Langes Portrait Ć¼ber Elon von Ronan Farrow im New Yorker. Wenig neues Ć¼ber Twitter aber doch ein paar interessante Dinge drin. Hier einige AuszĆ¼ge:
Muskās influence is [ā¦] brazen and expansive. There is little precedent for a civilianās becoming the arbiter of a war between nations in such a granular way, or for the degree of dependency that the U.S. now has on Musk in a variety of fields, from the future of energy and transportation to the exploration of space. SpaceX is currently the sole means by which NASA transports crew from U.S. soil into space, a situation that will persist for at least another year. [ā¦]
One Pentagon spokesman said that he was keeping Musk apprised of my inquiries about his role in Ukraine and would grant an interview with an official about the matter only with Muskās permission. āWeāll talk to you if Elon wants us to,ā he told me. In a podcast interview last year, Musk was asked whether he has more influence than the American government. He replied immediately, āIn some ways.ā Reid Hoffman told me that Muskās attitude is ālike Louis XIV: āLāĆ©tat, cāest moi.ā ā
Muskās power continues to grow. His takeover of Twitter, which he has rebranded āX,ā gives him a critical forum for political discourse ahead of the next Presidential election. [ā¦]
Sam Altman, the C.E.O. of OpenAI, with whom Musk has both worked and sparred, told me, āElon desperately wants the world to be saved. But only if he can be the one to save it.ā[ā¦]
Tesla for a time included in its vehicles the ability to replace the humming noises that electric cars must emitāsince their engines make little soundāwith goat bleats, farting, or a sound of the ownerās choice. āWeāre, like, āNo, thatās not compliant with the regulations, donāt be stupid,ā ā Cliff told me. Tesla argued with regulators for more than a year, according to an N.H.T.S.A. safety report. Nine days after the rolling-stop recall, the company pulled the noises, too. On Twitter, Musk wrote, āThe fun police made us do it (sigh).ā
Thereās a lot of underreporting in industry in general. And Elon Musk kind of seems to raise that to an art form.ā Garrett Brown, a former field-compliance inspector at Californiaās Division of Occupational Safety and Health, added, āWe have a bad health-and-safety situation throughout the country. And itās worse in companies run by people like Elon Musk, who was ideologically opposed to the idea of government enforcement of public-health regulations.ā
Musk started spreading misinformation on the platform: he shared theories that the physical attack on Paul Pelosi, the husband of the former Speaker of the House, had followed a meeting with a male prostitute, and retweeted suggestions that reports accurately identifying a mass shooter as a white supremacist were a āpsyop.ā Some people who know Musk well still struggle to make sense of his political shift. āThere was nothing political about him ever,ā a close associate told me. āIāve been around him for a long time, and had lots of deep conversations with the man, at all hours of the dayānever heard a fucking word about this.ā
Minutes later, he [Musk] posted an image showing a portion of [former head of trust and safety at twitter Yoel] Rothās doctoral dissertation, which focussed on the gay-hookup app Grindr and its user data. In the excerpt, Roth argued that such platforms will inevitably be used by people under eighteen, so they should do more to keep those individuals safe. āLooks like Yoel is in favor of children being able to access adult internet services,ā Musk wrote.
The attack fit a pattern: Muskās trolling has increasingly taken on the vernacular of hard-right social media, in which grooming, pedophilia, and human trafficking are associated with liberalism.
Muskās tweet about Roth got nearly seventeen thousand quote tweets and retweets. āThe moment that it went from being a moderation conversation to being a Pizzagate conversation, the risk level changed,ā Roth told me. āI spent my career looking at the absolute worst things that the Internet could do to people. Certainly, worse things have happened to people. But this is probably up there.ā Roth and his husband were forced to flee their house, a two-bedroom in El Cerrito, California, that theyād purchased just two years earlier.
Some of Muskās associates connected his erratic behavior to efforts to self-medicate. Musk, who says he now spends much of his time in a modest house in the wetlands of South Texas, near a SpaceX facility, confessed, in an interview last year, āI feel quite lonely.ā He has said that his career consists of āgreat highs, terrible lows and unrelenting stress.ā One close colleague told me, āHis life just sucks. Itās so stressful. Heās just so dedicated to these companies. He goes to sleep and wakes up answering e-mails. Ninety-nine per cent of people will never know someone that obsessed, and with that high a tolerance for sacrifice in their personal life.ā
Ein mir zutiefst unsympathischer Mensch. Je mehr ich von ihm lese, desto weniger wƶllte ich etwas mit ihm zu tun haben.