[thomaskcr]

> 2) do not give you a chance to explain your point of view.

You can't eliminate the department meant to answer media queries and then cry that they don't tell your side. He chose to remove the PR department.

> 1) purposely mischarachterize you and your work

That seems to have gone in Musk's favor more than not. Most people think Tesla makes their own batteries (they don't), their cars drive themselves (they don't), they have advanced manufacturing (by every metric they are terribly inefficient and after all the talk of air friction and alien dreadnoughts their model 3 ramp was pure incompetence compared to how other car companies just turn their lines on once validation is done). Musk's lies have been uncritically reported for years.

Honestly, even look at HN articles:

The 2nd highest Tesla article is "All Tesla Cars Being Produced Now Have Full Self-Driving Hardware" from FIVE YEARS AGO...

The top one is "Tesla Cybertruck" - from two years ago.

Third highest - Tesla Roadster - 4 years ago

6th - Tesla Semi - 4 years ago

None of those exist for public sale, all of them got reported and mass upvoted by an uncritical audience. If you fall for Musk's victim complex you're a sucker IMO.

[leobg]

4) FSD. Have you seen the videos of the FSD beta? And you’re not impressed, right? Thing is: This is technology that did not exist a few years ago (just like electric cars with the performance and safety at the level of a Model S, X or 3). “BUT”, I hear you saying, “they are behind schedule”. Well, who cares? Some things take longer than a human expected. Not exactly news. Give me a log of your previous five projects along with the estimates you had how long it would take. Then we can compare it to Musk. Also, when was the last time you built something that nobody has ever built before? Are you going to see all obstacles in advance? You fault Musk for being too optimistic. But how would he have started Tesla and SpaceX if he wasn't? There's a large crowd of people who feel inspired by that optimism. That's why they forgive Musk and Tesla when things take longer. Because they can see how hard the team is working to achieve what they have said they would do.

Really, if the things Musk promises would never happen, I'd be right there with you snickering about this "marketing genius". Yet, so far, pretty much everything he said he would do he did. Based on that track record, I have zero doubt that FSD, the Cybertruck, the Semi, and all of those things that are "late" will eventually be there. And when they are, they will be best in class. Again.

It really, really puzzles me. Here we have a man who works like crazy. Who revolutionized not just one, but several industries. Who has created billions of value. Whom you never see on a yacht or at the Taj Mahal or at a beach with a trophy wife. And yet you compulsively have to bet against him, and explain away anything he does by saying that he's just doing it for the attention.

Musk has a surplus of attention. And he has a surplus of money. These things, by definition, cannot be his motivation. If you think they are, be careful that you're not just applying your own mode of valuation - seeing the world not as it is... but as you are.