WEBVTT - "Making Money on Space Is Still Extremely Difficult" 0:00:03.960 --> 0:00:06.720 Well, Elon Muski is now the richest person on the planet. 0:00:07.200 --> 0:00:10.039 More than half the satellites in space are owned and 0:00:10.119 --> 0:00:12.080 controlled by one man. 0:00:12.440 --> 0:00:15.160 Starting his own artificial intelligence company. 0:00:15.400 --> 0:00:17.240 Well, he's a legitimate, super genius. 0:00:17.800 --> 0:00:18.919 Legitimate, he says. 0:00:18.920 --> 0:00:21.560 He's always voted for Democrats, but this year it will 0:00:21.560 --> 0:00:22.000 be different. 0:00:22.040 --> 0:00:25.000 He'll vote Republican. There is a reason the US government 0:00:25.040 --> 0:00:27.640 is so reliant on him. Elon Musk is a scam 0:00:27.720 --> 0:00:29.960 artist and he's done nothing. 0:00:30.600 --> 0:00:33.320 Anything he does is fascinating the people. 0:00:42.680 --> 0:00:46.000 Welcome to Elon Inc. Where we discuss Elon Musk's fast 0:00:46.040 --> 0:00:49.280 corporate empire, his latest gambits and antics, and how to 0:00:49.320 --> 0:00:52.879 make sense of it all. I'm your host, David Papadopolos. 0:00:54.160 --> 0:00:58.040 On Friday, SpaceX is scheduled to launch its starship spacecraft 0:00:58.040 --> 0:01:01.960 for the second time. The first one went well until 0:01:02.000 --> 0:01:06.240 it didn't. It was detonated within minutes of launch. A 0:01:06.280 --> 0:01:09.240 lot in space travel, of course, can go wrong, and 0:01:09.400 --> 0:01:12.280 has gone wrong. But we also now know from a 0:01:12.280 --> 0:01:16.319 new Reuter's investigation that even when things go well behind 0:01:16.319 --> 0:01:19.840 the scenes, they can get very messy. To discuss this 0:01:19.880 --> 0:01:22.440 and more, we brought in Lauren Grush, who covers space 0:01:22.480 --> 0:01:24.600 for us here and is the author of the six 0:01:24.959 --> 0:01:29.919 The Untold Story of America's first women astronauts. Welcome, Lauren, Hello, 0:01:30.040 --> 0:01:33.440 thanks for having me. Sarah Fryar, who oversees our coverage 0:01:33.480 --> 0:01:39.240 of Silicon Valley's biggest companies. Hi, Hello, Sarah. And Max Chafkin, 0:01:39.440 --> 0:01:41.520 senior reporter at Bloomberg Business Week. 0:01:41.720 --> 0:01:43.880 Hey, how's it going? Hello? Max? 0:01:44.520 --> 0:01:47.600 All right, but we're gonna start back in Texas with you. 0:01:47.800 --> 0:01:48.160 Lauren. 0:01:48.680 --> 0:01:51.600 Just remind us why Starship is so important to the 0:01:51.680 --> 0:01:55.160 company and two Musk's multiplanetary vision. 0:01:56.440 --> 0:01:59.360 Sure, so, I guess you could say Starship is what 0:02:00.080 --> 0:02:03.120 Elon has been working towards since the very beginning. He 0:02:03.240 --> 0:02:08.040 founded SpaceX to start a civilization on Mars, and in 0:02:08.120 --> 0:02:10.680 order to do that, you need quite a large rocket 0:02:10.720 --> 0:02:14.160 to get people there. And so Starship is ultimately that 0:02:14.240 --> 0:02:19.280 transportation system that will take people to deep space destinations. 0:02:19.720 --> 0:02:22.000 Right now, they're kind of working toward the Moon, as 0:02:22.160 --> 0:02:24.160 NASA is looking to go back to the Moon, and 0:02:24.520 --> 0:02:28.120 Starship holds a multi billion dollar contract with NASA to 0:02:28.200 --> 0:02:31.880 take the agency's astronauts to the Moon first, but eventually 0:02:32.240 --> 0:02:35.200 the goal is to take upwards of, you know, hundreds 0:02:35.240 --> 0:02:37.560 of people to Mars and then you know, bring them 0:02:37.600 --> 0:02:38.800 back at some point as well. 0:02:39.320 --> 0:02:43.520 And so back in April you were there. What happened? 0:02:43.560 --> 0:02:44.280 What went wrong? 0:02:45.880 --> 0:02:49.799 Well, a lot of things didn't quite go as planned. 0:02:49.960 --> 0:02:52.200 As I could see as I was watching it launch. 