This article reads like an abused partner defending their abuser. This kind of double-sidedness is extremely common in abusive relationships, in large part because it's a really effective method of exerting control over someone while encouraging them to blame themselves for being abused.
> If there are employees not aligned with that vision, he will chew them out and he will do it in a vicious way, which is his right as owner.
No one has a right to chew you out in a vicious way. As owner he has a right to fire you, but if I were a Twitter employee and he raised his voice to me, I'd be right in face at twice the volume. I'd have to get paid a lot more than a "competitive" salary to be viciously chewed out.
This guy worked with elon for 1 year. He's says in the article that he didn't enjoy that style of management and left. Sounds like he's the perfect candidate for this topic rather than a yes man from elon
We're all adults, don't like his style, don't work for him. It's that simple.
Obviously enough people don't think his style is harsh or vicious, as described in the article, otherwise his numerous companies wouldn't have a line out the door of prospective employees.
My take on the article was Musk drives you like a good highschool sports coach. Demanding, hard, unforgiving... and you either live up to the high expectations or you are weeded out.
Which actually sounds wonderful... working with an entire organization that is aligned in thought and motivations, and everyone bringing their 'A' game. Compare that to your current job...
Not to mention the guy in the article only worked with Musk for less than 1 year, over 20 years ago. I don't know about you, but I'm not the same person I was 20 year ago...
Sounds like Bill Gates. He yelled and bullied people to get what he wanted (and he has admitted it). Steve Jobs was also part of this club, more or less.
There is no denying this type of uncivilized abusive leadership works sometimes. It drives off people not suited to it, but results speak for themselves.
Complete opposite approaches work also. I think it's tied to leaders personality. Asshole can't succeed with nice guy strategy, nice guy can't succeed with asshole strategy.
It'll be interesting to see how Musk handles negative sentiment regarding him and his IP trending. Stories about burning Teslas and Tesla wrecks trending will be a thing of the past.
On the flip side, boosting the visibility of pro Musk IP content is an inevitability along with unfairly boosting Tesla stock and never-ending SEC investigations.
Well his vision so far for Twitter seems to be to turn it into an anti-woke, advertiser shaming, ad supported platform. I'm sure there are a few people excited about that, but I'm not sure it's as visionary and uniting as something like putting people on Mars.
I think maybe it's not worth much trying to stereotype people into mental diseases to blame for behaviors, until we'd identify the causes and properly characterize those classes. By the way, from what I learn on the Internet, I'd agree with the other comment that he's a jackass.
Edit: Yes, firing 3000 people with lives and families because you paid an obscene amount of money for a company that you didn’t actually want makes you a jackass.
Type II NPD. Musk has covert narcissism. His recent passive-aggressive posts regarding Starlink and Ukraine, plus blaming activists for advertisers leaving Twitter, gives it away. Passive-aggressiveness and blaming are particularly common to Type II. Seeing those, we wouldn't need to look too hard for other Type II NPD symptoms, such public generosity along with being cruel in private, being intolerant of or oversensitive to criticism, smugness, self-absorbtion, self-criticsm, shyness, perfectionism, holding grudges, and all types have strong denial and low empathy. Though if Musk often engages in humiliating others, I have it wrong; that's Type III, toxic. Usually successful individuals will get NPD buttoned up along with becoming fit even though denial is very difficult to overcome.
What would make you think he was bipolar? There are other symptoms, but BPD requires depressions and manias.
I think Elon Musk is trying to be Tony Stark. Tony Stark is a fun character to read about in comic books and see fly around in a movie but he'd be insufferable in the real world. I think he's going to lose his shirt at this dumb Twitter thing and maybe that will be a humble Tony Stark post-Thanos snap style rebirth...
In the comic books he's also an alcoholic. In the first movie he's a rich kid who inherited his wealth, is making a killing selling arms, and only changes his tune after the consequences of his actions lead him to being captured and nearly killed -- where he decides to change his tune and become a one man army, judge jury and executioner unbound by laws.
He's really a bizarre character to idolize in many ways, the real life analogue is a rich asshole who makes people around him's lives worse at the same rate he's making the world worse.
I agree with the author that there is a good Elon and a bad Elon.
But I think Twitter only gets the bad Elon.
At Tesla, Elon is producing EVs to help save the planet. At SpaceX, he is producing spacecraft to help save humanity. At Twitter, he is making the world a better place for unfounded conspiracy theories and Russian talking points, which he himself promotes.
In the last month, Elon has claimed on Twitter that 1) the attack on Nancy Pelosi's aging husband was due to a dispute with a gay lover; 2) Ukraine, a sovereign nation, should give up its industrial heartland to a bunch of rapists and war criminals; 3) Taiwan, a sovereign nation, should subjugate itself to the Chinese police state.
That is, Twitter employees don't get the visionary. They get an abusive boss who is also bad at filtering information, leaning into stupid theories, and willing to traffic with police states to forward his interests.
Frankly, I miss the good Elon, and I wonder where he went.
I don’t buy the premise: it’s not clear to me how prolonging our dependence on personal cars saves the planet, or how anything about space exploration is going to save the billions of humans who live on Earth.
It’s very easy to confuse objects of technical fascination with moral virtue, particularly when our world appears bleak. But Musk has demonstrated no motives other than profit and infamy.
