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Elon Musk: Officially a fraud and piece of shit. Official or unofficial war criminal?


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"i called doctors in wuhan" - WHAT? WHO?

he says in it that after talking to docs in Wuhan they said they put too many people on intubated ventilators for an extended period and that was what was damaging lungs

why are there all of these articles out here about how Musk personally donated vents or that his companies helped with vents then?

he said people yelled at him and he said "yeah, but i do make space ships with life support systems - what do you do?"

idk where the 80% number is from but yeah, turns out when you put really sick people in the ICU who have to be put on a vent they are in bad shape and a lot of them die.

edit: added in some JAMA stuff on the 80%: https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2020/04/22/coronavirus-ventilators-survival/

 

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Now five weeks into the crisis, a paper published in the journal JAMA about New York state’s largest health system suggests a reality that, like so much else about the novel coronavirus, confounds our early expectations.

 

Researchers found that 20 percent of all those hospitalized died — a finding that’s similar to the percentage who perish in normal times among those who are admitted for respiratory distress.

 

But the numbers diverge more for the critically ill put on ventilators.

 

here is the moneyshot, which nobody mentioned:

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A total of 1,151 patients required mechanical ventilators. Of the 320 for whom final outcomes are known (either death or discharge), 88 percent died. That compares with about 80 percent of patients who died on ventilators before the pandemic, according to previous studies — and with the death rate of about 50 percent that some critical-care doctors had optimistically hoped for when the first cases were diagnosed.

 

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/elon-musk-helped-medtronic-tackle-ventilator-crisis-153911498.html
 

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Medtronic, the supplier of a third of the world's ventilators, produced 200 per week prior to the pandemic but quickly ramped up production to 1,000 per week, Martha told Yahoo Finance in a new interview.

To ramp up production, Medtronic first had to overcome a supply chain disruption that caused a shortage of key parts. Medtronic took the unusual step of posting its ventilator designs online, and an engineer at SpaceX noticed that a critical part of Medtronic's ventilators matched a part used in SpaceX rockets, Martha said.

"If you think about [it], a spacecraft has a life support system on it — a ventilator is a life support system," Martha says.

"Next thing you know, I'm on the phone with Elon Musk, and he really became a good partner of ours," Martha adds.

 

and
 

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"[Musk] wanted to validate that we really needed it, and they could really be of assistance, but he was very supportive, and very easy to talk to," Martha says. "I was surprised, given all the businesses he has, how much he knew about this one part."

"He told us the whole story [about] how he saw the supply chain was not very reliable," Martha adds. "And he decided to insource it."

"He was very down to earth, very friendly, and very deep into the details, and was very helpful," Martha says.

In addition to the help from Musk, Medtronic formed partnerships with tech company Intel (INTC) as well as manufacturers in Bangladesh, India, Canada, and the United States in order to amplify its production, Martha said.

 

he offered to make vents: https://www.reuters.com/article/health-coronavirus-musk/teslas-musk-offers-to-make-ventilators-amid-shortage-in-coronavirus-battle-idUSL4N2BC1TT

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“We will make ventilators if there is a shortage,” Musk said on Twitter, responding to a fan’s suggestion that the billionaire repurpose a factory for the task.

he donated 1200 to California: https://fortune.com/2020/03/24/coronavirus-ventilators-elon-musk/

which he fucked up and sent something else: https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/17/tech/elon-musk-ventilators-california/index.html

he sent them bipap and cpap machines.

 

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8 minutes ago, NoName said:

idk where the 80% number is from but yeah, turns out when you put really sick people in the ICU who have to be put on a vent they are in bad shape and a lot of them die.

The fact that we have a gigantic moron class that 1) considers themselves giant brain geniuses and 2) doesn't understand that "correlation does not equal causation" is going to be the death of us.

For fuck's sake, I'm sure some very high percentage of people who are treated with a defibrillator for a heart attack end up dying.  These fucking absolute jello-brained idiots would 100% conclude "it's the defibrillators that are killing people!  The cure is worse than the disease!"

