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Tesla Adds Larry Ellison and Kathleen Wilson-Thompson as Board Directors

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Re: Tesla Adds Larry Ellison and Kathleen Wilson-Thompson as Board Directors

#271

Post by dang »

chmaynard wrote: post #250
dang wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We merged that thread into this one, which was posted earlier.

Finally! I've been suggesting for years that HN start merging comment threads for duplicate posts. I hope this gets automated.

We've been doing that a long time!

https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comme...

https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comme...

https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comme...

We don't catch all of them, though. If people see two current threads about the same things with lots of comments, emailing us at hn@ycombinator.com would be helpful.

Re: Tesla Adds Larry Ellison and Kathleen Wilson-Thompson as Board Directors

#272

Post by ElijahLynn »

cdkee wrote: post #266
ElijahLynn wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, one thing that got me about him was his acquisition of Sun Microsystems to acquire the patents on Java to sue Google for Android. Which Sun didn't have any issue with Google about the use of Java for Android. But Larry did. He saw $$$. Maybe I am wrong about the above but that is my impression of what I have read. Open to corrections.

Sun had the hardware that Larry wanted for his engineered systems. Prior to that there was an announced partnership with HP for that. The Google lawsuit came later. Remember the purchase was in 2009, when Android was still in its early days in terms of adoption and market share.

Thanks, so it was more of a "oh, look at what we have here" type of thing it sounds like.

Re: Tesla Adds Larry Ellison and Kathleen Wilson-Thompson as Board Directors

#273

Post by darkpuma »

Sniffnoy wrote: post #270
darkpuma wrote: post #243

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe, I'm not sure. But I know I don't trust his idea of "good for the human beings inside Tesla cars, and the human beings on the road with Tesla cars."

I mean, these are related. If Tesla cars aren't safe for the people inside, people won't buy them. If they're not safe for others, lawsuits will follow. Bad for these are bad for shareholders too. But certain people will ignore this to their own detriment, and I expect Ellison to be one of them.

That's assuming car buyers are rational actors, and assuming the courts are fair. I think both are poor assumptions. What if the car itself isn't faulty if operated according to the fine print, but the marketing material for the car suggests to drivers the car has capabilities that exceed reality? Could Tesla theoretically be sued into compliance? Sure, maybe. But would it actually happen? Would Tesla defend their reputation by correcting their marketing material, or would Tesla defend their reputation for blaming the drivers?

And of course as you mention there is the possibility that Ellison is irrational.

Re: Tesla Adds Larry Ellison and Kathleen Wilson-Thompson as Board Directors

#274

Post by extrapickles »

darkpuma wrote: post #267
joefourier wrote: post #259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Level 5 self driving is still theoretical at this point, and theoretically speaking, there is no reason to assume LIDAR is absolutely necessary for it. Computer vision based pipelines are theoretically capable of providing the same depth information as LIDAR, using stereo, camera arrays or even monocular SLAM. The main obstacle for self-driving car is much more on the processing side than on the sensor side. After al…

No matter which way you slice it, Tesla should not be claiming the hardware required is present if the hardware requirements are, at best, theoretical.

If it turns out the hardware is not good enough I would expect them to replace it with something that is once hardware requirements are known.

Re: Tesla Adds Larry Ellison and Kathleen Wilson-Thompson as Board Directors

#275

Post by wisecommentator »

golfer wrote: post #88

Bruce Scott, the co-founder of Oracle says, “I remember Larry very distinctly telling me one time: Bruce, we can’t be successful unless we lie to customers.” And adds: “All the things that you would read in books of somebody being a leader, he wasn’t. But he was tenacious; he would never give up on anything.” [0] Elon stretches the truth constantly. Should be a good fit. [0]: https://techcrunch.com/2010/12/01/larry-e…

Larry Ellison is a visionary. Seems like all visionaries have been called liars by some. Steve Jobs is said to have had a “reality distortion field”. Elon Musk is a visionary. Are they all “liars” or do “visions” seem like stretching of the truth to us? Are visions simply extensions of the “truth”?

