7 ms·

Everything I've read about Elon Musk recently has really made me root for the guy. He is disrupting two very difficult industries. This was posted on HN a few

by dos1 14y ago

Everything I've read about Elon Musk recently has really made me root for the guy. He is disrupting two very difficult industries. This was posted on HN a few months ago, but I really thought this interview with him was exceptional: http://www.wired.com/science/space/news/2008/08/musk_qa http://www.wired.com/science/space/news/2008/08/musk_qa What's most impressive to me is that this interview was almost 4 years ago, and he's done exactly as he said. He's focused on results and he's spending his considerable capital on things likely to make an impact on the world, not on frivolous applications like social networks.

vannevar 14y ago
I'd really like to know how he's doing it. Is it because he's personally a brilliant engineer, micromanaging the projects to success? Or does he have an eye for great talent, able to rapidly put together highly productive teams? Or is he so motivational that he can take ordinary engineers and inspire them to do extraordinary things? The stuff they're doing is hard. A lot of very talented people have failed in the space and automotive businesses. To succeed in both to the degree he has is mind-boggling. Tesla and SpaceX still have a long way to go, but where they've been in a few short years is remarkable.
- JanezStupar 14y ago
  Probably his companies have less than your average share of bickering VP's and MBA class business types waging corporate warfare with his resources.
  - powerslave12r 14y ago
    I think one major reason is that his companies have a 'strict no-assholes policy.' [Clip http://www.oninnovation.com/videos/detail.aspx?video=1256&title=Hiring%20The%20Right%20People http://www.oninnovation.com/videos/detail.aspx?video=1256&#3...] I have seen a few of his talks and he makes it look really easy. It's probably well known already, but in case you missed it, Iron Man's character in the movies is based off of him to some degree.
    - philwelch 14y ago
      I keep hearing the Iron Man thing, but honestly I'm not sure I see it. I've seen interviews with Musk and he's way less cocky and more down-to-earth than you'd expect with that basis of reference.
      - MikeCapone 14y ago
        I think they were basing it more on the whole "Renaissance man + entrepreneur" thing rather than personality.
    - anothermachine 14y ago
      Iron Man is decades old. If anything, the reverse is true: The popular perception of Musk is based off the Iron Man archetype.
      - jlgreco 14y ago
        Allegedly the character, as portrayed in the recent movies, took inspiration from him.
    - gojomo 14y ago
      The Tony Stark character, billionaire-industrialist-brilliant-engineer superhero, has existed in the comics since 1963, 8 years before Musk was born. So, the claims of Musk as a model for Stark are best taken with a grain of salt. Most likely, the Iron Man movie team -- including Jon Favreau and Robert Downey Jr. -- just finds it helpful to reference Musk as a modern Stark-archetype. (Starketype?) The original Stark drew from Howard Hughes, but Hughes isn't as familiar to the movie's modern audience. And, our other modern billionaires, like Gates and Jobs, don't quite have the same rockets-and-motion pedigree as did Hughes and now Musk.
      - brc 14y ago
        Howard Hughes is very much the same type of man as Musk. He was at the forefront of both movies and aviation, both of which were young industries at the time. A lot of attention is focussed on Hughes' later years when he turned basically insane, but in his productive years he pushed forwards the design of the airplane and motion pictures. If anyone is unfamiliar with his work, I'd recommend picking up a biography and giving it a read.
- clebio 14y ago
  Second this. He's also seems just an exceptionally sweet and lucid man. If anyone has actual knowledge about this question, I would love to hear about it. Worth a blog post, or a book contract, even.
  - DaniFong 14y ago
    He is one of the most strikingly rational and sincere people I have ever met.
- ams6110 14y ago
  Starting without the 80 years of inertia that all the established auto makers have accumulated certainly helps too.
- bfe 14y ago
