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Elon Musk Shares Rare Photo of His and Grimes’ Son X in Honor of His 4th Birthday – E! Online – E! NEWS

Posted: May 6, 2024 at 2:44 am

Elon'sfather is an engineer and like Elon, was born in South Africa. In the 2015 biography Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX and the Quest for a Fantastic Future, author Ashlee Vance wrotethat Elon and his dad had a difficult relationship.In an emotional 2017 Rolling Stone interview, Elon criticized his father and talked about his upbringing, saying that after his parents split, he moved in withhis dad, which, he said,"was not a good idea."

However, Errol toldRolling Stone,"I love my children and would readily do whatever for them."

In a 2015 Forbesinterview, Elon's dad said he used to take his kids on trips overseas. "Their mother and I split up when they were quite young and the kids stayed with me," he said. "I took them all over the world."

After divorcing Elon's mother Maye, Errol married Heide, whose daughterJana Bezuidenhoutwas 4 years old at the time. Errol and Heide went on to havetwo daughters together beforethey, too, broke up.

Years later, Jana reached out to Errol following a breakup. "We were lonely, lost people," Errol explainedin a 2018 interview with The Sunday Times. "One thing led to anotheryou can call it God's plan or nature's plan." Either way, the duo welcomed son Elliott in 2017 and then a baby girl in 2019. As Errol put it to The Sun, "The only thing we are on Earth for is to reproduce. If I could have another child I would. I can't see any reason not to."

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Elon Musk Shares Rare Photo of His and Grimes' Son X in Honor of His 4th Birthday - E! Online - E! NEWS

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As Elon Musk Abandons the $25K Tesla, This EV Costs Just $4400 – WIRED

Posted: May 6, 2024 at 2:44 am

As Elon Musk steps away, yet again, from the idea of a $25,000 Tesla, lets take this opportunity to zoom out and appreciate what a truly affordable EV can be. For this we need to ignore the Nissan Leafcurrently the cheapest EV in the US at $29,280and skip over Europe, home to the adorable but flawed $10,000 Citroen Ami, and head to China.

Here youll find the equally cheap BYD Seagull, a small electric hatchback styled by ex-Lamborghini designer Wolfgang Egger and with a 200-mile rangefour times that of the Ami.

But what if even that is too expensive? Then allow us to present the Zhidou Rainbow. This is a compact city EV priced from 31,900 yuan before subsidiesthat's just $4,400. For a new electric car. WIRED literally recommends ebikes that cost more that this.

The Rainbow has three doors and four seats, and an interior with a 5-inch digital driver display and a 9-inch touchscreen for the infotainment system. Theres even a connected smartphone app, charge scheduling, and the promise of over-the-air (OTA) software updates.

Splash out on the flagship Color Cloud Edition (which costs $5,800, or about half the price of Porsches fanciest bicycle) and you can have each panel of your Rainbow painted a different color. A bit like Volkswagen did with the somewhat mad Polo Harlequin in the mid '90s.

There are two models on offer. The first has that headline $4,400 price tag and is powered by a 20-kW (27-horsepower) motor with 85 Nm (63 ft-lbs) of torque and fed by a tiny 9.98-kWh battery. Spend 39,900 yuan ($5,500) and your Rainbow is fitted with a 30-kW (40-horsepower) motor with 125 Nm of torque and a 17-kWh battery pack. Range is between 78 and 127 miles using Chinas generous CLTC testing standard.

Be under no illusion here, these are tiny numbers. Even the larger battery is the same capacity of that of a plug-in hybrid Honda CR-V, which also employs a 2.0-liter engine to help it get around. But the range isnt terrible. Even if the testing standard is generous, and the larger battery has a more realistic range of 100 miles, thats about the same as the Honda e, which cost a whopping 37,000 ($46,000) before it went off sale at the end of 2023.

There are two Rainbow models: One powered by a 20-kW (27-horsepower) motor fed by a tiny 9.98-kWh battery; and a pimped 30-kW (40-horsepower) motor version with 17-kWh battery.

