1. We should strive to live in a world where Elon Musk is unremarkable. “Oh yeah, that guy getting to Mars. He’s cool but I’m a fan of the guy building a tunnel between China and the US”
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12. Elon is neither a flawless god-king or a lucky huckster. Or maybe he’s both. In some cases he’s spot on, visionary, and inspiring. In some cases he’s misguided, misleading, and irresponsible. I suspect you may not be able to get one without the other.
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13. Elon’s recent successes are due to both free markets *and* governments. SpaceX couldn’t exist without NASA - both direct $$ and process knowledge. Tesla+Li-ion tech has gotten tons of government subsidies. And all would be wasted without market incentives. (Controversial)
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14. Ascribing superhuman qualities to Elon is bad for two reasons. 1) It hamstrings ambition. "I need 8 hours of sleep and I'm not a millionaire so might as well not try." 2) It chills support for ambitious projects. "I like what she's trying to do, but she's no Elon..."
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15. Elon Musk should cause cognitive dissonance in more people: "Software is how to change the world!"//"SpaceX, Boring Company, Hyperloop are some of the most exciting projects!" "I don't invest in hardware companies"//"I wish I had invested in Tesla/SpaceX" "Specialize!"
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16. Elon's communication style is super effective in part because of his precision. Pay attention to how much detail he uses but how it's in service of the bigger point.
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17. Elon's precise communication style completely makes you forget that he's not actually the best orator. Most people do the opposite - they use superb oratory to obscure imprecise thought.
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18. Elon doesn't understand how modern machine learning works. See the relative imprecision of the way he talks about "AI" contra other things.
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19. Elon is the direct intellectual descendent of Thomas Edison. Both were master storytellers who hoarded credit and used it to build larger-than-life reputations as innovators and used it to push massive technological change into the world.
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20. Most of the ideas attributed to Elon aren't original, but that doesn't matter. What is original: His articulation of them in a way that makes them seem feasible and excites people. This is why it's stupid to dismiss ideas just 'because they've been tried before.'
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21. Other things that I think are both true and don't matter: 1) I have a hunch Elon is a brutal boss 2) He gives the impression he does things singlehandedly 3) Elon's Mom is a celebrity and his family is well-connected
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22. Elon's balance between get-shit-done intensity and playfulness is underrated. It's very easy to get pushed one way or another.
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23. Elon illustrates the power of cultural cross-disciplinarianism. The parties, launch events, and general feel of his companies are very LA, not Silicon Valley. What else could be unleashed by more cultural cross-disciplinarianism?
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24. People shouldn't let Elon blindly polarize them. Both on the fanboy side "Elon can do no wrong!" and the hater side "Everything Elon does is a fraud/dangerous/unoriginal."
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25. Elon fails to deliver on many promises* but almost eliminates the emotional/memory impact because of excellent announcement timing and storytelling. See "seamless story modification" in tweet #2 *remember solar roofs, autosummon, level 4 autonomy coming next year, etc?
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26. I don't think Elon is the master of 5-D world-business-domination chess, unlike some people on the internet.* His combination of precision, storytelling, past successes, and diverse bets gives that impression. *see: https://caseyhandmer.wordpress.com/2019/11/02/starlink-is-a-very-big-deal/amp/?__twitter_impression=true …https://waitbutwhy.com/2017/03/elon-musk-post-series.html …
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27. Elon has bad feedback loops. From what I can tell not knowing him (so massive grain of salt) he has nobody he respects who can push back on his ideas. Maybe Gwynne Shotwell in a SpaceX context. Add that to hordes of fanboys who accept everything or haters who reject all.
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28. It's hard to tell which parts of Elon's persona are manufactured so that he can become the person he needs to be to win and which were there originally. This probably doesn't matter.
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29. Elon strives for celebrity both because it's crucial for pushing his future-vision agenda *and* because he likes the attention. Celebrity is one of the powerful ways to get into people's heads outside your domain. I don't think you can be an amazing showman sans enjoyment.
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30. Elon is surprisingly low-salience outside the kind of people who are reading this thread. In 2015, I lived downstairs from a woman who had never heard of him, Tesla, or SpaceX. Times have changed, but not that much. This is a reason why the celebrity is important.
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31. It's fascinating how tightly Elon has bound himself to his projects in our minds. Look at this thread - I use him, SpaceX, Tesla, etc. almost interchangeably. I wonder how he does it so effectively.
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32. Elon's other historical parent is Howard Hughes (in addition to Edison.) Brilliant, risk taking polymath engineer/businessmen pushing the limits in aerospace. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Howard_Hughes … Note that you've absolutely heard of Edison, but perhaps not Hughes. This will be relevant
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33. (Non-paypal) Elon projects are surprisingly low-direct-impact on most people. Most of us don't interact with rocket launches, fancy cars, etc. regularly. The promise/dream/assumption is that they will hit a tipping point to mass impact any minute now - starlink, model 3
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34. It's also fascinating that there seems to be post-SpaceX Elon and pre-SpaceX Elon. Pre-SpaceX Elon worked almost exclusively on software projects (except aborted PhD project.) I would call these two "Bitland Elon" and "Atomland Elon."
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35. Elon is the master of what
@matthewclifford calls "predictably successful" ideas. Essentially ones where you can say "we're not sure we can execute on this, but if we do, it's clear we will win so hard."http://benjaminreinhardt.com/predictably-successful-ideas …Prikaži ovu nit -
36. Most of Elon's projects ride the razor's edge between success and failure. I think both people who say any of them are doomed to failure or destined to succeed are wrong. SpaceX could be screwed by a single disaster/contract change. Tesla could lose the faith of the market
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37. The quote "you either die a hero or live long enough to become the villain" feels apt to Elon. Historically, public opinion towards celebrity innovators is shockingly fickle. As soon as they stop a steady stream of perceived successes the narrative goes sour.
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38. Elon is amazing at using hype waves and bubbles to get things off the ground but has the timing or foresight to untether from them. Paypal exited just before the stock crash. OpenAI got on the AI hype train at the right time. SpaceX+commercial launch. Tesla + greentech
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39. It's fascinating how un-involved Elon is in the startup/tech ecosystem. To my knowledge, he doesn't angel invest, help startups, sit on other boards, etc. It's his projects or bust.
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40. At first glance Elon seems unfocused (so many projects! so many industries!) but the way that he *only* works on *his* projects is actually a type of focus that few of us have. Note him divesting from OpenAI once it wasn't really his project anymore.
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41. Elon's consistent playfulness is underrated. See: twitter, tesla in space stunt, cameos in shows/movies, etc. Playfulness in general is underrated - I suspect it's a hard-to-fake indicator of thinking for yourself. Adults, esp in public, are expected to have decorum.
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