The stupidity...that people think is INTELLIGENCE...I just can't anymore.

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35 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

The fact that we have a gigantic moron class that 1) considers themselves giant brain geniuses and 2) doesn't understand that "correlation does not equal causation" is going to be the death of us.

For fuck's sake, I'm sure some very high percentage of people who are treated with a defibrillator for a heart attack end up dying.  These fucking absolute jello-brained idiots would 100% conclude "it's the defibrillators that are killing people!  The cure is worse than the disease!"

The stupidity...that people think is INTELLIGENCE...I just can't anymore.

I’m starting to realize that giving idiots access to information doesn’t make them smarter. It just reinforces their stupidity 

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4 hours ago, NoName said:

he sent them bipap and cpap machines.

 

The ventilators he SHOULD have sent would have been fine but the c-pap machines he ACTUALLY sent, the philips brand in particular, had a defect that philips kept quiet about for a decade that poisoned its users lungs with formaldehyde-phenol. Possibly that's what he's trying to deflect from. It's an unbelievable scandal that became known earlier this year thanks to the work of ProPublica and the Pittsburgh Post Gazette (Pittsburgh is the location of Philips' US HQ).

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/investigation-finds-philips-hid-safety-issues-with-its-cpap-machines-for-years

 

 

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10 hours ago, Neonmoon said:

I’m starting to realize that giving idiots access to information doesn’t make them smarter. It just reinforces their stupidity 

10 hours.  10 HOURS!!!   Ten hours since Neonmoon posted - and no Aggy-mentioning response to this so far.

A couple inches of rain have completely deranged all of you. 

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On 10/31/2023 at 4:17 PM, Chopper said:

Finally got a bluesky invite a couple weeks ago. It's alright to skim every once in a while but if you're twitter addicted it seems like it's growing and well-positioned to take its place. I think the time may have passed for me to be interested in a social media app and I can't imagine making/finding friends on one like I did on twitter years ago.

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image.thumb.png.dbac33dacb7add63951a63d585149f69.png

 


I can't get an invite to BlueSky.  1.3 million social media followers but BlueSky is apparently too cool for me.

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3 minutes ago, SydneyCarton said:

ALmost all of that 2022 revenue  bump has to be coming from Stalkink and the war on Ukraine...which means it's being propped up by the US and other governments...

 

Eh, they have a growing user base outside of Ukraine.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starlink#Subscribers

I just think they are over-estimating how many users they are going to be able to draw and maintain. I just replaced my system with fiber and will not be looking back. If there is any physical high speed option available, I can't understand why someone would pick Starlink over that.

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2023/09/spacex-projected-20-million-starlink-users-by-2022-it-ended-up-with-1-million/

 

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Just now, Captain Ron said:

 

Eh, they have a growing user base outside of Ukraine.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starlink#Subscribers

I just think they are over-estimating how many users they are going to be able to draw and maintain. I just replaced my system with fiber and will not be looking back. If there is any physical high speed option available, I can't understand why someone would pick Starlink over that.

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2023/09/spacex-projected-20-million-starlink-users-by-2022-it-ended-up-with-1-million/

 

Listen, I'm not shitting on Starlink. I know it's growing, and people in rural areas sing it's praises. But simply eyeballing that chart, it looks like they TRIPLED year over year revenue, right at the time the war in Ukraine started. That is...not a coincidence, imo. It's the opposite of steady growth. 

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25 minutes ago, longhornmatt said:

I refuse to believe there isn’t a massive untapped market of people who cannot get internet access yet at the same time can afford to pay for Starlink.  Or that launching enough satellites to brighten the night sky isn’t the most cost effective way to bring internet to rural locales, for that matter.

