this post was submitted on 20 Feb 2026
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No, you were right. He used to be a very intelligent, ruthlessly effective asshole. He enabled some great things, and participated in them, and also had some flaws.
Through whatever combination of drugs, radicalization, mental illness... he's all flaw now.
I don't agree. He sounded like he was moderately knowledgeable right up until the point where he spoke on a field in which I had expertise. Then he sounded like a fucking moron reading popscience articles and thinking he had special insights.
He's an investor. That's all he's ever been. He's never contributed meaningfully to the end results other than having money and being willing to spend it on big swings.
And note that this applies to nearly every name associated with big technical leaps. They're just MBA/investor types doing cosplay as techies. They'd be equally qualified selling pillows as they are tech.
I've heard the same from several other people. Some of the other points that others realized include: him scrapping a rocket because it wasn't pointy enough, wasting over a billion dollars, when he fucked up Tesla, and when he made a fool of himself on Twitter after he had purchased it. More people realized after he created the rolling dumpster, some others realized when he roleplayed as his toddler son, even more have realized over the past year after it came out that he paid other people to play Path of Exile 2 for him, and I'm sure that even more realized that he was a loser after he posted ai dogshit of himself as Iron Man, and I'm sure some other things. Even more recently, he's been ridiculed for begging to go to Epstein's island, and seemingly being seen as such a loser by Epstein that he wasn't allowed to go. He went from being seen as a cool, interesting man, albeit a bit eccentric, to being seen as who he truly is, one of the biggest losers and pieces of shit in the history of the US.
Wait, what? Must have missed that one.
And the PoE thing was hilarious.
Yeah, he had an alt that he used to roleplay as his son. He had to admit to it in court. Shame it didn't get more attention. There's also a bit of evidence that he's a babyfur. I think that's like what he was doing with his son, but also furry? That one is nowhere near proven though.
Agreed. He was always a rich wannabe who had a great PR team, until he thought he was smarter than them too.
His value was in listening to the smart people in the room and not giving a fuck about red tape, clearing the way for those smart people.
Those smart people have been replaced by right wing grifters and even more ketamine.
He did have some value. Even if he didn't invent them, I don't think electric cars get to where they are today without his help. And now they wouldn't have begun to decline without his help.