ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
No bio...
User ID: 626
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
9hr ago
It is!
I have a question - if Falcon Heavy is so much cheaper than Falcon 9, why are they relying so much on the latter for Starlink?
I think quite the opposite – if you get the cost low enough, sending stuff to space becomes a high school science project and everyone wants to do it. Lots of amateur CubeSats in this vein.
Can we do some back of the envelope calculations here? How low does the price have to go, for people to start launching satellites en-masse? How many would they want to launch? How many clients would SpaceX have to get to make a decent profit at such a low price point? How much can they launch before triggering Kessler Syndrome?
Maybe you're right. To clarify, your position is that Starship will never make a successful orbital payload delivery? Or that it will never land successfully?
The bets I placed are on the former, and I admit that it's not impossible I will end up losing it. Fire-and-forget is a lot easier, after all, but I don't think Starship development is going well.
Right now they can't, can they? New Glenn is having its own developmental issues
Hence, why I brought up EscaPADE. If they pull it off, that might trigger questions and concerns from SpaceX investors and clients.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
9hr ago
Even without Starship, there is no other company that can hope to do anything like those numbers anytime soon.
Ok, why the push for Starship then? My contention is that Starship is one of the galaxy-brained promises Elon will never deliver on, and that this will be the end of him. If Falcon 9 is more than enough for them to rake the cash in, why not just rake the cash in, instead of blowing $1 billion on every rocket that goes boom?
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
9hr ago
To me, being a futurist brand guy that's well positioned to capture value in the growth of the transition to EVs, development of space, and AI is a pretty fantastic position. And unlike Microsoft, Elon still has big bets to make.
I don't think Elon's position in EV's or space is as good as Microsoft's was in computers, and for that matter I don't think EV's or space in general are going to be that big of a deal. I don't have an opinion on AI yet, but then again I don't understand why people are acting like OpenAI == Elon Musk. Does he still have a stake in it? Why was he using "give me my compensation package, or I'll leave Tesla to found an AI company" as an argument?
Anyway, you making any bets?
I have 2 outstanding bets with fellow motteposters about Starship ever making it to orbit. If you absolutely insist, you can join in, I think I can take 1 or 2 more, but I'd like to diversify. You think they'll ever make it to the moon? What about robo-taxis?
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
9hr ago
That’s the thing. I don’t think it’s a reasonable opinion at all.
For the record @FCfromSSC is 100% right about my motivation. The difference between me and Holocaust deniers is that I hope I'm wrong. Like I said my pride is a small price to pay for getting to see Earth from orbit, before I die.
The guy has founded three different companies with huge market values. SpaceX trades hands at over $200 billion in private markets, Tesla has a public market value of over $200 billion, OpenAI has a weird market structure as a nonprofit but if was a normal corporate probably would have trades happening at over $200 billion market cap.
Since you brought it up, I'll also ping @Belisarius - this is why my arguments sounded like they're about financial analysis.
Look, my entire point is that the value of his companies is propped up by promises of crazy technologies he's not going to deliver on. When that becomes apparent to the public, it's over, they're crashing. OpenAI is probably exempted, but does he have any actual control over it? I thought it was all Sam Altman.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
10hr ago
I recognize this as a valid comeback, but I think their patience has limits. Politically the blob has turned against him. so the moment they find an alternative the gets ejected. This is why I think the EscaPADE mission is potentially the mark when the tide turns for him.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
10hr ago
Speed is hardly the only important factor for an internet connection. HughesNet has latency in the 600-800ms range,
Yeah, I know. My question is, do I really need gaming-rate latencies, when I'm in the middle of literal nowhere? I'm sure there are cases where the answer is a resounding "Yes!". Drone operators probably hate being fragged as much as gamers, and it's only so many times that your CO is going to take "lag" as an excuse. This is why I'm also willing to believe there is a lot more money in it, than a naive analysis of the civillian market would let on, and possibly how SpaceX was sustained for so long.
But for everyone else? Bro, move somewhere close to a cell tower. I don't know how things are in the US, but in Europe you pretty much have to go underground to escape cell coverage.
Either that or live with the lag, and that's the whole question here. How many people absolutely need to low latencies, because if they don't the ISP's that are in geo-synchronous orbit are going to slaughter you on costs. For every one of their satellites, you're going to need... scores? hundreds?
Might?
Last year you wrote,
Indeed, my past posts is why I said I could be considered biased.
Is there any explanation other than bias for opining with that level of ignorance?
No, but on the other hand, I think ignorance is self-justifying! It is our default state after all.
