this post was submitted on 30 Apr 2024

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Thomas Edison was the Elon musk of his era (lemmy.world)

submitted 6 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

140 comments fedilink hide all child comments

I bet that rich dumb ass would love this comparison.

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[–] [email protected] 11 points 6 months ago

So instead of one dumb guy founding Tesla and running it into the ground, TWO dumb guys gave everything over to another dumb guy to run it into the ground. Masterful gambit !

[+] [email protected] -7 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (1 children)

Unpopular opinion: Edison wasn't nearly as bad as people are painting him to be.

Extra unpopular opinion: Musk is, very much, quite similar to Nikola Tesla, as he was an extravagant lunatic, that really liked talking about shit he had no idea about, a bitter loser that prefered playing the victim over accepting responsibility for his failures, and he also had fanboys that mindlessly gobbled up everything he said.

Edit: Hey, cowards, instead of just downvoting me, how about some of you try to help the one brave man that actually tried to prove me wrong, he seems to be bruised from falling flat on his face so many times

[–] [email protected] 8 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Inaccurate opinion more like it. Dude pulled Trump shit and just refused to pay people he owed. Tesla died in poverty while Edison owed him tens of thousands of dollars, sure he isn't that bad..... Its like saying Henry Ford wasn't an absolute piece of shit.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Source?

[–] [email protected] 6 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (1 children)

~~Education~~ Edison owed him 50k, roughly 1.2 million dollars in today's metrics.

Several months after Edison employed him, Tesla announced that his work was successfully completed. When Tesla asked to be paid, however, Edison seemed astonished. He explained that the offer of $50,000 had been made in jest. "When you become a full-fledged American you will appreciate an American joke," Edison said. Shocked and disgusted, Tesla immediately resigned.

Not just a shitty person but a literal bigot that likely would have followed ford in aligning himself with Hitler, he simply didn't live long enough and missed it but like 7 years.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (1 children)

I'd really like to see where you got that quote, because it's complete bullshit. This story originally comes from Tesla's autobiography:

The Manager had promised me fifty thousand dollars on the completion of this task but it turned out to be a practical joke.

But you see that? He never said it was Edison, just 'The Manager'.

Btw in that same book Tesla calls Edison "a wonderful man".

Edit: nvm, I found what you quoted. It's this fucking pile of garbage

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (1 children)

Where did you find that. I've got multiple sources who say the same, you've got "nuh uh" for a subject better you not I were alive to know first hand.

How is sourced PBS publication "a fucking pile of garbage" you never even offered actual criticism.

Ed: another, this one from 1919.

https://books.google.com/books?id=xrhhE4q5gmgC&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&printsec=frontcover&pg=PA65&dq=%22The+Manager+had+promised+me+fifty+thousand+dollars+on+the+completion+of+this+task+but+it+turned+out+to+be+a+practical+joke.%22&hl=en&source=gb_mobile_entity&ovdme=1#v=onepage&q=%22The%20Manager%20had%20promised%20me%20fifty%20thousand%20dollars%20on%20the%20completion%20of%20this%20task%20but%20it%20turned%20out%20to%20be%20a%20practical%20joke.%22&f=false

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Where did you find that

I told you. In Tesla's literal autobiography called "My Inventions", full text of which you can find here.

I've got multiple sources who say the same

None of them are Tesla though. It's all just a giant echo chamber all quoting each other, sometimes changing it slightly, but noone ever can be bothered to actually check the primary sources.

you've got "nuh uh" for a subject better you not I were alive to know first hand

Wha?

How is sourced PBS publication "a fucking pile of garbage"

It doesn't seem to contain any sources whatsoever. They also say that "Tesla claimed" those things, yet they never say where or when he supposedly claimed that.

The link you sent doesn't seem to contain anything, but it looks like it's supposed to link to the magazine "Electrical Experimenter", so I went ahead and checked its every 1919 issue. Couldn't find what you're claiming. In fact I couldn't find anything negative about Edison at all. Curious.

