There’s probably no such thing as an honest billionaire, but Elon Musk at least keeps things interesting. And he has done and is doing a lot of cool things.
Technoking, world’s wealthiest man and future Top Twit, Elon Musk is currently attracting a lot of negative press over his pending acquisition of Twitter (TWTR).
The gist of the complaints seems to be that he’ll overturn most of the controls and limits that Twitter has imposed on bad actors and return it to a free-speech hatefest free-for-all.
Even worse, he may let a certain seditious former federal employee who used the service to inspire the single worst attempt to overthrow the U.S. government back onto Twitter.
Judging by Twitter’s share price, which currently is about 10% under Musk’s offer price, Wall Street has its own doubts that the acquisition will actually go through.
But for all the shade and critiques being thrown his way, Musk remains a different kind of billionaire, and probably the least awful, or, in any event, the most interesting one in a long time.
Consider these five examples of cool things Musk has done.
1. Starlink to Ukraine
Musk donated tons of Starlink receivers to provide Ukraine with communications infrastructure in its fight with Russia. Sure it was a savvy business play to send Ukraine all those receivers. You couldn’t have a better real-world proof-of-concept case to demonstrate their value. But it was also a decent thing to do, suggesting that perhaps concerns over Musk’s anti-democratic tendencies may be a bit overwrought.
2. Dragon 2
SpaceX used its Dragon 2 capsule to U.S. astronauts into space from American soil for the first time in a decade thus giving the U.S. access to space without relying on Russia. Musk seems to have a knack for frustrating Russian interests. In this case, he undercut a (modest) income source for the Kremlin as well as rebuilding a bit of pride in U.S. can-doism. And it sure saves on those trips to and from the middle of Kazakhstan.
3. Tesla
Musk and Tesla (TSLA) made electric vehicles cool and desirable. This one is potentially changing the way the world moves and reducing dependence on fossil fuels like the ones that come from ... Russia. The cars are hot looking, very zippy and jam packed with technology that gets updated all the time. After all, creating a car that can be programed to run the air conditioning to keep your dog cool while you’re shopping is pretty sweet.
4. Dreamed Big
Like the George Bernard Shaw quote goes, “Some men see things as they are and ask why. Others dream things that never were and ask why not.” Musk is clearly in the second category. The guy has a restless and relentless mind, driven by a willingness to try to reimagine and improve almost anything. And anybody who’s making as serious an effort as he is to build reusable rockets to fly people to Mars is not playing small ball.
5. Falcon 9 First Stage
Musk and his people made a rocket booster that could be returned to earth; landed on on a barge in the middle of the ocean and towed back to land over and over. It's one thing to imagine such an idea, it's another to actually make it happen. And nothing demonstrates Musk’s ability to make the improbable probable better than that.