The vision of space occupation has always come across to me as really stupid. From many scientific points of view it is infeasible, and many philosophical perspectives on top of that. I get the idea of making your vision come true and treating every obstacle as a technicality, but not all problems work that way. Especially not ones that go really far against biology.
> really stupid. From many scientific points of view it is infeasible, and many philosophical perspectives on top of that.
That might be true. But let’s think about it from a larger perspective. Let’s just assume that, however unlikely, we managed to survive next 800 million years on this planet. Once our Sun starts dying, we gotta get out of here anyway. For sure, the only end game for us must be to become an interplanetary species.
Robotic asteroid mining to supply robotic construction of O’Neill cylinders (giant rotating habitats) is feasible with current or near-future technologies. Eventually, over 100-150 years, it should be possible for millions of people to live in space.
Should we do it? Sure, why not? We’ll explore the solar system and beyond. The human race would be able to multiply almost indefinitely, and develop amazing new tech, human like robots, medical cures, art and music, anti-matter propulsion, quantum computers… so much potential.
stormbrew|3 years ago
> If there are employees not aligned with that vision, he will chew them out and he will do it in a vicious way, which is his right as owner.
Is it?
kenjackson|3 years ago
xeromal|3 years ago
trentnix|3 years ago
You should read a few stories about working for Steve Jobs (or head to YouTube and watch interviews). This article is extremely mild, in comparison.
xcavier|3 years ago
Is it? >>
Yes, this is the sentence that stopped me in my tracks. No-one has that "right". But more importantly, it isn't right...
Alupis|3 years ago
My take on the article was Musk drives you like a good highschool sports coach. Demanding, hard, unforgiving... and you either live up to the high expectations or you are weeded out.
Which actually sounds wonderful... working with an entire organization that is aligned in thought and motivations, and everyone bringing their 'A' game. Compare that to your current job...
Not to mention the guy in the article only worked with Musk for less than 1 year, over 20 years ago. I don't know about you, but I'm not the same person I was 20 year ago...
Nokinside|3 years ago
There is no denying this type of uncivilized abusive leadership works sometimes. It drives off people not suited to it, but results speak for themselves.
Complete opposite approaches work also. I think it's tied to leaders personality. Asshole can't succeed with nice guy strategy, nice guy can't succeed with asshole strategy.
agumonkey|3 years ago
timbit42|3 years ago
nosmokewhereiam|3 years ago
Madmallard|3 years ago
unknown|3 years ago
[deleted]
hamiltonians|3 years ago
unknown|3 years ago
[deleted]
beenBoutIT|3 years ago
On the flip side, boosting the visibility of pro Musk IP content is an inevitability along with unfairly boosting Tesla stock and never-ending SEC investigations.
_jezell_|3 years ago
unknown|3 years ago
[deleted]
Animats|3 years ago
jbreckmckye|3 years ago
numpad0|3 years ago
barbazoo|3 years ago
https://www.axios.com/2022/04/15/elon-musk-aspergers-syndrom...
woodruffw|3 years ago
Edit: Yes, firing 3000 people with lives and families because you paid an obscene amount of money for a company that you didn’t actually want makes you a jackass.
plazmatic|3 years ago
[deleted]
Maursault|3 years ago
What would make you think he was bipolar? There are other symptoms, but BPD requires depressions and manias.
danielodievich|3 years ago
etblg|3 years ago
He's really a bizarre character to idolize in many ways, the real life analogue is a rich asshole who makes people around him's lives worse at the same rate he's making the world worse.
brindlejim|3 years ago
But I think Twitter only gets the bad Elon.
At Tesla, Elon is producing EVs to help save the planet. At SpaceX, he is producing spacecraft to help save humanity. At Twitter, he is making the world a better place for unfounded conspiracy theories and Russian talking points, which he himself promotes.
In the last month, Elon has claimed on Twitter that 1) the attack on Nancy Pelosi's aging husband was due to a dispute with a gay lover; 2) Ukraine, a sovereign nation, should give up its industrial heartland to a bunch of rapists and war criminals; 3) Taiwan, a sovereign nation, should subjugate itself to the Chinese police state.
That is, Twitter employees don't get the visionary. They get an abusive boss who is also bad at filtering information, leaning into stupid theories, and willing to traffic with police states to forward his interests.
Frankly, I miss the good Elon, and I wonder where he went.
* https://www.cbsnews.com/news/elon-musk-taiwan-china-ukraine-...
* https://www.vice.com/en/article/ake44z/elon-musk-vladimir-pu...
* https://www.cbsnews.com/news/elon-musk-paul-pelosi-tweets-li...
woodruffw|3 years ago
It’s very easy to confuse objects of technical fascination with moral virtue, particularly when our world appears bleak. But Musk has demonstrated no motives other than profit and infamy.
Madmallard|3 years ago
rad_gruchalski|3 years ago
That might be true. But let’s think about it from a larger perspective. Let’s just assume that, however unlikely, we managed to survive next 800 million years on this planet. Once our Sun starts dying, we gotta get out of here anyway. For sure, the only end game for us must be to become an interplanetary species.
blisterpeanuts|3 years ago
Should we do it? Sure, why not? We’ll explore the solar system and beyond. The human race would be able to multiply almost indefinitely, and develop amazing new tech, human like robots, medical cures, art and music, anti-matter propulsion, quantum computers… so much potential.