  He's extremely smart and extremely hard-working; he has personally, aggressively recruited others whom he's identified as the key people he wants working for him, and by all accounts he inspires them to work as hard as him; he's trained himself into deep domain expertise in both rockets and electric cars and serves as the chief designing engineer of his companies' products; but maybe most important, he has really extreme determination. Consider this exchange after SpaceX had lost its first three launches in a row: Wired.com: At the end of the day you're still zero for three; you have so far failed to put a rocket into orbit. Musk: We haven't gotten into orbit, true, but we've made considerable progress. If it's an all-or-nothing proposition then we've failed. But it's not all or nothing. We must get to orbit eventually, and we will. It might take us one, two or three more tries, but we will. We will make it work. Wired.com: How do you maintain your optimism? Musk: Do I sound optimistic? Wired.com: Yeah, you always do. Musk: Optimism, pessimism, fuck that; we're going to make it happen. As God is my bloody witness, I'm hell-bent on making it work. http://www.wired.com/science/space/news/2008/08/musk_qa http://www.wired.com/science/space/news/2008/08/musk_qa Compare Paul Graham: "I now have enough experience with startups to be able to say what the most important quality is in a startup founder, and it's not what you might think. The most important quality in a startup founder is determination. Not intelligence-- determination." http://paulgraham.com/startuplessons.html http://paulgraham.com/startuplessons.html
  - jpendry 14y ago
    I just wanted to include the last line of the interview that you left off, as I think it's actually pretty important: Wired.com: So what have you learned so far? Musk: Patience is a virtue, and I'm learning patience. It's a tough lesson.
  - clebio 14y ago
    Thanks for that, it's an excellent survey -- a stunning combination of factors that he worked like hell to align (that the universe didn't simply take care of....). He's also comfortable being honest, as in that bit about optimism, and other comments in other interviews.
    - bfe 14y ago
falling 14y ago
> he's spending his considerable capital on things likely to make an impact on the world, not on frivolous applications like social networks. While I agree that the guy is awesome, his projects are inspiring and I dislike this social everything wave as much as you probably do, social networks do make an impact on the world, probably even faster and more direct than space ships.
- datalus 14y ago
  Yes, they do, but we should rename them to social ad networks.
  - falling 14y ago
    Do you call it Google Ad Search?
    - waterlesscloud 14y ago
      Do I think of it that way? Yeah, sometimes I do.
- dos1 14y ago
  Good point - I guess my biggest complaint is that companies like Facebook and Twitter pull some of the most brilliant minds. These minds, in my opinion, could be better spent finding solutions to big problems like cancer, space exploration, green energy, clean water etc. I guess it's not so much that I dislike social networks, more that I dislike the opportunity cost of having smart people go work for them.
  - genwin 14y ago
    Space exploration has little benefit to the average person, esp. for the environmental damage it does. For most people it's just interesting news. I'd like to see more of that innovative talent and gov't money applied to environmental concerns. (That said, I'm still looking forward to tuning into Mars via a microphone/video placed there. Just no ultra-expensive humans, please.)
MikeCapone 14y ago
> He is disrupting two very difficult industries. If you don't count his earlier internet work, he's still active in 3 difficult industries. He's also chairman of SolarCity, a solar panel installer with some innovative financing options. I think he had the idea for the company and provided funding, and his cousins (?) are running it.
- cdjarrell 14y ago
  You're correct, Lyndon and Pete Rive are Musk's cousins. He has invested a considerable amount of money in SolarCity and oversees the board; both are indispensable as the former allowed SolarCity to scale (which was the main problem with lowering installation costs outside of material procurement) and the latter has provided the Rives guidance when they needed it. But as Musk has said, his main role at SolarCity is showing up to the board meeting and hearing the great results.

