Elon Musk on Advertisers, Trust and the “Wild Storm” in His Mind _ DealBook Summit 2023

Please welcome Andrew Ross Sorkin and his guest , Ceo of Tesla , CEO of spacex , chief engineer and CTO of X , Elon Musk .

Good evening , everybody .

Thank you so much for being with us throughout the day and I couldn't be more pleased to sit with Elon Musk as our final interview of this remarkable time , we've all had uh together , he doesn't need much of an introduction , but I want to say a couple of things .

Um He's the richest person in the world .

He may very well be the most , most consequential individual in the world right now .

Uh He runs the most innovative companies in the world , Tesla spacex , uh Starlink , which is part of that neuralink , the boring company X uh and his uh uh X dot A I .

Um and he's disrupted each of these lanes .

Um He's moved at breakneck breakneck speeds .

Um But he's faced a storm of controversy in the process .

Uh He joins us today following a visit as you all know so well .

And we discussed earlier um on Monday to Israel where he met with the Prime Minister there and the president of Israel and we're going to talk about everything .

And my hope is that we can talk about how he thinks about his influence , about his power , about all of it .

And we're going to talk about innovation and everything else .

I want to say just two other things real quick .

We met each other for the first time , 16 years ago .

It's been a long time and all the kids were three when , when we first met .

Um , I don't , I think you're just , you're about to deliver your first Roadster .

I don't think you had yet .

Larry Page was still waiting to get one , like 2007 , 2007 , 2008 .

Um , and I remember it was delivered in 2008 .

I remember going back to the newsroom and saying , I think I just met the next Steve Jobs and I'm going to hold to that .

I'm going to hold to that .

But a lot has happened between when I first met you and now you came to deal and boring .

That's for sure .

Well , actually I do have a boring company .

2012 .

You came to deal book and sat on this stage .

Uh , and we're , we're , we're thrilled to have you back , but there's been so much that's happened between now and then and there's been so much that's happened in the past week , week and a half and a lot of folks and I , I want to tell you this , a lot of folks uh called me up and said , you really , you're really gonna host Elon Musk here .

Can you believe what he just said on , on Twitter ?

Um on , on X , on X ?

Um No idea what this Twitter thing is you're talking about .

Should you platform him ?

That's what they said .

Should you platform him ?

And I said that , I think that it's our role and I know you have issues with journal , I have a platform .

Um And I know you have an issue with journalists uh uh oftentimes , but I said it's our role to have conversations and to inquire and um to , and sometimes even interrogate ideas .

And that's I , I'm hoping we can do that .

So I wanna start just so we can begin this conversation and just level set .

Take us through everything that happened .

If you could everything .

No , over the past week and a half , how long have you gone ?

We're going to , we've got the time .

OK .

You , you send out a , you send out a , a post or a X or a tweet , whatever .

Um I'm trying to say like when things were just 100 and 40 characters , it made sense to call him a tweet .

Uh cause like a bunch of little bits chirping but when you know the point at which you can put like three hour videos on , it's like uh it's a very long tweet .

So , so here we are , this is more descriptive I think .

And at some point , I don't know where you were , but you write in responding to another tweet , this is the actual truth and it set off a firestorm of criticism all the way to the White House .

And then you make this trip to Israel .

You have advertisers who left the platform .

People calling the trip to Israel is independent of , of it wasn't some like apology to her .

I want to be clear .

That was , well , let's talk about that .

So just , but just take us back to the moment at which you write that trip to Israel is an independent of it , like in response to that at all .

Well , let's do , we'll do Israel in just a moment .

I have no problem being hated by the way .

I hear it away .

Well , but you know what ?

Let's go straight to that then for a second because there is an idea and you could say that I think it's a real weakness to want to be liked , a real weakness .

I do not have that .

Well , let me ask you this .

Then there's a difference between saying I don't care if anyone likes me or they hate me , but given your power and given what you have amassed and the importance you have .

I would think you want to be trusted .

I would think maybe you don't need to be liked or hated but trusted matters .

If , if X is going to become a financial platform where people are going to put their money where people , where , where the government's gonna give you money for , for , uh , for rockets where people are gonna get into the cars , they need to ultimately decide that you are .

Maybe they don't have to say that they , they love you but that you are ultimately a decent and good human being .

Yes .

I mean , II , I think I am .

Um , but I'm certainly not going to , uh , do some sort of tap dance to prove to people that I am .

Um So as , as for trust , I mean , I think we break that down in a few ways .

Uh If you want , if you want satellites sent to orbit , reliably , uh SpaceX will do 80% of all mass to orbit this year .

China will do 12% .

The rest of the world will do eight that includes Boeing Lockheed and everyone else .

So the , the , the track record of the rocket uh is the best by far of anything .

You , you could , you could hate my guts next .

You , you could not trust me .

It is relevant .

The rocket track record speaks for itself .

Uh with respect to Tesla , we make the best cars , whether you hate , you hate me , like me or in diff or indifferent .

Uh Do you want the best car or do you not want the best car ?

Um So uh so I will certainly not pander and Jonathan like the only reason I'm here is because you are a friend .

Like , what was my speaking fee ?

You don't , you're not making any , first of all , I'm Andrew .

But uh yeah , sorry , it's ok .

Uh Second of all , we've known each other for a very long time .

Um uh Yes and listen , you know , uh what I'm trying to illustrate is that sometimes I say the wrong thing .

I think there are a lot of people who are tired but let , let , let , let me , let me go back .

Um You should hear the sketches that SNL wouldn't post by the way , those are really good .

Um And I would say unfortunately , or fortunately or unfortunately , whatever friendship we have not great .

We don't talk to you that , that much .

But let me ask you this .

True .

That's true .

Where am I doesn't call the point is I I'm here because you're a friend .

Not because , uh I mean , paid all because I need any validation or anything .

The is that we've been friends for 16 years and I promise you I'd be here and that's why I'm here .

Well , I appreciate you being here for any other reason .

But let me ask you this then just go at it .

Just tell me what happened .

You write this tweet that says that this is the actual truth .

People read that tweet and they say Elon Musk is an anti semite that he , he , he , he is , he is riling up this base .

You're hearing it from as I said , the White House , you're hearing it from Jewish groups all over .

I think Jonathan Greenblatt from the ADL is here .

There's , there's lots of people who say this and by the way , it's not just that .

Did you read the whole thing ?

I did ?

And that's why I want to ask .

Excuse me ?

I said more , more responses .

I said , I said more than what you just read .

Yes .

No , there was a , there was absolutely more .

Um , but I'll tell you the thing that struck me , it wasn't , um , and I'm an American Jew .

Um , it wasn't just the people who , who had that view .

It was actually people who ha who really are anti-semitist who said , oh my goodness , go go Elon .

This is fabulous .

And that actually was the thing that really , uh , really set me back .

And I said to myself , what's going on here and I wanna know how you felt about that in that moment when you , when you saw all of this happening .

Yeah .

Um , well , first of all , I , I did clarify , uh , almost immediately .

Uh , what I meant , I would say that that was , um , you know , if I could go back and say I should in retrospect , um , not have replied to that particular person .

Um , and I should have , uh , written , uh in greater length as to what I meant .

Um I did subsequently clarify it in replies .

Uh , but those clarifications were ignored by the media um , and essentially I handed a loaded gun to those who hate me .

Um , and arguably to those who are anti Semitic , uh , to , and for that , uh , I'm quite sorry .

I , that , that is not , uh , that was not my intention .

Um So I , I did , you know , uh , post uh on my primary timeline to be absolutely clear that I'm not anti Semitic .

Um , and that I , in fact , if anything , I'm phyo Semitic , um and the trip to Israel was planned before any of that happened , uh it was neither here nor there .

Do you see , you see this thing ?

You know what it is ?

I do because I actually followed your entire trip to Israel , right ?

Why don't you tell everybody this is , this says , says , bring them home the hostages .

It was given to me by the parents of , of one of the hostages .

And I said I would wear it as , as long as there was a hostage story meeting .

And I have um what was that trip like ?

And obviously , you know that there's a public perception that and , and , and you're clarifying this now , but there's a public perception that that was part of a apology tour .

If you will , that this had been said online , there was all of the criticism , there was advertisers leaving .

We talked to Bob .

I , you hope uh don't advertise , you don't want them to advertise .

No .

What do you mean ?

