Do you want to be a success in the field that made me rich? Let me tell you each and every one of my very profitable secrets! I want to flood the market with knowledgeable competitors so I can be broke! – Every success grifter

No shit…

The saddest thing about billionaires is their lack of high quality, constructive hobbies. Where are the public gardens they’ve built, where is the community neighborhoods they’ve designed and founded? Where are the terraforming and farmland reclaimation projects they’ve done? Where are their great library wings, public water features, hospitals and healthcare systems.

They contribute nothing. I don’t want to see them dead, I just want to see them demoted to the lowest rungs of society.

This rings true. Of course, you can get the odd philanthropist here and there, but they’re the exception. One of the problems other than the billionaires’ insatiable greed is that they know how much everyone hates them. And instead of showing people that they’re worthy of love, they choose to hate everyone right back. Where this circle started is like the chicken and the egg.

I’m not sure they do know how much everybody hates them. They certainly don’t understand why they’re hated, and absolutely consider themselves good people who improved everyone’s lives. Maybe even a little gratitude would be nice.

Without billionaires, you wouldn’t need philanthropy

Bezos made a philanthropist. His ex-wife, MacKenzie Scott Tuttle. Diverced him, took $40bn, and has to date donated over half to charities. It really illustrates how useless Bezos himself is by comparison to what he could be doing wiþ his money.

I don’t want to see them dead, I just want to see them demoted to the lowest rungs of society.

That’s a rare viewpoint around here

Yeah like at least build a Minecraft world or something c’mon

The only exception I can think of is Walmart, who turned their little town in NW Arkansas into a cycling oasis. But you could easily argue that they did that selfishly because no one wanted to live in Bumfuck, AR and work for them, but the people benefitted, regardless.

Yeah the Waltons aren’t super liked outside of that little town, and there are plenty inside it who aren’t fond of them anymore as the city bends to their whims. Sometimes you benefit from what they do, sometimes it fucks up something you liked already. A little of their guilt money is in my nonprofit’s bank account. I am happy to be using it for things they’d probably hate.

I didn’t say anything about liking them.

I don’t want to see them dead

I want them jailed, and their money redistributed

Reminds me of the crypto mining rig kickstarter projects.

“If oil rigs were profitable, the shipyard wouldn’t sell you one”

I despise Musk as much as the next Group 14-based lifeform, but there is such a thing as specialisation.

That is such a disingenuous comparison lol

Musk is a scam artist there is zero chance the terms are favorable to anyone other than himself.

He is a scam artist, but this specific argument in the broader reality doesn’t really stick. The argument is that no one ever sells something that yields value to anyone else, which is obviously off.

It works better if you highlight that Tesla is less like those companies. They are demonstrably big on vertical integration, including the ride shares, so for them, it is out of character, but as a generic business strategy, it’s perfectly routine.

its a pump and dump scheme, much like is truck and the hyperloop.

Oil rigs aren’t billed as automatable. This is most likely just a way to offload liability

This is most likely just a way to offload liability

And to make the owners pay for maintenance and electricity.

If they lock the feature behind a higher price tier, a subscription, or a cut of the profits, it’s a low-risk income stream with minimal expenses.

And to make the owners pay for…electricity.

Tesla is an electric utility, they could probably make more money providing it to themselves than passing the costs off to their contractors.

Doubt it would be more. Electricity is going up in the US. Selling is more profitable right now

I mean as a utility provider, selling more electricity is usually a good thing…

Ya sure. Like he would give a thin dime (or cab) to anyone to make any sort of profit. Anyone who buys into that scam deserves everything they get and more and it surely will not be profit.

You know who wins out in a gold rush?

The person selling picks.

I read this as Cybercrab and was immediately disappointed

The same pitch you hear from ads on instagram where they tell you the “secret” how to earn millions without doing anything. All you have to do is buy this eBook for $49

My friend bought such ebook and the secret was make more ebooks and sell it to gullible people, unlike you

You could apply the same logic to airlines, most aircraft manufacturers don’t operate passenger services using the aircraft they manufacture.

And yet, airlines make money.

Heh yeah but not from flights from credit cards.

The difference here is that running an airline is hard. If you could buy a plane and press a button for it to make money autonomously,then Airbus and Boeing wouldn’t sell their planes either.

