[FlamingMoe]

Not really a huge PG fan, but this is what billionaires should be doing: see where a need is exists and put some of your insane wealth towards making an improvement. This why I respect Elon even though I don’t really like him; he puts his money to use, in a very public manner.

[turnsout]

This is not altruistic. He is looking to make an investment which he assumes would have an upside.

[consilient]

Yes, and? There is no plausible near future where anyone else (except maybe his heirs) directs how that wealth is used. Better that it go towards socially useful investments than megayachts or land hoarding.

[Geee]

Capitalism is altruism.

[steve_adams_86]

I'm not arguing that Elon doesn't put his money to use publicly, but I'm interested how you think he does. Do you mean he uses his wealth privately in a way that benefits the public, and/or he does it in public view?

[qup]

Musk has a track record of working on what he considers (among) the most important problems, and he supposedly set that course in college.

[frenchman99]

I fail to see how Tesla fixes an "important problem". They're big electric SUV with huge batteries that require tons of mining and destroy the environment. They're largely non repairable. The full self driving feature seems to be vapor ware.

The space stuff looked interesting until he started sending all kinds of things into space to become an ISP, polluting space the same way Tesla pollutes the earth.

The real issues are still here: poverty, lack of access to clean water, etc. How does Musk fix that?

[xeromal]

This seems like those conservative talking points "I saw a homeless child on my drive to work today. Why are we sending money to Ukraine".

We can work on many problems at once. Tesla also makes a car.

[frenchman99]

This had nothing to do with conservative talking points. It has to do with current capitalism always looking for money but letting the real societal issues ongoing because fixing them doesn't pay enough dividends.

Simplified, with current capitalism, doing the right thing doesn't pay off. We have more than enough know-how and technology to fix real issues but we'd rather put rich people in overweight electric cars.

Yes, full self driving could help save lifes. Space exploration helps us better understand our world. But often times, current capitalism encourages the use of technology and know-how for things that benefit a minority at the expense of the most vulnerable.

[pb7]

It’s not Musk’s responsibility to fix societal problems, it’s the government’s. He sucks as a person but the companies he’s in charge of are quite useful and I’m happy they exist. I’m watching my government fail every single day at addressing basic issues like homelessness despite near infinite money. They would fail at fast satellite internet and electric cars too.

[j45]

Not sure if PG fits a billionaire stereotype.

YC was investing in ways the traditional VCs weren’t when it started, and coding HN was a part of it. I doubt I’m the only one who had having a few HN tech support emails from PG.

[borg16]

> Not really a huge PG fan

can you elaborate?