I if , if somebody's gonna try to blackmail me with advertising , blackmail me with money .

Go fuck yourself but go fuck yourself .

Is that clear ?

I , I hope it is .

Hey , Bob here in the audience .

Well , well , let me ask you then that's how I feel .

Don't have a taste .

How do you think then about the economics of , of X ?

If , if , if , if part of the underlying model , at least today and maybe it needs to shift , maybe the answer is it needs to shift away from advertising .

Um If , if you believe that this is the one part of your business where you will be beholden to those who uh have this view .

What do you do ?

Fy II , I understand that .

But there's a reality too , right ?

Yes .

No , no .

I mean , we know Yaccarino is right here and she's got to sell advertising .

Absolutely .

So , no , no , no .

Actually what this advertising boycott is , is going to do , it's going to kill the company .

And do you think that I , but , and the whole world will know that those advertisers killed the company and we will document it in great detail .

But there are those advertisers I imagine are gonna say they're gonna say we didn't kill the company .

They're gonna say to Earth , but they're going to say that they're going to say Lan that you killed the company because you said these things and that they were inappropriate things and that they didn't feel comfortable on the platform , right ?

That's what , and let's see how Earth responds to that .

So , OK , this , then this goes back to we'll , we'll both make our cases , right ?

And we'll see what the outcome is .

What are the economics of that for you ?

I mean , you , you have enormous resources so you can actually keep this company going for a very long time .

Would you keep it going for a long time ?

If there was no advertising ?

I mean , if the company fails because of an advert , advertiser boycott , it will fail because of an ad advertiser boycott .

And that will be what bankrupted the company and that's what everybody on earth will know .

What do you think ?

Then of the , I guess this goes back to the idea of trust though , then it'll be gone and it'll be gone because of an advertising boycott .

But , but you recognize that some of those people are going to say that they didn't feel comfortable on the platform .

And I , I wonder , I just wonder and ask you and think about that for it to the judge .

But the , but the judge is going to be the judge is the public and you think that the public is going to say that that Disney is making a mistake .

Yes .

And they're gonna boycott Disney .

They already are .

Well , there are , there are some that are for , for , for lots of different reasons .

But you think that this is going to , that you have the this goes to actually the interesting of , of , of , of power and leverage , let the trips fall where they may let the chips fall where they may , can I ask why that is the approach ?

And I ask it because you've been your approach .

Well , you've been very particular about the , I mean , the approach to Tesla .

Uh when you think about the engineering involved in that the approach to SpaceX , the approach to some of the stuff you're doing with , with A I has been very specific , right ?

There's not a let , let the chips fall where they may approach to those businesses .

I don't think we're focused on making the best products and uh and and Tesla's garden tours , garden with no advertising at all .

I understand that Tesla currently sells uh to twice as much uh in terms of electric vehicles as the rest of uh electric car maker in , in the United States combined .

Tesla has done more to help the environment than uh all other companies combined .

It would be fair to say that therefore , as a leader of the company , I've done more for the environment than everyone else and any single human on earth .

How do you feel about that ?

No , you know what I feel about that ?

Yeah .

No , I'm , I'm asking you personally , how do you feel about that ?

Because this goes , we're talking about power and influence .

And I'm saying , I'm saying what , what I care about is the the reality of goodness , not the perception of it .

And what I see all over the place is people who care about looking good while doing evil , fuck them .

OK ?

OK .

Let me ask you this because I think part of this , by the way , there's some people who have said look , owning X to begin with has just created problems that you've created so many amazing things that are changing our world and , and , and I know you want to uh make X uh this fabulous Town Square free free speech platform , but that unto itself that , that has created such a distraction of all of these things .

This is the conversation we're having , we're not focused , we're not talking at least yet and we will on Tesla , you have your cyber truck deliveries tomorrow and everything else that you're doing .

But there would be the biggest product launch of anything by far on earth this year .

Is there any part of you though that just says , you know what , I just shouldn't have done this or maybe I should sell it or give it away or do something else with , with the , with the X piece of it given , given , given the propensity for some of the things that you do and say on that platform to create these , these issues .

Yeah , of all the posts um I I've done on the platform , I think there might be 30,000 or something like that , right ?

Once in a while I will say something foolish .

And I have and I would certainly uh put uh that comment um that you said the truth uh in among perhaps one of the most foolish , if not the most foolish thing I've ever done on the platform .

And I did do my best to clarify afterwards that , you know , I , I certainly don't mean anything anti-semitic in that the , the nature of the criticism was simply that the Jewish people have been persecuted for thousands of years .

There is a natural affinity therefore for persecuted groups .

This has led to the funding of organizations that is essentially promote any persecuted group or any group with the perception of persecution .

This includes radical Islamic groups .

Everyone here has seen the , the massive demonstrations for Hamas in every major city in the west that should be Jared .

Well , a number of those organizations received funding from prominent people in the Jewish community .

They didn't expect that to happen .

But , but if you generically without conditions , sort of fund , if you , if you fund persecuted groups in general , some of those persecuted groups unfortunately want your annihilation .

And what I what I meant by that when I subsequently clarified is , is that it's unwise to , to , to find organizations that support groups that want your annihilation .

Is this coming across my question to you though , I think logically this makes a lot of sense .

Is there any part of you ?

I mean , just tell me what happens though ?

When once all of this happens , let's say you fund a group and that group supports Hamas who wants you to die .

Perhaps you should not fund them , right ?

But you , but you do thank you , you , you do appreciate that when you wade into these very delicate waters at these very delicate times that it can create a real , I mean , as it created headlines for the past two weeks and an economic impact .

What , what I'm just so curious what happened in your brain when you see all this happening ?

Are you sitting there going ?

Oh my God , I stepped in and I wish I didn't do that .

Are you saying screw them ?

I hate these people .

Why are they after me ?

But all of that .

Yeah , there's all of that .

Uh I mean , uh I mean , look , I , I'm sorry for that , that , that tweet or post .

It was foolish of me of the 30,000 .

It might be literally the worst and dumbest to post that I've ever done .

Um And I tried my best to clarify uh six race this Sunday .

Um But you know , at least I think over time it will be obvious that in fact , far from being anti-semitic , I'm in fact , PLO Semitic and all the evidence in my track record would support that .

There are people who say crazy things on , on X as you know , maybe you think they're crazy .

Maybe they're not the , the , the the aspiration for X is to be the Global Town Square .

Now , if you were to walk down to , let's say Times Square , right ?

Um Do you occasionally hear people saying crazy things ?

Yes , but they're not , they don't have the megaphone , right ?

And that's , that's the conundrum .

They can only say it to the 50 or 100 people that are , that are sitting standing there in Times Square .

They don't have a mega , I mean , look , the , the , the joke I used to make about Old Twitter was it was like giving everyone in the psych ward a megaphone .

Um So , uh you know , I'm , I'm a , I'm aware that things can get promoted uh that are negative beyond the sort of circle of , of somebody simply screaming crazy things in Times Square , which happens all the time .

Um You know , so , so the , it , it's , it's actually , it's , it's pretty rare for something .

Um frankly , that is uh hateful to be promoted .

It's not , it's not , it's not that it never happens .

Um But it's , it's fairly rare .

Um I mean , I would encourage people to look at for those that use the system when you look at the , the sort of the , the feed that you receive .

Uh How , how often is it , is it hateful and over time has it gotten more or less hateful ?

And I would say that if you look at uh the X platform today versus a year ago , I think it is actually much better .

I mean , what , what is your personal ?

Are you surprised ?

I'm just curious , you use this , I use the platform uh religiously .

So you admit to being an addict and I use the for you .

And I will , I will say now the problem is because I'm a journalist , I go looking for stuff .

Well , I'm just saying and because , and I also think the algorithm for me personally because I'm looking for stuff also is feeding the others things .

Well , this is actually a challenge in that .

Like sometimes people will say like , why is it showing me uh uh you know , a post from this person that I hate ?

And , and we were like , well , did you interact a lot with this person that you hate ?

Well , yes .

Well , therefore it thinks that you want to interact more with this person that you hate .

That's like a reasonable , you know , you kind of want to have an argument tweet .

Yeah .

Do you have a post , let's say post when you post , listen , I'm open .

If , if anyone can come up with a better word , uh that would be great when you post though , but uh the least bad word I can think of is post uh when you post though .

Do you , are you trying to rile up either a base or an audience ?