The irony here is that, though I'd agree with many of your points above (as would most techies; e.g. "Elon time" is something in between a sad joke and an actual conversion coefficient at this point), I still can't actually trust your presentation of them to add anything on top the bare hyperlinks themselves, and even with the links I've got to worry that selection bias is a problem. How could I justify further trust as more than Gell-Mann amnesia?
First of all, I hope I'm not coming across as believing I'm some sort of an expert. I have a mild interest on the subject, follow some of the news, and am going off on vibes. In fact a good part of the reason why I'm posting is to test Vibe Analysis. I'm pretty sure it's a valid way of analyzing the world - I predicted Trump with Vibe Analysis, I predicted COVID with Vibe Analysis, I predicted BLM2 with Vibe Analysis... the problem is that my wife is the only person that heard me making these predictions, and her memory isn't even that good so I have no bragging rights. Now the vibes are telling me Elon is about to crash, and if it's true, I want bragging rights, god dammit! If it's wrong, and I have to wear the DUM DUM hat until the rest of my life - I'm happy with that deal. My pride is a small price to pay for an affordable ticket to space.
Posting here is also a way to verify whether or not I'm receiving all the relevant vibes. It's a bit like my TransTrend prediction post (and it's follow-up), I felt the vibes shift, pro-trans people going from extremely confident to somewhat on the back foot. I wanted to plant a flag, and see if they'll try and take it, and they didn't... at least not in the same way. It was no longer "The Science is on our side, chud!" and a lot more of "oh, are you sure you want the government to dictate what adults can do with their bodies" or petty relitigatiion of Culture War history. Same with Elon - I think his companies are going to crash, I wanted to see if anyone is going to call me a retard for it, and so far the arguments in his defense boil down to him already deserving some sort of trophy... Fine! Give him his bloody trophy, I just want to know whether his companies are sustainable.
If I'm right I also want to warn you lot, so you don't suffer from splash damage of Elon's collapse. I'm planning on spending the foreseeable future bashing woke-supporters for being for "gender affirming care", I'm planning on establishing a goddamn museum, I don't want them to have "Oh yeah? Your side supported the arch-conman Elon Musk" as a comeback!
Sorry if this is too schizo, but I am, after all, the Tinfoil Gigachad... even if that tinfoil hat has "DUM DUM" written on it.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
12hr ago
That still massively diminishes the size of the "conspiracy theory", and doesn't change the fact we don't have any audited numbers. Like I said, we'll see soon enough.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
13hr ago
And you can do the same thing for Steve Jobs
I'd be happy to! I hate Apple and all it's products! They did invent nothing, all their products are hype, and people willing to pay a premium to look high-status. If someone tried to paint Jobs as a once-in-a-century innovator I'd be on their ass too. But the difference between Jobs and Musk is that Jobs company is sustainable in a way that Musk's will prove not to be. I think he also tended to deliver the products he announced, but I can't say I followed him very closely.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
13hr ago
The thing is, if it's not the case, we have to consider that SpaceX is putting down more launches than the rest of the market put together as some sort of stunt or fraud, which starts to edge into conspiracy theory.
Not if you realize the overwhelming majority of those launches are for Starlink, than it becomes a straight-forward application of using hype to generate more hype to extract as much money from investors as possible.
Either Musk is a machiavellian genius running a massive misinformation campaign using billion dollars of hardware
I unironically believe that this is closer to the truth than the alternative, and that we'll see it soon enough (I'll go with Thunderf00t's 5 year clock, starting last year, though like I said the vibes are telling me it might happen a lot sooner).
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
14hr ago
Starlink brought in $4B in 2023, up from $1.4B in 2022, latest estimate $6.6B for 2024. Development via investment dollars is much faster than via cash flow alone would be, but it's not a necessity.
Very nice, now show me their costs so we can calculate the profits...
first place is SpaceX
The overwhelming majority of their launches is Starlink itself, a project of unknown profitability / sustainability.
The thrilling upcoming news is that they might launch New Glenn later this year
To Mars... on first attempt...
and if they evolve it twice as fast as SpaceX did once they got their first partly-reusable launcher to orbit, they'll have a Falcon-9-killer by 2030, tops
So... what's your estimate on Starship being functional under those assumptions?
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
14hr ago
The motte for Elon Musks is he’s the most important person of the 21st century to date and the most important engineer since probably 1900.
Ok, well that, to me, is the Bailey. Upon interrogating the arguments, the Motte ends up being something like "Ok he's hyped up, but he still innovated a lot of stuff" or "But look at how much his companies are worth".
