Hey everybody, checking back to the Elon Musk Podcast.
This is a show where we discuss the critical crossroads, the
shape, SpaceX, Tesla X, The Boring Company and Neuralink.
And I'm your host, Will Walden. One more thing.
Before we start, Google Podcasts is being discontinued by Google,
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Search for Elon Musk podcast. So Elon Musk is currently
defined a Brazilian Supreme Court order aimed at censoring
certain user content under the guise of combating fake news.
This legal conflicts shows that there's a huge issue regarding
freedom of expression and freedom of speech and the role
of social media in Brazil. Now, the Brazilian judiciary has
demanded that X block content from Brazilian users, which the
court labels as false information are fake news.
And Musk's refusal to comply with these demands has led to
significant legal scrutiny, positioning him against Brazil's
federal judiciary. Now, the inquiry, known as
Digital Militia Investigation, does not concern the common
issues of controlling Big Tech's influence, safeguarding
democracy, or child protection online.
Instead, it focuses on a political clash involving the
Supreme Court and critics of Brazil's president.
This indicates A politicized judicial system as of right now.
Now, critics argue that the Supreme Court's actions
represent a departure from democratic norms, suggesting
that the Brazilian judiciary no longer operates independently.
The scenario portrays A grim situation for democracy in
Brazil, which they claim is deteriorating publicly.
The controversy stems from the court's attempts to silence
commentators with opposing political views, though,
especially those who command significant influence through
social media platforms. Musk and many Brazilians regard
these actions as undemocratic and indicative.
Of a tyrannical. Approach to governance now
Historically, though, Brazil has championed civil liberties, with
the constitution upholding freedom of speech.
This principle has been foundational since Brazil's
return to democracy all the way back in 1985, making the current
judicial actions against free speech particularly jarring.
Now, the situation escalated following scandals involving the
Workers Party and former President Lula, who was
imprisoned in 2017 due to corruption charges.
These events tarnished the party's image and LED to a shift
in political power with the election of Bolsonaro in 2018.
Now. Bolsonaro, a former.
Army captain, known for his straightforward style, was
elected on promises to uphold privacy, private property
rights, restore order and freedom of speech, and
challenging prevailing social and political norms.
In Brazil, the support largely came from that was disillusioned
with the previous regime's corruption of policies, and
despite his controversial manner and rhetoric, Bolsonaro's
administration made significant strides in fiscal management,
deregulation, and improving the business environment through
digital initiatives. Now, by 2021, though,
Bolsonaro's potential re election seemed threatening
enough to his opponents that efforts were intensified to
rehabilitate Lula's political image.
The Supreme Court annulled Lula's conviction, enabling him
to participate in the 2022 presidential race.
This judicial intervention sparked widespread dissent,
particularly online, where Brazilians express their
disapproval now. The Electoral Tribunal responded
by increasingly censored online speech and targeting digital
platforms to comply with their directives.
The punitive measure is extended to financial sanctions and also
social ostracism, with some critics facing severe
repercussions like imprisonment and exile, often without due
process for merely questioning the legitimacy of Luda's
election victory. Now, despite the absence of
legislation supporting the judiciary stance on fake news,
the court persists in its demands for social media
platforms to block alleged misinformation, a stance that
Musk has publicly challenged. Now on April 6th, Musk
highlighted the opaque nature of these judicial orders on X,
emphasizing the lack of transparency about the reasons
behind the blocking orders and the identity of the missing
authority. He also noted the legal threats
posed by non compliance, including potential fines.
Now, Musk's resistance took a more active form when he
recently unblocked several users and threatened to disclose his
communications with a Brazilian court, arguing that the public
deserves transparency about these judicial interactions.
There's another thing going on at X.
We'll touch on that real quick. It's significant for its
operations. The platform's brand safety
score, as rated by Double Verify, was mistakenly low due
to a display error, affecting advertiser confidence and
investment in the company. Now they have to keep the lights
on in order to keep this fight going with Brazil now.
The misinformation about X's brand safety persisted for
several months though, influencing advertising
decisions detrimentally. The correction of this error in
Musk's ongoing public fight against censorship in Brazil
shows that X is in a tough spot right now.
They're not making a lot of money, they're doing OK, but
this brand awareness from double verify the brand safety score
could hurt them and it was months in the making.
So I'm expecting a lawsuit from Elon Musk and X in the.
Future for this Let's talk about some SpaceX news here.
The FAA and SpaceX are working. Very hard together to make sure
that the next. Flight of Starship.
Happens without a hitch now. Starship IFT 3 the integrated
flight test that just. Happened a little while ago, was
pretty much a success, right? So now they're moving forward
with the IFT 4 launch, and hopefully everything goes well
with that launch. Now the FAA has to work with
SpaceX in order to give them a flight license.
They have to make sure that everything's safe for SpaceX,
the rocket, the workers and also people in the way of the Rockets
flight. That's important.
They don't want to hurt anybody, any property or anything going
forward. With these flights.
Now it's important because SpaceX launches the Starship
over the Gulf of Mexico and apparently, according to the I
FT3 flight. Path.
It was going to land in the Indian Ocean.
