FULL ELON MUSK TALK AT VIVA TECHNOLOGY 2023
Questions on ElonsFAQ asked in this interview (6)
Transcript
0:00Maurice LévyElon musk. Yeah.
0:12Maurice LévyElon, thank you.
0:15Co-hostThank you.
0:18Maurice LévyHey, guys.
0:29Maurice LévyYou have to know that no one in Paris believed that you would be in person. They all said, no, he's not going to come. He was already at Versailles for Choose France, so he's not going to come.
0:44Maurice LévyAnd it will be video. So is it real? Are you real?
0:49Elon MuskI'm a hologram.
0:51Maurice LévyAh, then this is a hologram or an Android. Elon, it is a pleasure and an honor to have you. So thank you for making the trip. I know that this has not been very easy.
1:07Maurice LévyAnd I know also that for the first time in my life, I will interview somebody who is introvert.
1:17Elon MuskYes, yes.
1:18Maurice LévyYou told me.
1:18Elon MuskI started out that way.
1:20Co-hostYeah.
1:20Maurice LévyShy and introvert. So I'm asking the audience to be a little bit gentle with Elon because he's so shy that he needs your support. And on top of that,
1:42Maurice LévyOn top of that, he's speaking in front of his mother. So you can imagine how difficult it is. Mess standards.
1:54InterviewerYeah.
2:02Maurice LévySo, as you have seen, since we have announced your participation, it has been quite something because everyone wanted to be here, so we had to change. We had a very modest room with only 1500 people and we had to move here.
2:27Maurice LévyAnd you have to know that the Dome de Paris is the place where there is the musicals. So we are not expecting you to sing or to dance, but if you can do it, we would be very happy.
2:42Maurice LévyYeah. But you have also to know that this is the room where Steve Jobs was coming. Every time he was doing a keynote or presenting new product, it was here.
3:00Maurice LévySo I hope that you like the symbol and you, you don't need any introduction. Your name is a brand is already a brand. It's a brand for innovation, for ambition, for perfume.
3:28Maurice LévyYes, yes. This, the agreement that you made with the Arnault family a few hours ago, I mean, it's.
3:36Elon MuskI mean, really, it brands itself.
3:38Maurice LévyYeah. And you are the origin of people. Tesla, SpaceX, to name a few, and even OpenAI. So.
3:52Maurice LévyYou love taking risks and you are going always against the tide and the popular wisdom. You have been always proven right. Now there is almost, not always. Now there is a bet of the 44 billion US dollar question, which is, will you still be right with Twitter?
4:23Elon MuskSure. It was expensive.
4:28Maurice LévyYeah.
4:30Elon MuskI don't know if you know, listen, if I'm so smart, why did I pay so much for Twitter then?
4:45Maurice LévySo as I'm not a journalist, I'm not trying to get headlines and to have provocative response and to make a scoop. But nevertheless, if you wish to do that, it is authorized.
5:01Maurice LévyOkay, great. So we are expecting that you will really make the show because everyone comes here to see you, to listen to you and to get some of the magic that you have.
5:17Elon MuskAll right, well, I'm honored that you all want to listen to what I have to say. It's great to see the crowd and I know you guys seem awesome, so.
5:27Maurice LévyBut you told me that you would
5:29Co-hostlike,
5:32Maurice Lévyyou said that you would like to. You speak in French.
5:36Elon MuskOh, my goodness.
5:49Maurice LévyThere are some people who believe that you are a genius and there, there are some who are you who believe that you are evil. So.
5:56Elon MuskBut I mean, you can be both. I mean, you could be an evil genius. That's not, you know.
6:02Maurice LévySo you will tell us what you are or you will let the people draw their own conclusion.
6:09Elon MuskI am definitely not evil.
6:20Maurice LévyWhat is the thing that you have ahead of your.
6:22Elon MuskYes, if you look carefully, you can see an angel's halo on my head and the wings. It's subtle, but where are the wings? Yeah, they're difficult to see, but if you look carefully, you know, they're right there.
