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Elon Musk emails employees about 'extensive and damaging sabotage' by employee

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Re: Elon Musk emails employees about 'extensive and damaging sabotage' by employee

#81

Everyone's reaction to this seems to be "He is crazy / paranoid". He gave very specific examples of things this person did. If you were someone with a large position against Telsa, or a competing manufacturer, or an oil / gas company finally picking things up after a terrible oil price collapse, yeah maybe it makes sense to go mess things up subtly enough that the company slips a little bit closer to bankruptcy? I'm…

From the standpoint of anyone trying to sabotage Tesla, the risk/reward ratio is extremely high. To claim that someone is trying to do so is an extraordinary claim, and we all know the saying about extraordinary claims...

Elon says that the person claimed he did it because he didn't get a promotion he wanted. That's probably true because it would be the least extraordinary possibility. But it doesn't hurt to consider and prepare for extraordinary circumstances.

Re: Elon Musk emails employees about 'extensive and damaging sabotage' by employee

#82

I made this same comment on the other discussion. I find it concerning that one person was able to push malicious code to 'production'. To me, this suggests that Tesla, a company building highly sensitive software, does not employ basic branch policies. How is is it that these changes could have made it through a code review process and get deployed? If a company like Microsoft or Google announced that a disgruntled…

I would say it's like the difference between China and America having a major environmental accident - we treat developing economies and businesses differently from established ones.

Re: Elon Musk emails employees about 'extensive and damaging sabotage' by employee

#83

We need to figure out if he was acting alone or with others at Tesla and if he was working with any outside organizations. As you know, there are a long list of organizations that want Tesla to die. These include Wall Street short-sellers, who have already lost billions of dollars and stand to lose a lot more. Then there are the oil & gas companies, the wealthiest industry in the world — they don't love the idea of T…

I wouldn't suggest this to be paranoia. It's simply reality. Wall Street profits from the stock cratering right now. Its not unfathomable that some hedge fund would go to extreme lengths to embed a mole into the Tesla team to cause sabotage.

There's a (mediocre) documentary on Netflix about Bill Ackman's famous Herbalife short. In there they detail the hundreds of $1000 spent just defending his short position through hiring former Herbalife people, funding legal campaigns, funding support groups. If you're short to the tune of a few $100 million - a few $100k is pocket change for these guys.

Re: Elon Musk emails employees about 'extensive and damaging sabotage' by employee

#84

I made this same comment on the other discussion. I find it concerning that one person was able to push malicious code to 'production'. To me, this suggests that Tesla, a company building highly sensitive software, does not employ basic branch policies. How is is it that these changes could have made it through a code review process and get deployed? If a company like Microsoft or Google announced that a disgruntled…

This is a very naive comment. There will always be a small handful of engineers that can push the button to move code into PROD or even change code in PROD live. Ideally, with mature controls, the people in this list is short. But to jump to the conclusion that Tesla doesn't use good practises is very short sighted. Who's to say that external parties didn't target this person specifically because of their role/influence.

Re: Elon Musk emails employees about 'extensive and damaging sabotage' by employee

#85
post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

According to the email from the article, the person has admitted to it and claimed it was due to promotional reasons. "The full extent of his actions are not yet clear, but what he has admitted to so far is pretty bad. His stated motivation is that he wanted a promotion that he did not receive. In light of these actions, not promoting him was definitely the right move."

> In light of these actions, not promoting him was definitely the right move that's pretty short sighted cheesy hollywood movie reply. you can just get from this dismissing statement how much they care about their employees. a better reply would've been "we'll launch a review to see how it got to this point / what made this person behave this way".

> that's pretty short sighted cheesy hollywood movie reply.

yeah but joe average shareholder is pumping his fist yelling "LOL, i love Elon, god he is so funny! Go Tesla!"

Re: Elon Musk emails employees about 'extensive and damaging sabotage' by employee

#86

I have no problem believing that a disgruntled employee sabotaged part of the production line. But I do have a problem believing that all of the problems since the Model 3 started production were caused by sabotage. I also have no problem believing that the disgruntled employee simply wanted to take revenge by sabotaging his/her employer -- that's not uncommon, and it should not be difficult to prove if it really hap…

This might be the language put there among other things to encourage employees to be vigilant (us vs evil them is an effective way to motivate people).

Re: Elon Musk emails employees about 'extensive and damaging sabotage' by employee

#87

I have no problem believing that a disgruntled employee sabotaged part of the production line. But I do have a problem believing that all of the problems since the Model 3 started production were caused by sabotage. I also have no problem believing that the disgruntled employee simply wanted to take revenge by sabotaging his/her employer -- that's not uncommon, and it should not be difficult to prove if it really hap…

"Musk is going a bit too far in suggesting that other forces are involved unless he has credible evidence,"

It's not a bit too far since oil&gas companies and car companies have an established history of doing very evil things.

Re: Elon Musk emails employees about 'extensive and damaging sabotage' by employee

#88

I have no problem believing that a disgruntled employee sabotaged part of the production line. But I do have a problem believing that all of the problems since the Model 3 started production were caused by sabotage. I also have no problem believing that the disgruntled employee simply wanted to take revenge by sabotaging his/her employer -- that's not uncommon, and it should not be difficult to prove if it really hap…

"Musk is going a bit too far in suggesting that other forces are involved unless he has credible evidence," It's not a bit too far since oil&gas companies and car companies have an established history of doing very evil things.

> It's not a bit too far since oil&gas companies and car companies have an established history of doing very evil things.

That does not mean they have done every specific evil thing they are accused of, such as sabotaging Tesla's factory.

Re: Elon Musk emails employees about 'extensive and damaging sabotage' by employee

#89
post #43

We need to figure out if he was acting alone or with others at Tesla and if he was working with any outside organizations. As you know, there are a long list of organizations that want Tesla to die. These include Wall Street short-sellers, who have already lost billions of dollars and stand to lose a lot more. Then there are the oil & gas companies, the wealthiest industry in the world — they don't love the idea of T…

There's a $10+ billion short position against TSLA, constituting over 25% of outstanding shares. Anyone working at Tesla should be paranoid. Remember Enron? People invested deeply in something do criminally reprehensible things. Much more importantly, Musk made very concrete allegations, the truth of which should come to light in short order. I remember the insinuation SpaceX made during the 2016 incident, which was…

Your Enron example is worthwhile for the opposite reason you intended: there was a massive short position against Enron too, and corporate management accused the shorts of all manner of conspiracy, and the shorts were right.

"People invested deeply in something" describes the management of fraudulent companies far more than it does short sellers. There's a quote from David Einhorn's book (that I think he attributes to Warren Buffet) that is something to the effect of: "When you're short a fraudulent company, you'll be surprised at the ends they'll go to defend themselves. Because to you this is 5% or whatever of your portfolio, but to them it is everything."

Re: Elon Musk emails employees about 'extensive and damaging sabotage' by employee

#90

Listen y'all it's sabotage

I can't stand it, I know you planned it... gotta set straight this Watergate.

"young npm punks littering the thread with beastie boy references and old C wizards grumbling at the youth of today"
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