The Starship was. The booster is going to land in
the Gulf of Mexico. OK, so the Starship might land
in the Indian Ocean. Again, we're not 100% sure
what's going on with this. We are guessing everyone's
guesstimating that it will happen similarly.
But there is some FAA hinting at what may happen for this next
one. So before anything happens, FAA
and SpaceX will be working together to make sure to safe
the whole operation. They have to make sure that
SpaceX uses the time between this flight, the last flight,
IFT 3 and IFT 4 to safe the area and make sure that they put
anything in place that they found was wrong in the last
flight. So anything in the booster or
anything in the ship, they have to fix it.
They have to change it in order to make it a safer flight.
For the future. Now there's a possible flight in
May. But it's not guaranteed.
Right now, the FAA needs to modify the launch license due to
changes potential changes in the flight profile.
We don't know exactly where this is going to land, but it might
land similarly close to where it was going to land in the Indian
Ocean, depending on the mission. Now, the FAA will prioritize the
public safety over anything else.
And public safety is paramount, for one thing.
Mainly, but mostly there, there's two things.
One mainly is the booster in the Gulf of Mexico, because that's
going to try to do a soft landing on a virtual tower,
according to Elon on flight. 4. And I made a video about flight
4 in flight 5 of Starship. So flight 4 they want to do a
virtual tower in the Gulf of Mexico.
This means that they're going to do the normal flight like
normal, like IFT 3, fly the ship to the Indian Ocean, get the
booster, hot stage separation, all of that stuff.
But after the hot stage separation, they're going to
send the booster into the Gulf of Mexico, land it vertically.
In the Gulf. Similar to what they would do
with a launch tower. Land it.
They're going to make a virtual tower.
Maybe they're going to use some sort of a?
R. VR set up so they know exactly
what's going to happen. I don't know.
What they're going to do at that point?
But hopefully they have a really good understanding of the
landing mechanics of the booster because they haven't even gotten
it close to landing now. IFT 1, IFT 2, IFT 3.
We haven't even seen the booster get close to landing in the Gulf
of Mexico. So IFT 4 if they can nail this.
Elon has said in his latest talk that he wants to land the
booster at Starbase, and I don't know if this is a great.
Idea I'm. I don't know, I'm so scared of
this. I don't want them to move back
six months because. They landed a.
Booster and it wasn't prepared to land yet.
I'm just I'm terrified that they could blow something up or
something could happen. They haven't got a Rudd at
Starbase and they could set themselves back six months.
Now, I know this is a thing that they have thought about.
They're rocket scientists after all.
They're engineers. They're scientists.
They do this for a living. They make a bunch of money doing
this. And I'm not that guy.
I am a coder, I know how difficult code is, but landing a
rocket, not 100% an expert at that.
And that's why I default to the engineers and the scientists at
SpaceX. And I trust them that they'll do
the right thing. But I'm also scared that they're
going to set themselves back. I just don't want them to do
that. But the landing attempt in the
Gulf of Mexico, let me know what you think about it in the
comments below. I think it's scary.
That's all I'm going to say. It's got to be a wild ride.
It's got to be excitement guaranteed, as Elon says.
But we do have some information from an FAA spokesperson, Jim
Coleman said that I think we could possibly get there, which
means a launch in May. I'm not going to say we will get
there, absolutely, but I won't say it's out of the question
either. On the possibility of a May
launch. He said that the other day,
three days ago. He also said they're going to do
some different things with this particular missions, referring
to changes in the flight profile.
So IFT 3, they did normal flight profile booster back to the Gulf
of Mexico and it did a Rudd and today it exploded over the Gulf
of Mexico, which is fine. They expected something like
that and they did hot stage firing was great.
They did the Starlink door, they opened up the Starlink door,
which was fantastic. And they did some communications
with the ground we've heard about.
They did some live video feeds, which we didn't expect them to
do, but it was fantastic as well.
And then they try to land the Starship in the Indian Ocean.
Now I have T. 4, they're going to, as Elon said as well,
they're going to try to get the Starship to the height,
basically a melting point of the Starship as it reenters the
atmosphere into the Indian Ocean and then it's going to there.
I think they're going to explode Indian in the Indian Ocean.
So we're expecting that. Now, there's other things.
The virtual tower landing, not exactly sure what that is, but
Elon has said it. They might do a public safety
review. The FAA might do a public safety
review with a full mishap investigation or from the full
mishap investigation that SpaceX does just to speed up the
process. But I think that's what's going
to happen from here on out. Elon and SpaceX and company will
do a full mishap investigation form the previous launch and
then the FAA will look at it and do a public safety review
depending on that mishap information and investigation
information that they send over. They're both willing and able to
do this. Fast.
FAA said they are willing to go fast by may they want to in the
separation of the public safety review.
Hence it a potential difference between public safety flaws and
broader mishap investigation details.
Now SpaceX is going to have to do some things though before
they launch this rocket. Pre launch checks FAA likely
conducts conducts a thorough review of the launch vehicle and
launch procedures to ensure that they meet safety standards as
normal. They should do this.
It can involve inspections, simulations, and analysis of new
potential risks for IFT 4 and IFT 5 going forward.
The flight path. If it's changed the trajectory,
FAA might assess the flight path a trajectory to ensure a minimal
risk to populated areas and also debris.