Do you , do you , do you recognize the power you have in that ?

And , and also by the way , not just rile up , rile up one version of that , but also rile down , which is to say , as I said , there are people who are demonstrably anti Semitic on the site who I get Jew Boy things and all sorts of things that come my way for a while .

I thought I was Jewish .

So they would , you know , I get it .

But no , but the question is , my name is superhero .

Do you ever think to yourself ?

You know what , I'm going to go online and I'm going to say these people , I condemn these people that are on my site saying these things because I said , I , have you say I've condemned anti Semitism .

But do you ever go ?

I said , I , I literally , I literally posted I condemn anti Semitism in all its forms like that is a literal , I believe , literal post that I made .

Um I mean , I'm like , listen , if I can get out the thesaurus , if you , you know , and we could , you know , uh let me ask you a different question .

You , you , you compose it , I'll post it .

OK , let me ask you this .

Um You , um you were on a , you were on a podcast uh about a month ago and you said something that struck me , um , and it struck me as accurate , it came out of your mouth .

So , uh hopefully it is , but I'm hoping to go deep on this just because it came out of our mouth does not mean it's true , but my mind is a storm .

I don't think most people would want to be me .

They may think they want to be me but they don't know , they don't understand .

What did you mean by that ?

What was your mind being a storm ?

And I think it , I mean , I have known you for quite some time .

I think it is a bit of a storm .

Yes .

Um Yeah , I mean , in , as much as a weather metaphor makes sense , I , my mind is often feels like a , like a , like a very wild storm .

Um I mean , I have , I have a fountain of ideas .

I mean , I have more ideas than I could possibly execute .

Um uh So I have no shortage of ideas .

Innovation is not the , not the problem execution is the problem .

I've got a million ideas .

I mean , I've got an entire design for an electric supersonic vertical takeoff jet .

But I , I mean , I just , if I , I just can't do that as well , I've had that for 10 years .

Um um I know there's a million things .

Is your storm a happy storm .

No , it's not a happy storm .

Tell us about that because I , I think that that actually when people try to really understand you , I think that there's a lot of this comes from some other place and I want , I want to talk about that .

What do you think that is we should we really need like a psychiatrist catcher or something .

Um I , you know , II I think to some degree I was born this way but , and then it was amplified by a difficult childhood frankly .

Um So , uh but I can remember even in happy moments when I was a kid that there's just , it just feels like this is a , a range of forces in my mind constantly .

Um But now this , you know , productively manifests itself in technology and building things uh for the most part .

So , and I , and I think on balance the output has been very productive .

Um I think the results as we , you know , discussed earlier with spacex Tesla paypal , which is , you know , still going today .

Um The uh first year in that company that I started , in fact , the first year in that company I started up to was um funded by New York Times company , HST Knight Ritter .

And we wrote some of the software for the New York Times website .

Um And we helped bring online several 100 newspapers that previously were only in print .

Um Now this is in the nineties which at this point is like , I'm like a grandpa that , but basically , um you know , the nineties and internet feels like a pre Cambrian era when there were only sponges .

Um So , um anyway , so , but , you know , I , I feel like a lot of productive things have been done and you can also look at Te Tesla as being through many companies in one like our supercharging network is if it were , it's if , if the Tesla super track network were its own company , it would be a fortune 500 company by itself , just , just the supercharging system .

Um We also make the cells , we we , we build the power electronics and the powertrain from scratch .

Um We have the most innovative uh structural design , the largest castings ever used .

Um We have the , the best manufacturing technology at Tesla , better manufacturing technology than companies that have been doing it for 100 years .

So , so these , these demons of the mind uh uh you know , are for the most part uh harnessed to productive ends .

Um That doesn't mean that once in a while they , you know , uh to go wrong but , but , and this is a question , I think a lot of people , you know , are always trying to figure out about not just you but sometimes themselves , meaning what is driving all of this , you're doing all of these things .

Do you think it's , do you think that you would be as successful ?

Whatever success is if it wasn't being driven by some , I think that there's something you're trying to prove either to yourself or to somebody .

I don't know , we're all trying to prove to prove .

It's my mother .

I don't know .

No , I , if I were to say , describe my , my philosophy , it is a philosophy of curiosity .

Um , I , it , um , I mean , I , I did have this existential crisis when I was , uh , around 12 , uh , about , what's the meaning of life ?

Isn't it all pointless ?

Why not just commit suicide ?

Why exist ?

Um , I read the religious texts .

Um , I read the philosophy books , um , that , you know , especially the German philosophy books made me quite depressed .

Frankly .

I want you to not read Schopenhauer and Nietzsche as a teenager .

Um But then I read uh Douglas Adams Hitchhike's Guide to the Galaxy , which is a book on philosophy in the form of humor .

And the point that uh Adams was making there was that uh we don't actually know what questions to ask .

Um That's why I said that , you know , the answer is 42 like basically it's a giant computer and , and it came up with the answer 42 .

But then to actually figure out what the question is .

That's the actual hard part .

Um I think this is generally true also in physics at the point at which you can uh properly frame the question .

The answer is , is actually the easy part .

Um So , so , so my motivation then was that , well , my life is finite , really a flash in the pan on a , on a galactic ti time scale .

Uh But if we can expand the scope and scale of consciousness , then we are better able to figure out what questions to ask about the answer that is the universe and maybe we can find out the meaning of life or even what question to what , what the right question to ask is .

Um you know , where do we come from ?

Where are we going ?

Um Where are the aliens ?

Are the aliens ?

Um And you know , these , these questions , you know , is there new physics to discover uh or is this because there seems to be some real questions about dark matter and dark energy ?

And um so the , the purpose of spacex is to extend life beyond earth on a sustained basis so that we can at least pass one of the Fermi grate filters uh which is that of being a single planet civilization .

Uh If we are a single planet civilization , then we are simply waiting around for some extinction event , whether that is manmade or uh natural .

Um But if you're a single planet civilization , eventually you will uh that something will happen to that planet and you will die .

If you're a multi planet civilization , you will live much longer also multiplane civilization .

Uh is the , that's the natural stepping stone to being a multis civilization and being out there among the stars .

So now this I think has two that there's , this is not simply a defensive uh motivation .

Um But it is also one where that , you know , that gives meaning , man's search for meaning .

Um But let me finish this philosophy point , even though it may seem rather esoteric .

Um It may resonate with a few people .

Um We must get past this fermi filter of being a great filter of being a single planet civilization .

Um And if we do that , we are more likely to understand the nature of the universe and what questions to ask .

Um If you're a believer in the philosophy of curiosity , then , then I think you should support this ambition .

Um And , but , but it's more , there's being a multi planet species is more than , than simply , you know , life ins life insurance for life collectively .

That's a defensive reason .

But , but I , but I think also that , that , that life has to be more than simply solving one sad problem after another .

Uh You know , they have to be , there have to be reasons where you wake up in the morning and you're happy to be alive .

There have to be reasons that you , you have to say , why are you excited about the future ?

Like what gives you hope and , and , and if you , if you , if you aren't sure ask your kids and the , and , and , and I think the idea of us being a spacefaring civilization and being out there among the stars is incredibly inspiring um and exciting and something to look forward to and there need to be such things in the world .

Let me ask you a different question about confidence .

We were having a conversation here earlier .

But people um and where your , where people get their confidence from .

Some people have great insecurity , other people uh have great confidence .

And I was thinking about you because you have a very interesting history where people have told you over and over again that you're wrong .

Well , sometimes they're right .

Well , sometimes they are , but I would say that when it comes to Tesla , when it came to spacex , people told you that you were crazy .

You were out of your mind .

This was never going to happen , this was never going to work .

And so I ask you this though is now when people say you're wrong , this isn't right .

Do you look at that and say , you know what ?

That's like a red flag for me because , you know , I , I've been told so often that I'm wrong that I know that I , and I know I'm right because I've had that experience or are there people in your life when they say , you know what Elon ?

This is not , this is not right .

Do you know what I'm saying ?

Um I mean , I , I think what you sort of trying to say is that uh do I at this point think because uh I've been right so many times when others have said I'm wrong that now I believe I'm right when in fact I'm wrong , you did very well .

What do you think ?

No , I'm right .

Um So uh yeah , no , look , he here's the thing .

Um physics is un unforgiving .

Physics is unforgiving .