The earliest source I could find of that claim is a book called "Prodigal Genius: The Life of Nikola Tesla", released in 1944, so a year after Tesla's death, and it also doesn't say where that quote is actually taken from. Interestingly, the author of this book claims that upon hearing the request for payment Edison said: "Tesla, you don't understand our American humor". So quite different to what the PBS article claims. In fact, it seems like the newer the source, the more villainous and bigoted that alleged quote becomes.

You're welcome to prove me wrong though. If you show an actual, trustworthy, primary source, I will change my mind.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Biography not autobiography, big difference.

Yours isn't either.

You didn't provide a source, it's not hard to figure out.

They're at the bottom boss.

It does check again, I linked it directly it just didn't preserve the highlight.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 months ago (1 children)

What do you mean "not autobiography"? He literally wrote it.

It is.

My "Wha?" was meant to express that I have no idea what you're talking about, as that sentence was absolutely unintelligible to me.

Your link doesn't work for me, but it seems like you're linking to the very quote I gave, just in the original magazine, not in the book. Why? You're only proving me right in that Tesla never said it was Edison.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (1 children)

He literally didn't. Read the author section, it was ghost written.

Ed:

Description

My Inventions: The Autobiography of Nikola Tesla is a book compiled and edited by Ben Johnston detailing the work of Nikola Tesla. The content was largely drawn from a series of articles that Nikola Tesla had written for Electrical Experimenter magazine in 1919, when he was 63 years old. Tesla's personal account is divided into six chapters covering different periods of his life.

Notably been Johnston wasn't born until 1927 and Tesla died in 1946 when the author was 16, they never even met.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 6 months ago (1 children)

"Compiled and edited" doesn't mean written. He just took Tesla's articles and put them in a book. The words are still Tesla's. Like, what the hell are you on? You literally linked me one of those articles, and it's in the literal description you just quoted, so you must know that.

I also don't think you know what "ghost writing" means.

But most importantly you're just arguing semantics at this point. Instead of addressing any of the actual points, you choose to argue whether Tesla's words put into a book count as autobiography. It doesn't matter. They're Tesla's words, and you know it because you literally linked to the place where he wrote them. The only reason you'd do this is if you could see you're wrong, but were too stubborn and proud to admit it, so you try to derail the discussion by changing the subject. I will not allow that. If you still want to have this discussion, bring some actual points that are relevant, if not, that's fine by me, but I will not wrestle you in mud.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

Compilations are ghost written to be contiguous.

No I did that so you'd see it was edited to be in a magazine then edited again to be in a book. Do you think many small circulation papers would be willing to slander one of the richest people in the planet at the time? No, seems unlikely right but they still left it written to be Edisons fault, the managing partner of Edison machine works was Edisons right hand man. It also includes that Edison told him he simply didn't understand American pranks when he really had an oral contract quick is generally enforceable. Let's also not muddy the waters but forgetting the reason I brought up the debt owed anyway, Edison was a piece of shit who said his favorite movie was birth of a nation....

Defend a shit person with your myopic shitty argument if you want but "I will not wrestle you" in mud.

[–] [email protected] 20 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Apparently Edison wasn't even the first historical tech bro, but some French dude that eventually killed himself with his "own" invention. And the very first modern techbro was Steve Jobs, who gets cited more and more often as an influence as Elongated Muskrat is becoming more and more far-right.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 6 months ago (2 children)

Was Jobs really a techbro? I usually think of techbros as being fairly political/libertarian (or some interpretation of libertarianism, at any rate), while Jobs was afaik pretty apolitical.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 6 months ago

Behind the bastards podcast did a four-part series on just how big of a piece of shit Steve Jobs was. We all knew that, but what I didn't know especially was just how fucking stupid a lot of his business decisions were, coming from his enormous hubris.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 6 months ago

Jobs was the same ilk, he just had better optics at that time. If he lived today, he'd sell out to whatever party they let him to outsource the manufacturing (and coding) to the cheapest possible country. Maybe he'd even double down on the whole AI thing.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 6 months ago

And Elon is the Musk of our times imo

[–] [email protected] 5 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Wow, that's a lot of upvotes

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