undefined | Better HN

story

0 pointsboxed1y ago0 comments

> His profits don’t come from his products, but from his fanbase buying his stock.

SpaceX is private, Starlink makes real money from real users.

> Everything he does is done to influence the public opinion to make him the tech genius of today in the collective psyche.

Well that's clearly not right. He's doing a lot of things to make himself seem like a total tool that we should all boycott no matter how good the products are. If he actually did what you say, he wouldn't be burning all these bridges.

0 comments

kubb1y ago

The bulk of his wealth is the Tesla stock. I know that SpaceX produces value. Some of his ventures do. But the image of a genius entrepreneur is way more valuable than any government contract he might get.

Remember he was way less crazy before his market cap skyrocketed. Now he can afford being polarizing as a PR strategy once his fanbase has reached a certain critical mass. He’s been constantly testing what works.

sebzim45001y ago

He'd still be one of the richest people in the world just based on his stake in SpaceX (IIRC valued over $100B)

melodyogonna1y ago

He would be one of the richest people in the world even if he didn't start both SpaceX and Tesla, just from what he made from the sale of Paypal. Hell, he'll be one of the richest people in the world even if he didn't start the original X and just lived off the $13m he made from Zip2. $13m still places you in the top 0.5% in the world today.

XorNot1y ago

SpaceX is not where most of his valuation comes from: it principally comes from Tesla stock, which is vastly, hilariously overvalued compared to it's performance as a car company, and definitely compared to it's performance as a technology company.

Even more importantly, analysis of Elon's tweeting patterns versus Tesla stock valuation makes the why Twitter became so central to him obvious[1] - it was a massive driver of Tesla stock value. Buying it was a good move from the perspective that he really couldn't afford to be banned from Twitter.

[1] https://www.sciencepublishinggroup.com/article/10.11648/j.ij...

boxedOP1y ago

> Buying [twitter] was a good move from the perspective that he really couldn't afford to be banned from Twitter.

Another good move would have been to not be an ass. I mean, if he really did care about the stock price like this thread implies. Being seen as a genius entrepreneur doesn't imply you should also be a racist conspiracy theory nut. I'll repeat it again: the thesis that he's doing all these things due to competency is absurd. Never attribute to competence what can be sufficiently explained by stupidity.

He's doing these things because he's lost his marbles. Trying to make it out like he's doing it for reasonable reasons is like trying to claim Trump is playing 5-D chess. It's the same as Q-anon logic. It just falls flat against Occams Razor.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse