Elon Musk really needs no introduction. One of the world’s most recognized business leaders and visionaries, Elon has built a brand for himself that would have most celebrities and businesses turning green with envy. Elon Musk is known for founding Tesla Motors and SpaceX, which launched a landmark commercial spacecraft in 2012.
There is a lot to be learned from him, I will tell you some facts about him. So Let's Start...
1. He Became a Coding Prodigy at Only 12 Years Old
While the most 12-year-olds dream of playing their first video game, 12-year-old Elon decided to design a game on his own. In fact, he even sold it for $500, exposing Elon to the untapped market of coding and programming. The game that Elon designed was called Blastar, and he created it with the use of a popular ‘80s web version known as Commodore VIC-20. In fact, you can still play the game online today! From a young age, Elon had a passion for reading and programming. He dedicated five hours of his daily life to consuming anything and everything in the world of coding. Elon was such a brilliant child that he even cured his fear of the dark by reading basic physics. This way, he understood that darkness was not a consequential effect of evil, but rather the simple absence of photons in the visible wavelength.
2. Musk Believes that PhDs are a Waste of Time
While Musk’s view on the education system might seem radical to most, he is quite the scholar, to say the least. In 1995, Musk completed two degrees in economics and physics, before enrolling in a Ph.D. course at Stanford. After only two days of attending the lectures, Musk was utterly bored and dropped out to focus all his energy on starting a business. At 24 years of age, he requested a $28,000 loan from his father and started a software company with the goal of creating a city guide that would benefit local newspaper publishers. This was at a time when the yellow pages ruled the world, and were a vital source for businesses to relay their information to the public. The company was a success, and in a few years, Musk managed to sell it for a whopping $22 million. That’s why from Musk’s point of view, pursuing a Ph.D. is a waste of time. One would much rather focus on entrepreneurship.
3. Co-founder and Member of The PayPal
Musk was a co-founder and member of the PayPal mafia after his zip to success it didn't take long for Elon to pick his next target the banking industry so he started X Dotcom. X Dotcom and PayPal went head-to-head for a couple of years until they decided to join forces unfortunately though he was ousted from his CEO role in 2000 because of leadership disagreements when they sold Paypal his cut was 165 million dollars but what is PayPal mafia you'd think that cashing in on Paypal money would be enough but the people who created PayPal all went on to create other companies of humongous success three of them went on and created YouTube one of them created LinkedIn which was recently acquired by Microsoft for 26 billion dollars another created yelp another founded Kiva and a few others have become some of the most respected investors in Silicon Valley with very early investments in Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat, Uber and more along these guys was Elon who went ahead and is changing the world with Tesla and SpaceX.
4. Elon Loves Cars, and Once Bought Himself a McLaren F1
Elon Musk purchased a McLaren F1 in 1999 for $1 million when he was only 28 years old. At the time, it was quite a hassle to get an insurance quote for such a heavy luxury car, so Elon didn’t bother taking himself through this rigorous process. He’d much rather take his luxury car out for a spin. Unfortunately, he crashed it. But from then on, it was clear to Elon that he had a passion for luxurious wheels. In 2013, he went on to purchase the classic Lotus from the 1977 Bond film, The Spy Who Loved Me, buying it for a staggering ~$1 million. Elon even jokingly admitted that he was disappointed that the car could not transform into a submarine as was seen in the movie. Nevertheless, he plans on undertaking an ambitious pet project to transform the car of his childhood dreams into an actual submarine.
Read Also: 12 Things You Didn't Know About Apple's Founder, Steve Jobs
5. Robert Downey Jr. Modelled Tony Stark to be a Boisterous Version of Elon Musk
Did you know that the genius and eccentric playboy character Tony Stark is actually modeled after Elon Musk? We’re talking specifically about the version portrayed by Robert Downey Jr. in the Marvel films. According to sources close to Downey Jr, the actor opted to study Musk’s mannerisms to project a more flamboyant character of the man. Musk even got a cameo in Iron Man 2 as a thank-you for letting the actor and movie directors model the protagonist in his image.
6. Tesla's Salary is One Dollar
His basic tesla salary is just 1$ a year, few people know that he wasn't a founder of tesla he discovered the company and bought himself in after arguing with the CEO. He fired him and installed himself a few weeks ago we ranked the most expensive electric cars in the world and tesla has two of them in the top ten you might want to check it out.
7. Musk Believes That AI is One of The Biggest Existential Threats to The Human Race
Musk thinks that AI is the most serious threat to survival of the human race and believes the world is coming after AI in the wrong way it's easy to assume that a tech entrepreneur would be head over heels in love with the idea of artificial intelligence but musk is apparently not one of them confusingly however he's invested in various AI firms and even founded a non-profit AI research company he believes that creating a neural network which basically means we all connect our brains to the internet is the way to go that way we can democratize the artificial intelligence and if we're all a part of it it cannot kill us he's compared traditional AI to summoning a demon.
8. He Wants to Bring the Entire World Online
In 2017, Elon Musk was ambitious enough to request the United States government to put up 4425 satellites in Earth’s orbit to provide free internet to the entire world. SpaceX currently has many satellites in space, and the company is working rigorously towards achieving this goal. According to Elon, the project will generate enough money for the company to build the first city on Mars. For years, the Internet problem is something that both Facebook and Google have attempted to solve, albeit with little success. Helium attempted to solve the problem using Helium balloons, while Facebook opted to use solar-powered drones to face this issue. Nevertheless, SpaceX is in pole position to potentially deliver the internet to the entire world.
9. Building The Largest Building
He's building the largest building in the world from a footprint point of view it's called the gigafactory because he's serious about shifting the world from fossil fuels to sustainable energy he'll be needing a lot batteries more than the rest of the world combined could produce so he built his own factory this place is massive when completed and running at full capacity it will be able to create more batteries in one year than the entire world ever created to put things into perspective if there were 99 more gigafactories the entire planet would be completely sustainable from an energy standpoint.
10. Musk’s Biggest Dream is To Live and Die on Mars
Elon Musk is obsessed with spearheading the colonization of Mars, and he is willing to put everything on the line to actualize this dream. Seemingly a longshot, his most ambitious plan was to greatly reduce the cost of interplanetary travel to $100,000. And with the recent docking of the SpaceX Crew Dragon on the International Space Station, there’s a clear indication that Elon is heading in the right direction. According to Musk, his plan is to send at least 1 million people to Mars by 2050; and to create the first human colony on the planet. Finally, he plans to live his final years on the planet he has loved ever since he was a young boy. Remember, we’re still on the verge of unveiling Musk’s most fascinating opinion, so stick around to find out what it is!
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