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As Elon Musk Abandons the $25K Tesla, This EV Costs Just $4400 - WIRED

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Elon Musk has turned Tesla into a meme stock as he tells Wall Street to value the EV maker like an AI company, top … – Fortune

Posted: May 6, 2024 at 2:43 am

Elon Musk is no longer over-delivering like he used to, but he is still over-promising, according to a top economist, who pointed to the Tesla CEOs recent insistence that his EV company should be valued like an AI company.

In a Project Syndicate op-ed published on Wednesday, UC Berkeley economics professor and former Treasury official J. Bradford DeLong gave Musk credit for creating a historically important tech company thats the tip of the spear in the transition away from internal-combustion-engine vehicles.

Musks rocket company SpaceX also shows great promise, and he has proven to be an effective coach for engineers working on battery technologies, electric vehicles, and rocket science, DeLong added. Without him, those technologies would not have been pushed forward as much as they have.

In fact, while Musk has frequently over-promised, he over-delivered on those fronts, helping Teslas market cap and Musks personal wealth soar since the 2010s, DeLong said.

But more recently, he has shifted his focus from EVs, charger networks, and batteries to social media, artificial intelligence, and robotaxis.

Even as Musk vowed last month to accelerate plans to launch a new, lower-cost EV model that Wall Streets views as critical to its future, he also reaffirmed his robotaxi ambitions to develop a fleet of autonomous cars.

Meanwhile, Teslas surprise firing of its entire Supercharger team raised worries about the key network as well as the industrys future. This also comes amid slower EV demand, weaker sales, broader workforce cuts, a steep stock decline, and an exodus of senior leadership.

Yet while the over-promising has continued, the over-delivering has not, DeLong wrote. The fundraiser, cheerleader, and coach for teams developing real technologies has become a meme-stock carnival barker.

He pointed to last months Tesla earnings conference call, where Musk exhorted Wall Street analysts to value his company more like a robotics or AI company instead of an auto company. In particular, Tesla should be viewed almost entirely in terms of solving autonomy and being able to apply that to a gigantic fleet of cars, the CEO added.

But DeLong noted that more than 80% of Teslas first-quarter sales were from automotive revenues, adding that car manufacturing has nowhere near the marginal costs of an IT company, which can write code once and run it everywhere.

For all the current Tesla shareholders planning to offload their holdings in the next couple of years, everything hinges on the company succeeding as a meme stock, and Musk is diligently working toward that goal, DeLong warned. Since there are virtually no long-term Tesla shareholders, the market does not particularly care that the company lacks a CEO who is trying to build it into an enduring profit-making organization.

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Elon Musk has turned Tesla into a meme stock as he tells Wall Street to value the EV maker like an AI company, top ... - Fortune

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Harry Potter: Even Elon Musk Is Telling J.K. Rowling to Lighten Up – Bleeding Cool News

Posted: May 6, 2024 at 2:43 am

Posted in: Max, Movies, Opinion, streaming, TV, TV | Tagged: elon musk, harry potter, jk rowling, max, opinion

As Warner Bros. Discovery continues work on its Harry Potter series, Elon Musk wonders if J.K. Rowling could post more "positive content."

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Ever since Warner Bros. Discovery announced back in April 2023 that they would be teaming up with bestselling author J.K. Rowling on a multi-season adaptation of Rowling's "Harry Potter" novels, we've been looking at the project on different levels. From a series standpoint, there are the usual question marks surrounding the cast, writers, directors, etc. But Rowling being directly in the mix creates a whole other level of concern and the vast majority of that has to do with her viewson trans women and the seemingly endless (and quite often nasty) engagement that she engages in on social media. And that's raised questions about how WBD will handle the questions that it's going to get as well as the show's cast & creative team as production officially gets underway. We've already seen Rowling's recent comments regarding original stars Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson, and Rupert Grint's position on trans women, bringing a response from Radcliffe that doesn't sound like he plans on working with her anytime soon not a good sign for WBD. In fact, you know WBD is about to have a major issue on its hands when even Twitter/X owner Elon Musk is telling Rowling to lighten up.