0:02:53.120 --> 0:02:57.240 Multiple Raptor engines on the rocket flamed out. As I 0:02:57.320 --> 0:02:59.200 was watching it, I turned to the person next to 0:02:59.240 --> 0:03:00.440 me and I said something like. 0:03:00.760 --> 0:03:02.359 Uh, is that supposed to happen? 0:03:02.639 --> 0:03:06.519 But the rocket kept climbing, so I just kept filming 0:03:06.600 --> 0:03:08.880 it and watching it. But as it turns out, that 0:03:08.960 --> 0:03:12.880 was not supposed to happen. So multiple engines either failed 0:03:13.040 --> 0:03:16.320 or didn't even start up during the launch, and then 0:03:16.520 --> 0:03:20.680 as it climbed towards space, there's a portion of the 0:03:20.720 --> 0:03:25.560 flight where the vehicle intentionally separates. It's known as stage separation. 0:03:26.160 --> 0:03:29.160 And there are two stages on Starship. There's the Starship 0:03:29.400 --> 0:03:33.000 spacecraft itself, which is the top portion of the rocket 0:03:33.000 --> 0:03:36.480 and that's what would presumably carry people and cargo someday. 0:03:36.760 --> 0:03:38.760 And then you have the booster, what's known as the 0:03:38.840 --> 0:03:42.000 super heavy booster. It's a very long piece at the 0:03:42.040 --> 0:03:44.960 bottom that is needed to really get it out of 0:03:45.440 --> 0:03:49.119 the Earth's gravity and get it into orbit. Well, at 0:03:49.160 --> 0:03:51.880 some point, you know, the stages are supposed to separate 0:03:51.920 --> 0:03:54.120 because it gobbles up all the fuel in that super 0:03:54.160 --> 0:03:57.760 heavy booster. When that time came, the vehicle started to 0:03:57.800 --> 0:04:02.000 spin out of control, and then inly SpaceX opted to 0:04:02.840 --> 0:04:04.760 intentionally destroy the vehicle. 0:04:05.560 --> 0:04:07.680 They shut it down essentially, right, Yeah. 0:04:07.800 --> 0:04:11.760 Yeah, it's a precautionary measure with a system known as 0:04:11.760 --> 0:04:14.960 the Flight Termination System. It's embedded in every rocket and 0:04:15.000 --> 0:04:17.880 it's used for this exact scenario. So in case things 0:04:17.920 --> 0:04:20.800 don't go according to plan, they intentionally blow up the 0:04:20.880 --> 0:04:24.200 rocket to make sure it doesn't veer into a crowded 0:04:24.240 --> 0:04:28.400 area and cause unintended damage to public and property. 0:04:29.000 --> 0:04:32.680 After that explosion, they fixed their problem. Since then they're 0:04:32.720 --> 0:04:33.280 ready to go. 0:04:34.520 --> 0:04:37.000 That's what SpaceX says. The FA came up with a 0:04:37.040 --> 0:04:40.000 list of corrective actions that they need to implement. One 0:04:40.040 --> 0:04:43.440 of the biggest updates that you'll see during this flight 0:04:43.600 --> 0:04:46.960 is the addition of what's known as a water deluge system. 0:04:47.200 --> 0:04:50.800 So the way Elon described it is basically a shower 0:04:50.839 --> 0:04:54.800 head but pointed upward. So they've installed these steel plates 0:04:54.880 --> 0:04:57.920 underneath the launch pad or the launch mount that will 0:04:57.960 --> 0:05:02.680 gush water underneath the rocket when the engines fire, and 0:05:02.680 --> 0:05:05.280 that's meant to mitigate and lessen the forces that are 0:05:05.320 --> 0:05:08.360 created when those engines ignite. I mean, you have to remember, 0:05:08.400 --> 0:05:11.120 this is thirty three raptor engines that are supposed to ignite, 0:05:11.440 --> 0:05:14.880 and they're very powerful engines. So and that was ultimately 0:05:14.920 --> 0:05:17.680 what caused all of the destruction. Last time. They really 0:05:17.680 --> 0:05:20.760 didn't have any mitigation measures in place. And so I 0:05:20.800 --> 0:05:25.440 was actually watching the live stream from the original Starship launching. 