But I wanna live in the automate luxury communist future Elon promised!!

Not without my lgbtq homies.

Truth. So I’m not misunderstood. I’m just pointing out Musk’s bullshit commitment to essentially are the ideals of a techno-utopia with no jobs. I am in no way stanning him

Word, it’s Fully Automated Luxury GAY Space Communism. Can’t leave that bit out

Best he can do is fascist

LOL, anything connected to Elon Musk is the last place I’d trust my money.

mechahitler controlled optimus robots are expected on the same “income plan”. Musk has been saying FSD/full autonomous was 1 year away since 2015. OP is right to be skeptical. First Tesla shows it can run a robotaxi fleet, then you can consider buying one/several for same purpose, even though price would rise if it made money and didn’t crash too often.

I mean, fuck Musk, but the same would apply for literally any manufacturer of commercial or industrial equipment.

By this logic ASML would never sell their world-leading computer chip lithography machines. They would just run their own production lines instead.

On the other end of the cost spectrum, no manufacturer would ever sell robot vacuum cleaners or lawn mowers, instead contracting these out as cleaning services.

The truth is companies will sell profitable machines to other companies simply because the entirety of civilization is built on the specialization of labor. This applies to both individuals and groups of individuals. Sure, ASML could raise capital and try to invest in their own chip fabs, but why? If they have the money to invest, they would be better off buying more equipment and hiring more employees to make more of the tools they already sell. This company’s machines are one of the major bottlenecks in global compute production. They can sell machines as fast as they can make them. They know how to make a really good lithography machine. They don’t know how to run a full fab well. Instead they focus on just their one part of the industry.

Specialization of labor built civilization. It’s why we’re not still living in caves. I would never by a Cybercab because I don’t want to give money to nazis. And it’s actually likely that Musk is lying about the profitability of these things. At the same time, however, it is very poor logic to assume that simply because a company is selling a piece of commercial or industrial equipment means that equipment is unprofitable to own.

The more likely case is that the equipment (an autonomous cab) is unprofitable to own once you factor in risk with liability and damages.

Broadly, you have a point. However with Tesla Musk has been pretty consistent that they would be directly doing it and they have the Tesla app managing the rides.

Their strategy has been all in one, they make the cars, they own the chargers, and they don’t really partner with anyone in any significant way.

While it does happen that companies end up partnering and competing at the same time, it’s relatively less likely. So for Tesla it is extra strange to be pitching being a supplier for other autonomous taxis while simultaneously being in the market.

So yeah, generally it is a poor argument, but in the context of Tesla, it is at least a bit out of character for them.

it is very poor logic to assume that simply because a company is selling a piece of commercial or industrial equipment means that equipment is unprofitable to own.

The article is not making this generalization, it’s specifically about Tesla’s situation and offer.

Your ASML analogy would work, if 1) ASML already ran their own chip foundries, 2) ASML was offering you the chance to buy a lithography machine that would not work except inside an ASML foundry, 3) ASML promised they would lease “your” lithography machine back from you, on terms they set, at some unspecified future date.

I’d disagree. The man tells that he’s selling perfume and it’s selling out instantly. I bet he’s just folding extra money on top of the profit. There isn’t any regulation so who can check?

the fact that they wont just put a steering wheel on it and call it a model 2 tells me this is an investment scam.

They will never make another car with that naming scheme because the current lineup spells “SEXY” and Elon Musk is a pathetic manchild. Shoutout to Ford Motor Company for forcing him to rename it to the model 3 instead of E and forever ruining his stupid joke.

They’re probably limiting their liability, the same way they partnered with local roofing companies to install solar roofs.

But as Electrek also reported on recently, Tesla discontinued solar roofs, and left those roofing companies with hundreds of thousands in losses from wasted investment.

Now if anyone in Europe wants a solar roof, Solarstone sells them and I don’t think they’re going anywhere unlike Tesla, given that this is their main business. Plugging it because they’re from Estonia like me, gotta support local businesses lol

I love supporting real tech companies rather than investment scams

And you’d be competing directly against the company that controls the platform. Tesla can undercut your prices, prioritize its own cars in the app, change the revenue split, or geofence you out entirely. You don’t own a business in that arrangement. You own the downside.

Well done, friend.