What could happen? Debris and blast radius.
So if they read somewhere in the Gulf of Mexico, what's that
blast radius look like? What's the debris going to look
like and where's the good debris going to end up since the ocean
is so huge, The debris from it's a big rocket to us, but to the
ocean it's nothing. Don't think Elon and company and
the FEA are going to worry about A1 rocket booster or one rocket
in the Gulf of Mexico or the Indian Ocean.
Now another thing that the FEA works on.
Is the launch abort system. The Rudd system, basically the
FTS, basically this thing blows up a rocket if something goes
wrong, and Elon and company have shown that it works.
After the IFT one mishap where it didn't work and the thing
spun out of control. Now they know what they're
doing. FT-2, IFT 3, both worked great.
The they're working forward, They're working with SpaceX on
the CFA and SpaceX, they're working on this critical safety
flaws. Elon and company are working on
those. The FAA might want to confirm
there aren't any critical safety flaws for the next rocket flight
profile. Like I said before, overall
public safety is a paramount for the FAA and SpaceX as well.
If anything happens public safety wise, Elon and company
are going to be pushed back possibly for months, maybe a
year or two depending on the severity of the public safety
incident. Now, IFT 5, this is going to be
a wild ride. If they do that booster landing
in the Gulf of Mexico, what's going to happen?
I want them to go as fast as possible.
And of course, iterative design is the best way to do rocket
design, apparently, because we know that Elon and SpaceX,
they're killing it right now. They're doing great work.
So there's no reason why they should not continue doing this
in the future. Let me ask.
You a question Would you pay to be part of a social media
network? More importantly, would you pay
to be a user on elonmusksx.com? So Elon Musk has just announced
a plan to charge new users on the social media platform X,
formerly known as Twitter. Of course, a fee to post
content. Would you pay for that?
That's the question. This aims to address the ongoing
issue about accounts that plagued the platform.
Musk believes that imposing a small fee on new users is
essential for combating the influx of these fake accounts
now. Since acquiring Twitter, though,
in 2022, Musk has repeatedly floated the idea of a user fee.
He suggests that such a fee could effectively deter the
creation of spam accounts driven by artificial intelligence and
coordinating with troll farms, which can easily bypass
traditional security measures such as CAPTCHA.
Now, as part of an experimental policy implemented in October of
2023, X began charging new unverified users in New Zealand
and the Philippines an annual fee of $1.00.
Now, this fee enabled these users to engage fully with the
platform, allowing them to post and interact with other content
which was otherwise restricted. Now, the issue of bots on X has
been a persistent challenge, one that Elon Musk has vowed to
conquer even before finalizing his purchase of the platform.
His strategy has involved various initiatives aimed at
reducing these unwanted accounts, which not only distort
user engagement metrics but also compromise the overall user
experience. On April 15th of this year,
attention was drawn to a change in X's policy that indicated a
potential expansion of the annual user fee to additional
countries. This update was first spotted by
an automated tracking account on X.
And was later. Confirmed by Elon Musk in a
series of posts, Musk said unfortunately a small fee for
new user write access is the only way to curb the relentless
onslaught of bots. Current AI and troll farms can
pass the quote Are you a bot test with ease.
Now he shows that he's using some rationale for the policy
shift, highlighting the ineffectiveness of conventional
security measures against sophisticated automated AI
systems. Now, despite the introduction of
a user fee, must clarify that new users would not be
indefinitely bound to this fee. You mentioned that after an
initial three months, new users would gain full access to the
platform without any payment, thus providing a balance between
initial security measures and eventual.
User freedom now. Let me ask you a question.
If the bots are so powerful that they can bypass everything,
$1.00 fee doesn't seem like a lot if you can gain 1000 dollars
$10,000 a $100,000 from using the platform with your bot.
Of course, on the black market, on the Gray market, there are
credit cards that are stolen and possibility that they could use
those credit cards with their bots to use their influence to
make more money than $1.00 on the platform per year.
The introduction of fees for new users coincides with broader
efforts by X to cleanse the platform of spam and bots
accounts, though earlier in the month, X initiated a major purge
aimed at reducing these accounts, though the impact on
the platform's bot population remains to be seen.
There's no data out there yet from Elon Musk or from X.
Now. Musk's approach to managing X
also involves leveraging the platform's data for his other
ventures. For instance, his AI company, X
AI, utilizes public posts from X to train its machine learning
algorithms. This integration shows that Elon
is using his broader vision and all of his companies combined to
make XAI better. But if there are bot accounts on
X, he's not getting clean data for his AI models, and that's
going to be a huge problem in the future.
You know, X's strategy to monetize and also, let's say,
enhance user engagement includes making its advanced chatbot,
Grok, available to premium users.
And like I said, if that's trained on bot information.
There's no real upside to it. Because if there's millions of
bots, bot accounts compared to human accounts, it's going to be
a a tough go for Grok at this point.
Now Grok used to be offered at a higher subscription tier and is
now more accessible, potentially increasing its use and relevance
within the user base. Now the financial aspect of
these changes is significant. X has been facing financial
challenges with a reported 71%. Drop in its value since Musk's
takeover. The.
