Elon Musk: Always A Douche

[Legbiter]

But he obviously went off the rails eventually...

Yeah Elon went off the deep end in 2022 or thereabouts. He seems to take after his father who also started displaying similar schizo behavior at about the same age (perhaps a little older). 

From the Isaacson bio:

[DGuller]

I think it is fair to call Musk a genius for what he achieved and I would also credit him personally with building very successful companies. One of the greatest entrepreneurs of all time and visionary on multiple technologies.

But he obviously went off the rails eventually and turned from entrepreneurial genius to crazy fascist. He seems to have been an asshole throughout.

I would agree fully with that characterization.  I think the desire to retroactively blackwash Musk's reputation as an engineer comes from the difficulty people increasingly have in seeing complexity in real human beings.

[PJL]

I think you need to be an asshole to be a good entrepreneur to some extent, especially in high tech industries. But Musk has gone from normal businessman villainy to to comic book super-villainy in the last few years.

[crazy canuck]

I'm not a rocket scientist, obviously, but it seems like getting a rocket company off and running is simpler, management not wise, than a car company. You don't need branding, or  as much competition (Russia?), or manage consumer expectations to anywhere in the same degree. You just need to hire guys that know how to build rockets and the money to hire them and do RnD. And that's where his mad genius lies. Getting money. He's a hype man. A car salesman in the classic sense. Whether it's investors or government grants dude knows how to get money.

Yeah, I think that is a good way of describing his strengths.  He is good at convincing people to give him money.

[The Brain]

I don't know enough about Musk's history to have a solid opinion on his intellect. On the one hand, everything I've heard or seen him say has been like stuff a somewhat slow 12 y/o would say. On the other hand he has become extremely rich. On the third hand Trump is the most successful politician on the planet, and he's dumber than most vertebrates. "You can't argue with success" is in many ways a valid point, but taken too far you end up worshipping Powerball winners for being genius businesspersons.

[HVC]

I don't know enough about Musk's history to have a solid opinion on his intellect. On the one hand, everything I've heard or seen him say has been like stuff a somewhat slow 12 y/o would say. On the other hand he has become extremely rich. On the third hand Trump is the most successful politician on the planet, and he's dumber than most vertebrates. "You can't argue with success" is in many ways a valid point, but taken too far you end up worshipping Powerball winners for being genius businesspersons.

If you want to read through 300 or so pages ( ) Otto did a good job of debunking a lot of the musk myths about his engineering genius in this thread.

[Zanza]

The new type of car had already been developed by others.  You, and others here, keep making the mistake of crediting him with the technology that was developed.

Tesla was hyper innovative in all dimensions of the automotive industry, be it hardware, software, RD, production and sales processes. Also their vertical integration went against best practices, but was successful. Not sure how much of that was Musk, but he was the CEO for that time. Not sure if Tesla still is as innovative though. Their competitors seem to pass them by, especially Chinese companies.

[crazy canuck]

The new type of car had already been developed by others.  You, and others here, keep making the mistake of crediting him with the technology that was developed.

Tesla was hyper innovative in all dimensions of the automotive industry, be it hardware, software, RD, production and sales processes. Also their vertical integration went against best practices, but was successful. Not sure how much of that was Musk, but he was the CEO for that time. Not sure if Tesla still is as innovative though. Their competitors seem to pass them by, especially Chinese companies.

No disagreement with any of this.  The question is who gets the credit for all that innovation, and from what I have been reading, it goes to those who developed that tech, rather than Musk.  Musk saw a good thing and invested in it.  So he can be credited as seeing a good thing to make a bet on.

[Zanza]

He took over less than a year after Tesla was founded. So all innovation happened with him at the helm and I doubt much of it was on any roadmap in 2003. Did he do the engineering legwork himself? Of course not. But did he have the vision for a game-changing product and presumably directed his teams in that direction? I guess so.

Anyway, not really that it matters. His non-entrepreunerial side is the topic of this thread.

[garbon]

He took over less than a year after Tesla was founded. So all innovation happened with him at the helm and I doubt much of it was on any roadmap in 2003. Did he do the engineering legwork himself? Of course not. But did he have the vision for a game-changing product and presumably directed his teams in that direction? I guess so.

Did he have to give them direction? Presumably he could have just them get on with it.

[crazy canuck]

He took over less than a year after Tesla was founded. So all innovation happened with him at the helm and I doubt much of it was on any roadmap in 2003. Did he do the engineering legwork himself? Of course not. But did he have the vision for a game-changing product and presumably directed his teams in that direction? I guess so.

Anyway, not really that it matters. His non-entrepreunerial side is the topic of this thread.

Why do you think it was his vision?

[Syt]

So ... is Elon Musk a candidate for being one of the biggest con men or grifters in history?

[HVC]

So ... is Elon Musk a candidate for being one of the biggest con men or grifters in history?

Judging by his actions while in control of the government of America... maybe?

[Zanza]

@garbon @crazy Canuck
I have no sources or whatever to convince you. Maybe we can just leave it here disagreeing in his role in Tesla's success.

[HVC]

And he doesn't need to be a grifter. A ceo that can attain capital is vital, especially in a start up. This is a man that hires people to play video games for him so he can claim he's a great gamer. Doesn't seem like the hall mark of a strategic genius