Hacker News Reader

Comment by onion2k | Hacker News Reader

SpaceX wins lots of space contracts with the help of Musk's "Occupy Mars" marketing.

Tesla sells lots of cars on the promise of self-driving in the marketing.

Musk bought BTC, single-handedly pumped the price of BTC, and then sold at a huge profit.

I don't think he's a genius but Musk is definitely not stupid. He's just not playing the obvious game you think he's playing.

View on HN

And denying covid kept workers in his factory, against the law.

I think there needs to be some rule in discussion that as soon as you start arguing over if someone is dumb or evil, you have to stop. It's impossible to figure out which (or what mix) it actually is.

I'm fairly certain it was not in violation of "the law", but rather in violation of edicts from unelected officials.

"The law" gives public health officials authority to issue those "edicts". Try taking them to court and see how far that gets you. Hint: not very.

Well, given how nobody was prosecuted, taking it to court seems unnecessary, which was my point.

Not being prosecuted is not the same as not guilty.

If that was your point, you did a poor job of making it.

Some people seem to have done pretty well in court bringing a case against unconstitutional edicts: https://www.npr.org/2021/04/10/986010977/supreme-court-rules...

Restricting religion and regulating a factory are pretty different. The first runs directly afoul of the constitution, while the second is clearly within the purview of regulators and public health officials.

I was thinking of Jacobson v Massachusetts in my original comment, which upheld state and local governments' broad authority in public health.

Here's a balanced view of the powers affirmed in Jacobson and how that has changed over time to better protect individual liberty: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1449224/

Note however that applies to individuals, not factories or places of business which are subject to much more regulation.

Ironically, I believe this was overturning a law made by elected officials (on constitutional grounds)

It makes me so sad that it's impossible to have a polite conversation these days without clinical paranoids popping in at every juncture to say, "COVID is a hoax! Public health officials are frauds! Medicine is meaningless!"

Huh?

The California Executive Order creating a shutdown was issued by the Governor, who is elected.

> I think there needs to be some rule in discussion that as soon as you start arguing over if someone is dumb or evil, you have to stop.

I really like this, and I propose it be called "Kulak's Law".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanlon%27s_razor is basically the same thing

Also the word "kulak" is loaded - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kulak

Acting that dumb when you literally employ a huge team of top-notch rocket scientists to advise you is absolutely evil.

Wait, did you not just do that above, calling Musk not that bright?

Clearly they don't pay attention to what they say.

As far as I know, when I made my first comment we weren’t yet debating dumb vs evil.

It was practically an invitation to though.

Tesla would have been dead if he had not brought the Fremont factory back online. I give him credit for this, as I think ignoring the “rules” was one of the smartest business moves ever made in 2020.

Would you think the same way if it was your life on the line? Not livelihood. Live.

I think when evaluating situations compassion for people's lives is a more important matter than economical wellbeing. (Even if it's their wellbeing)

Most of his workers were in an age group at negligible risk from covid; they'd be more likely to die in a road accident driving home.

Wow, people here really hate statistics. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10654-020-00698-1... ; if you're aged under 34 (as are the majority of tech workers), in the USA you're almost ten times more likely to die from "other acccidental fatalities" (0.0032) than covid if you catch it (0.004). Note that to assess risk the covid IFR there should be multiplied by the chance of catching it, to make it more comparable with the other columns, so if the chance of catching covid is less than 50%, then overall you're also more likely to die in a traffic accident.

You are making a strong point for further lockdowns.

Traffic accidents decrease, other accidental fatalities decreases, the number of people who catch covid decrease in a lockdown.

>Traffic accidents decrease, other accidental fatalities decreases, the number of people who catch covid decrease in a lockdown.

What's the point of being alive if you can't live life? Fine if you choose that for yourself, but you're a monster if you'd dare to assume you have the right to confine everybody else to such a miserable existence.

Marx has a great quote along those lines:

"The human body is mortal by nature. Hence illnesses are inevitable. Why does a man only go to the doctor when he is ill, and not when he is well? Because not only the illness, but even the doctor is an evil. Under constant medical tutelage, life would be regarded as an evil and the human body as an object for treatment by medical institutions. Is not death more desirable than life that is a mere preventive measure against death? Does not life involve also free movement? What is any illness except life that is hampered in its freedom? A perpetual physician would be an illness in which one would not even have the prospect of dying, but only of living. Let life die; death must not live. Has not the spirit more right than the body?"

It's a good thing not everyone has such disregard and lack of empathy for their fellow humans. I'm guessing you're Libertarian, not Communist, right?

It's good that not everybody has such flagrant disregard for human rights; I'm guessing you're a Democrat?