So , uh I mean , I have , you know , these various little saying I've come up with uh that uh physics is the law and everything else is a recommendation uh in the sense that uh you can break any law made by humans , but try breaking a law made by physics that's much more difficult .

Um So if you are wrong and persist in being wrong , the rockets will blow up and the cars will fail .

Um So this is , uh we're not , we're not trying to figure out what , what flavor of ice cream uh is the best flavor of ice cream .

The , like if there's 1000 things that can happen on a rocket flight and only one of them gets the rock to orbit .

And so being wrong results in failure when dealing with physical objects .

But that's the interesting part .

So now you've built this , these great companies that physically , the physics of them are enormously successful , so successful .

Arguably that you have leverage over everybody else , right ?

There's nobody else can do starlink .

Nobody else can get , nobody else can get the rockets in space yet .

Amazon and Jeff Bezos are trying , but they haven't yet .

I hope he does .

You hope he does ?

Yeah .

Yeah .

And I think , you know , uh but I , I actually agree with , with , with L Jeff's motivations .

Um I , I mean , I think , you know , he's , you know , and I don't , so I let me put it this way .

If there , if there was a button I could , that would delete uh blue origin , I wouldn't press it .

Um So I think uh it's good that he's spending money on , on um making rockets too .

Um You know , I suggest perhaps you spend more time on it but uh you know , it's up to him .

Uh the , the uh but I should make a point here .

So nothing , nothing any of my companies have done has been to stifle composition .

In fact , we've done the opposite .

So at Tesla , we have open sourced our patents .

Anyone can use our patent for free .

How many companies do you know who have done that ?

Q name one ?

I can't .

Um at spacex we don't use patterns .

So , I mean , she said once in a while we'll , we'll file a patent just so some patent doesn't cause trouble , but we're not stopping any .

We've done , we've done nothing anti competitive , we've done nothing to stop that .

Just you at all .

Iiii I just want to clarify for the audience because some companies have done , done anti competitive things .

Iii I think the , the strange thing or the unusual thing about SpaceX and Tesla is that we've done things that have helped our competition .

So at Tesla , we um have made our supercharger system open access .

We , we've , we've , we , we've made our charger technology available for free to the other manufacturers .

The reason I have no wall of garden , we could have put a wall up , but instead we invited them in the reason I mentioned this though is because you've had this success in the physical physics world .

You now have these very uh difficult decisions that have huge impacts on the world that are not physical decisions at all .

They're , they're decisions of the mind , they're decisions that you and others have to make .

And there's a question whether you should be making these decisions at all .

And I , I think about it in the context of Starlink .

Uh obviously , there was the uh report about uh how it's being used used in Ukraine and in the Russia War , there's questions about what , you know , Taiwan , whether Taiwan should use it or will use it .

I believe they're not right now because they're worried that at some point , maybe the Chinese will tell you that you have to uh they have leverage over you and you're gonna have to turn that off , right ?

I mean , these are , these are very difficult decisions and I'm so curious how you think about that and not just the decisions , the fact that you have that power .

I , I just , I think it's important for the audience to understand that the reason I have these powers is not because of some anti competitive actions .

It's simply because we've executed very well .

Oh , I'm not dismissing that .

I think there are so many people , by the way who are huge supporters of what you , there are other satellites out there , you know ?

But , but they're , but they're not as good as yours and the same and we can say that maybe make the same argument of the cars and everything else .

But as a result that gives you enormous leverage .

Right ?

I mean , with the exception of the , by the way , these advertisers who aren't on X in every other instance , everybody needs you .

But I mean , nobody's letting their use our product if it's better than use somebody else's product , if it's the other product is better , and I accept that and maybe one day somebody to create a better product , is it like , you know , how is it a bad thing to make better products with other companies ?

Well , and I wanted to go back to this , to the starlink piece of it though because that has sort of a geo geopolitical ramification in terms of your power and how you think about that specific power and then uh the power that the US government might have either over you or not over you , the power that Chinese government might have over you or not over you and how those things get used .

I mean , what are you suggesting ?

I , I'm , I'm , I'm asking the question around this , this very idea of how these satellites are going to be used , whether you think that you should have control of them , whether the government should have control of them .

How about the government ?

Well , that's , there's a lot of people who don't trust the government .

Exactly .

But then this goes back to the trust of you .

Right .

I mean , like I said , that we're not the only company who has communication satellites , the satellites are just much better than theirs .

So , it's not like we have a monopoly .

Do you feel , do you feel like anybody has product ?

It's not like , do you feel anybody has leverage over you ?

I mean , I think at the end of the day , if we make bad products that people don't wanna use , then the users will vote with their resources and use something else .

P the conversation for a second .

I mean , certainly me and my company is overseen by regulators and , and while , um , you know , once so the , the , it's since , uh SpaceX Starlink Tesla , um , are overseen by , you know , cumulatively over 100 regulators .

Uh , and , and actually more than that , a few 100 regulators , uh , because you got , we 55 countries .

Um , if , if you sum up all the times that I had an argument with regulators of hundreds of regulators over decades , it , it can sound really terrible except , but they forgot to mention that there were 10 million regulations we complied with and only five that I disagreed with , but it was still the five and it sounds like , wow , this guy's a real maverick .

I'm like , yeah , but what about the 10 million we complied with .

Do you , let me , let me 11 related thing on this in the , the , the leverage of countries and things over you and regulators ?

Um X is this free speech platform ?

You do business in China ?

Lots of business in China .

That's an important part of your business , I imagine .

Well , let's face X , how do you think about the leverage that the Chinese have over you ?

And do they have leverage over you ?

And how do you feel about some people would say , is it hypocritical uh for you to be doing business in China or frankly in other countries as it relates to X and other things that don't follow this free speech path that uh you have espoused , the best that the X platform can do is adhere to the laws of any given country .

Uh uh uh Do you think there's something more we could do than that ?

I think it would be very hard .

But I just wonder given uh the sort of strong philosophical approach that you've , you've , you've , you've been vocal about whether you say to yourself , you know , maybe I shouldn't be doing business in that country .

Uh Well , first of all , Starlink and spacex do are no business in China whatsoever .

Um uh Tesla has one of four factories , four vehicle factories in China .

Um and China is , you know , I don't know , a quarter of our market or something like that .

Uh And so it's a quarter of the market of one company .

Um The same is true by the way of , of all the other car companies , uh they also have something on that order of a quarter of their sales in , in China .

Um So if you , if that's a problem for Tesla , that's a problem for every car company .

Um I mean , I think one has to be careful about not conflating uh the various companies because I can only do things that are within the bounds of the law .

I cannot do beyond that .

Um My aspiration is to do as much good as possible and to be as productive as possible within the bounds of what is legal more than that I cannot do .

Um I want to pivot and talk about A I for a moment .

We had Jensen Wong here who's a big fan of yours as you know ?

Yeah , Jensen's awesome .

Talk about , talk about bringing you the first box , by the way with IA uh interestingly enough uh back in 2016 , I think there's a video of Jensen uh and me unpacking the first A I computer at open A I .

So I'm so curious what you think of what's just happened over the past two weeks while you were dealing with this other headline series of headlines .

There was a whole other series of headlines .

I open A I , what did you think ?

Well , uh uh you founded it co-founded , co-founded it Yeah .

Um , well , well , the , the whole arc of open A I frankly is a little troubling because the , the , the reason for starting open A I was to create a counter counterweight to , uh Google , Google and deep mind , which at the time had two thirds of all A I talent and basically infinite money and compute .

And there was no , there was no counterweight .

It was unipolar world and Larry and Pig .

And I used to be very close friends and I would stay at his house and I would talk to Larry into the late hours of the night about A I safety .

Um And it became apparent to me that Larry did not care about A I safety .

Um I think perhaps the thing that gave it away was when he called me a species uh for being pro humanity um as in , you know , like a race but poor species .

Um So I'm like , wait a second .

Uh What side are you on , Larry ?

Um And , and then I'm like , ok , listen , this guy is calling me a specious .

He doesn't care about A I safety .

Um We've got to have some counterpoint here because this seems like we could be , this is this , this is no good .

So open A I was actually started and it was meant to be open source .

Uh I named it uh open A um after open source .

Um It is in fact closed source .

Super close .

It should be , it should be renamed super close source for maximum profit A I .

Um So because this is what it actually is .

Uh I mean , fate loves irony .

