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While I'm inclined to believe Musk went into these industries (at least initially) because of fairly altruistic desires, it's important to note that this is is a narrative that originates and is promoted by him. That is, it would be foolish to make decisions based on that being true and also reflective of his current motivation without very good current evidence to back it up.

Now, I have the luxury of being able to take him at face value because I have no vested interest in any of these companies, as you may not. That said, a fair many people here do in some way or another (as a customer, an investor, or in some related market or field). It behooves them to be very critical.

>founding spacex and tesla only make sense if there was some genuine desire to make the world a better place.

You're forgetting ego. Really, your last paragraph shows you're a true believer and it's not helping the discussion.

I think most of HN are true believers.

Seriously in a world run by bean counters and MBA's where the only excitement is Donald Trumps next dick move or how thin the next iPhone is going to be how can you not like what this guys trying to achieve.

> Seriously in a world run by bean counters and MBA's where the only excitement is Donald Trumps next dick move or how thin the next iPhone is going to be how can you not like what this guys trying to achieve.

I have noticed some interesting parallels between some Donald Trump supporters on a certain subreddit[0] and some HNer regarding Musk (example comments up top): they both assume their hero/idol is working on an inscrutable genius masterplan which us mere mortals will retroactively understand one glorious day in the future. According to the true believers, Trump is allegedly playing 4D political chess and Musk intends to upgrade humanity to a Type II civilization... Both groups could very well be correct, but I'm cynical given the supporting evidence I currently have access to.

1. /r/the_donald - I am a non-American lefty trying to understand wtf is going on. I also like having my assumptions challenged

i am passionate about evs. i have been for a long time -- before tesla and the model s. i watched electric vehicles get laughed off the stage every time they made an appearance in the media. i watched the tesla death countdown. i watched the tesla roadster get railed on top gear. at every turn it seemed as though there was a conspiracy to keep evs from ever happening. i watched the new york times drive a model s in circles in a frozen parking lot to try and make it look like the battery ran out. they didnt realize tesla was logging all of that.

so yeah, i kind of have a chip on my shoulder. its only because the success that electric vehicles are currently experiencing came after a long, tooth and nail fight led jointly by tesla and electric vehicle enthusiasts and absolutely nobody else. tesla and by extension elon musk deserve huge credit for what they have accomplished because in the end this is a victory for everyone.

To those who are dubious about Musk, I have a question:

What do you think is the correct way of going about determining if a person has sincere ideals or is just a con artist?

Ideals become pretty maleable when you're in a situation of crisis (which Musk seems to have been, according to the pundits).

Things I do are good + I am in trouble financially -> Conflict of interest doesn't matter, because it's to save Important things.

It's possible to have sincere ideals and still make iffy judgement calls. The positioning makes sense, but who here would bet that this would have still happened if both companies were turning a profit?

> It's possible to have sincere ideals and still make iffy judgement calls. The positioning makes sense, but who here would bet that this would have still happened if both companies were turning a profit?

This is not the first time this decision needed to be made: http://www.theverge.com/2015/5/14/8605597/elon-musk-discusse...

>who here would bet that this would have still happened if both companies were turning a profit?

Do you even understand what you're saying? Solarcity 'loses' money because they invest all their profits and more into expansion. Same goes for Tesla. You should read the quarterlies and SEC notices yourself.

I would say the easiest way to check is if actions match the talk. If ideals are altruistic, then margins and prices should reflect the same. You cannot have 2x margins and claim your goals are idealistic.

> You cannot have 2x margins and claim your goals are idealistic.

I think that's very short sighted. If your goal actually requires a lot of resources then theoretically amassing a lot of money, or getting a lot of investor goodwill through making them a lot of money may be a way to go about it.

There may be completely different strategies required for acting on different timescales. If your plan is to achieve something in a year or two, the path may be fairly obvious to those looking on. If you are working on a timescale of decades, it may be much harder to see the plan. The quickest way between two points may be a straight line, but that doesn't mean that's the most likely way to succeed.

Now, for how this applies to Musk and Tesla, he's been very forthcoming about his eventual goals. For Tesla in the medium term, that's to prove the technology through a sports car (done), prove the automation and assembly through a factory (done), and to use this to build cars at scale and offer them much cheaper (a promise yet to be delivered on). It's not hard to see how high margins could have been useful in these prior steps. What remains to be seen is whether he actually follows through on the promise. In any case, I don't see any reason why current margins prevent an altruistic goal.