0:05:25.480 --> 0:05:28.039 I could see the chunks of concrete kind of flying 0:05:28.160 --> 0:05:32.200 everywhere during that initial takeoff. So hopefully the DILUTIONE system 0:05:32.600 --> 0:05:34.360 will prevent that from happening this time. 0:05:34.560 --> 0:05:39.000 Launchpad basically blew up max, yes, which I mean happens 0:05:39.040 --> 0:05:43.320 when you're launching experimental rockets and like these. You know, 0:05:43.320 --> 0:05:45.320 I almost feel like this is the area where Elon 0:05:45.440 --> 0:05:47.960 Musk is sort of most comfortable, right where he's sort 0:05:47.960 --> 0:05:50.600 of trying to develop a new technology, where he's able 0:05:50.640 --> 0:05:56.719 to like lower expectations sufficiently, where a little explosion is 0:05:56.800 --> 0:05:58.160 just kind of like a bump in the road, right, 0:05:58.160 --> 0:06:00.440 because they were they were celebrating, Yeah, and I think 0:06:00.440 --> 0:06:02.960 you can argue, I mean, Lauren, correct me if I'm wrong. 0:06:03.120 --> 0:06:05.400 I feel like you could argue that it was a success. 0:06:05.440 --> 0:06:07.799 I mean, right, this is they achieved something that hadn't 0:06:07.839 --> 0:06:10.919 yet achieved and again experimental vehicles, like they don't need 0:06:10.960 --> 0:06:13.120 to get to Mars in one boom. 0:06:13.440 --> 0:06:18.240 Yeah, no, absolutely. SpaceX has been very clear that their 0:06:18.760 --> 0:06:23.080 approach to testing and development is very iterative, and you know, 0:06:23.160 --> 0:06:26.280 they like to go and fly things and push them 0:06:26.320 --> 0:06:28.920 to their limits until they break, and that helps them 0:06:28.920 --> 0:06:31.240 to learn and then they come back and do it again. 0:06:31.360 --> 0:06:34.960 The issue that they have though, is that they built 0:06:35.400 --> 0:06:39.080 Starship and star Base, this launch facility that in Boca 0:06:39.160 --> 0:06:42.920 Chica next to a wildlife refuge, and so you know, 0:06:43.040 --> 0:06:45.480 they can blow up their own launch pad as much 0:06:45.520 --> 0:06:48.880 as they want, but you know, when it crosses into 0:06:49.000 --> 0:06:53.960 potentially harming animals in the area or you know, causing 0:06:54.040 --> 0:06:57.440 damage to uninvolved public and property. 0:06:57.200 --> 0:06:59.800 And it did, right, I mean, it would cause tremendous 0:07:00.240 --> 0:07:00.840 of damage. 0:07:01.240 --> 0:07:03.000 Yeah, I do want to be clear, it was just 0:07:03.080 --> 0:07:06.120 the intense force of the launch itself that caused the 0:07:06.160 --> 0:07:09.239 most damage on the ground. They hadn't put in enough 0:07:09.640 --> 0:07:14.120 mitigation measures that most orbital flights normally do. And this 0:07:14.200 --> 0:07:17.880 is the potentially the largest and most powerful rocket ever developed. 0:07:17.920 --> 0:07:21.760 What does SpaceX say, So, what would its response to 0:07:21.800 --> 0:07:22.440 all this be. 0:07:24.040 --> 0:07:26.880 I would say the response is that they it happened 0:07:26.920 --> 0:07:29.880 exactly as they hoped, you know, they wanted to learn, 0:07:30.480 --> 0:07:34.760 and they are happy to damage and destroy their own 0:07:34.840 --> 0:07:37.600 launch pad as much as possible. I think they obviously 0:07:37.720 --> 0:07:41.840 don't want to cause any unintended consequences to the nearby 0:07:41.960 --> 0:07:45.080 environment or But at the same time, I think they 0:07:45.480 --> 0:07:47.760 they would blow up their launch pad as much as 0:07:47.800 --> 0:07:50.840 possible if it meant learning, you know, new things about 0:07:50.840 --> 0:07:54.320 their vehicle, and they'll happily, you know, rebuild again and again. 0:07:54.440 --> 0:07:56.520 I think in the long term they don't want to 0:07:56.560 --> 0:07:59.880 continue blowing up their launch pad, but in these early 0:08:00.120 --> 0:08:03.680 days of testing, that is just a side effect of 0:08:03.800 --> 0:08:06.520 learning and pushing the envelope forward. 