How many of those workers have friends and/or relatives who are part of a vulnerable demographic?

Nobody's forcing them to associate with vulnerable friends or relatives. And it's not like they don't have a choice; tech workers aren't exactly poor.

What do tech workers have to do with a car factory?

Workers at a Tesla factory are high-skilled and highly paid, it's not some third-world sweatshop.

OR driving to the funerals of their parents, grandparents, friends, neighbors, and other loved ones and acquaintances who they infected with COVID-19.

I've got some bad news for you: Tesla died in 1943.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikola_Tesla#Death

If Tesla died, the major automakers would probably abandon EVs.

Does the industrial effort to decarbonize our economy really matter? Is it urgent? Is it essential?

If you've done what Elon Musk has done, you're definitely not dumb.

That's what I hate about people telling Trump is dumb. If you've done what he has done, he's definitely not dumb.

Funny thing is that although I never liked Paris Hilton, I was pretty sure she was not that dumb (turned out she wasn't).

The same story when I look at my Facebook feed. Plenty of smart people have all kinds of different views on Covid and vaccination. And all of them call the 'other group' dumb.

Seems like political viewpoints have nothing to do with being smarter than someone else.

If it's true to say that there are different types of intelligence, then it's true to say that there are different types of dumb

Interesting comment. Never quite thought about it that way.

If you started your adult life with the same help from Daddy that Trump had - and did nothing, literally besides putting all of that money into an index fund - you’d be richer than Trump is today. They did the math.

So what exactly are Trump’s accomplishments? It’s not like the dude started off selling hot dogs. He made a lot of shitty investments, lost a lot of money, and is one of the few people on this planet capable of bankrupting a casino. In Vegas.

Yes he’s famous, of course, but his “look at me I’m a successful billionaire” image is all smoke and mirrors.

> And denying covid kept workers in his factory, against the law

not sure if there even can be a complete list with Musk but, let's also add:

1) privileged background thanks to emerald mining fortune made in apartheid South Africa,

2) union-busting and abusive employer,

3) hoarding $175.6 billion in stolen wages during a pandemic,

4) encouraged a coup

> 3) hoarding $175.6 billion in stolen wages during a pandemic,

I hadn't seen this before. Do you have an article diving into this number?

> He's just not playing the obvious game you think he's playing.

I think I would agree with that.

Take note of that last part of his tweet[0]:

> Tesla will not be selling any Bitcoin and we intend to use it for transactions as soon as mining transitions to more sustainable energy. We are also looking at other cryptocurrencies that use <1% of Bitcoin’s energy/transaction.

Here he posed a problem that is now on people's mind. Soon he will offer a solution and people will go nuts about it. He often does that kind of thing.

[0] https://mobile.twitter.com/elonmusk/status/13926020410258432...

So you mean starting his own crypto?

He will sell an all in one renewable energy crypto mining pods or similar.

>Musk bought BTC, single-handedly pumped the price of BTC, and then sold at a huge profit.

Doesn't this have legal ramifications when done in the stock market? If it is shady for that market, why is it acceptable in other markets? Oh, right, they're not regulated.

Telling people that you bought a certain stock isn't illegal wtf. Have you watched CNBC or Bloomberg? They have hedge fund operators come in and praise or criticize stocks that they have bought or sold short.

It is when you do it for the purposes of market manipulation.

Intent matters, which also makes market manipulation so difficult to prove.

Allowing people to buy cars in bitcoin and telling people might be.

Then maybe Satya Nadella should've been put in prison first. https://www.marketwatch.com/story/microsoft-starts-accepting...

Start with the guy who started accepting bitcoin for pizza.

https://ln.pizza/myfirstbitcoinpizza/

The SEC doesn’t consider Bitcoin a security, so it can’t be securities fraud. Also there usually must be lies (or intentional omissions) involved to prosecute these things, and I don’t think either of those apply here.

Cryptocurrency is almost completely unregulated, so no there are not likely to be ramifications. It's anarchy and just about anything goes. Buyer beware.

Also I didn't get the sense that Musk single-handedly pumped BTC. He jumped on the bandwagon about mid-way through the current pump. I am still foggy on what kicked off the current bull run.

The daily volume of BTC is above 50 billion. The cap is over a trillion. This is not a fundamental movement but a value based / perception one.

> Oh, right, they're not regulated.

Wasn't that one of the big selling points of BTC?

It's not illegal to sell a security after disclosing that you own that security.

I don't even have to point to any specific laws, just look at all the websites that talk about stocks operating without any SEC intervention.

It is illegal to "pump and dump" a security.

I have a hard time believing the people here defending Musk dont know this, and can't see how his behaviour _migbt_ qualify as a pump and dump.