Electric cars didn’t exists before him.
The hell they didn't. They were driving around golf courses for decades before that. People didn't drive them on roads before, because it might no economic sense, and here's the kicker: we still don't know if it makes any economic sense. They're being hyped and subsidized by tech enthusiasts, and clueless green activists, in a futile attempt to do something about global warming, and despite that they're not really enticing when compared to ICE cars.
I believe he’s the only person to start a car company from scratch in a 100 years without state backing.
A completely meaningless achievement, if it's based on promises he will never deliver on, and his company ends up crashing.
Rockets had completely had no advance for 60 years before him.
Reusability is not a fundamental advancement, it was always a question of whether it's worth the effort, and again, it's even less clear that it is, then in the case of electric cars, since we have no insight into the costs.
The motte for him is no reason to dump Musks as an ally. There is no human on earth I would prefer as an ally.
I hope you're right, and I end up looking like an idiot, but don't say I didn't warn you, if I don't.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
14hr ago
It is interesting that it has become a moniker for "fighting for what's right" and so on, even among the more conservative section
I dunno, it's not exactly mind-blowing that even people I'm vehemently against are fighting for what they believe is right. I also have no issues admitting it takes a special kind of person to commit to such a fight, when all "respectable" society is against you, and to admire that, even when I disagree with what they're trying to achieve.
Likewise, being "countercultural" by itself would indicate being satisfied with a certain niche status instead of taking over the actual general culture
Oh, that might be an actual thing that changed. I think there's a whole bunch of factions, not just conservatives, that written off mainstream society, and are just looking for ways for their communities to survive whatever the powers that be have in store for us.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
15hr ago
Also Falcon 9 launches were both profitable and undercutting the competition
From what I understand we don't actually know that. Do we have any audited numbers on their launch costs?
Am I missing something here
If Starship works (and it seems likely to) it will absolutely revolutionize orbital delivery.
Yeah... if reusable rockets were so great, orbital delivery would already be absolutely revolutionized, you wouldn't have to point to the next big thing that is just around the corner.
Going back to the idea of using Starlink to create demand, Starship is likely to drop cost-to-orbit enough to create more demand
I believe the argument is that this is false. There aren't that many people who want to launch satellites, or do that many things in space. Is space tourism supposed to be the thing he'll make bank on?
I don't think "Starship will work eventually" should be considered an Elon Fanboy Position,
This is where I disagree. I think he'll run out of hype before he manages to get it to work.
Now, I wouldn't be surprised to see space mining in my lifetime
I'd like you to be right about it, but I'd be shocked.
but I think the true reason SpaceX will do fine for the short-to-medium future is because space is a key national security concern, and getting moreso. There is a ton of money in national security, and SpaceX is uniquely suited to tap it.
Sure... but the glowies can pay Bezos instead.
Not necessarily. I had a comment about this, but I think it got sucked into the abyss when out database crapped out, but the short of it is that due to the fundamental properties of rocketry, you get the most oomph out of the last bit of fuel you burn. If you reuse your rocket, that last bit will be necessary to bring your rocket back. So there's a simple exercise you can do with an excel spreadsheet that shows you the economics of reusability relative to one time use, and it's not impossible to end up above the break-even point. The Shuttle was barely below, and it wasn't really due to NASA's incompetence.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
15hr ago
My guess is that the combination of Twitter being not really his sort of company with the "Fair Game" notice the Biden administration put out on him in retaliation for buying it is why his star's falling.
Yes, I think that's a significant component of it, but it's more of an accelerant, than the cause. If he actually cracks robo-taxis, or something, his progressive detractors will have no other choice but to quietly seethe. If he doesn't, and all he'll have is a promise of yet-another-awesome-thing, that gimmick would run out of fuel sooner or later.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
15hr ago
People like Thunderfoot have been predicting Musk to crash and burn for years. I don't believe that will happen in the future, like it didn't happen so far.
I think it was last year that he actually started, and he set the clock to 5 years. He's been criticizing Musk for a while, but I don't recall him talking about crashing and burning.
It isn't really fair to Musk to compare him to Elizabeth Holmes. The man has significant tangible successes.
The discrepancy between the hype around him, and what he delivered vs what he promised, is enough to justify the comparison, in my opinion.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
15hr ago
What's interesting in this thread is how esteemed the concepts like 'counterculture', 'rebellion', 'new punk' and so on are.