0:08:06.760 --> 0:08:11.760 Now Max More recently, Reuter's published a long investigative piece 0:08:11.800 --> 0:08:15.600 looking into the raft of injuries sustained at SpaceX facilities, 0:08:16.120 --> 0:08:18.360 and so it's pretty much a look at the human 0:08:18.440 --> 0:08:21.320 toll of what we call musk speed, right, that relentless 0:08:21.440 --> 0:08:23.600 drive to get new products ready, get them out the 0:08:23.600 --> 0:08:26.840 doors as fast as possible. I mean. Among the findings 0:08:26.840 --> 0:08:30.400 in their story, there have been six hundred injuries of 0:08:30.440 --> 0:08:34.319 SpaceX workers since twenty fourteen. More than one hundred workers 0:08:34.360 --> 0:08:39.040 suffering cuts or lacerations, twenty nine with broken bones or dislocations, 0:08:39.360 --> 0:08:43.320 Sementine whose hands or fingers were crushed, nine with head injuries. 0:08:43.320 --> 0:08:46.600 You had five burns, five electrocutions, eight accidents that led 0:08:46.600 --> 0:08:50.160 to amputations. One man is in a coma, and one 0:08:50.240 --> 0:08:54.160 man is dead. Is this of course at any industrial 0:08:54.240 --> 0:08:58.280 site there will be injuries? Is this abnormal? 0:08:58.400 --> 0:08:58.600 Well? 0:08:58.600 --> 0:09:01.480 I think so two things. One is, like you said, 0:09:02.280 --> 0:09:04.320 SpaceX is going to say that they're doing their best. 0:09:04.400 --> 0:09:07.559 You know, they're taking appropriate precautions. But we have read 0:09:08.240 --> 0:09:11.360 stories like this about Tesla, and in some ways it's 0:09:11.400 --> 0:09:14.839 not surprising, especially given what we know about Elon Musk. 0:09:14.840 --> 0:09:16.840 If you know, if you've looked at the Walter Isaacson book, 0:09:17.120 --> 0:09:21.640 you've seen scenes in which SpaceX engineers are sort of 0:09:21.679 --> 0:09:24.520 like drinking heavily, doing things in the middle of the night. 0:09:24.840 --> 0:09:27.520 It doesn't Now again, I don't think there's any allegation 0:09:27.760 --> 0:09:30.160 that any of that played into these injuries. And even 0:09:30.200 --> 0:09:32.480 when you listen to things that Musk says about this, 0:09:32.559 --> 0:09:35.880 you know, Musk talks about, you know, the distinction between 0:09:36.120 --> 0:09:39.320 sort of regulations that don't have anything to do with 0:09:39.360 --> 0:09:41.560 physics and laws of physics. You know, laws of physics 0:09:41.600 --> 0:09:45.040 are requirements. Everything else is a recommendation. Is a line 0:09:45.040 --> 0:09:47.640 that comes up over and over again in the Walter 0:09:47.720 --> 0:09:49.800 Isaacson book. The other thing is, I do think this 0:09:49.840 --> 0:09:54.880 is pretty damaging. Aerospace is an industry where safety standards 0:09:54.880 --> 0:09:58.960 really matter and where accidents can be super problematic. You know, 0:09:59.000 --> 0:10:01.560 the long term goal is, as Lauren's talking about, is 0:10:01.600 --> 0:10:04.640 to send regular people up in these rockets, and and 0:10:04.720 --> 0:10:08.520 anything that sort of dents that the aura of safety 0:10:08.800 --> 0:10:12.000 or reliability or anything like that can be long term damaging. 0:10:12.559 --> 0:10:17.199 I would also mention that, you know, the reason that 0:10:17.280 --> 0:10:20.480 this I think these things happen it stems from the 0:10:20.520 --> 0:10:24.920 culture and the frenzy that Elon creates about the need 0:10:24.960 --> 0:10:27.360 to get to Mars as quickly as possible. He said 0:10:27.559 --> 0:10:31.640 many times before that the window to Mars is open now, 0:10:31.760 --> 0:10:34.240 and it could close, so we need to work as 0:10:34.320 --> 0:10:37.240 quickly as possible to get there, and so that creates 0:10:37.360 --> 0:10:41.120 I think a kind of crazed environment to work as 0:10:41.200 --> 0:10:44.720 quickly as possible to at all costs, you know, And 0:10:44.760 --> 0:10:46.760 that's why we know that SpaceX has a bit of 0:10:46.760 --> 0:10:50.160 a burnout culture, and that you know, people like you said, 0:10:50.160 --> 0:10:53.440 are working through the night and have a lot of 0:10:53.440 --> 0:10:56.600 anxiety just to try and get these things done to 0:10:56.760 --> 0:10:59.480 fulfill that mandate that Elon has. 0:10:59.720 --> 0:11:03.640 I mean, I think that the Mars rush is sometimes, 0:11:04.480 --> 0:11:06.800 as we saw in the in as the same book 0:11:06.840 --> 0:11:11.440 another reporting, sometimes he just gets in a mood and 0:11:11.480 --> 0:11:14.640 he thinks, I have this new idea, I want to 0:11:14.640 --> 0:11:17.040 fix it now, or I want to change this now. 0:11:17.600 --> 0:11:20.280 We are you know, we had this as our priority, 0:11:20.360 --> 0:11:23.480 but our priority is now this and it starts tonight 0:11:23.679 --> 0:11:24.560 on a Friday night. 0:11:24.640 --> 0:11:24.840 You know. 0:11:25.160 --> 0:11:27.480 It is just it's just the way he works, and 0:11:27.600 --> 0:11:30.880 I think some employees find that extremely exciting. 0:11:34.600 --> 0:11:38.640 Now, Lauren, if I'm correct here. SpaceX did not comment 0:11:38.880 --> 0:11:41.840 for this story. Did not comment to Reuters for this story. 0:11:43.200 --> 0:11:46.920 In general, their public posture in terms of how they 0:11:46.960 --> 0:11:50.400 treat safety workplace safety at SpaceX is. 0:11:50.679 --> 0:11:53.679 What and I imagine they would say that it is, 0:11:54.679 --> 0:11:59.600 you know, a high priority. SpaceX is one of, if 0:11:59.640 --> 0:12:03.160 not the biggest partner with NASA right now, and when 0:12:03.160 --> 0:12:06.480 it comes to how they work together with the Space Agency, 0:12:07.120 --> 0:12:10.400 you know, safety is very a top priority for NASA 0:12:10.559 --> 0:12:12.520 and so when it comes to at least how they 0:12:13.280 --> 0:12:16.920 certify their vehicles to carry people to space, what is 0:12:17.000 --> 0:12:21.199 involved with making sure that their vehicles and their rockets 0:12:21.200 --> 0:12:24.160 and their capsules are up to NASA's standards. That is 0:12:24.760 --> 0:12:29.199 very heavily oversighted. And so you know, there is definitely 0:12:29.960 --> 0:12:33.360 regulation and oversight and a lot of things that SpaceX does. 0:12:33.960 --> 0:12:36.640 It's you know, but there are other things. I'm sure 0:12:36.920 --> 0:12:38.840 you know. NASA isn't there every single day. 0:12:39.440 --> 0:12:40.920 As I was thinking about this, you know, I was 0:12:40.960 --> 0:12:43.080 thinking about when you when you take a few steps 0:12:43.080 --> 0:12:45.840 back from the Elon Musk, like the Elon Musk story, right, 0:12:45.880 --> 0:12:49.000 it's all about applying the lessons of software to hardware, 0:12:49.320 --> 0:12:52.640 and that is like super useful, I think to a point, right, 0:12:52.880 --> 0:12:55.840 because software is very iterative. You can fix it. You 0:12:55.840 --> 0:12:58.520 can have little issues, you can have little things break 0:12:58.720 --> 0:12:59.520 and no one cares. 0:12:59.600 --> 0:12:59.720 Right. 0:12:59.760 --> 0:13:02.720 So we're companies all the time, including really big ones 0:13:02.760 --> 0:13:06.640 like Apple, ship products that are not fully baked or 0:13:06.640 --> 0:13:08.680 that have problems that are being fixed kind of in 0:13:08.720 --> 0:13:11.200 real time, and that is like a recipe for innovation. 0:13:11.559 --> 0:13:13.600 I just think like this kind of gets at the 0:13:13.679 --> 0:13:17.720 limitations of this approach and like you can talk about, 0:13:17.760 --> 0:13:20.240 you know, the fail fast mentality or whatever. But when 0:13:20.280 --> 0:13:22.240 you're you know, there's an anecdote in there about somebody 0:13:22.320 --> 0:13:25.240 dropping like a very heavy piece of untund yeah, one 0:13:25.280 --> 0:13:29.720 hundred pound chunk of something not concrete, you know, down 0:13:29.800 --> 0:13:31.880 and like at a normal company. 