Introduction of a posting fee could provide a new revenue
stream at a time when the platform has experienced
significant advertising revenue losses.
Now, the decline in advertising dollars was particularly stark
following a backlash from advertisers over content
moderation issues. Companies like Comcast, Apple
and the Walt Disney Company withdrew their ads after reports
service of ads appearing next to inappropriate content including
pro Nazi and hate speech. Now Musk's direct responses to
advertisers concerns have been controversial.
In an interview, he bluntly criticized those withdrawing
their advertising from X, which reflects his unconventional
approach to business and public relations in response to the
ongoing challenges with brand safety.
Though third party firms like Double Verify have been involved
in assessing the suitability of content on X for advertisers,
there been discrepancies in these assessments, indicating
ongoing issues with maintaining a brand safe environment.
The bot problem at X is not just a nuisance, but it's a huge
operational challenge impacting everything from user experience
to advertising, trust and revenue.
And Musk's decision to impose a posting fee on new users is a
strategic move to mitigate these issues.
Albeit we don't know how effective this is going to be,
and neither does Elon at this point.
Could drive some users away. I know to post on X.
There's no reason for me to pay a dollar for that.
I'll just move to a different platform.
Most people think the same way and these platforms have been
historically free and we can post whatever we want whenever
we want to. Facebook, even Threads, now all
of these platforms, Instagram. YouTube.
Spotify for podcasters where we post this podcast, everything's
free to post. Why would I pay even a dollar to
be able to post on this platform now?
This policy change has sparked a variety of reactions like mine
right there, and I would love to hear what you say about it.
Because if you're a user of X, you should be concerned about
this. Some view the feat as a
necessary evil. Though and I.
Totally understand that if there are hundreds of millions of bots
running around doing malicious things.
Putting a barrier. To entry in front of them is.
One of the best. Ways to mitigate this now?
These the quality of interactions on X, while others
are concerned about the potential barrier it creates for
new users. I can understand that too.
Maybe you don't have a dollar to interact with these platforms.
Maybe you're in a financial situation.
Maybe you're in a different country than the United States
and you don't make a lot of money.
You don't make a dollar. That you can put towards social
media, so I can understand that too.
And you'd probably move platforms like I was talking
about before, move over to Threads or just move to
Instagram or some other platform, Facebook, et cetera,
so you can post your content. And that's understandable.
And as X continues to evolve under Musk's leadership, the
effectiveness of this new fee system in combating bots will be
important all over. Stakeholders from users to
advertisers, will be watching closely to see what happens with
his imposed $1.00 fee for X. On today's episode, we're going
to be talking about Spacex's HLS mission to the moon, NASA's
Orion spacecraft, and how things may completely change for the
Artemis missions going forward. Now, originally NASA wanted
SpaceX to launch the lunar HLS Starship to Moon orbit, where it
would dock with the Orion spacecraft and the HLS ship
would take the astronauts down to the surface of the moon.
Now, something drastic may be changing in the near future.
There's been murmurings that behind closed doors, NASA is
discussing a low Earth orbit transfer of astronauts between
the Orion spacecraft and the Starship HLS.
Now, these are unconfirmed right now.
They haven't released anything about this yet, but Ars Technica
posted an article about it and Eric Berger is very reputable
and he was the one that posted this article.
What may be happening with the Starship in the Orion?
So let's just wind it in a little bit because we have to
understand what the process is of getting the HLS.
Starship. To the moon first.
OK, so first they have to launch a fuel depot or a fuel fuel, a
few fuel depots for the actual Starship to fuel up in low Earth
orbit before it gets to the moon, before it launches to the
moon. In NASA, it said somewhere
around 10:00-ish. In SpaceX, Elon Musk said
somewhere around 10 to 15. So we're going to go on the low
side. We're going to say about 10
depots will be launched to low Earth orbit where the HLS
Starship will dock with them and fuel up before it goes to the
moon. Then the HLS will be fueled up
and possibly in between the fuel and going to the moon.
Like that step right there? Astronauts will fly on an SLS
rocket to. Low Earth orbit.
And then dock with the Starship. Now, we're not sure if this is
even feasible right now. We know that this is going to be
a thing in the future, but there are some caveats to this that
could make this a more impressive mission and also
could save NASA billions of dollars in the future.
You're asking yourself, why do they need the SLS rocket if it's
not going all the way to the moon?
That's what I'm asking myself too.
If the Orion capsule could be retrofitted to be on top of a
Starship or on top of a Dragon or Falcon 9 instead of a Dragon
capsule, that's a possibility. But you're also probably
thinking, why don't they just use a Dragon capsule and dock
that with the Starship? Because Dragon capsules already
go to low Earth orbit and they can dock with the International
Space Station. So that seems like the logical
next step, right? Not quite yet.
So there will be a possible mission with the Orion
spacecraft and the HLS Starship? Because they need to test this
out to see if the Orion can actually.
Dock with the Starship. While in space, because that's
what they're going to be doing in the Moon's orbit, and the
Dragon capsule cannot go to the Moon and dock with the Starship
and come back to Earth. It just isn't feasible.
It doesn't work like that. The physics don't work.
The Dragon capsule is not built for that.
So they need to use the Orion capsule or some other capsule
that could be created in the future for docking with the
Starship and then coming back to Earth.
