SpaceX said to fire employees involved in letter rebuking Elon Musk • Hacker News Board

Re: SpaceX said to fire employees involved in letter rebuking Elon Musk

#171

Post by api » Fri, Jun 17, 2022, 1:56 PM UTC

bitexploder wrote: post #151

user_named wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait six month, when the Tesla stock has crashed and he gets margin called. He's going to go nuts and have an epic fall from grace.

If I might be so bold, I don’t think anyone around here really appreciates Musk’s antics very much. However Tesla and SpaceX are fundamentally sound, if overvalued, businesses. Since the start of Tesla he has had loud and obnoxious detractors who have had any number of reasons Tesla is about to implode. Instead they keep churning out solid EVs and SpaceX keeps putting stuff in space. As much as I dislike him, I would…

His businesses are not just him. He's the public face. They all have shareholders and many employees.

I give Gwynne Shotwell a ton of credit for actually running SpaceX on a day to day basis.

I think a lot of the issues with Tesla exist because as far as I can tell Tesla does not have a Gwynne Shotwell.

Re: SpaceX said to fire employees involved in letter rebuking Elon Musk

#172

Post by rluhar » Fri, Jun 17, 2022, 1:57 PM UTC

blocked_again wrote: post #120

nocoolnametom wrote: post #97

Musk may end up being the most influential person to: 1. Electrify our vehicular infrastructure 2. Get humans to the Moon, if not to Mars 3. Accelerate the unionization of Silicon Valley tech workers His approach to remote-vs-in-office work is less that of a data-informed futurist and more that of an autocrat. Just as he's loudly supporting public free speech as long as it's his speech, I predict within a few months…

Quoted post unavailable.

You might want to do some reading on why unions came about in the first place.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trade_union

Re: SpaceX said to fire employees involved in letter rebuking Elon Musk

#173

Post by shagmin » Fri, Jun 17, 2022, 1:57 PM UTC

yieldcrv wrote: post #117

nocoolnametom wrote: post #97

Musk may end up being the most influential person to: 1. Electrify our vehicular infrastructure 2. Get humans to the Moon, if not to Mars 3. Accelerate the unionization of Silicon Valley tech workers His approach to remote-vs-in-office work is less that of a data-informed futurist and more that of an autocrat. Just as he's loudly supporting public free speech as long as it's his speech, I predict within a few months…

Do you feel that Elon will exclude some forms of protected speech? I haven't been following that closely

I would be surprised if he didn't. He has a history of being vindictive towards critics and has a lot of grudges and is more hands-on than typical CEOs.

Re: SpaceX said to fire employees involved in letter rebuking Elon Musk

#174

Post by api » Fri, Jun 17, 2022, 1:58 PM UTC

speedgoose wrote: post #119

leesec wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would companies be democratic? That would be an extreme historical rarity

Why would governments be democratic? That would be an extreme historical rarity

Government is a necessary evil with a monopoly on the initiation of force, and as such a primary concern with government is restraining it. Democracy is all about restraining and also providing a (usually) non-violent pressure valve to avoid revolutions and insurrections that destabilize the entire system or threaten to cause government's restraints on the use of force to be removed.

Unrestrained government was a really significant cause of death in the early 20th century.

Private businesses have an entirely different purpose.

Re: SpaceX said to fire employees involved in letter rebuking Elon Musk

#175

Post by pyronik19 » Fri, Jun 17, 2022, 1:58 PM UTC

rg111 wrote: post #147

Musk talked so much about "free speech" in recent times! This move is embarrassing. You can't just fire people for criticism.

You have freedom of speech just not freedom from consequences :)

Re: SpaceX said to fire employees involved in letter rebuking Elon Musk

#176

Post by Symmetry » Fri, Jun 17, 2022, 1:58 PM UTC

alkonaut wrote: post #100

Does Elon Musk always ask himself “ok what’s the most petty/childish/immature response I can produce for this situation?” I’m not sure what’s actually wrong with him or if it’s at all clinical or just the billionaire disease of being surrounded by people who agree with you for too long. But I get a feeling there is something a bit off with his behavior and/or mental health, and that it’s been getting worse lately. I…

“The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.”