0:13:31.640 --> 0:13:34.320 And like landed at somebody's face. Yeah, it didn't hurt anybody, 0:13:34.360 --> 0:13:35.360 but they were like, my god. 0:13:35.520 --> 0:13:37.199 And the story says that a normal company, they will 0:13:37.200 --> 0:13:39.320 get you fired. At SpaceX, it doesn't. And I think 0:13:39.440 --> 0:13:42.240 like that is telling and that that allows obviously allows 0:13:42.280 --> 0:13:44.840 you to move faster, but it it it. 0:13:44.760 --> 0:13:47.120 Reaches a faster and also by the way, race ahead 0:13:47.120 --> 0:13:50.200 of Boeing, race ahead of Blue Origin, right, and when 0:13:50.440 --> 0:13:54.160 they are, they are in many ways dominating the space race. 0:13:54.480 --> 0:13:58.160 We talked about Elon Musk's relationship with workers last week 0:13:58.200 --> 0:14:00.280 as it applies to Tesla, but you know, you kind 0:14:00.280 --> 0:14:02.360 of see it here too. When you're dealing with like 0:14:02.720 --> 0:14:08.080 big industrial plants with heavy equipment and things that can 0:14:08.240 --> 0:14:12.160 kill or maim you very easily, it requires a different approach. 0:14:12.320 --> 0:14:15.920 One last bit of SpaceX news here. So we had 0:14:15.960 --> 0:14:20.000 a story last week showing that revenue it's starlink, the 0:14:20.000 --> 0:14:23.480 SpaceX unit that puts small Internet satellites up into space. 0:14:23.960 --> 0:14:27.000 That revenue there is growing, and apparently growing quite a bit, 0:14:27.520 --> 0:14:30.120 so fast that it'll count for more than half of 0:14:30.200 --> 0:14:35.120 SpaceX's total revenue by next year. Lauren, this strikes me 0:14:35.160 --> 0:14:37.640 as surprising. What do we make of this? 0:14:38.600 --> 0:14:41.520 Well, I think from the very beginning, Starlink was meant 0:14:41.560 --> 0:14:44.520 to be a bit of a money maker for SpaceX. 0:14:44.640 --> 0:14:47.080 I think there were some early documents that came out 0:14:47.400 --> 0:14:49.680 a few years ago before they even started launching, that 0:14:50.080 --> 0:14:56.440 projected very high revenues for Starlink. They're also very tenacious 0:14:56.520 --> 0:15:01.320 about finding new businesses for Starlink's so while they have 0:15:01.400 --> 0:15:05.960 the customer consumer facing business, they're also very eager to 0:15:06.040 --> 0:15:10.480 get Starlink government customers and to planes, onto cruise ships, 0:15:10.680 --> 0:15:12.560 things of that nature. So I think if you read 0:15:12.600 --> 0:15:16.000 the tea leaves, it's clear that Starlink is very important 0:15:16.040 --> 0:15:19.000 to SpaceX in terms of being kind of this money 0:15:19.000 --> 0:15:23.040 maker to help generate funds to, you know, for that 0:15:23.160 --> 0:15:23.920 ultimate goal of. 0:15:24.000 --> 0:15:26.600 Sure that they can keep blowing up rockets as they 0:15:27.120 --> 0:15:28.680 push sure higher and hire. 0:15:28.760 --> 0:15:31.240 And find demand for all of these rockets that they 0:15:31.280 --> 0:15:34.800 want to launch, like they're launching these gigantic, as Lauren's saying, giant, 0:15:34.840 --> 0:15:38.200 bigger rockets than anyone's ever launched. You know, these enormous, 0:15:38.760 --> 0:15:42.400 enormous number of launches of the earlier generation of rocket, right, 0:15:42.560 --> 0:15:46.160 they kind of need something like Starlink to to fill 0:15:46.200 --> 0:15:46.800 up their boats. 0:15:47.680 --> 0:15:49.760 And I think one thing to keep in mind is 0:15:49.800 --> 0:15:55.160 that while SpaceX is this very successful company and does 0:15:55.200 --> 0:15:57.800 all of these amazing things, it still remains to be 0:15:57.880 --> 0:16:02.480 seen if space is a profitable business. The truth is, 0:16:02.600 --> 0:16:06.800 making money on space is still extremely difficult, and so 0:16:07.320 --> 0:16:11.120 I think SpaceX is trying to find kind of where 0:16:11.160 --> 0:16:15.160 they can create that revenue stream through space so that 0:16:15.200 --> 0:16:18.080 they can support all of these other endeavors. And we're 0:16:18.120 --> 0:16:20.920 still kind of seeing if Starlink