I mean , and in fact , a friend of mine has this says , like the way to predict outcomes is the most ironic outcome is the mo it , it's like it Ockham's razor , like the simplest sort of explanation is most likely .

And uh my friend Jonah's view is that the most ironic outcome is the most likely .

And that's what's happened with open A I .

Um it's , it's gone from an open source .

Uh Foundation of 5123 to suddenly it's like a $90 billion for profit corporation with closed source .

So I don't know how you go from here to there , but that seems like a , I don't know how you get , I don't know if is this legal ?

Like , so as you saw Sam Altman get ousted by somebody , you know , Ilya and Ilya was somebody who was a friend of yours .

You brought him there .

Uh Your relationship with Larry Page effectively broke down over you recruiting him away .

I think that's correct .

That was the , that was the Larry refused to be friends with me after I recruited IA .

And so here's Ilya apparently saying something is very wrong .

I think we should be concerned about this because I think Ilya actually has a strong moral compass .

Um He thinks about it , you know , he he really sweats it over questions of what is right ?

Um And if Ilya felt strongly enough to wanna , you know , fire Sam .

Well , I think the world should know .

What was that reason ?

Have you talked to him ?

I've reached out but he , he doesn't want to talk to anyone .

Have you talked to other people behind the scenes ?

Is this is all happening .

I talked to a lot of people as n nobody , I have not found anyone who knows .

Why .

Have , have you , I think we are all still trying to find out .

I , I mean , one of two things is , is either it was a serious thing and we should know what it is or it was not a serious thing and , and then the board should resign .

What do you think of Sam Altman ?

I have mixed feelings about Sam .

I , I do um you know , the , the ring of power , you know , can corrupt .

Um And he is the ring of power .

So , you know , I don't know , I think I wanna know why Elliot felt so strongly as far as Sam , this sounds like a serious thing .

I don't , I don't think it was trivial and I'm quite concerned that there , that there's some , you know , dangerous element of A I that they've discovered .

Yes .

You think they've discovered something that would be my guess .

Where are you with your own A I efforts relative to where you think open A I is where you think Google is , where do you think the others are ?

I mean , on the A I front , I'm in somewhat of a quandary here because um I've thought a , I could be something that would change the world in , in a significant way since I was in college .

I mean , like 30 years ago .

Um So the reason I didn't go ba I right from the get go was because I , I was uncertain about which which edge of the double edged sword which would be sharper , the good edge or the bad edge .

So I held off on doing anything on A I could have created , I think leading A I company and kind of open A I actually kind is that um because I was just uncertain if you make this magic genie , what will happen .

Um You know , whereas I think building sustainable energy technology is much more of a single edged sword that is single edged good , making life , multi planetary , I think single edged good .

Um You know , stalling mostly single edged good .

I mean , giving people better connectivity to people that , you know , don't , don't have connectivity or too expensive I think is very , you know , very much a good thing .

Um So like wa was instrumental by the way in halting the Russian advance .

Uh The Ukrainians said , so , um so , you know , I think there's , but with a I , you , you've got the magic genie problem .

Um You may think you want a magic gen ?

But that , but once that genie is out of the bottle , it's hard to say what happens .

How far are we away from that genie being out of the bottle ?

Do you think ?

You think it's already out ?

I mean , the genie's certainly poking his head out .

Um , the A G I , the idea of artificial general intelligence , given what you now are working on yourself and you know how easy or hard it is to train , to create the inferences , to create the weights .

I hope I'm not getting too far in the weeds of just how this works .

But those are the basics behind the software end of this .

It's funny , you know , all these weights , uh they're just basically numbers in a comma separated value file and that's our digital guide A CS B file .

Not that funny .

Um uh But that's kind of literally what it is .

So , II I think it's coming pretty fast , you know , is that , I mean , uh you , you , you , you , you famously have admitted to overstating how quickly things will happen but how quickly do you think this will happen if you say smarter than the smartest human at anything ?

Yup .

It may not be then quite smarter than all humans .

W well , machine , augmented humans , you know , cause we keep people who got computers and stuff .

Um There's a higher bar but you say smaller than any , you know , C can write as good a novel as say JK Rowling or discover new physics or invent new technology .

Um I would say that we are less than three years from that point .

Um Let me ask you a question about uh Xa I and , and what you're doing .

And um because there's an interesting thing that's different , I think about what you have relative to some of the others , which you have data , you have information , you have all of the stuff that everybody in here has put on the platform to sort through .

Um And I don't know if everybody realized that initially , what is the value of that ?

Yeah , I mean , data is very important .

You could say da data is probably more valuable than gold .

Um But then maybe you have actually , maybe you have more , maybe you have the gold in X in a different way in a way again that II I don't know if the public appreciates what that means .

Yes .

Um X is the mi might be the single best source of data .

Um I mean , it is uh they're more , you know , people links that go to you click on more links to X than anything else on earth .

Sometimes people think Facebook or Instagram is a bigger thing .

But actually there are more links to X than anything you can , there's public information , you can Google it .

OK .

Let me ask you a um So it , it is , it is uh where you would find what is happening right now on earth at any given point in time , the whole open a drama played out , in fact on the X platform .

Um So it is one of the , it's not the there , you know , Google certainly has a massive amount of data , so does Microsoft .

Um So it's not like , but , but it is one of the best sources of data .

Um Can I ask you an interesting uh IP issue which I think is actually something uh I can say as somebody who's in the creator business and journalistic business and , and whatnot uh or care about copyright .

So one of the things about training on data has been this idea that you're not gonna train or , or these things are not being trained on people's copyrighted information historically .

That's been the concept .

Yeah , that's a huge lie .

Say that again with these A I , what these A I are all trained on copyrighted data obviously .

So you think it's a lie when , when open A I says that this is not , none of these guys say they're training on copyrighted da data .

That's a lie .

It's a lie straight up , straight up lie .

OK .

So it's been trained on appropriated data .

OK .

So let me ask the second question , which is all of the people who have been uploading all of the people who have been uploading articles , the best quotes from different articles , uh videos two X , all of that can be trained on and it's interesting because people put all of that there .

Um And those quotes have historically been considered fair use , right ?

People are putting those quotes up there and individually on a fair use basis , you'd say OK , that makes sense .

But now there are people who do threads and by the way , there may be multiple people who've done , you know , an article that has 1000 words , technically all 1000 words could have made it onto X somehow and effectively .

Now you have this remarkable repository and I wonder what you , how you think about that again and how you think the creative community and those who were the original IP owners should think about that .

I don't know , except to say that by the time these lawsuits are decided , we'll have Digital God .

So we asked to ask Digital God at that point , um These lawsuits won't be decided before on a time frame that is relevant .

Um Is that a good thing or a bad thing ?

But I , I think we , we , we live , you know , there's that , I don't know if it's actually a real Chinese thing or not , but uh maybe live in interesting times apparently , uh not a good thing .

Um But uh I know II , I would prefer to , personally , I would prefer to live in interesting times .

Um And , and we live in the most interesting of times , I think uh uh for , for a while , I was like , really getting demotivated and losing sleep over the sort of the threat of a I danger .

And then I finally sort of became fatalistic about it and said , well , even if I knew it was annihilation was certain , uh , would I choose to be alive at that time or not ?

And I said I probably would have choose to be alive at that time because it's the most interesting thing .

Um , even if there's nothing I could do about it .

So then , you know , then basically , uh , sort of a fatalistic resignation help me sleep at night because I was having trouble sleeping at night because of a I danger .

Um , now what to do about it ?

I mean , I've been the biggest , the , the one banging the drum the hardest by far , the longest , uh , or at least one of the longest , uh , on four A I danger and , and these regulatory things that are happening , uh , the single biggest reason they're happening is because of me .

Um , do you think they're ever gonna get their arms around it ?

We , we talked to the vice president this afternoon .

She said she wants to regulate it .

People have been trying to regulate social media for years and have done nothing effectively .

Well , there's , there's regulation around anything which is a , like a , a physical danger to or a danger to the public .

So , like cars are heavily regulated , communications are heavily regulated .

Rockets and aircraft are heavily regulated .

Um , the the general philosophy about regulation is that when something is a danger to the public , that there needs to be some uh government oversight .

Um So I think in my , in my view A I is more dangerous than nuclear bombs which , and we regulate nuclear bombs , you can't just go make a nuclear bomb in your backyard .

Um I think we should have some kind of regulation with A I .

