How Elon Musk Became the Most Powerful Influencer in the World | by Rob Walker | Feb 2021

Tesla CEO has a better grasp of social media – and online culture in general – than the head of any social media company

“U“Underestimating Elon is not a good idea,” Bill Gates said on the Kara Swisher podcast the other day. But really, at this point, who is underestimating Elon Musk? Man is everywhere, influencing everything (or trying to do so). In addition to promoting his own businesses, he is getting into cryptocurrency and “GamestonkInterviewing the CEO of Robinhood (and putting Clubhouse on the map in the process), separately inviting Kanye West and Vladimir Putin for another Clubhouse appearance, and even criticizing the Texas power grid operator. And that’s only the last two weeks.

This is youmthink we have reached the top of Musk. But I’m not convinced: on the contrary, Musk’s status as the most ridiculous, yet most effective influencer in the business world is only solidifying. In fact, he’s increasingly transcending the corporate world, having become a cross between a public figure, a mainstay of pop culture, and a living, breathing subreddit.

That last point is crucial: Musk has a better command of social media – and online culture in general – than any CEO of a social media company. Sometimes it’s calculated (especially when it comes to Hyper Tesla), sometimes it sounds like a pure, uncut identity (the ‘pedo’s’ shameful attack on the speleologist who helped save these Thai children in 2018), and sometimes it feels like just trolling.

What you never feel is an act. Both online and offline, Musk comes across as purely genuine – although you can’t tell if he’s serious and most importantly. when it just seems reckless and weird. (Here’s the part where I mention him smoking weed on Joe Rogan’s show and his son, along with his musician girlfriend Grimes, are called X Æ A-12 Musk.) At the same time, he’s not just a clown; Whatever Tesla’s ultimate fate, it helped change the whole conversation about the future of the automobile and against all odds. On a bad day for TSLA, Musk is still the second richest person in the world. So he seems to behave like someone who has both nothing to prove and nothing to lose.

To be clear, I’m not making an argument here about the value of Tesla or SpaceX or any other trendy Musk company. These companies are ultimately tied to the realities of profit and loss (and seem overvalued to me). But Musk, as a free voice in culture, is not attached to any reality. And maybe especially after Donald Trump, there is an audience for it. You can, of course, say that Musk jumped the shark with his series of bizarre stunts and flippant remarks. But jumping the shark is what it does; he made an art of it. He looks at us like he does, over and over, and asks, “Don’t you wish you could do that too?” And for better or for worse, he’s not wrong.