This looks like a scam. Not the typical regular person type of scam, but the kind specifically targeted to "wealthy Silicon Valley idiot."
> We are a separate company from X Corp, but will work closely with X (Twitter), Tesla, and other companies to make progress towards our mission.
You know, just in case any investors decide to sue afterwards based on misrepresentation.
- SpaceX was launched to make us a multiplanetary species.
- Twitter was bought to fight the woke mind virus that is destroying the world.
- And now xAI will understand the Universe.
One of the clear rules of PR for Musk is that whatever he says it must involve at least one whole planet, ideally multiple planets, galaxies, or ideally, the whole Universe. What is delivered is another story entirely.
- SpaceX was founded to capture more free government money in the form of billion dollar NASA contracts / contracts with DOD for spy satellites / etc.
- Twitter, Saudi money mostly
- xAI ?????
I think with all his monkeying around, this time his plans will fail.
– Even if SpaceX existed to "capture free government money" the result which matters is US taxpayers saving tens of billions of dollars because of how much cheaper SpaceX was compared to all alternatives. SpaceX has also cut off billions of dollars of US taxpayer money getting exfiltrated to Russia, whether directly (e.g. access to ISS) or indirectly (e.g. ULA buying RD-180 engines).
– Or maybe facts exist
– What's there to get? Like anyone else, Elon has opinions and some amount of money. They're not necessarily your opinions or your amount of money. But the principle remains the same.
There's something that feels incredibly ostentatious about the opening sentence "The goal of xAI is to understand the true nature of the universe.". Not because I think it's a bad goal, or a goal that no company can claim, but because of the broader context around AI and Musk's antics.
I'm genuinely curious to see what comes out of this, but it also gives me the same queasy feeling in my gut that I got when looking at various crypto initiatives over the years.
I don't doubt that there are incredibly smart people getting involved. It's just a bit difficult to take it seriously. I hope to be proven wrong.