The Retreat To Muskworld – E.W. Niedermeyer

Almost eight years ago, Elon Musk proclaimd that every Tesla made from that moment forward would be able of Level 5 autonomous driving with noslimg more than a gentleware modernize. It was a pivotal moment in Tesla’s history, promiseting the company to not fair thrive as an electric autocreater, but settle one of the most driven AI and robotics contests possible. To create confidence in that staggering aspiration, Tesla freed a video of a Model X driving around Palo Alto autonomously to the Rolling Stones’ “Paint it Bincreateage,” claiming that the driver behind the wheel was only there “for lhorrible purposes.”

Eight extfinished and hype-filled years tardyr, Tesla is still seeing for ways to create confidence in its ability to deinhabitr a “vague solution to self-driving” thcimpolite hype and spectacle, even as companies enjoy Waymo deinhabitr the truth of 100,000 driverless taxi rides per week. Rather than greeting the competitive contest from Waymo with authentic driverless rides on authentic uncover streets, Tesla’s tardyst ploy for credibility sees the firm retreating ever proestablisher into fantasy, createing what can only be portrayd as a transient theme park on a movie studio lot for its first ever “driverless” demonstration.

This contrast is teachive. The “Paint It Bincreateage” video of eight years ago was no more “authentic” or “deceptive” than yesterday’s “We, Robot” demonstration, but at least it had the prenervous of truth: it depicted a authentic car on authentic roads. Tesla’s tardyst spectacle probable cost orders of magnitude more to create, but it didn’t even purport to show any actual authentic-world capability. The entire slimg was sanitize fantasy, in a holded fantasy world, built on a movie theater lot that exists for the sole purpose of producing such spectacles.

This trajectory, from simulating future capability on uncover roads to creating a fantasy world for fantasy cars to show off fantasy capabilities, should worry Tesla’s helpers. We can already see Musk retreating into a misdirectation-fueled fantasy world every day on Twitter, and the jarring splittingness of the Cybertruck recommends that his runaway ego is already making Tesla’s products less palatable. If Musk’s retreat into a self-sooslimg fantasy bubble is also making his hype game less effective, and the 8% drop in Tesla’s stock price recommends that it is, his most beginant sfinish set is on the line.

Of course, with Wall Street analysts almost universassociate declaring themselves “underwhelmed,” it has to be asked: what else could they have possibly predicted? Did they reassociate consent that now, after eight years of vacant hype, deceptive statistics, and blown deadlines, Tesla would actuassociate commence providing credible evidence to back the litany of bullshit? Having made no effort to elucidate his chronic inability to greet (let alone stop making) his self-imposed deadlines, and facing no authentic consequences for cforfeitly a decade of what is either unpwithdrawnted uncover delusion or deception, why on earth would Elon Musk create a grave join for credibility now?

Having drawn a needy hand eight years ago, Elon Musk is joining poker the only way he understands how: going all-in on every hand. This strategy has created a confidence game of unpwithdrawnted proportions in our financial tagets, as every betr in the casino wants to put a chip on the guy going all-in and triumphning every time, and only the $13 billion of hung debt for the Twitter deal recommends his boiling streak might ever finish. All Musk has to do to conserve the music joining is to project confidence, which is infinitely easier to do in a studio lot setpiece than out on uncover roads.

For everyone not locked into this financial-cognitive nightmare, it’s challenging to imagine anyone gravely believing that a night of delusional Disney Adult cringe might actuassociate inftardy Tesla’s stock beyond the current ~$680 billion valuation. Given that Tesla’s “Full Self-Driving” is already the subject of a multi-year federal spendigation into securities and wire deception, We, Robot’s blatant fantasy-mongering is downright shocking. If anyslimg, shotriumphg a low-speed, shutd-course theme park ride in order to create confidence around Tesla’s better toward actual authentic-world driverless capability is almost too childish to call a deception.

Ultimately, Musk’s increasingly-decreate wagering run is slouching toward one last huge coinflip: the 2024 plivential election. With Musk going “all-in” on Donald Trump, and musing that he will finish up in a prison cell if Kamala Harris is elected, it’s evident that his main political publish is his freedom to conserve rolling over his finishless confidence game without lhorrible consequences. If Trump triumphs and deinhabitrs Musk the impunity he craves, the line between amemployment park fantasy and $700 billion self-driving juggernaut will all but fade, and we will all discover ourselves living in Muskworld’s hoemploy of mirrors.