Except Bitcont isn't a security, so there are no laws against "Pump and Dump" in the unregulated market.

Some would argue that Bitcoin is fundamentally a giant "Pump and Dump" anyway, so nothing to see here.

Sure, but what you're basically saying is "what Musk did isn't illegal because the thing he did it against isn't considered a security"

You may be technically correct, doesn't make it any less sketch or immoral

Pump and dump arguably isn't immoral. It's just using herd mentality, if it wasn't illegal people might actually try to think before they buy and sell.

1. Tell someone you own a security 2. They get excited and buy it 3. You sell it when it goes up

You can't just classify this set of actions as a pump and dump. You have to do something that is considered a scam, such as grossly misrepresenting the security with the intention of making a profit at the cost of uneducated investors. As far as I can tell, Elon never claimed Bitcoin is environmentally friendly, nor did he make other false claims about Bitcoin's functionalities or capabilities.

pwning libertarians is ok in my books!

(ooooh, was there lead in your hamburger? just the price of freedom, I guess! if you don't like it, you can go eat fiat hamburgers like the plebes.)

lead in your hamburger is illegal in both libertarian legal frameworks and non-libertarian legal frameworks.

liberty: intentionally or intentionally harming people is illegal. If you or your company poison someone, you are held responsible for the harm you caused.

non-liberty: a specific regulation about the level of acceptable lead in meat. limited liability shields the owners from being held responsible.

> and then sold at a huge profit

No they didn't, according to the announcment:

>> Tesla will not be selling any Bitcoin and we intend to use it for transactions as soon as mining transitions to more sustainable energy.

Realistically we won't know until the Q2 financials are out.

Note the wording "*will not* be selling any Bitcoin" not "*has not* sold any Bitcoin". There were major dumps a couple minutes before Elon's announcement. It should be no surprise if Tesla front-run Elon's announcement, knowing that it would affect the price.

They'll keep a trivial amount on the financials, but I suspect the majority was off the books.

They will also use this an excuse to realize revenue in what will appear to be a very lean quarter. I mean they can't exactly sell to "test liquidity" again.

They are publically on record as having bought $1.5billion Bitcoin.

I don't think that counts as a trivial amount on the financials.

Why do you need to own Bitcoin for transactions?

Someone wants to buy a 50k car. They give you 50k worth of Bitcoin. You immediately sell the Bitcoin for 50k of dollars.

At no time did you need to own Bitcoin before the transaction.

I read it as implying Tesla intends to use BTC for outgoing payments.

Of course, that would require Tesla's vendors to start accepting BTC. I strongly suspect LG Chem and Panasonic don't accept bitcoin payments.

From their Q1 disclosure, Tesla made $272 Million from 'Proceeds from sales of digital assets' [1]. From the same disclosure, Tesla still holds $1,331 Million (~$1.3 Billion) of digital assets. As this is from their Q1 disclosure, they may have sold more since March 31st.

[1] https://ir.tesla.com/

Yep, plus one to this. A lot of people are quick to either rationalize his behavior as either awesome or stupid, but I think Musk is really a misunderstood mogul who's intention is to turn a profit, not deliver on his ridiculous worldview.

Can't it be both? You won't get anywhere today with a world view that doesn't integrate financialisation.

I certainly won’t argue that Musk is stupid, but trust me, his Mars marketing has never won SpaceX a launch contract, and if anything it probably hurt them in the early days. This business was long dominated by stodgy defense giants, and it has seen a lot of wild-eyed idealists with big dreams and a little too much money come and go. Government and commercial launch contracts have never been awarded on the basis of idealistic excitement, and the conventional wisdom used to be that the SpaceX mentality just didn’t work in this Very Serious and Difficult Field.

In recruiting, on the other hand, the Mars marketing has helped them a lot.

While I really dislike some of his behavior, this goal post moving to try to deny Musk credit for what he's accomplished annoys me.

Before Musk we had no economical reusable launch systems, economical space flight was sci-fi, and in the 2000s there were many people who thought modern civilization must inevitably grind to a halt as we deplete oil because oil is absolutely irreplaceable for modern transport.

SpaceX built the first economical to operate reusable space hardware at any scale, and Tesla validated the market for EVs. Even if Tesla fails, without them I highly doubt the EV revolution would be happening. Traditional car companies would never have cannibalized their ICE sales with EVs without a hard kick in the ass to do so.

Yes, those comments are right up there with the 'what have the Romans done for us' list.

Like him or hate him, no point denying Musk his achievements, which are more than many of us here will manage in our lifetimes and Musk appears to be far from finished. His biggest enemy at this point is himself, that unstable streak is a real worry. But here's to hoping that he will notch up a longer list of achievements.

