Congrats to @elonmusk and @SpaceX on the largest IPO in history. Tens of thousands worked to tackle some of the hardest engineering problems imaginable, revolutionizing an industry in service of their nation and humanity, are now fully realizing the American Dream🇺🇸
May this moment spark many more companies like it across the domains of the future, unlocking new capabilities and prosperity for those who dare to dream.
Fable 5 estimates that Musk employs a half million direct and indirect people in the US connected to businesses he created paying in $5-7B+ into SS. Bernie knows this but chooses to distort reality to create villains and divide our country
bro immigrated from Mexico and took a $28/hr contract welding job in 2015.
didn't even know what SpaceX was.
they gave him $10,000 in stock and let him buy more through payroll deductions.
that stake is now worth $880,000.
and he's one of 4,400 employees who became millionaires on Friday. welders. technicians. cafeteria staff.
I found the SpaceX IPO surprisingly emotional today. It reminded me of why I came to the US as an 18-year-old. Even then, I knew that I wanted to build stuff, and that the place to do it was America. There was no second option in the world.
The concept of American exceptionalism is nothing new, but I have come to appreciate the culture that justifies it. SpaceX is yet another case in point. America’s risk-taking culture celebrates wild successes while embracing the legitimacy of hard-earned failure. American culture doesn’t celebrate inherited wealth, nor does it frown upon inherited poverty. It doesn’t seek to create equal outcomes, but rather equal opportunity.
It is not immediately obvious that this is unique in the world. Truly unique. I’m Canadian, and I love many aspects of Canadian culture, but Canadian culture does not offer people the same environment in which to take risks.
I write this because I was dismayed to see US politicians complaining of the extreme wealth created by the SpaceX IPO. Say what you will about wealth inequality, or a single man’s politics, but don’t tell me that immense wealth creation in America is bad. Do not tell me you’d rather SpaceX not exist, exactly as it does. That you’d rather this company exist in some other country or culture.
Thankfully, despite today’s politics, SpaceX could not have been a Chinese company, or a Canadian one, or a French one. It could only ever have been an American one.
If nationalism is pride in your birthplace, then it’s merely tribalism, which serves to divide us. But if it’s pride in your culture, a culture that lets people achieve incredible things like this, then under those terms I am a nationalist. I want to protect and enhance our culture of risk-taking, of celebrating wins, and of celebrating failures along the way.
I think it is amazing that America created a trillionaire out of a risk-taking immigrant. It is absolutely fucking absurd, of course, but isn’t that the point? SpaceX is not a reason to be pissed off; it’s a reason for every person in the world who wants to build stuff to see themselves as American, no matter where in the world they live.
p.s. — this is entirely from my brain, with AI used only for fixing typos and grammar. :^)
History's first trillionaire is a guy who catches rockets out of the sky with chopsticks and beams internet to every dead zone on the planet.
Same guy ships cars that drive themselves, humanoid robots for the factory floor, brain chips that let paralyzed people move a cursor with pure thought, and an AI running on a supercomputer his team stood up in months instead of years.
And the people crashing out about his net worth are doing it on the app he owns. The same app governments spent years trying to censor.
You cannot legislate a rocket into orbit.
The US government, citing national security authorities, has issued an export control directive to suspend all access to Fable 5 and Mythos 5 by any foreign national, whether inside or outside the United States, including foreign national Anthropic employees.
The net effect of this order is that we must abruptly disable Fable 5 and Mythos 5 for all our customers to ensure compliance.
Access to all other Claude models is not affected.
We apologize for this disruption to our customers. We believe this is a misunderstanding and are working to restore access as soon as possible.
Read our full statement: https://t.co/bwn0sximKZ
I couldn’t care less about what career politicians like AOC and Bernie think about Elon becoming a trillionaire. My life is worse because of career politicians and better because of Elon Musk’s products.
My Tesla doesn’t need oil changes, I can charge at my house. I’ve saved tons of money owning a Tesla. It’s fun to drive.
When my home in Wyoming was being built, internet lines weren’t an option. Starlink saved the day and now I have perfect internet in the mountains.
So for any journalist or politician complaining he’s now a trillionaire, I kindly tell you to piss off.