Between a lot of people here having their roots in the left, and appreciation for fighting for what's right, regardless of societal pushback, probably being a universal quality, how is that interesting at all?
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
15hr ago
Somebody who's currently taking your lunch money has no need to document their balance sheet.
Sure, but if they don't publish it, I have no way of confirming that they are, in fact, taking anyone's lunch money.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
16hr ago
Thanks for the response!
This one will take some reading / thinking before I have anything to say.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
16hr ago
Most of your analysis is based on economic performance and your negative opinion of how he runs his business even though he has been very successful.
Not quite. My analysis is that claims of Musk's greatness are based on his promises of delivering revolutionary new technologies that will change the world, and I'm saying these technologies are never going to be delivered. There will be no self-driving, robo-taxis, semis, bipedal robots doing manual labor for us, revolutionary new batteries, manned missions to Mars or the Moon. All of these things would make him a great man, if he managed to deliver, but he is not going to. This will also have financial consequences, because the stuff he might deliver is not going to be enough to sustain his companies, and as a result they will crash.
Apologies for the financial emphasis, but the last time I was in a conversation about Musk, someone literally made the opposite argument: "who cares the tech he's promising is hype, look at how much his companies are worth!"
Frankly, since this is the culture war thread, why should I really particularly care about the fact that the guy is not the business Messiah? I
I can tell you why I care: because for some reason Musk is the face of letting techies think outside the box and do whatever they want, and if he crashes we are going to see an unending stream of arguments telling us they gave us a chance, and we have to "color inside the lines" now.
I don't think there are that many blind Elon fanboys here.
I literally just got "but have you considered space mining" as a response.
Well, I didn't bother to read their financial statements,
Even if you bothered to, you can't. It's a private company.
What I know is that Space X is highly innovative and even the American goverment rely on them in regards to part of what they are doing. Or with technology like Starlink.
Ok, cool. On the other hand he has a contract to help NASA go back to the Moon, and I'm nearly certain he's going to fail. All the little and big things that the failure resulted from is going to be talked about non-stop, and anyone whoever believed in Elon is going to be subjected to a non-stop shaming campaign. I'm here to tell you you still have time to get off the Musk hype-train.
Your analysis is more like what a random individual who made some research on the issue would provide when trying to suggest whether we should, or shouldn't buy shares on Elon's companies.
No, I don't care about shares. I mean, yeah you probably shouldn't buy, but that's irrelevant. I'm telling you that anyone circling the wagons around Musk will end up in about a similarly humiliating position, as people trying to sell "gender-affirming care" for children.
Anyway, the important thing is the influence of buying twitter, not whether it is profitable for Musk.
I agree, but I'm afraid he's going to be ousted, if his companies come crashing down around him. The relative freedom we are enjoying right now might end up being very brief.
By those metrics Musk should be judged
I think he should be judged by the promises he's making, and whether or not he can deliver on them. Also on whether or not his companies crash.
It is weird, to see this common judgement of Musk based on that when nobody judges Soros or Singer or some of the EA donors massively donating to the Democrats only by those metrics.
He's being judged by the same metrics as Elizabeth Holmes or Trevor Milton, I don't think that's weird.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
17hr ago
One of our local Germans will have to go into the details on that, all I can tell you is that their PMC is extremely woke, from my experience. Then again, so is the rest of Europe these days.
re SpaceX one thing you leave out as a potential economic case is space mining. Could be insanely valuable.
This goes directly into the big bag of wild ideas the might happen sometime in the future, that could be insanely valuable, and are never delivered. Can he please deliver on any of the other wild insanely valuable things he promised, before we entertain this? Can he at least do ship-to-ship refueling first?
Also most financial analysts value Starlink quite highly. Maybe you are missing something they are not.
Maybe, but then again, maybe not. I'm not one for "trust the experts" type arguments. It's not like there isn't a long history of eggs ending up on financial analysts' faces, in my short time on this planet alone.
Yes! I wanted to bring it up in this comment but it ended up slipping my mind. This discussion is useful in figuring out where Elon's strengths and weaknesses are. Like you said, from the replies it seems like Falcon 9 and Starlink are his strong points.
Well, the only "short" I'd urge people to do is to avoid falling on any swords for the guy. He (rightfully) won a lot of goodwill with his takeover of Twitter, but I'm worried people are too defensive of him. It might all be very silly in the end, I doubt preventing the establishment to have a gotcha on the contrarians will work, even if it's achievable... but, I dunno, I feel like this will end up being a pretty big egg on some people's faces.
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