Before anyone starts crowing Musk for being bold about anything, he makes it clear in his response to Rowling that "I heartily agree with your points regarding sex/gender." Musk's concern? He wishes she would be "posting interesting and positive content on other matters." Well, it turns out that Rowling did just that though noting that she didn't do it because she was told to. And it didn't last long, based on what's come out of her account after the recent one that we screencapped below:

In February of this year, Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav offered an update on the series during a corporate call. "We've not been shy about our excitement around Harry Potter. The last film was made more than a dozen years ago," Zaslav shared, revealing that the series is expected to hit screens in 2026. From there,Zaslav revealed that he and some other big names from WBD had recently met with Rowling in London to discuss the project. "I was in London a few weeks ago with Casey [HBO & Max head Casey Bloys] and Channing [WBD TV head Channing Dungey], and we spent some real time with J.K. and her team. Both sides are thrilled to be reigniting this franchise. Our conversations were great, and we couldn't be more excited about what's ahead," Zaslav shared. "We can't wait to share a decade of new stories with fans around the world on Max."

The stories from each of Rowling's Harry Potter books will become (from the statement) "a decade-long series produced with the same epic craft, love, and care this global franchise is known for. The series will feature a new cast to lead a new generation of fandom, full of fantastic detail, much-loved characters, and dramatic locations that Harry Potter fans have loved for over twenty-five years. Each season will be authentic to the original books and bring Harry Potter and these incredible adventures to new audiences around the world, while the original, classic, and beloved films will remain at the core of the franchise and available to watch globally."

Speaking with Variety earlier this year, Warner Bros. TV Group head Channing Dungey offered an update on where things stood as initial creative planning began. "We're in conversations with a number of different writers to figure out who's going to be the person to lead that franchise for us," Dungey shared while also pushing back on reports that casting is already underway. "The first step for us is figuring out who this showrunner is going to be, and once we get that locked down, then we can start having those [casting] conversations." Dungey added, "The tricky part is the first two books, where the kids are on the younger end, around 11 or 12."

That same month, reports hit that writers Tom Moran, Kathleen Jordan, Martha Hillier, Michael Lesslie, and others were commissioned by the streaming service to pitch their takes on a series adaptation. Rumblings were that the first round of pitches took place in Los Angeles, with the top picks moving on to pitch in the UK. In addition, it's said that the streamer is "open to the possibility of developing more than one idea based on Harry Potter" and that more than one writer from the pitching process could end up coming aboard the project. That brought us to February, with sources reporting that Francesca Gardiner, Moran & Jordan are the three contenders, with each reportedly having the opportunity to work on their final pitches before a decision is made (reportedly in June).

The stories from each of Rowling's Harry Potter books will become (from the statement) "a decade-long series produced with the same epic craft, love, and care this global franchise is known for. The series will feature a new cast to lead a new generation of fandom, full of fantastic detail, much-loved characters, and dramatic locations that Harry Potter fans have loved for over twenty-five years. Each season will be authentic to the original books and bring Harry Potter and these incredible adventures to new audiences around the world, while the original, classic, and beloved films will remain at the core of the franchise and available to watch globally."

The series stems from Max in association with Bront Film and TV & Warner Bros. Television. Rowling, Neil Blair, and Ruth Kenley-Letts are set to executive produce, with David Heyman currently in talks to executive produce.

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Harry Potter: Even Elon Musk Is Telling J.K. Rowling to Lighten Up - Bleeding Cool News

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Elon Musk is throwing his weight around Tesla, comes in like a wrecking ball – Electrek

Posted: May 6, 2024 at 2:43 am

We are getting more information on the ongoing layoffs at Tesla. Several employees describe the situation as Elon Musk throwing his weight around to solidify his status after being mostly absent over the last year.

But he is coming in like a dangerous wrecking ball.

Sources familiar with the matter told Electrek that Musk was not as frequently present at Tesla as he used to be over the last year and since his acquisition of Twitter.

That has changed over the last few weeks.

Musk is now all over Tesla or at least, his presence is being felt everywhere at Tesla.

It started with the first wave of layoffs two weeks ago. Musk announced that Tesla would be laying off about 10% of its workforce and used his usual excuse of growing the headcount too fast, resulting in hiring inefficiencies with duplicate jobs.

However, when we first heard about those plans a day prior, we heard that the layoffs could be closer to 20% of the workforce.

Sure enough, the layoffs are still ongoing.

Tesla started another wave of layoffs this week including the entire charging organization.

Now, Electrek has learned that Musk also gutted Teslas cathode material manufacturing team in Texas.

It started with Anthony Thurston, Senior Manager, Cathode Materials & Manufacturing at Tesla, earlier this month, but Electrek has learned that Musk has now let go of most of the team.

Sources familiar with the matter describe a difficult situation at Tesla right now. Uncertainty, confusion, and frustration are the main feelings going around the offices.

Several sources confirmed that there are rumors around Tesla that the vehicle engineering and design departments are next.

During Teslas earnings call last week, Musk commented a bit more on the layoffs. This time, he said it was about reorganizing the company:

Weve made some corrections along the way. But it is time to reorganize the company for the next phase of growth and you really need to reorganize it.

Analysts and Tesla fans are trying to understand the logic behind some of these moves and the firing of almost the entire charging organization, around 500 people, has been hard to understand for most people.

Musk said that Tesla still plans to grow the Supercharger network but with a focus on existing stations:

We reported that Tesla has already backed out of leases for new Supercharger stations.

Sources say that Tesla will have issues continuing to grow the network without the organization of Rebecca Tinucci, Teslas former head of charging.

In the past, Tesla rehired people it fired after realizing that it couldnt get the work done without them.

This is raising questions about the logic behind some of the layoffs and their efficacy.

Sources familiar with the matter believe that some of the layoffs have nothing to do with hiring inefficiencies or restructuring, but rather with Musk throwing his weight around Tesla.

Two sources told Electrek that Tinucci was fighting back pressure from Musk to fire a bigger percentage of her team, and the CEO decided to let go of the entire team as an example.

Musk wrote in an email to executives on Sunday:

Hopefully, these actions are making it clear that we need to be absolutely hard-core about headcount and cost reduction. While some on exec staff are taking this seriously, most are not yet doing so.

The message is clear: fire people as many people as Im asking, or you and your entire team will be gone.

This is clearly about more than hiring inefficiency and restructuring. Musk is cleaning house. It could be that he has serious concerns about the economy and lack of reversal for Teslas sales in the short term, but he didnt go into that in the earnings call last week.

It could be about more than that. I dont know if I completely agree with the theory that Musk is securing his leadership position at Tesla, but it is a viable theory.

As I previously presented, the vote on his compensation package is turning into a vote of confidence in the CEO.

These layoffs are useful for him on that front. A lot of the leadership is gone. With every leader leaving, Musk becomes more needed at Tesla. Also, it doesnt hurt that all these leaders are unloading their stocks, which wont be voted against him.

However, it raises the question: is it actually good for Tesla?

The Supercharger team did something incredible: build the only successful and liked fast-charging network in North America, which is critical to EV adoption.

Firing the entire team because the head was pushing back on the number of layoffs is ridiculous, especially if the plan is still to grow the network. Tesla needs to grow the network since it is currently onboarding other automakers on it. Even if Tesla sees its own sales slowing down, the Supercharger network will need a capacity increase.

Everyone I talked to at Tesla says that it is a complete mess. Contractors for most ongoing Supercharger projects lost their point of contact at Tesla. Again, many suspect Tesla will try to rehire some of the workers fired.

Tesla has hiring inefficiencies leading to layoffs and layoffs inefficiencies leading to new hires.

Its not a good look.

The only way I can get behind Musk on this is if Teslas financials are really in the dumpster. It doesnt look that bad right now based on the financial statements, but its not impossible that Tesla has internal numbers, like orders coming in, that look awful.

Some of this reminds me of Tesla in 2019. Things were looking pretty good, but Tesla launched a huge cost-cutting effort. We later learned that Tesla was on the verge of bankruptcy because it didnt anticipate how costly it would be to launch Model 3 in high volume in Europe.

The long transit time put a lot of financial pressure on Tesla, and the cost-cutting effort was intended to compensate for that Musk didnt communicate to shareholders until later.

Maybe theres something similar going on that we dont know about, but at the same time, Tesla is in a completely different situation right now, sitting on $27 billion in cash.

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Elon Musk is throwing his weight around Tesla, comes in like a wrecking ball - Electrek

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Boeing is about to face a big test after falling behind Elon Musk’s SpaceX – Fortune

Posted: May 6, 2024 at 2:43 am

After years of delays and stumbles, Boeing is finally poised to launch astronauts to the International Space Station for NASA.