>I would say the easiest way to check is if actions match the talk.

If you look over his actions for his whole career with tesla and solarcity, he seems to be either an idealist or just a legitimate businessman. I can't see any way he is setting himself up to steal an immense amount of money from investors or customers, and run off to some place without an extradition treaty (Mars?).

>i get so mad at people who are constantly detracting from tesla or evs in general. it is so ironic that the one company that isnt trying to fuck people over

Maybe you should care less about the fact that people like a consumer product company less than you? And the idea that this is the "one company" not trying to fuck people over is down right ludicrous.

It's not really about how much someone likes a product. It's about the widescale famine, extinction and war on our doorstep and whether we as a planet can do anything to confine warming to a manageable rate.

Manageable being the opposite of out-of-control.

I don't get why it has to be one extreme or the other on HN. Reading through these comments Musks's either a fraudster or the second coming of Jesus.

> here is a man who twice bet his personal fortune on these companies with no other apparent motive besides making the world a better place.

That has to be the most naive statement I've seen on Hacker News.

That insult would be more impactful if backed up with an explanation of why you feel that way.

And, once that explanatory paragraph was written, you could remove the insult and just let it stand on its own.

What evidence did the OP provide?

Almost anyone can think of other apparent motivations Musk might have without my help and indeed without much thought. It doesn't require explanation.

I also think that people should be strongly discouraged from making claims like "here is a man who twice bet his personal fortune on these companies with no other apparent motive besides making the world a better place." That statement actively decreased the quality of discussion. Hopefully bronz will think before posting in the future.

There are communities where insulting the author of a comment is an acceptable way to make an author think critically about their statement, but this is not one of them. That your comment consisted entirely of an insult and your point needed to be assumed from the subtext points towards it not being very conducive for discussion itself. That you chose to address a comment that you think lowered the quality of discussion with a comment that was even worse in that respect is unfortunate. Your goal was good, your methods were not.

Hacker News, where saying it nicely is valued more than saying anything useful.

Where discussion is prioritized over personal expression. It's not just about what you say, but about how you say it, because it doesn't matter how insightful you are if nobody understands you. It's not about being nice for niceness sake, it's about emphasizing methods of communication that work.

That depends very much on what you consider "working". I don't see any value whatsoever in what bronz was communicating, and any discussion that starts from that is going to be equally vapid. That's not "working" to me.

It's about what you say AND how you say it.

> I don't see any value whatsoever in what bronz was communicating, and any discussion that starts from that is going to be equally vapid.

That's fine. What I'm referring to doesn't actually have to yield further discussion. Some people will take belittlement, accept it as an indication they should have thought through their position better (if that was indeed the cause). Others will immediately become defensive and start responding to something that doesn't really need a response. Sometimes it just depends on the mood of the person. Not using insults (or at least making them clearly supplemental to the supported point) helps avoid this.

Insults are appeals to emotion. Emotion is exactly what you don't want when you are trying to avoid useless discussion. I understand the pull, and I'm sure I fall into the trap myself from time to time. Sometimes someone says something that seems divorced from reality, and you find the premise so absurd that you find it hard to address it seriously. It feels good to strongly call out the absurdity for what it is, and people who agree enjoy seeing it, but ultimately it makes it more about you than the point. For example, I wholeheartedly agree with the sentiment of your original comment. I just think it's slightly self defeating when the discussion is between many people in a group setting, because it often yields more useless comments as people dig in on their sides.

> It's about what you say AND how you say it.

That's the exact point I was trying to make in the prior comment.

never underestimate the cult of elon :^)

HackerNews: Build apps, expect billions in valuation.

Elon Musk: Pour fortune into building actual things, get shit on by startup culture.

Haters gonna hate.

I actually have nothing against Elon Musk. I don't expect anyone to do things completely altruistically. But it's ridiculous to claim that this is just purely altruistic.

Purely altruistic? Probably not. But spending hundreds of millions of dollars on ventures that have an extremely high likely of failure? He's definitely not in it primarily for the cash.

On what basis are you claiming that his ventures have an extremely high likelihood of failure?

> He's definitely not in it primarily for the cash.

I don't see any evidence whatsoever for this assertion.

im not a member. but perhaps he has a cult for a reason.

Perhaps people worship wealth and power, yes.