So once the astronauts are on board the Starship, then three
or more astronauts would fly their way to the moon's orbit,
where they would land on the moon's surface.
And then when they're done with their science and
experimentation on a lunar surface, they would fly back up
and dock with the Orion capsule or the Moon station, transfer
the astronauts again, and then from the Orion, they would come
back down to Earth. The HLS rocket would stay either
in the lunar orbit or docked with the Moon station until the
next mission and possibly just land on the moon and wait for
another HLS rocket to come up because there's a limited shelf
life for these things while they're in space and orbiting in
the moon. So could land it on the moon and
it could become a habitat for future astronauts.
Now, the good thing about going to the moon in the HLS is that
you're not cramped like the Orion spacecraft.
The Orion spacecraft, even though it is a modern marvel of
engineering, there's not a lot of room.
You can't really move around a lot.
You can't really do much, and you can't really stretch a lot.
There's no, there's no room for activities there.
With the HLS Starship. It's 9 meters around, 30 feet
around. It's a massive ship and if they
can construct this so the astronauts could just fly all
the way to the moon on the HLS rocket, seems like it's totally
doable. Then they could land the
Starship with the astronauts on board and it would be a much
better experience for the astronauts.
They could have more experimentation time because the
HLS rocket could have more room for experiments and so low Earth
orbit experimentation while they're waiting.
Or. They could do experimentation
all the way to the moon and while they get to the moon,
while they orbit the moon and when they land on the moon.
So the experimentation time and the experimentation mass of
experimentation could be much bigger than just going in the
Orion space capsule. Because it seems, I don't know,
it seems like this is the win win.
We've been talking about this for a long time.
I know a lot of space reporters were like, why do we need Orion
when Starship's going to low Earth orbit anyway and they're
going to dock with Starship and then go didn't make a lot of
sense. So we've been talking about this
for a long time. But since there's murmurings
within NASA now about this happening, it's this totally a
possibility. They're going to need to launch
a few SLS, few more SLS rockets before they change completely
over to the Starship because Starship can do everything that
SLS can and possibly even more. It's, it looks like a bright
future for HLS Starship. Now the first mission that these
astronauts may do because they can't go into the Starship
immediately then fly to the moon, this they need to test
this thing out. So the Polaris program was going
to test a docking from a dragon into a Starship and do some low
Earth orbit experimentation and check out to see if the Starship
is feasible for low Earth orbit or moon travel.
And that was going to be the initial docking and testing
phase. So there's a possibility that
the Orion could, or maybe even a Dragon could do this docked with
the HLS. 2 astronauts would transfer into the HLS Starship,
while two others would stay inside the Dragon capsule and do
testing from there. From a distance.
They could do maneuvering, they could do some burns, they could
do orientations, they could possibly even do an.
Eva, which doesn't make. A lot of sense from a Starship
standpoint, but it might be something they do in the future
just for testing. Then they could redock with the
Dragon capsule and then come back down to Earth.
So they have to test the Starship out before they get it
to the moon. So the HLS Starship is that
might be the first Test of this series of tests.
Then that HLS Starship could fly to the moon and do a test
landing on the lunar surface, just to make sure that there's
no astronauts on board in case something bad happens.
So. Let me know down the commas
below what you think about this 'cause it seems like a logical
step forward. Like why would they even use the
Orion capsule in low Earth orbit to test this when they have a
Dragon capsule? But they do need the Orion
capsule to go to the moon and come back down to Earth, so I
could totally get that. I totally get that part.
But everything else seems very logical.
Dock in Earth orbit and make sure that everything's OK with
the Starship and command a gigantic spaceship between the
Earth and the moon. That sounds like a no brainer to
me. 150 to 200 feet long Starship.
It's a massive ship. Can do all sorts of sciencing
all sorts of engineering on your way to the moon and in low earth
orbit while you wait and then head to the moon.
Sounds sounds great to me. Let me know what you think down
in the comments. Now, does this make the SLS
rocket unsustainable for the billions and billions of dollars
per launch that it costs? I think it does.
I think it does because if the Orion spacecraft only has to go
to the Earth orbit. They can launch it from another
rocket, whether it's a ULA rocket, what it whatever.
It could be a star or it could be another SpaceX rocket, who
knows. I'm not sure exactly what the
configuration would be, but the SLS rocket is a jobs program it
makes. America, a bunch of money, and
these people are spread across the whole nation making and
designing, building, engineering, all of these parts
to build this massive SLS rocket.
So the SLS rocket is a jobs program as well.
So they would lose tax money and they would lose funding if they
get rid of the SLS rocket. So I don't think they're going
to get rid of the SLS rocket. They may use it for deep space
exploration or something like that in the future and just
shift over to Starship and SpaceX for the time being for
the moon launches and maybe SLS will be more Mars and further
out into the solar system in the future.
But we know that Starship will be.
Capable in the future of going to Mars as well so.
There's really no reason to use SLS anymore if this is true.
Other than super far out space like science missions, it's a
massive rocket and Starship can do everything the SLS can do and
then more. So I think this might be the end
of the SLS program. This might be the beginning of
the end of the SLS. Program.
