different than being the space program. If we came to think of launch as a very large part of what constitutes a space program, that's only because we allowed the costs of launch to become entirely too high, such that it dominated budgets.
- dylan604 2y ago
  No. They were just the rescue (to stay on theme) for America's space program.

blastonico 2y ago

[flagged]

sneak 2y ago

How much of SpaceX’s boring day to day stuff (including ~all of the F9 stuff) do you think he has a hand in anymore? Isn’t he running Tesla, Twitter, Neuralink, The Boring Company, Starlink, and the Starship R&D, including its first-of-it’s-kind Raptor engine design which just hit major version 3? And also raising the remainder of his 12 kids (~8?) that are still speaking to him? I’m fairly certain that most of the “boring” stuff at SpaceX happens despite Musk, not because of him. Ms. Shotwell’s (the SpaceX COO) name doesn’t come up nearly as often as his does, and I suspect she does at least an order of magnitude more work there. Indeed, several SpaceX staff wrote an open letter complaining about him and his antics being a distraction that hinders them. https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2024/01/spacex-illegally-fired-employees-who-criticized-elon-musk-nlrb-alleges/ https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2024/01/spacex-illegally...

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
dotnet00 2y ago
Musk is pretty clear about the fact that Shotwell handles the 'boring' operational stuff, so, F9, FH, and very likely includes Starlink now. These have customer-related constraints, which Gwynne is much better at handling. Elon does decision making for the R&D programs, i.e. Starship, where his style works better.
panick21_ 2y ago
In literally every thread about SpaceX people who don't like Musk (and sometimes others), people bring up Shotwell. Of course her name doesn't come up as often as Musk, Musk is literally one of the most famous people on earth, a highly controversial public figure and one of the richest people on the plant, who also owns and leads the company. For most other tech companies people done even know the Nr.2 person in the company, and that includes companies much bigger then SpaceX. So if anything Shotwell comes up more often then literally any other Nr.2 person in a major tech company. I couldn't tell you the relevant people at Nvidia, or Google, or Microsoft. Also the letter was more about the external image, that Musk reflected on them. There was no actual argument in the later work inside SpaceX was slowed down because of it. And from the continued progress SpaceX has made before and after that, there is no evidence of that it actually did. But of course its also self evident that the CEO isn't doing 'boring day to day stuff', but neither is Shotwell.