Which Tech Leaders Do Tech Professionals Admire? Elon Musk Heads the List | Hacker News Reader

Which Tech Leaders Do Tech Professionals Admire? Elon Musk Heads the List

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11 pointsteklaperry15 comments

When you see Zuckerberg as number four on the list, you begin to question the study.

or humanity

Musk as number 1 already made me question this study and humanity.

Not trolling- why do you think that?

Not the OP, but maybe, whatever his achievements (which mostly include suing his way into being listed as a founder of something he did not found), "pedo guy", as it were, shouldn't really be the most admired person, even among a crowd as sorely lacking in ethics as "tech professionals".

Musk is the closest we have to a trump-like personality in tech. Some similarities between them include but are not limited to those below. And I can expand on each of them.

1) Picking fights and raising conspiracy theories on Twitter, just like trump. This is bad since Twitter enhances mob mentality even more than fb does, by having a vocal monitory drive all communication. Elon musk constantly gaslights his fanbase against big oil, malicious shorts, stealerships, sabotage against SpaceX, and encourages them to dox skeptics.

2) He personally participates in such activities. He personally had the doxxed skeptic threatened about losing his job. He also called the British diver who helped rescue Thai kids a pedophile, then doubled down on it while emailing a journalist, and then bet a signed dollar on it.

3) He also lies constantly, just like trump. In the case against musk by the diver, he claims that he used pedo only to call him an old person, and didn't mean the opposite. Inspite of the fact that he doubled down and bet on it.

4) Calling news he doesn't like as fake instead, just like trump. Elon musk literally said that and proposed a journalist ranking system called Pravda. When a website like electrek criticizes Tesla, he blames the author to be suspiciously biased against Tesla.

5) Behavior not suitable to his position, just like trump. It may be "4 Ford CEO in 3 years", or "420$ funding secured. Short burn of the century!"(oh another lie), Or just smoking weed on a podcast.

6) Constant stream of lies about capabilities and over-exaggeration in general, just like trump. Self driving was apparently solved in 2015, and we were going to have cross country summon in 2016. Then coast to coast autonomous drive in 2017. Then fsd with driverless taxis in 2018. Where are we now? Will they ever own up to false marketing and the shortcomings of autopilot? This extends beyond Tesla to SpaceX, boring company, neuralink, openai, and well anything Elon musk touches.

7) And finally the cult around his geniusness, just like trump. Ironman personified! The Tesla of our generation! He's never wrong. Let's dump public transit because it's costly (60 billion for high speed train), because Elon musk said he can make high speed trains in a vaccum tube for 6 billion! Sometimes, this fanbase is just pathetically stupid.

Thanks for responding. To be honest, I'm a little underwhelmed by the list which mostly relies on likeness-to-Trump as an indictment, as opposed to focusing on the reasoning.

The reasons themselves are a bit flimsy: Too erratic on Twitter, acting in his own self interest, over-promising things... I've forgiven people for a lot more than that.

Number 7 isn't even a reason not to like him, it's just your frustration that people _do_ like him.

Flimsy? Will musk lost your vote if he shoots someone on fifth avenue?

Makes sense. He founded a tech company with his brother, got super rich, reversed his balding, got super sexy, and now builds rockets and fancy cars.

When I was a kid, the magazine that came with the Sunday paper would once a year give a list of the world's most admired persons. The first time I read one, I couldn't understand the criteria, and asked my parents. They said, Oh, it's about name recognition--people start fishing their memories for names, and the overlap polls highest.

So, with a few exceptions, making a few billions of dollars through some less than ethical shenanigans makes you admired by the Hired crowd.

Good to know.

Why is Jack Ma anywhere near this list.

Worthington's Law: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y6WEo9Ix_7Q

where is Torvalds?

the hell, where is Sergej Michajlowicz Brin?

Brin isn't of Polish descent, so "cz" would be an unusual transcription.

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