Today we're gonna be talking about a company named Max Space
and the idea of building massive, massive, massive
inflatable space stations on Mars.
What is this? What is this thing?
I'm not 100% sure that this is even feasible, but according to
Max Space, within the next 10 years we're going to have
stadium sized space stations in the orbit of the Earth, but also
space stations on the surface of Mars, possibly in Mars orbit,
anywhere in the solar system. And most of these, every
component could be flown on a SpaceX Falcon 9 and in the
future for the stadium, the massive ones could be launched
out of SpaceX Starship. Now these things have been tried
in the past and some of them successful and some of them not
so successful. But right now there are two that
we know of. One of the Co founders of this
company actually has two inflatable modules in space
right now and they've been orbiting the Earth for a while
now. I want to tell you about
Maxspace they just released. Kind of a.
Press release recently and I'm going to talk about some of the
points of this press release. 40 years of building successful
space companies is Maxspace 2 entrepreneurs.
Aaron Kemmer who's the Co founder of Maxspace and said
that they're going to bring this technology to light in the next
few years. I don't even understand this
because it's so wild. I'd love to bring you wild
stuff. Let's roll the clip.
Here you can see they're building a Lunar Module mock up,
but also they have a clip. Of the interior of.
One of these modules, absolutely massive amount of space for
anybody that's travelling to space.
So that was wild, right? You can see that there's an
inflatable space station ready to be built.
All of these modules can be connected.
You can get different sizes, different shapes.
They can do different things like medical, they could be a
sleeping pod, there could be something like a workout pod.
These things could be built into anything you wanted.
Or maybe like they want to do, they want to do a space hotel,
they want to make it into a tourism destination, put a
couple of these pods up in space in orbit, fly people up there on
a Falcon 9 dock with it. It'll be sturdy enough to do all
this stuff. By the way, it's not inflatable
like, you know, like a. Pool.
Toy or something like that. It's very structurally rigid, so
it can handle anything the space station can handle and then
some. It's actually more protected
from projectiles in the space station, which is incredible.
They want to disrupt space, the Space Flight industry.
They want to disrupt space tourism.
Because right now there's only a few things you can do in space.
You can fly the space and orbit the Earth.
You can go to the space station, and that's about it.
But in the future, if Max Space is successful, they're going to
allow people to go to space and live in a space hotel for a
little while. It's like an Airbnb in space.
How cool is that? Or maybe, you know, maybe
there's a shorter duration where you do get to orbit the Earth a
bunch of times, then come back down, dock with the Falcon 9,
come back down, or with the dragon, sorry, the Crew Dragon,
then come back down to Earth. You know, when your mission is
done and think about the scientific benefits of having a
massive space station. Not only can you have space to
do things, room to do things, but you can bring up equipment,
say on a SpaceX Starship, massive equipment.
That you could. Feed into this thing in the
future or masses of equipment, not massive because we don't
know what the ports are going to be like on this in the future,
but masses of equipment, tonnage of equipment that you can put
into low Earth orbit inside of one of these modules.
Sounds pretty impressive, right? And the Co owners or the Co
founders and Aaron Kemmer and maximum of Dejong.
Max is a visionary in this space.
Designer, engineer, manufacturing, space deployment.
Everything is already been done by Max and he's built first two
inflatable spacecraft pressure halls, Genesis One and Genesis 2
which are circling the globe right now.
So there's a. Proven track record from.
From at least Max going forward and also Aaron as sort of like a
Aaron's the kind of the business guy behind this as far as I know
and Max is the engineering brains behind it.
But they do have a small. Team that they're working with
to get this done. Medicine and space engineering
and space space construction. Think about that.
This could be a way for them to store like a storage modules as
well in space. So if you bring up pieces for, I
don't know, a habitat in space, some other sort of habitat in
space, or some spacecraft where you need.
There's a bunch of small parts that you need to put into one
spot. This could be the way to do.
It and you can transport them from either a Starship or a
Falcon 9 and you could transport them and store them there until
they're needed after you build the rest of the platform until
you put all these modules together.
The thing is you can build these modules according to them kind
of as big as you want to. And what's really cool about
this is that they can build something as big as the space
station or a little bit bigger for a fraction of the cost.
The space station costs $100 billion to run over the time
that it's been up in space, and they think that they can get it
down to about $1 billion in operational cost.
To. Build this thing in space, fly
these and put them in space. So if they could cut it down to
a billion dollars, imagine the cost savings for that.
And also imagine what else they could put into space for $100
billion. How?
Large. That space station would be so
they're saying a stadium size like a like a football or soccer
field size to begin with. Like, that's what's what they're
aiming for, bigger than the ISS. They want to be bigger than the
ISS, and there's more room inside than the ISS.
And also, there's no reason why they can't go bigger than that.
They're in microgravity. So the gravity isn't going to be
yanking down on either end of this thing.
It's gonna float around the whole orbit of the Earth.
I mean, the possibilities are endless up here, you know, with
these modules. So I just want to let you know
about it because I think it's a really impressive idea and they
have a really impressive track record as well, Max, especially
Aaron as well. Aaron is.
He's had a couple. Space programs, space companies
in the past made in Space, which is space manufacturing Magic,
which is an AI assistant. He's also a former board member
of Red Wire Space and he exited in 2021.