Now , th this tends to cause the A I acceleration is to get up in arms .

Um because they think A I is sort of heaven basically .

Um But you typically don't like regulation .

You've pushed back on regulators for the most part in the world of Tesla and so many , so many instances where we read articles about you pushing back on the regulators .

I'm so curious why in this instance , now you own one of these businesses a as I said a moment ago , um uh you one should know how to uh take what is viewed in the media as being uh the whole picture .

Um There are literally hundreds uh like this is not an exaggeration .

So there are probably 100 million regulations that , that my companies comply with and there are probably five that we don't .

And if there , if we disagree with some of those regulations , it's because we think the regulation that is meant to do good , doesn't actually do good , but that is not the defying regulations .

But the question if there are laws and rules , whether the idea is that you're making the decision that the law and the rule shouldn't be the law and the rule .

And then , right isn't , I'm saying you're finally mistaken and , and , and you , it should be obvious that you're mistaken .

Um , my company's , uh , automotive is he heavily regulated .

Uh , we would not be allowed to put cars on the road if we did not comply with this vast body of regulation .

Now , you could , you could fill up the stage with , uh uh literally , uh uh you know , 6 ft high with the , the , the , the regulations that you have to comply with to ma make a car would make you , you could have a room full of phone books .

That's how many , that's how big the regulations are .

And if you don't comply with all of those , you can't sell the car .

And if we don't comply with all the , the regulations for rockets or for Starlink , they shut us down .

So , in fact , I am incredibly compliant with regulations .

Now , once in a while , there'll be something that I disagree with .

The reason I would disagree with this is because I think the regulation in that particular case , in that rare case , does not serve the public good .

And therefore , I think it is my obligation uh to object to a regulation that is meant to serve the public good .

But doesn't , that's the only time I object not because I seek to object .

I , in fact , I'm incredibly rule following , let me ask you a separate question , social media related question .

We've been talking about tiktok today um ahead of the election .

So , uh tiktok is , what do you think of tiktok ?

Do you think it's a national security threat ?

I don't use tiktok .

Um Say that again .

You don't , I don't personally use it .

I um but for , for people that , for , for , for teenagers and people in their twenties , they seem almost religiously addicted to tiktok .

Um Some people will watch tiktok for like two hours a day .

Um I stopped using tiktok when I felt the A I probing my mind and I don't , it made me uncomfortable .

Um So I stopped using it .

Um And in terms of anti Semitic content , I mean , Tik Tok is rife with that .

It has the most viral anti Semitic content by far .

But do you think the Chinese government is using it to manipulate the minds of Americans ?

No .

Is that something that you think we should worry about ?

I mean , you have , you have different states that are trying to ban it .

I don't think this is some Chinese government plot .

Um but it , it , it , it , it is the , the tiktok algorithm is entirely A I powered .

So it is really just trying to find the most viral thing possible , but it's , it's what is gonna keep you glued to the screen .

That's it .

Um now the o on , on sheer numbers , um there are on the order of 2 billion Muslims in the world .

And I think , uh you know , mu much smaller number of Jewish people , 20 million , something many orders mat fewer .

So if you just look at , at content production just on sheer numbers basis , this is gonna be overwhelmingly a Semitic .

Let me ask you , let me ask you a political question .

Um And I've been trying to square this one in my head for a long time .

In the last two or three years .

You have moved decidedly to the right , I think , have I , well , we can discuss this , I think that you have been espousing and promoting a number of , of , of Republican candidates and , and others .

You've been very frustrated with the Biden administration over I think unions and uh feeling uh like they did not respect what you've created .

Well , I mean , with , without any uh doing nothing to provoke the Biden administration , they held an electric vehicle summit at the White House and specifically refused to let Tesla attend .

This is in the first six months of the administration .

Um And we inquired , we're like , we literally make more electric cars than everyone else combined .

Why are we not allowed ?

Why are you only letting U A uh Ford GM Chrysler and UAW ?

And you're specifically disallowing us from the EB summit at the White House ?

We , we've done nothing to provoke them .

Um then uh Biden went on to add insult to injury .

Um and publicly said that GM was leading the electric car revolution .

This was in the same quarter that Tesla made 300,000 electric cars and GM made 26 .

Not too bad .

Does that seem fair to you ?

So , but , but tell me this , then it , it doesn't seem fair .

Um And , and , and I've asked repeatedly and you've probably seen that I had a great relationship with Obama .

So there was not a stupid , but then I voted for Obama .

I stood , stood in hours for six , I stood in line for six hours to shake Obama's head .

OK .

So , OK , so let me just ask on a personal level , I can see it in your face .

This , this hurt you personally and it hurt the company too .

And it was an insult to the , the , you know , Te Tesla has 100 and 40,000 employees .

OK .

Of , of the half of them are in the United States .

Tesla has created more manufacturing jobs than everyone else combined .

So let me ask this .

Then you , you've devoted at least the last close to 20 years of your life , if not more to uh the climate , climate change .

Uh trying to get Tesla off the ground in part to improve climate .

You talked about that , a real right wing motive repeatedly far , right ?

If I understand that and then it , it's reverse psychology next level .

Well , no But so here's the question , which is , how do you square the support that you have given ?

Uh , I believe you were at a fundraiser uh for uh uh VK Ramaswami , for example , who says that the climate , uh climate issue is a hoax ?

I disagree with him on that .

I , but I would think that that would be such a singular issue for you .

I would think that , that the climate issue would be such a singular issue for you that actually it would disqualify almost anybody who , who didn't take that issue seriously .

Well , I haven't endorsed anyone for , for president .

I mean , I wanted to hear what had to say , um , because I think some of his things are , that's one of the things he says , I think are pretty solid .

Um , you know , he is concerned about government overreach , um , about government control of information .

The , I mean , the , the , the degree to which , uh , Old Twitter was basically a soft puppet of the government was ridiculous .

Um So , you know , it , it seems to me that there's , there , there's a , a very severe violation of the first amendment um , in terms of how much the government control , uh how , how much control the government had over Old Twitter .

Um , and uh , it no longer does .

So , you know , there's a reason for the first amendment .

Um , the reason for the first amendment for freedom of speech is because the , the people that immigrated to this country , uh , came from a places where there was not freedom of speech and , and they were like , you know what we , we , we , we gotta make sure that that's constitutional .

Um , because where they came from , if they said something , they'd be put in prison or they'd be , uh , you know , uh , something bad would happen to them .

So , uh , and freedom of speech , you have to say , when is it relevant ?

It's only relevant when s when someone you don't like can say something you don't like or it ha it has no meaning .

Um , and , and , and , and as soon as you sort of , you know , throw in the towel and concede to censorship , it is only a matter of time before someone censors you and that is why we have the first amendment .

Um Could you see yourself voting for President Biden if , if it's , if it's a Biden Trump election , for example , I think I would not vote for Biden .

You'd vote for Trump .

I'm not saying I'd vote for Trump .

But I mean , this , this is definitely a different choice here .

You know , we would , you , uh , would you vote for Nky Haley ?

Nikki Haley , by the way , wants , uh , all social media um , names to be exposed as , you know ?

No , I think that's outrageous .

Yeah .

No , I , we , we , I , I'm not gonna vote for some pro cen censorship candidate .

Uh , like I said , I mean , I think these , you have to you have to , you know , consider that there is a lot of wisdom uh in these amendments , you know , I mean , the constitution .

Um , and , and , uh , you know , a lot of these , a lot of things that we take for granted here in the United States that don't even exist in Canada .

There's not no constitutional right to freedom of speech in Canada .

So , uh , you know , so , and , and there's no Miranda rights in Canada people , like , think like , you know , you have the right to romance on .

You don't actually in Canada .

Um So , you know , half Canadian , I can you say these things about both .

Um But you know , so , so like you , you just got , you , you , the freedom of speech is incredibly important .

Um even when people and like , like I said , it's , it's a , it's actually especially important .

In fact , it is only relevant when uh people you don't like can say things you don't like .

And do you think right now that they're meaningless , do you think right now , uh the Republican candidates or the Democrats are more inclined ?

I mean , this is where you go to , I assume to , to , to woke and anti woke and the mind virus issue that you've talked about .

Which party do you think is , is , is more pro freedom of speech , given all the things you've seen because we also see , you know , DeSantis , uh you know , preventing people from reading certain things .