Re: Tesla Adds Larry Ellison and Kathleen Wilson-Thompson as Board Directors

#276

Post by darkpuma »

extrapickles wrote: post #274
darkpuma wrote: post #267

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No matter which way you slice it, Tesla should not be claiming the hardware required is present if the hardware requirements are, at best, theoretical.

If it turns out the hardware is not good enough I would expect them to replace it with something that is once hardware requirements are known.

They've given themselves enough wiggle room to never roll out Level 5 automation (and thus never admit they were wrong about what hardware it would require.)

>"Please note that Self-Driving functionality is dependent upon extensive software validation and regulatory approval, which may vary widely by jurisdiction. It is not possible to know exactly when each element of the functionality described above will be available, as this is highly dependent on local regulatory approval."

Re: Tesla Adds Larry Ellison and Kathleen Wilson-Thompson as Board Directors

#277

Post by narrator »

narrator wrote: post #227
scirocco wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Larry's first day with the board: "Let's introduce audits to catch drivers tuning their cars!"

Larry's second day:let's introduce a pricing model that confuses customers, nickels and dimes them constantly and requires enormously expensive upgrades to do things the current car and all our competitors already do for free.

Larry's third day on the job: Let's buy all our competitors and raise prices 5x and get rid of independent car repair shops and make Bluetooth and anything besides AM radio an ad on for the car stereo that's $5000 extra and licensed per unique phone you pair with it. You also can no longer plug in your car at home without an annual license fee and priced per watt of charger output and how many different cars will use it. You also have to pay an extra charge per pound of passenger and luggage in the car over 50. The car won't start if it detects you're overweight.

Re: Tesla Adds Larry Ellison and Kathleen Wilson-Thompson as Board Directors

#278

Post by gameswithgo »

wisecommentator wrote: post #275
golfer wrote: post #88

Bruce Scott, the co-founder of Oracle says, “I remember Larry very distinctly telling me one time: Bruce, we can’t be successful unless we lie to customers.” And adds: “All the things that you would read in books of somebody being a leader, he wasn’t. But he was tenacious; he would never give up on anything.” [0] Elon stretches the truth constantly. Should be a good fit. [0]: https://techcrunch.com/2010/12/01/larry-e…

Larry Ellison is a visionary. Seems like all visionaries have been called liars by some. Steve Jobs is said to have had a “reality distortion field”. Elon Musk is a visionary. Are they all “liars” or do “visions” seem like stretching of the truth to us? Are visions simply extensions of the “truth”?

What did Larry envision, exactly?

Re: Tesla Adds Larry Ellison and Kathleen Wilson-Thompson as Board Directors

#279

Post by Jarbooski »

extrapickles wrote: post #274
darkpuma wrote: post #267

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No matter which way you slice it, Tesla should not be claiming the hardware required is present if the hardware requirements are, at best, theoretical.

If it turns out the hardware is not good enough I would expect them to replace it with something that is once hardware requirements are known.

And who will pay for it? Or do you believe it's profits from here to infinity, as Elon claims?

Re: Tesla Adds Larry Ellison and Kathleen Wilson-Thompson as Board Directors

#280

Post by Jarbooski »

leesec wrote: post #251
darkpuma wrote: post #246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> every expert in the field unconnected to Tesla I'm saying that when you ask people not getting a paycheck from Tesla, they say that LIDAR is required. Very notably including Mobileye, who severed their connection with Tesla over this disagreement. Mobileye is particularly notable since they invested heavily into camera-only solutions; Mobileye has a strong financial incentive to dismiss LIDAR, yet they don't. It's…

Required for what, the self driving cars that don't exist yet? Radar and computer vision is simply a separate approach, not a wrong one. Tesla is as much an expert in the field as anyone, given that, you know, they have the best self driving commercial product by far.

Cite anything that says Tesla has "by far" the best software. Laughable.
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