As long as you're quoting Life of Brian:

"He's not the messiah, he's a very naughty boy!"

Hehe, he definitely is not the Messiah, and it is very well possible that he indeed is a very naughty boy.

For Musk being grounded will have a completely different meaning though :)

SpaceX is excellent.

EVs would have happened without Tesla. The "kick in the ass" is the same thing that has driven all other emissions improvements: government regulation.

Without Tesla those government mandates would have led to undesirable “compliance cars.” Tesla made EVs sexy and is why we now have an E-Mustang.

There is no reason to believe the former. Car companies have to comply while also selling cars.

They would have dragged their feet as much as possible to keep ICE alive. Too much car culture inertia and sunk cost. Being shown up is more powerful and motivating than regulations.

> and in the 2000s there were many people who thought modern civilization must inevitably grind to a halt as we deplete oil because oil is absolutely irreplaceable for modern transport

Lol, what an exaggeration. I don't think anyone argued seriously that we would have to stop using cars at all. The conversation was always about renewable energy.

Yeah he has definitely helped push (and unwilling and petrol addicted) civilization a lot more towards EVs despite what the denialists want to have us think. However he's neither a messiah like the Muskavites would have us believe nor is he an evil mustache twiddling villain like the other side would have you believe.

In some ways he is the Donald Trump of Silicon valley. Just like many Americans failed to understand Trump, many in tech fail to understand Musk.

Isn't this just the same thing idiots did for Trump though? Look at whatever Trump does, and then find a reason in retrospect why actually that was a smart move.

SpaceX wins contracts because they are able to send payloads into space, nothing to do with marketing, and sending payloads into space isn't even that hard - they basically beat out Nasa who weren't allowed to compete and Boeing who can't send a plane to 30,000ft without fucking it up.

Tesla sells lots of cars because they're electric and Apple made battery technology cheap.

BTC has been running up and down far longer than Musk has been involved and it'll continue after he's gone.

If they are so easy, why isn't everyone doing it? Why can't Bezo put payloads into space with a billion every year invested? Why can't every other car manufacture seem to put together an electric car with the same range? I don't want to buy a Tesla, I'd rather something with physical knobs, but there's nothing that quite hits the mark yet.

> Why can't Bezo put payloads into space with a billion every year invested?

Because he was busy changing the face of consumer retail, the internet, and other huge aspects of society up to a few months ago. Give it a couple of years and you'll see Blue Origin eat SpaceX's cake.

> Why can't every other car manufacture seem to put together an electric car with the same range?

Mostly because other car manufacturers are very serious about not lying about things that are easily demonstrable like range. There's a reason Teslas are the only EV that no one can get the advertised range from, but all the other EVs crush their advertised ranges. Your question is "why doesn't every other car manufacturer lie psychopathically to the consumer?".

And other companies aren’t willing to sacrifice what Tesla is for range. It’s not like an egg is the best shape for an SUV and other companies just haven’t figured it out yet.

Give it a couple years? They have been at this longer than SpaceX has been and are about 10 years behind them.

Blue Origin is older than SpaceX.

Trump never actually accomplished anything unless you count ugly casinos that go bankrupt and a golf resort. There is nothing redeeming there to outweigh the bad stuff. There's just bad stuff.

If becoming billionaire and being elected president of the USA is "not accomplishing anything", then I'll start hoping I won't accomplish anything in my life.

I hope you don't incite any insurrections.

Sending payloads reliably into orbit is incredibly difficult. Not sure if I missed some glaring joke/sarcasm here

> and then sold at a huge profit

Are you sure he has sold?

Tesla sold 10% of their btc

before, not after the announcement.

He's a con artist, that's all

woah get a load of the philosopher over here guys.

No--there was no movment on electrical vechicles before his interest. That alone should be enough to put his image on a coin.

Please do not attempt to rewrite history. The electric vehicle has a long and storied history, and the modern revival was well underway in the 90s and 00s. Tesla Roadster was the first (I think?) highway-legal EV.

The Roadster was the first highway-legal EV to use a lithium-ion battery. The GM EV1 used 16.5 kWh of lead-acid batteries.

The first electric vehicle was developed in 1832, 24 years before Nikola Tesla was born, 139 years before Elon Musk was born.

https://www.energy.gov/timeline/timeline-history-electric-ca...

"and then sold at a huge profit."

I don't think musk/tesla has sold a single btc..

They sold ~270MM in Q1: https://www.coindesk.com/tesla-sold-bitcoin-in-q1-for-procee...

Reply on news.ycombinator.com