Maybe you maybe you think that's , that's , that's correct .

Uh Look , we , we actually are in an odd situation here where uh o on balance , uh the Democrats appear to be more pros censorship than the Republicans .

I mean , that used to be the opposite .

It used to be , you know , uh the left position was freedom of speech .

Um You know , I believe at one point the ac lu even de de defended the right of someone to claim that they were Nazi or something like that , you know , so like they were , they really were uh like the left was freedom of speech is , is , is fundamental .

Um And uh I mean , my , the perception perhaps it is inaccurate is that um the pro censorship is more on the left than , than the right .

Um We certainly get more complaints from the left than the right .

Let me put it that way .

Um So , um but my aspiration for the X platform is that it is the best source of truth or the least inaccurate source of truth .

Um And , well , you know , I don't know if you won't believe me or not , but I think honesty is the best policy and I , I think that the truth will win over time .

And the , you know , we've got this , this great system and it's getting better called Community notes , uh which is fantastic , I think at correcting uh falsehoods uh or , or adding context .

In fact , we , we , we make a point of , of not removing anything but only adding context .

Now that context could , could include that this is completely false and here's why .

Um and , and , and no one is immune to this .

I'm not immune to it .

Advertisers are not immune to it .

In fact , we've had community notes which has caused us some loss in advertising .

Speaking of loss of advertising revenue .

Um when a community note , if an a if , if , if there's false advertising , the community note will say this is false .

And here is why , um I mean , like , and , and there's one specific example that is pub public knowledge .

So I'll mention it , which is at one point , uh Uber had this ad , uh which said , earn like a boss .

Uh And it was community noted if by a bus , you mean $12.47 an hour , this , this did cause at least a temporary suspension of advertising from Uber .

I got to ask you a question that might make everybody in the room uncomfortable or not uncomfortable .

It goes to the free speech issue , uh the New York Times company and the New York Times newspaper , it appeared over the summer uh to be throttled .

What , what did the New York Times ?

Uh Well , we , we do require that , um , that everyone has to buy a subscription and we don't make exceptions for anyone .

And , and I think if I want the New York Times , I have to pay for a subscription and they don't give me a free subscription .

So I'm not going to give them a free subscription .

But were you ?

But were you throttling the New York Times relative to other news organizations , relative to everybody else ?

Was it , was , it , was it specific to the Times they , I didn't buy a subscription and by the only cost like $1000 a month .

So if they just do that , then , then they , they're back in , back in the saddle .

But , but , but you are saying that it was throttled , you know what I'm saying ?

I mean , was there a conversation that you had with somebody , you said , look , you know , I'm , I'm unhappy with the times they should either be buying the subscription or I don't like their content or whatev whatever a , a , any organization that refuses to buy a subscription , uh , is , is , is not going to be recommended .

But then what does that say about free speech and free ?

It costs a little bit , but that's it .

But that's an interesting , you know , it's like , it's like in , uh , South Park , uh , when they say , you know , freedom isn't free at Costa Bucko five or whatever .

Um , so , but it's pretty cheap .

Ok .

Um , it's low cost , low costs freedom .

I got a couple more questions for you .

Um , you're headed back to Texas , uh , after this to launch , uh , the Cyber truck .

Yeah , it's gonna be a big launch .

But I wanted to ask you right now , uh more broadly just about the the car business and what you see actually happening .

Um and specifically the government put in place lots of policies as you know , to try to encourage more evs .

And one of the things that's happened uniquely is you have now a lot of car companies saying actually this is too ambitious for us .

These plans are too ambitious .

4000 dealers .

I don't know if you saw just yesterday sent a letter to the White House saying this has gone too far , you're going too far .

You had this ev it was , it was , it was uh this is going too fast , too far and that there's not enough demand , our u underneath all this is this idea that maybe there's not enough demand for EVs that the American public has not bought into the , I mean , they bought into , with , with , with your company , but they haven't bought into it broadly enough .

Well , I think if you make a compelling electric car , people will buy it .

No question about it .

Um I mean , electric car sales in China are gigantic .

Um That's by far the biggest category .

Um And I think that would be the ca you know , um uh I mean , it's worth noting .

Uh ok , so , so the probably the best reputation of that is that the Tesla Model Y will be the best selling car of any kind on earth this year .

Of any kind , gasoline or otherwise ?

Is there another car company that you think is doing a good job with this ?

I mean , I think the Chinese car companies are extremely competitive .

Um by far our toughest competition is in China .

So um I mean , there's , there's a lot of people who , who are out there who think that the top 10 car companies are gonna be Tesla followed by nine Chinese car companies .

Um I think they might not be wrong .

So um China is super good at manufacturing and the work ethic is incredible .

So , um you know , like if we consider different leagues of competitiveness at Tesla , we consider the Chinese League to be the most competitive .

Um And by the way , we do very well in China because our China team is the best China .

How worried are you that the , that the union unionization effort that just took place uh at uh well , not , I shouldn't say effort but the , the , the , the , the new , the new wages and the like at GM and Ford are that they're coming for you and they are coming for you .

What is that going to mean to you and your business ?

Well , I , I mean , I , I think it's generally not good to have an adversarial relationship uh between um people online , you know , one group at the company and another group .

In fact , I mean , I , I disagree with the idea of unions but the perhaps for a reason that is different than you may expect is , which is I , I just don't like anything which creates kind of a lords and peasants sort of thing .

And , and I think the unions naturally try to create negativity in a company and , and create a kind of sort of lords and peasants uh situation .

Uh There , there are many people at Tesla who have come gone from working on the line to being in senior management .

There is no lords and peasants .

Everyone eats at the same table , everyone parks in the same parking lot , you know , at GM , there's a special elevator for only for senior executives .

We have no such thing as Tesla .

Um You know , and the thing is that I actually know the people on the line because I worked on the line and I walked the line and I stepped in the factory and I , and I worked beside them .

So I'm no stranger to him .

Um um And , and then actually many times where I've said , well , can't we just hold a union vote but apparently a company is not allowed to hold a union vote .

So it has to be somehow called for , but the unions can't do it .

So I said , let's just hold a vote and see what happens .

Um The , the actual problem is , is the , is , is the opposite .

It's not that people are trapped at Tesla building cars .

The , the , the , the challenge is , is how do we retain great people to do the hard work of building cars when they have like six other opportunities that they can do that are easier .

That's the actual difficulty is , is that building cars is hard work and , and , and there are much easier jobs and I just want to say that I'm incredibly appreciative of those who love cars and they know it .

Um You know , so there , there's , there's , I don't know , maybe there will be unionized .

If , if I , if I say like if Tesla gets unionized , it will be because we deserve it and we failed in some way .

Um But we , we , we certainly try hard to , you know , ensure the prosperity of everyone .

We give everyone stock options .

Um We've , we've made many people who are just working the line who didn't even know what stocks were .

We've made the millionaires .

Um So we're gonna run on time .

Final couple of quick , quick questions .

When do you have the time to tweet or to post ?

I actually think about it all the time .

As I said , I use the bathroom sometimes I use it all the time .

Meaning if , if we were to , if we were to open up our phones and look at the screen time , what does yours look like ?

Well , about every three hours , I uh make a trip to the lavatory .

That's the only time you do .

This seems like you're on there a lot .

Um No , I mean , I , I , there'll be like brief moments between meetings .

Um , I mean , it's not , obviously I've , I have like 17 jobs so , you know , and um , no , no , I , I guess technically it's work at this point .

It is .

But I , but I'm thinking just in terms of your mind sha I mean , by the way , there's a lot of people who should be working , who are , who are on this , technically posting on Twitter is , or , or X is , is work .

It does count as work .

So that's , you know , there's that .

Um , uh , but no , I mean , I , I think I'm on , well , I , I guess usually probably I'm on for longer than I think I am .

I know .

But do you think that five hours a day we have the screen time of like a number of hours per week ?

So that's a scary number .

Um , it's probably , I don't know , it's a little over an hour a day or something like that .

Just an hour a day .

If we really looked at this together .

Do you have your phone with you ?

Yeah , you wanna look ?

Ok .

Ok .

Here we go .

You ready ?

Screen time in general ?

Sometimes it's a scary number .

But I know that's why I , I thought , uh , oh , I just got a new phone so I think this is not accurate because it says I , it's one minute , pretty sure it's more than that .

Right .

It's over the week .