He's a board member of Outpost Space in a prolific space Angel
investor. That's what Aaron is.
And Max is a visionary and design engineering and
manufacturer of space deployment architecture.
So he built the first two inflatable spacecraft and
they're in orbit still. So that's pretty good as of
right now. So Aaron prestigious 30 under 30
Forbes list as well. So business is in Aaron's blood.
Let's see, Aaron LED Made in space.
To fly dozens of. Successful space missions and
over $250 million in NASA contracts.
Aaron holds 6 patents in space related tech with four
additional patents pending. So I may have gotten a little
bit wrong about Aaron. I thought Aaron was an Angel
investor to begin with here and I know he's he's run some
businesses in the past and he has some patents.
So I didn't, I didn't say that at the beginning.
So I'm like coming back. Full circle here.
To let you know about this and then red wire space, of course,
working right now with Max space, wild, wild, wild, wild.
I hope we have cameras. Hope there's a, a dragon capsule
or something up there that can film this or they they pop out a
little module with a with a camera.
That would be great. But we'll see.
We'll see what happens in the near future and I hope it's
successful. That's all I got to say.
I hope it's successful. It's going to be wild.
Tesla has issued a recall for all 3878 cyber trucks.
It is delivered due to a defect where the accelerator pedal can
become stuck, increasing the risk of accidents for the
drivers and the people inside the vehicle, as well as other
vehicles on the road. Now, the issue has been
identified by the National Highway Traffic Safety
Administration or the NHTSA, which noted the potential for
the pedal to lodge in the trim around the footwell, posing a
serious safety risk. Now, this recall makes a
challenging period for Tesla following workforce deductions
exceeding 10% or 14,000 people and the departure of key
executives earlier in this week. Now, these events were
compounded by a legal set back involving CEO Elon Musk's
compensation package, which shareholders are now
reconsidering after a judge's ruling.
Now, complaints about the Cybertruck's faulty accelerator
pedal emerged recently, prompting Tesla to halt
deliveries temporarily as it addresses the defect.
On social media, Musk emphasized the company's cautious approach,
stating that there have been no incidents or injuries reported
in relation to this defects. And nobody's been hurt yet,
which is great. And Tesla confirmed the
technical cause of the problem to the NHTSA, linking it to an
unauthorized use of lubricant during the assembly process,
which compromised the pedal's attachment.
This discovery led to the decision on April 12th to
proceed with a full recall of the Cybertrucks.
Company plans to rectify the issue by replacing or repairing
the accelerator pedals on all affected Cybertrucks.
Additionally, Tesla has begun incorporating a redesigned pedal
in new vehicles and is addressing units currently in
transit or at delivery centers. Now, despite the Cybertruck only
beginning shipments late the previous year, this isn't its
first recall. An earlier, less severe recall
involved updating software across all Tesla models due to a
font size of the warning lights. Now, Tesla's first revealed the
Cybertruck in 2019, but its launch was delayed until last
year due to production challenges and supply issues
related to its batteries. The recent recalls and other
setbacks have not only affected Tesla's operational momentum,
also its stock value, which saw a significant decline in the
past week. The Drive reported that drivers
experiencing stuck pedals could still halt their Cybertrucks
using the brake, although the vehicle will continue to move
slightly now. This flaw raised concerns over
the vehicle's safety during operation.
Social media posts from Tesla owners indicated temporary halts
in Cybertruck deliveries, with some reporting issues with the
accelerator pedal getting wedged.
The community response included sharing videos on social media
and photos that highlight the defects impact on pedal
functionality, which grew greater attention to this
defect. Now, despite no injuries or
accidents, the seriousness of the potential risk prompted
Tesla to take swift action about this.
Musk reiterated on X that the company's focus on safety and
the precautionary steps being taken are all about safety being
the priority. A Recently, Tesla Cyber Truck
customers noted on X that deliveries have resumed with
updates on Vins and scheduled delivery dates, indicating that
Tesla is progressing with fixes and addressing customer concerns
effectively. Tesla's proactive measures in
resolving the pedal issue show that they maintain high safety
standards going forward with the Cyber Truck.
The automaker has historically emphasized safety in his vehicle
designs, aiming to position his models as leaders in the
respective categories. Now, as Tesla addresses the
recent challenge, it's implementing both hardware
replacements and production adjustments and will update
software when needed. And the approach aims to ensure
that all new and existing cyber trucks meet stringent safety
criteria before they are delivered to customers.
And in response to the recall, Tesla has announced that
affected vehicle owners will receive notification letters in
June outlining the details and instructions for remedying the
accelerator pedal issue at no cost to the owners.
The first quarter of 2024 has seen Tesla recall approximately
2.4 million vehicles across various models for different
issues, according to Busy Car. While most of these recalls are
typically resolved with software updates, the current situation
requires a more hands on approach where you have to take
it to the shop or they can come to you.
And besides the accelerator pedal recall, Tesla has recently
addressed other safety concerns through recalls, such as a
significant recall in February concerning warning light font
sizes. Furthermore, an ongoing
investigation into power steering issues by US safety
regulators has been escalated to an engineering analysis, but
Tesla was swift about this. They are concerned for the
safety of their drivers. That's one of the major.