will be that money 0:16:20.960 --> 0:16:22.720 maker that they hope it will be. 0:16:22.960 --> 0:16:24.840 The one last thing that's interesting on this though, is 0:16:24.880 --> 0:16:27.360 there at the same time we're talking about potentially spinning 0:16:27.400 --> 0:16:31.120 off Starlinks and an IPO, at which point, sure, you 0:16:31.160 --> 0:16:35.720 get an influx of cash, but I guess your cash 0:16:35.760 --> 0:16:39.960 cow to fund your rockets sky way. 0:16:39.840 --> 0:16:42.120 And it's not totally clear that it is. I mean, 0:16:42.240 --> 0:16:44.400 can it clearly is you could generate a lot of revenue, 0:16:44.600 --> 0:16:47.760 but it's not clear that this is a super profitable business. 0:16:47.880 --> 0:16:51.040 Apparently it's breaking even this year and last year. 0:16:51.080 --> 0:16:53.240 You know, Musk was complaining that they were losing huge 0:16:53.240 --> 0:16:55.720 amounts of money in the context of the sort of 0:16:55.960 --> 0:17:01.120 argument over whether he should deploy more devices to Ukraine. 0:17:03.840 --> 0:17:04.600 Welcome back. 0:17:04.960 --> 0:17:05.160 Now. 0:17:05.200 --> 0:17:09.080 Elon is a pretty busy guy. He's running six companies 0:17:09.760 --> 0:17:12.240 and yet he's been spending his time giving multi hour 0:17:12.359 --> 0:17:16.240 podcast interviews, although not to this one. Elon, if you're listening, 0:17:16.280 --> 0:17:20.160 you are always invited. He talked to Joe Rogan for 0:17:20.359 --> 0:17:23.000 close to three hours, and then to Lex Friedman for 0:17:23.080 --> 0:17:28.320 over two Sarah amid all this talk. Tucked in there 0:17:28.440 --> 0:17:31.760 somewhere there were comments on the political evolution of Twitter 0:17:31.800 --> 0:17:32.919 as it became X. 0:17:33.440 --> 0:17:34.399 What did he have to say? 0:17:34.960 --> 0:17:39.199 Yeah, between the talk of aliens and everything else, there 0:17:39.320 --> 0:17:43.959 was a pretty interesting quote about X and it encapsulates 0:17:43.960 --> 0:17:46.240 what he said before. Take a listen. 0:17:46.440 --> 0:17:49.879 That's what it was controlled by far left activists. Objectively, 0:17:50.119 --> 0:17:53.600 they would describe themselves as that. You know, so if 0:17:53.640 --> 0:17:55.320 sometimes feel like well hasn't moved to the right, well 0:17:55.320 --> 0:17:57.760 it's moved to the center. So from the perspective of 0:17:57.800 --> 0:17:59.360 the far left, yes, it has moved to the right 0:17:59.400 --> 0:18:01.800 because everything to the right from the fall left, but 0:18:01.840 --> 0:18:03.080 no one on the fall Left that I'm aware of 0:18:03.119 --> 0:18:07.600 has been suspended or banned or de amplified. So, you know, 0:18:07.640 --> 0:18:10.080 but we're trying to be inclusive for the whole country. 0:18:10.080 --> 0:18:14.520 And so what's interesting here is that Bloomberg has actually reported, 0:18:14.600 --> 0:18:17.480 based on third party research that in the month since 0:18:17.720 --> 0:18:20.840 Musk took over Twitter and turned it into X and 0:18:21.119 --> 0:18:24.639 loosen the rules that he thought were liberal activist rules, 0:18:24.800 --> 0:18:28.080 you actually saw an uptick in hate speech and racist speech, 0:18:28.359 --> 0:18:33.040 anti Semitic speech. And that's not so much a thing 0:18:33.440 --> 0:18:36.760 that people care about in terms of politics as much 0:18:36.800 --> 0:18:39.000 as they care about in terms of the user experience. 0:18:39.640 --> 0:18:42.480 People don't want to come to a social network and 0:18:42.680 --> 0:18:47.399 feel bad. They don't want to experience, you know, hate 0:18:47.560 --> 0:18:51.600 and racism in Advertisers don't want to spend their money there. 