There we go .

Go , go , go to the week .

Ok .

So it's still wrong .

It's , it's more than four minutes .

I , I just got a new phone so this is not accurate .

It literally says four minutes .

New phone , Tim Cook , send you the phone , new new phone .

Who does ?

Yeah , I should ask by the way because I just mentioned Tim Cook .

Do you feel like you're gonna have to have a battle with him eventually ?

Is that , is that the next fight ?

I mean , over the App store , the idea of making a P oh or you mean like , no , no , no , over the App store .

You ever make a phone ?

Sam Alden's apparently thinking about making a phone with Johnny .

I , I mean , I don't think there's a real need to make a phone .

Uh I mean , if there's a essential need to make a phone , I make a phone but I got a lot of fish to fry .

So uh I mean , I do think there's a , there's a , there's a fundamental challenge that phone makers have at this point because you've got uh basically a black rectangle .

Um You know , how do you make that better ?

So do you want to do that ?

What does that , what does that look like in , in , in Elon's head ?

No , that's literally , yeah .

Good , good phrase uh in the head .

A neuralink .

Well , there we go that it's over , you know , the , the best interface would be a neural interface directly to your brain .

Um So that , that would be a neural , how far are we , do you think from that ?

And how , how excited or scary does that seem to be ?

And we read these headlines obviously about , uh , monkeys who died as you know , how , what should we think about that ?

Uh Yeah , a actually the , the , this is the uh the , the , the USDA inspector who , who came by the neuralink facilities literally said in her entire career , she has never seen a better animal care facility .

It is we are the nicest cha animals that you could possibly be even to the rats and mice , even though they did the plague and everything .

Um So uh it is , it is like monkey paradise .

Um So uh the , the , the , the , the thing that gets conflated is that there were some terminal monkeys where , you know , this is like , this is actually several years ago where the monkeys were about to die .

And we're like , OK , we've got an experimental device .

It's the kind of thing which only put in a monkey that's about to die .

And then , you know , now the monkey died but it didn't die because of the neuralink died because it was , you know , had a terminal case of cancer or something like that .

So uh uh NN Neuralink has , has never caused the death , the death of a monkey .

It's best I I'm I unless they , they're hiding something from me , it , it has never caused the death of a monkey .

And in fact , uh we've , we've now had monkeys with uh neuralink implants for like 23 years and they're doing great .

So , um and we've even replaced the Neuralink twice .

Uh and it's , and , and we're getting ready to do the , to do the first uh implants in hopefully in a few months .

Um The , the , the , the early implementations of neuralink I think are unequivocally good .

Speaking of the double edged sword , I think these early implementations are single edged sword .

Um because the first implementations will be to enable people who are , have lost the brain body connection uh to be able to operate a computer or a phone faster than someone who has hands that , that work .

Um So you can imagine if Stephen Hawking could communicate faster than someone um who had full full body functionality , how incredible that would be .

Well , that's what this device will do .

Um And we should have a proof of that in a human .

Uh Hopefully in a few months , um it already works , you know , in , in monkeys and works quite well um with , with monkeys that can play video games just using just by thinking .

Um So then the next application after um the , the sort of those , you know , dealing with tetraplegics who quadriplegic quadriplegics is gonna be um vision , vision is the the next thing .

So it's like if somebody is like has um lost both eyes or the optic nerve has failed basically where they have no possibility of having sort of some ocular correction .

The that , that will be the next thing uh for neuralink is a direct uh vision interface .

And , and in fact , then you could be like Jordy LaForge from Star Trek , you could , you could see in like any frequency actually , you could see in radar if you want two final questions .

Uh and then we're gonna do , uh end this conversation , which I think has taken everybody inside the mind of Elon Musk today as well as Neuro .

Um , it actually goes to self driving cars and vision and everything else .

Um And I asked this question of Pete Buttigieg , uh Transportation Secretary .

It's actually something you retweeted .

So I wanted to ask you the same question .

Um There's a big question about autonomous vehicles and the safety of them , but there's also a question about when it will be politically palatable in this country for people to die in cars that are controlled by computers , which is say we have 35 40,000 deaths every year in this , in this country .

If you could bring that number down to 10,000 , 5000 , that might be a great thing .

But do we think that the country will accept the idea that 5000 people that your family might have , have , have perished in a , in a vehicle as a result ?

Not of a human making a mistake , but of a computer .

Um , yes .

Well , first of all humans are terrible drivers .

Um , so people text and drive , they drink and drive , they get into arguments .

They , you know , um , you know , they do all sorts of things in cars that they should not do .

Um , so it's actually remarkable that there are not more deaths than there are .

Um , what we'll find with computer driving is I think probably an order of magnitude reduction in deaths .

Um , I think , and now in the US has actually far fewer deaths per capita than the rest of the world .

If you go worldwide .

I think there's something close to a million deaths per year due to , uh , automotive , uh , accidents .

Um , so I think computer driving will probably drop that by 90% or more .

It won't , it won't be perfect but it will be 10 times .

Do you think that the public will accept that ?

Do you think the government will accept that ?

Well , in , in large numbers , the , it , it will certainly be so obviously true , um , that it , it , it really cannot be denied .

And what do you think ?

I know we've talked about the timeline before and I know people have criticized you , uh , for putting out timelines that may not have come true just yet .

But what do you think it is ?

And , and by the way , do you feel like , do you ever say to yourself ?

Oh , I shouldn't have said that .

Sure of course .

Um , wait , I should have said that .

Um , so I , yeah , I , I mean , I , I'm optimistic about , I mean , I'm , I'm , I think I'm , like , naturally optimistic about time scales and if I was not naturally optimistic I wouldn't be doing the things that I'm doing .

Um , I , I mean , I certainly wouldn't have thought a rock company or electric car company if I were , didn't have some sort of pathological optimism frankly .

Um , so , um , as you pointed out , many people said they would fail and in fact , I actually , I agreed with them .

I said , yes , it probably will fail .

And they're like , hm , ok .

Um , but I , I thought SpaceX and Tesla had less than a 10% chance of success when we started them .

Um , so , yeah , anyway , but , but the self-driving thing is , is I've been optimistic about it but we certainly , um , made a lot of progress .

If anybody has tried , the very , has been using the sort of full self driving beta .

The progress is , uh , you know , every year has been substantial .

Um , it's really now , at the point where in most places it'll take you from one place to another with no inventions .

Um , and the dead is unequivocal that , uh , that supervised full self driving is somewhere around four times safer or maybe more than , than just human driving by , by themselves .

Um , so I'm , I'm , I , you know , I , I can certainly see it coming actually .

Really you think it's another five or 10 years ?

I mean , people ?

No , no , no , definitely not .

Definitely not .

Um And do you feel like investors have invested in something that , that hasn't happened yet ?

Is that , is that fair to them ?

And that's the other question that people have about that ?

Well , I mean , I think the , they've , they've all with exception , uh thought it wasn't happening so they were investing in , despite thinking they're very clear that they don't think it's real .

So they're not saying , oh , we , we just leave everything Ellen says hook line and sinker .

Uh And , but the thing is that , I mean , I would be a fair criticism of me to say that I am late but it isn't , but I always deliver in the end .

Let me ask you the final question .

I took note of this .

It was November 11th and you took to Twitter and you wrote only two words you said amplify empathy , right ?

I was taken aback by that keeping all the things that have been going on in the world .

Um Do you remember what you were thinking ?

Well , I think it's quite literally , I understand it but what was , what was going on ?

Why ?

Why did you write that ?

Well , I was encouraging people to apply empathy literally .

I tend to be quite literal .

Um But was there something that had happened that you had seen that you said to yourself ?

I need to , I want to say that , I think I was talking to some friends and we all agreed that we should try to amplify empathy .

And so I wrote a five of the um if you wanted an unvarnished look inside the Mind of Elon Musk , I think you just saw it sometimes .

It's pretty simple , you know , uh Elon Musk .

Thank you very , very much for the conversation .

Thank you .

Appreciate it very , very much .

Thank you .

Thank you so much here .

Take that with you for a second .

I'm just going to say a thank you to everybody who stuck around for what has been a remarkable day .

Uh We are so appreciative of everybody who has been with us for so many years coming back to this every year .

So thank you .

Thank you .

Thank you .

I hope you had a great day and I hope we have an opportunity to do this again .

Elon Musk , everybody .

Thank you .