That said, I think Elon needs to travel the world a little more. Several of his attempts to solve purported world-relevant issues may be founded in limitations present in the US.
1) I have been to the jungles of Cambodia, trekked across Myanmar, stayed in villages of central Iran, driven across the deserts North Africa. Never have I felt deprived on good connectivity, even in the deserts of Iran. Everyone glued to their smartphones like everywhere else. And I had a pretty strong case of FB-itis myself back then. Where there is a human settlement, there seemed to be a connection. As an anecdote, I recall having Skype calls with my folks from the Shwedagon Pagoda - it had excellent wifi ~7 years ago. Walking across a salt lake one can and should expect to drop our for a while. The only exception I recall is some village in Tunisian Sahara where locals made a point of not being connected (mostly expats). Ksar Ghilane, perhaps?
How is it that in rural US there is no alternative to satellite internet? There seems to be some local systemic failure. The rest of the world will be left holding the bag, so that people do not have to dig down some cables in Arkansas.
2) Building the self-driving car. It already exists everywhere. It is called the metro, tram, bus, tuk-tuk, rickshaw, whatever. It exists, and works great, servicing billions and if you exclude the latter options, safe. But not in N.America, where you cannot even cross a street without a vehicle. Thankfully, this seems to only use up VC money, without any externalities for the rest of the world.