Sadly, the people who do the most to change the world are often unreasonable in their personal lives. And if a person sincerely believes they are working to prevent climate change or give humanity a backup planet they'll tend to view opposition based on quality of life issues or whatever as unreasonable.

Re: SpaceX said to fire employees involved in letter rebuking Elon Musk

#177

Post by axg11 » Fri, Jun 17, 2022, 1:58 PM UTC

blocked_again wrote: post #120

nocoolnametom wrote: post #97

Musk may end up being the most influential person to: 1. Electrify our vehicular infrastructure 2. Get humans to the Moon, if not to Mars 3. Accelerate the unionization of Silicon Valley tech workers His approach to remote-vs-in-office work is less that of a data-informed futurist and more that of an autocrat. Just as he's loudly supporting public free speech as long as it's his speech, I predict within a few months…

Quoted post unavailable.

Most employees never consider starting their own company, so we can strike off (2). Buying SpaceX is vanishingly unrealistic, so discount (3). My impression of working at SpaceX is that the options for employees are:

1. Keep working at SpaceX - work on truly innovative technology with a lofty mission. The work environment sucks, you work 100 hour weeks but the _work_ itself is great. Your work might land on Mars this decade.

2. Join another startup (Relativity, Firefly, Rocket Lab, etc) - no proven track record of success or work on smaller scale (but successful) projects. Work hours and culture are variable, but there is a general sense of urgency. Your work is not landing on Mars this decade but could still change the aerospace industry in smaller ways.

3. Coast and enjoy life with your family (Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Blue Origin, etc). Work 38 hour weeks. You will get the chance to work on large prestigious projects. Your project is regularly in the news for being over budget and late. There is no sense of urgency. You have complete job security.

Re: SpaceX said to fire employees involved in letter rebuking Elon Musk

#178

Post by djaychela » Fri, Jun 17, 2022, 1:59 PM UTC

andsoitis wrote: post #154

nocoolnametom wrote: post #97

Musk may end up being the most influential person to: 1. Electrify our vehicular infrastructure 2. Get humans to the Moon, if not to Mars 3. Accelerate the unionization of Silicon Valley tech workers His approach to remote-vs-in-office work is less that of a data-informed futurist and more that of an autocrat. Just as he's loudly supporting public free speech as long as it's his speech, I predict within a few months…

> democracy as long as it's not within his companies. Can you name a single company that operates as a democracy?

John Lewis [1] springs to mind, although I don't know how deep that runs.

[1] - https://www.johnlewispartnership.co.uk/about.html

Re: SpaceX said to fire employees involved in letter rebuking Elon Musk

#179

Post by causality0 » Fri, Jun 17, 2022, 1:59 PM UTC

nocoolnametom wrote: post #97

Musk may end up being the most influential person to: 1. Electrify our vehicular infrastructure 2. Get humans to the Moon, if not to Mars 3. Accelerate the unionization of Silicon Valley tech workers His approach to remote-vs-in-office work is less that of a data-informed futurist and more that of an autocrat. Just as he's loudly supporting public free speech as long as it's his speech, I predict within a few months…

As someone who believes in free speech even for people I despise and opinions I find nauseating, I hate that people like Musk have become the public face of the free speech movement.

Re: SpaceX said to fire employees involved in letter rebuking Elon Musk

#180

Post by mcguire » Fri, Jun 17, 2022, 1:59 PM UTC

daenz wrote: post #118

>The letter asked SpaceX management to publicly separate the company from Mr. Musk’s personal brand, and to take steps to address what it said was a gap between SpaceX’s stated values and its current systems and company culture. >“Blanketing thousands of people across the company with repeated unsolicited emails and asking them to sign letters and fill out unsponsored surveys during the work day is not acceptable,” S…

Surprised? No. There's no large company in the world where attacking top management won't lead to major consequences.

Of course, SpaceX (and Google, along with a stack of other "tech" companies) wasn't supposed to be just another large company; they wanted to disrupt things, and wanted fanatical buy-in from their employees, customers, and fans. (Corporate fans? Really?)

It'll take a while, because religions don't die easily, but eventually it will become clear to anyone except the die-hard that it's just another company.