The Office Thank You GIF

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17 hours ago, Snake Diggity said:

I passed a cybertruck while driving out to Beerburg brewery in west Austin on Sunday.  Odds it was this piece of shit (Elon)?

not him, only because there would be a million pics of it.

honestly, it says *EVERYTHING* you need to know that he isn't out driving it all over the place in Austin now that we are <30 days from deliveries taking place.

it is truly an oddly shaped, useless shitbox that is going to be a stain on the TSLA brand (which has its huge list of issues)

this whole "bullet proof" thing is a prime example of how dumb everything is. i am SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO excited to see some dumb fuck TSLA stan go out and test it on video then release the video. it's going to be amazing

https://jalopnik.com/tesla-cybertrucks-bulletproofing-is-garbage-actually-1850980175?utm_medium=sharefromsite&utm_source=jalopnik_reddit

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On Twitter, though, Musk laid out a more specific claim: “The door panels are bulletproof to almost all subsonic projectiles.” While this may sound impressive, anyone familiar with guns will know that vanishingly few rounds actually move at subsonic speeds — in fact, subsonic ammunition is its own specialty niche within the ammunition market. Some calibers like .45 ACP and .380 ACP are naturally subsonic, but most other armaments — including the spring-powered air rifle I had as a kid — will apparently be too much for the poor widdle Cybertruck.

Standard ballistic protection ratings for vehicles usually start with .22 LR as an example caliber against which they’re armored. That’s a typical starter caliber for a first firearm, the kind of thing that’s often looked down upon by gatekeeping gun enthusiasts as not a real firearm. Yet, .22 LR is a supersonic caliber — by Musk’s standard, the Cybertruck won’t even protect against that. You’d have better luck with phonebooks.

also the bulletproof focus is dumb anyway. if someone is trying to shoot you in your car they are just going to shoot through the regular automotive glass in the dumb window right above it.

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1 hour ago, longhornmatt said:

I refuse to believe there isn’t a massive untapped market of people who cannot get internet access yet at the same time can afford to pay for Starlink.  Or that launching enough satellites to brighten the night sky isn’t the most cost effective way to bring internet to rural locales, for that matter.

the folks i know in rural areas that are paying for it are replacing things like HughesNet or fixed wireless internet where you have an antenna on the side of your house or who use a hotspot for their internet

that's a HUGE market of people switching over.

 

the night sky stuff is a legit issue as is the fact that as more people use it it gets slower in an area which leads people to go back to their other options OR go to more traditional options as those spider out from cities.

Edited by NoName
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46 minutes ago, NoName said:

the folks i know in rural areas that are paying for it are replacing things like HughesNet or fixed wireless internet where you have an antenna on the side of your house or who use a hotspot for their internet

that's a HUGE market of people switching over.

 

the night sky stuff is a legit issue as is the fact that as more people use it it gets slower in an area which leads people to go back to their other options OR go to more traditional options as those spider out from cities.

The bigger issue is that US telcoms have already gotten over $400,000,000,000 (yes really) to build out rural fiber internet, and yet..... Bupkis. Because there was nobody to hold their feet to the fire and not just pocket the extra money for some sweet sweet free profit

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If someone asked you to headline their conference along with other mediocre white men like the guy who fucked up the HBO brand, and the guy who was too weak to hold the job of Speaker for a full year would you head for zee hills or say "sure!"

And if you were a newspaper publisher would you invite a white nationalist who's vowed to terrorize you and other "mainstream news" orgs. to your "esteemed" conference?

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Edited by Chopper
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11 hours ago, Neonmoon said:

image.jpeg.89b1ce8e33f1753f0ff6468e1fa7562b.jpeg

lol 

Granted his post was dated a year ago, but we all know that bullshit was disproven. I had a buddy working that talking point, and a week or two later this article came out, and oddly never heard a peep:

https://gizmodo.com/ftx-sam-bankman-fried-sbf-secret-donations-republicans-1849834727

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3 minutes ago, High Plains Drifter said:

 

I thought it was well known he was donating to both Rs and Ds.