Key. Features that Tesla offers that
some other automakers don't. But they have ongoing efforts to
innovate and approve the vehicle lineup, and they're resilient in
the face of operational changes. The company continues to adapt
its production and quality assurance processes to prevent
future issues for the Cybertruck and all other vehicles in their
lineup. Tesla Inc recently announced A
substantial reduction of its workforce, cutting approximately
14,000 jobs, or about 10% of all of its employees.
That's a ongoing financial challenge at Tesla right now.
It's a shift in the company's strategic direction and there's
cost reductions at foot at a new.
Focus on specific. Technological advancement such
as a robo taxi in development and the manner in which these
layoffs were conducted has drawn significant criticism.
And that means that there's issues in corporate
communication and management empathy at this point.
Now, the layoffs were communicated via e-mail, with
many employees learning about their job loss in less than
ideal circumstances. And reports indicate that some
employees receive their termination notices in the
middle of their work shift or upon attempting to access their
workplace, only to find their security credentials
deactivated. This method of notification has
been perceived as impersonal and indicative of poor planning and
poor management, and also poor consideration for the impacted
employees emotional and professional well-being.
Now, an incident at Texas Gigafactory illustrated the
harsh reality of these layoffs. An employee shared their
experience with the local news outlet stating.
I was literally standing outside trying to figure out why my
badge wasn't working. Why is it that I can't log in
only to find out that they had been laid off?
Such instances show that this is abrupt and disorganized, and
it's not to be taken lightly. Now, the official communication
from Tesla cited A thorough organizational review and the
different decisions to globally reduce headcount as the reasons
behind the layoffs. The affected employees were
informed that their positions were eliminated due to this
restructuring, adding to the high stress situation and the
uncertainty of this time. Now, the reaction to this layoff
has been overwhelmingly negative, with critics pointing
out the lack of foresight and empathy in Tesla's layoff
strategy. Comparisons were made to
previous layoffs conducted by other companies by Elon Musk,
where similar patterns of abrupt and minimally communicated job
cuts were observed. From a business perspective,
Tesla maintains that the layoffs are a necessary step towards
adjusting to current market demands and financial realities.
The company is navigating decreased sales and a
significant shift in project focus, moving away from some
early automotive plans in favor of developing new technologies
like robo taxis. We've heard about this for years
and it looks like it may be happening now.
Despite legal compliance offering laid off employees
compensation through June 15th, which aligns with a 60 day
notice period, the approach taken by Tesla has been
questioned. The focus appears to be on legal
adherence rather than genuinely supportive practices that
consider the well-being of the individuals affected.
Now, personal accounts and broader reports suggest that the
layoff process added significantly to the emotional
distress experienced by employees.
Losing a job abruptly destabilizes personal and
financial plans. In the manner in which these
layoffs were executed only intensified these difficulties.
And while Tesla is known for its innovation and has been
significant success in the electric vehicle market,
company's internal practices, particularly in human resources,
have often been criticized. Situation shows that Tesla and
the related employee treatment is not up to par.
Now. The layoffs are part of a
broader context where Tesla is adjusting its strategic goals.
Earlier announcements had focused on producing a more
affordable electric car, the $25,000 EV if you will.
A recent shift seemed to prioritize the development of
autonomous driving technology and other high tech products.
This restructuring shows that the market is changing and the
operations at Tesla are also changing, including missed
delivery dates that have happened recently and reported
issues with the launch of new models like the Cybertruck.
Additionally, rumors about the cancellation of the low cost
Model 2 vehicle have added to uncertainty, although Elon Musk
has disputed these claims. Financially, Tesla has
experienced a significant downturn, with a 37% drop in
share prices this year and a notable decline in sales.
The first quarter report showed a 8.5% decrease in deliveries
compared to the previous year, marking the first such decline
since disruptions caused by the 2020 global pandemic.
Amidst these strategic and operational upheavals, Tesla has
also proposed A substantial pay package for CEO Elon Musk.
Similar to a previous compensation plan that was
voided by a court decision due to governance concerns.
This proposal is likely to be scrutinized in light of the
layoffs and financial performance.
It's $58 billion, by the way. And in response to criticisms of
the layoff process, Elon Musk acknowledged that some severance
packages were incorrectly low and assure that these errors
will be corrected. This acknowledgement, however,
it does little to mitigate the broader concerns about how the
layoffs were managed and communicated.
Now, Musk's e-mail to employees attempted to address some of the
fallout, stating as we reorganize Tesla, it has come to
my attention that some severance packages are incorrectly low.
My apologies for this mistake. It is being corrected
immediately. And despite these efforts, the
damage to employee morale and public perception may be harder
to mend. And looking forward, Tesla's
management faces the challenge of rebuilding trust not only
with its workforce but also with investors in the public.
The company must navigate the strategic pivot while ensuring
more consideration and strategic handling of its workforce,
especially during transitions that involve job cuts of the
layoffs at Tesla have thus sparked a broader discussion
about corporate responsibility and the ethical implications of
how layoffs are conducted. For a company at the foreprint
of technological innovation, the human element of business
practices remains a critical. Area for their improvement.
Hey, thank you so much for listening today.
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