0:18:51.720 --> 0:18:54.359 It can be you know, a chilling effect on people 0:18:54.359 --> 0:18:58.360 who feel like they're in the minority or being being 0:18:58.400 --> 0:19:02.160 attacked to speak there, and we've seen that migration away 0:19:02.280 --> 0:19:06.520 from X and and so I think I think it's 0:19:06.560 --> 0:19:09.920 just worth thinking of those comments in that framing where 0:19:09.920 --> 0:19:12.360 it's like it is a it is a business decision 0:19:12.400 --> 0:19:15.320 and one that's actually gone poorly for him. 0:19:15.520 --> 0:19:20.240 Okay, So in this interview Sarah, he also rekindled an 0:19:20.280 --> 0:19:24.800 old feud with Chatchept Sam Alton, and former business partner 0:19:24.800 --> 0:19:25.200 of Musk. 0:19:25.320 --> 0:19:27.840 Now arrival. What's the deal there? 0:19:27.920 --> 0:19:31.240 Oh, there's some history here. So so open ai started, 0:19:31.320 --> 0:19:36.200 as Musk says in his his chatter about it, and the. 0:19:36.200 --> 0:19:40.960 Name the opening, Opening is supposed to be an open 0:19:40.960 --> 0:19:44.160 source and I was created as a nonprofit open source 0:19:44.200 --> 0:19:46.240 and now it is a closed source for maximum profit, 0:19:47.600 --> 0:19:50.399 which I think is not good comma. 0:19:51.080 --> 0:19:54.359 So the the thing to understand here is Musk was 0:19:54.400 --> 0:19:59.240 a large backer of this open ai project back when 0:19:59.280 --> 0:20:03.800 it was considered a nonprofit, back when they were trying 0:20:03.840 --> 0:20:08.080 to you know, solve solve the issues with with AI 0:20:08.320 --> 0:20:13.159 taking over and doing harmful things and and yeah, it 0:20:13.200 --> 0:20:16.080 has become a for profit company. But the context there 0:20:16.160 --> 0:20:19.560 is is Musk just launched his own for profit version 0:20:19.680 --> 0:20:23.639 of of Grock, which we spoke about in the last episode. 0:20:24.000 --> 0:20:29.760 And so now we've seen this this very public brawl 0:20:30.680 --> 0:20:35.439 between Sam Altman and Elon Musk where they're throwing shade 0:20:35.440 --> 0:20:38.440 on each other through memes on Twitter. You know, Sam 0:20:38.440 --> 0:20:42.920 Altman made fun of of Elon Musk's grock as being 0:20:43.200 --> 0:20:46.840 like the dad joke, the cringey dad joke version of 0:20:47.040 --> 0:20:50.480 Ai and in Musk responded in a way that sort 0:20:50.480 --> 0:20:52.520 of confirmed his hypothesis. 0:20:52.720 --> 0:20:55.560 So, Max, where does the Altman feud rank and the 0:20:55.560 --> 0:20:58.680 Pantheona Musk future? I mean, is this like Zuckerberg level, 0:20:58.720 --> 0:20:59.520 AOC level? 0:20:59.720 --> 0:21:04.200 I think this is like a top to top twenty feud. 0:21:04.400 --> 0:21:06.639 It's definitely one of the one of the key and 0:21:06.960 --> 0:21:08.920 at the moment, I'd say it's like in the top five. 0:21:08.960 --> 0:21:10.440 But when you when you step back and look at 0:21:10.440 --> 0:21:14.240 the you know, panoply of Elon feuds. I want to 0:21:14.280 --> 0:21:17.160 offer one update from the world of sports on this 0:21:17.359 --> 0:21:19.360 on this podcast interview, Lex. 0:21:19.160 --> 0:21:21.560 Freed a very broad definition of sports. 0:21:21.680 --> 0:21:25.280 Lex Friedman trained or or you know, maybe wrestled with 0:21:25.320 --> 0:21:28.560 Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg grappled. There were some pictures 0:21:28.600 --> 0:21:31.800 on Twitter and there was no mention none of the 0:21:31.840 --> 0:21:33.720 cage fight during this entire two and a. 0:21:33.680 --> 0:21:35.160 Half hour podcast. Is that possible? 0:21:35.240 --> 0:21:36.399 Unforgivable? If you ask me. 0:21:36.480 --> 0:21:37.200 So, it's the case. 0:21:37.480 --> 0:21:39.040 I promise an update, but it's it's sort of a 0:21:39.080 --> 0:21:39.639 non update. 0:21:40.240 --> 0:21:41.199 It's sorry, I can't say. 0:21:41.240 --> 0:21:44.280 I remember it's always about the cage fight for our 0:21:44.280 --> 0:21:48.560 final segment. Today, we've got this biopic coming out, uh 0:21:48.840 --> 0:21:52.359 timeline unknown. But in Muska, I'm sure they're saying it's 0:21:52.359 --> 0:21:53.600