Hacker News Reader

I think Musk deserves credit for recognizing that the USA is so car-centric that any effort to get people to use trains and busses would be met with enormous resistance, whereas popularizing electric variants of the most dominant form of transport can actually be impactful.

I would certainly like to see a marketing-savvy billionaire start a sustained campaign of "ride the train/bus." I've wondered for some time, both what that would look like and whether it could have a meaningful impact in any given metropolitan area.

(And rinse and repeat for other vital public goods, like parks, libraries, public health, and so on.)

Getting people to fight climate change by making their lifestyles worse is going to be a tough sell.

Premium sedans are much better sell to the richer stratum of the society, though.

And once you hook them, your chances of a major breakthrough are much better.

All the world-changing technical developments had to be marketed to the rich people first. Railway, electricity, airplanes, computers.