Its the first flight of Boeings Starliner capsule with a crew on board, a pair of NASA pilots who will check out the spacecraft during the test drive and a weeklong stay at the space station.

NASA turned to U.S. companies for astronaut rides after the space shuttles were retired. Elon Musks SpaceX has made nine taxi trips for NASA since 2020, while Boeing has managed only a pair of unoccupied test flights.

Boeing program manager Mark Nappi wishes Starliner was further along. Theres no doubt about that, but were here now.

The companys long-awaited astronaut demo is slated for liftoff Monday night.

Provided this tryout goes well, NASA will alternate between Boeing and SpaceX to get astronauts to and from the space station.

A look at the newest ride and its shakedown cruise:

THE CAPSULE

White with black and blue trim, Boeings Starliner capsule is about 10 feet (3 meters) tall and 15 feet (4.5 meters) in diameter. It can fit up to seven people, though NASA crews typically will number four. The company settled on the name Starliner nearly a decade ago, a twist on the name of Boeings early Stratoliner and the current Dreamliner.

No one was aboard Boeings two previous Starliner test flights. The first, in 2019, was hit with software trouble so severe that its empty capsule couldnt reach the station until thesecond tryin 2022. Then last summer, weak parachutes and flammable tape cropped up that needed to be fixed or removed.

THE CREW

Veteran NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams are retired Navy captains who spent months aboard the space station years ago. They joined the test flight after the original crew bowed out as the delays piled up. Wilmore, 61, is a former combat pilot from Mount Juliet, Tennessee, and Williams, 58, is a helicopter pilot from Needham, Massachusetts. The duo have been involved in the capsules development and insist Starliner is ready for prime time, otherwise they would not strap in for the launch.

Were not putting our heads in the sand, Williams told The Associated Press. Sure, Boeing has had its problems. But we are the QA (quality assurance). Our eyes are on the spacecraft.

THE TEST FLIGHT

Starliner will blast off on United Launch Alliances Atlas V rocket from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. It will be the first time astronauts ride an Atlas since NASAs Project Mercury, starting with John Glenn when he became the first American to orbit the Earth in 1962. Sixty-two years later, this will be the 100th launch of the Atlas V, which is used to hoist satellites as well as spacecraft.

Were super careful with every mission. Were super, duper, duper careful with human missions, said Tory Bruno, CEO of ULA, a joint venture of Boeing and Lockheed Martin.

Starliner should reach the space station in roughly 26 hours. The seven station residents will have their eyes peeled on the approaching capsule. The arrival of a new vehicle is a really big deal. You leave nothing to chance, NASA astronaut Michael Barratt told the AP from orbit. Starliner will remain docked for eight days, undergoing checkouts before landing in New Mexico or elsewhere in the American West.

STARLINER VS. DRAGON

Both companies capsules are designed to be autonomous and reusable. This Starliner is the same one that made the first test flight in 2019. Unlike the SpaceX Dragons, Starliner has traditional hand controls and switches alongside touchscreens and, according to the astronauts, is more like NASAs Orion capsules for moon missions. Wilmore and Williams briefly will take manual control to wring out the systems on their way to the space station.

NASA gave Boeing, a longtime space contractor, more than $4 billion to develop the capsule, while SpaceX got $2.6 billion. SpaceX already was in the station delivery business and merely refashioned its cargo capsule for crew. While SpaceX uses the boss Teslas to get astronauts to the launch pad, Boeing will use a more traditional astrovan equipped with a video screen that Wilmore said will be playing Top Gun: Maverick.

One big difference at flights end: Starliner lands on the ground with cushioning airbags, while Dragon splashes into the sea.

THE FUTURE

Boeing is committed to six Starliner trips for NASA after this one, which will take the company to the stations planned end in 2030. Boeings Nappi is reluctant to discuss other potential customers until this inaugural crew flight is over. But the company has said a fifth seat will be available to private clients. SpaceX periodically sells seats to tycoons and even countries eager to get their citizens to the station for a couple weeks.

Coming soon: Sierra Spaces mini shuttle, Dream Chaser, which will deliver cargo to the station later this year or next, before accepting passengers.

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Boeing is about to face a big test after falling behind Elon Musk's SpaceX - Fortune

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