 

Oh....you're adorable. You think that a certain political demographic in this country actually reads/absorbs any news that doesn't validate their one-sided worldview.  See above.  When the full story came out (that he contributed like a mofo to candidates of both parties).....crickets from the EXACT outlets that were shouting the story from the mountaintops days before.

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17 hours ago, Captainant said:

The bigger issue is that US telcoms have already gotten over $400,000,000,000 (yes really) to build out rural fiber internet, and yet..... Bupkis. Because there was nobody to hold their feet to the fire and not just pocket the extra money for some sweet sweet free profit

The major ones haven't, but a  lot of small groups jumped in and got things going. The fiber I got for my place is in BFE Vermont. 

I'm along that road 19 going NE in that shot. And that is about a rural as you can get.

 

12 hours ago, Neonmoon said:

image.jpeg.89b1ce8e33f1753f0ff6468e1fa7562b.jpeg

lol 

I'm sure we'll see a retraction of that tweet post haste.

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28 minutes ago, High Plains Drifter said:

 

I thought it was well known he was donating to both Rs and Ds.

 

And then there was this - he was giving everyone money. It wasn't just Dems.

Edited by Captain Ron
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The new "stockholders" of X..er, Twitter received a document outlining the risks facing the company.  The owner of the company is listed as one of the risks.

https://www.theverge.com/2023/11/3/23945420/the-risks-facing-x-elon-musk

 

Quote

Yesterday, employees at X received a crash course in private equity from the folks at Morgan Stanley, whose Shareworks platform is being used to manage the restricted stock units that Elon Musk has finally begun doling out.


The issuance of new equity, complete with an official stockholder agreement and disclosure statement, marks the beginning of a new chapter in the saga of Twitter’s haywire transformation into X. The old Twitter, a publicly traded company incorporated in Delaware with an independent board of directors, has been dead for a year. In its place now is X Holdings, a private, Nevada-based corporation with one controlling shareholder and a PO box in Austin, Texas.

 

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If the transcript I published of X’s all-hands with Musk and Linda Yaccarino last week wasn’t clear enough, the internal equity documents solidify that Musk, X’s “Principal Stockholder,” calls the shots. He’s the company’s “sole director” who controls all decision-making through a special class of shares. He can hire and fire board members, should he decide to create a board.
Despite her CEO title, Yaccarino is mentioned in X’s lengthy list of risk factors only once, where it’s noted that she is focusing on “business operations” and that the company’s “reliance on a small number of executive officers reduces our ability to quickly and successfully respond to any unforeseen or significant issues.”

 

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The reason for these documents being shared with employees (and now me) is that Musk has finally acknowledged what he thinks X’s equity is now worth: $19 billion, a 55 percent drop from his $44 billion purchase price. Since promising employees new stock awards since he took over, Musk had yet to follow through with the details until this week. 
Private companies typically price the shares they give employees as low as possible since that gives the most potential upside. But this is Musk, of course. He didn’t follow the typical playbook of using an external auditor to arrive at $19 billion. He also didn’t bother to register X’s shares with the SEC (an agency he hates), which presents other complications for employees, including future tax implications that could be quite messy.  

 

Spoiler

Based on how the stock market has treated money-losing tech companies this year, $19 billion is quite an optimistic number. When you consider how X’s revenue has collapsed and the roughly $13 billion in debt Musk took on to help finance the acquisition, well, yikes. (The only investors who will regularly get to see the company’s financials are those who put in $250 million or more: Sequoia, Andreessen Horowitz, Aliva Capital, VvCapital, Binance, Brookfield, Fidelity, Larry Ellison, and the Qatar government.)


One theory floated to me by an investor who knows Musk is that an inflated valuation means that he gets to issue fewer shares to employees since they are being awarded RSUs based on a previously communicated dollar amount. By using a higher valuation, fewer shares need to be issued, offsetting Musk’s dilution. 
Another theory is that Musk wants to keep his investors, which include longtime friends like Ellison and Sequoia’s Roelof Botha, from having to more aggressively mark down the value of their investment. If Musk, the richest man in the world, says X is worth $19 billion, that’s all that matters?