by dos1 14y ago

vannevar 14y ago

I'd really like to know how he's doing it. Is it because he's personally a brilliant engineer, micromanaging the projects to success? Or does he have an eye for great talent, able to rapidly put together highly productive teams? Or is he so motivational that he can take ordinary engineers and inspire them to do extraordinary things? The stuff they're doing is hard. A lot of very talented people have failed in the space and automotive businesses. To succeed in both to the degree he has is mind-boggling. Tesla and SpaceX still have a long way to go, but where they've been in a few short years is remarkable.

JanezStupar 14y ago
Probably his companies have less than your average share of bickering VP's and MBA class business types waging corporate warfare with his resources.
- powerslave12r 14y ago
  I think one major reason is that his companies have a 'strict no-assholes policy.' [Clip http://www.oninnovation.com/videos/detail.aspx?video=1256&title=Hiring%20The%20Right%20People http://www.oninnovation.com/videos/detail.aspx?video=1256&#3...] I have seen a few of his talks and he makes it look really easy. It's probably well known already, but in case you missed it, Iron Man's character in the movies is based off of him to some degree.
  - philwelch 14y ago
    I keep hearing the Iron Man thing, but honestly I'm not sure I see it. I've seen interviews with Musk and he's way less cocky and more down-to-earth than you'd expect with that basis of reference.
    - MikeCapone 14y ago
      I think they were basing it more on the whole "Renaissance man + entrepreneur" thing rather than personality.
  - anothermachine 14y ago
    Iron Man is decades old. If anything, the reverse is true: The popular perception of Musk is based off the Iron Man archetype.
    - jlgreco 14y ago
      Allegedly the character, as portrayed in the recent movies, took inspiration from him.
  - gojomo 14y ago
    The Tony Stark character, billionaire-industrialist-brilliant-engineer superhero, has existed in the comics since 1963, 8 years before Musk was born. So, the claims of Musk as a model for Stark are best taken with a grain of salt. Most likely, the Iron Man movie team -- including Jon Favreau and Robert Downey Jr. -- just finds it helpful to reference Musk as a modern Stark-archetype. (Starketype?) The original Stark drew from Howard Hughes, but Hughes isn't as familiar to the movie's modern audience. And, our other modern billionaires, like Gates and Jobs, don't quite have the same rockets-and-motion pedigree as did Hughes and now Musk.
    - brc 14y ago
      Howard Hughes is very much the same type of man as Musk. He was at the forefront of both movies and aviation, both of which were young industries at the time. A lot of attention is focussed on Hughes' later years when he turned basically insane, but in his productive years he pushed forwards the design of the airplane and motion pictures. If anyone is unfamiliar with his work, I'd recommend picking up a biography and giving it a read.
clebio 14y ago
Second this. He's also seems just an exceptionally sweet and lucid man. If anyone has actual knowledge about this question, I would love to hear about it. Worth a blog post, or a book contract, even.
- DaniFong 14y ago
  He is one of the most strikingly rational and sincere people I have ever met.
ams6110 14y ago
Starting without the 80 years of inertia that all the established auto makers have accumulated certainly helps too.
bfe 14y ago
He's extremely smart and extremely hard-working; he has personally, aggressively recruited others whom he's identified as the key people he wants working for him, and by all accounts he inspires them to work as hard as him; he's trained himself into deep domain expertise in both rockets and electric cars and serves as the chief designing engineer of his companies' products; but maybe most important, he has really extreme determination. Consider this exchange after SpaceX had lost its first three launches in a row: Wired.com: At the end of the day you're still zero for three; you have so far failed to put a rocket into orbit. Musk: We haven't gotten into orbit, true, but we've made considerable progress. If it's an all-or-nothing proposition then we've failed. But it's not all or nothing. We must get to orbit eventually, and we will. It might take us one, two or three more tries, but we will. We will make it work. Wired.com: How do you maintain your optimism? Musk: Do I sound optimistic? Wired.com: Yeah, you always do. Musk: Optimism, pessimism, fuck that; we're going to make it happen. As God is my bloody witness, I'm hell-bent on making it work. http://www.wired.com/science/space/news/2008/08/musk_qa http://www.wired.com/science/space/news/2008/08/musk_qa Compare Paul Graham: "I now have enough experience with startups to be able to say what the most important quality is in a startup founder, and it's not what you might think. The most important quality in a startup founder is determination. Not intelligence-- determination." http://paulgraham.com/startuplessons.html http://paulgraham.com/startuplessons.html
- jpendry 14y ago
  I just wanted to include the last line of the interview that you left off, as I think it's actually pretty important: Wired.com: So what have you learned so far? Musk: Patience is a virtue, and I'm learning patience. It's a tough lesson.
- clebio 14y ago
  Thanks for that, it's an excellent survey -- a stunning combination of factors that he worked like hell to align (that the universe didn't simply take care of....). He's also comfortable being honest, as in that bit about optimism, and other comments in other interviews.
  - bfe 14y ago

falling 14y ago

> he's spending his considerable capital on things likely to make an impact on the world, not on frivolous applications like social networks. While I agree that the guy is awesome, his projects are inspiring and I dislike this social everything wave as much as you probably do, social networks do make an impact on the world, probably even faster and more direct than space ships.

datalus 14y ago
Yes, they do, but we should rename them to social ad networks.
- falling 14y ago
  Do you call it Google Ad Search?
  - waterlesscloud 14y ago
    Do I think of it that way? Yeah, sometimes I do.
dos1 14y ago
Good point - I guess my biggest complaint is that companies like Facebook and Twitter pull some of the most brilliant minds. These minds, in my opinion, could be better spent finding solutions to big problems like cancer, space exploration, green energy, clean water etc. I guess it's not so much that I dislike social networks, more that I dislike the opportunity cost of having smart people go work for them.
- genwin 14y ago
  Space exploration has little benefit to the average person, esp. for the environmental damage it does. For most people it's just interesting news. I'd like to see more of that innovative talent and gov't money applied to environmental concerns. (That said, I'm still looking forward to tuning into Mars via a microphone/video placed there. Just no ultra-expensive humans, please.)

MikeCapone 14y ago

> He is disrupting two very difficult industries. If you don't count his earlier internet work, he's still active in 3 difficult industries. He's also chairman of SolarCity, a solar panel installer with some innovative financing options. I think he had the idea for the company and provided funding, and his cousins (?) are running it.

cdjarrell 14y ago
You're correct, Lyndon and Pete Rive are Musk's cousins. He has invested a considerable amount of money in SolarCity and oversees the board; both are indispensable as the former allowed SolarCity to scale (which was the main problem with lowering installation costs outside of material procurement) and the latter has provided the Rives guidance when they needed it. But as Musk has said, his main role at SolarCity is showing up to the board meeting and hearing the great results.