For now, sure. But a private company’s valuation is ultimately whatever management thinks someone will pay in the future. Musk has said that he wants to model X’s compensation structure after SpaceX, which conducts regular tender offers so employees can sell their vested shares to outside investors and get some liquidity. 
Perhaps Musk knows people who will buy X equity at $19 billion in the near future. Nothing about a buyback was communicated to employees this week, flummoxing some. The stockholder agreement only mentions the possibility of the shares, which have a seven-year timer before they expire, being cashed out in the event of an IPO or acquisition. 


Risk factor nuggets
The risk factors X shared with employees this week are intentionally meant to spell doom and gloom. Similar disclosures are common in SEC filings by public companies. The reason they exist — to help protect management from shareholder lawsuits — means they are often the most sober look you’ll get at the problems facing a business. 


If you’ve been following the news about X closely, a lot of these won’t come as a surprise. But still, it’s nice to hear from the horse’s mouth:
“As of June 30, 2023, we had approximately 1,450 active employees, representing an approximately 80% reduction from the number of X employees prior to the Merger.”


“The reduction in force may result in unintended consequences and costs, such as the loss of institutional knowledge and expertise as well as valuable sales and other employees, the failure to effectively transfer knowledge from employees who departed abruptly, attrition beyond the intended number of employees, decreased morale among our remaining employees, reputational harm and difficulty recruiting candidates in the future.” 


“To the extent Mr. Musk’s behaviors, posts, public commentary or other actions or inactions are not well received, or not broadly acceptable or mainstream, it may result in the loss of advertisers and users, including popular content creators, which would harm our business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects.”


“If our content moderation-related decisions are perceived to be arbitrary, biased, partisan, or self- serving, our reputation may be harmed and we may experience a decline in growth, retention and engagement. Additionally, there may be a perception that X is only useful to users who have political and social ideologies consistent with those of Mr. Musk.” 


“We risk losing users on our platform who migrate to Truth Social, particularly as we move closer to the 2024 election cycle.”


“A large portion of the content on our platform comes from a small number of users and accordingly we are highly dependent on those content creators to provide quality content.”


“We may also update our policy to affect accounts whose primary purpose is the promotion of competing platforms. While we believe this will improve our competitive advantage, it could result in reduced engagement by content creators.”


“We have had disagreements with Apple regarding the terms and fees of the App Store, and future disagreements could lead to repercussions such as removal from the App Store. Additionally, there is a continued risk of being removed from Apple and Google’s app stores for violating their guidelines, which would significantly impact our user base and reduce our potential revenue from subscribers.”


“To date, revenue from subscribers has been derived from a small subset of our users. We will need to meaningfully increase the number of participating accounts in order to realize the anticipated benefits.”


“We expect revenue from advertising will continue to be a material part of our overall revenue.. advertisers have expressed concern that there is a lack of comfort with our content moderation policies and capabilities or an acceptable level of certainty that their advertisements will not appear adjacent to or otherwise be associated with objectionable content that may appear on our platform and harm their brand as a result.”


“As of September 30, 2023, we were subject to over 2,000 individual arbitration demands, as well as claims, charges, investigations and other legal proceedings (including thirteen putative class action lawsuits for various employment-related matters) that involve severance demands and/or allegations of unlawful discrimination, unlawful termination, breach of contract, intentional infliction of emotional distress, fraud, failure to pay wages, intentional interference with prospective economic gain, and/or violations of the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act and National Labor Relations Act.”


“As we work to decrease our operating costs, we have stopped payment or services on certain of our contractual obligations, including certain lease payments. Such actions have resulted in litigation, including a putative class action lawsuit, and we expect there will be additional litigation with contractual parties from whom we have withheld payments in the future.”


“We do not expect to have employment agreements other than offer letters with any member of our senior management or other key employees, and we do not maintain key person life insurance for any employee.”

 

Edited by Francisco 2.0
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