6:33Maurice LévyYeah, yeah. Small wings. Yes.
6:37Elon MuskSo, yeah, hopefully not evil. Aspirationally not evil. So, yeah.
6:46Maurice LévyOkay, so that wasn't convincing. You have done a lot of operation, you have created a lot of companies. The most important question for everyone is what the hell is driving you?
7:02Maurice LévyWhy are you so obsessed by new operation, new creation, new things to do?
7:12Elon MuskYeah. Crystal meth is the answer if you think Red Bull gives you wings. So, man, that quote's gonna probably sting. So. Yeah, just kidding. For the record.
7:34Elon MuskSo. Well, I think there's. The companies still have a lot to do for their core mission for electric vehicles, sustainable energy. Still less than 1% of the global fleet is electric.
7:50Elon MuskSo we've got about 2 billion cars and trucks on the road, but still less than 20 million are electric at this point. So there's still a long way to go for sustainable energy, for sustainable energy generation.
8:04Elon MuskSo this, you know, the Tesla mission, I think we've, we've made a lot of progress, but still it's a lot, a lot more ahead then SpaceX. The goal is, it's a big goal, but we want to try to make life multi planetary, to extend life beyond Earth.
8:25Elon MuskAnd I think this is important for a number of reasons, but there's the sort of defensive reason of ensuring that the light of consciousness does not go out. And I may some of these questions.
8:39Elon MuskIf I'm going on too long, you feel free to interrupt Me?
8:41Maurice LévyBut no, no, you can, you can be long.
8:45Co-hostOkay.
8:46Elon MuskSo, you know, people do ask me, you know, have I seen UFOs and aliens and that kind of thing. And I haven't. And I think I would have seen them by now.
9:01Elon MuskSo it appears that we might, we might be the only consciousness, at least in this galaxy. And, and if so, that's kind of a scary prospect because it, it means that the light of consciousness is like it, like a tiny candle in a vast darkness and we should do everything we can to prevent that candle from going out.
9:25Elon MuskSo yeah,
9:32Elon MuskAnd, and, and so, so some of the things. So that means obviously taking the actions to ensure that Earth is good, that Earth is safe and secure for civilization.
9:43Elon MuskAnd I think it also means extending life beyond Earth to other planets in the solar system and ultimately to other star systems. And I think that that's both a sort of defense of the light of consciousness and also I think a point of inspiration.
10:02Elon MuskBecause life cannot just be about solving one problem after another. We need things that inspire us. I mean, we need things that move our heart. And that when you wake up in the morning, you're excited to be alive and being a space faring civilization and making true the things that we see in the good science fiction movies.
10:31Elon MuskThis is one of the things that I think can inspire all of humanity. Just like the, you know, when, when the astronauts went to the moon in 69, it was something that they said for all mankind, you know, and it really was something you say to any human on Earth.
10:48Elon MuskWhat's the, what is, what's like the most amazing thing that humanity has ever done? A lot of. At least one of those things would be we went to the moon, you know, and so you want to have these inspiring things that make you excited to be alive and excited about the future.
11:05Elon MuskYeah.
11:06Maurice LévyAnd you had those thoughts and dreams when you were a kid or this came much later on.
11:17Elon MuskWell, I didn't think I would be doing these things as a kid, that's for sure. I was interested in technology. I read a lot of books, so I was obviously interested in science.
11:30Elon MuskI mean, this is hardly going to be surprising. I was interested in science fiction and technology.
11:35Maurice LévyYou have to tell the truth because there is someone who is listening to you.
11:38Elon MuskYeah, my mom's right there. She can call me out on this if it's not accurate, but. So I guess the thing that was maybe most significant from a philosophical standpoint was that when I was about maybe 12 or 13, I had somewhat of an existential crisis where I was like, I was like, what is the meaning of life?
12:04Elon MuskIs life just meaningless? Why are we here? What does it all mean? And I read a lot of books on religion and philosophy and then ultimately I read this book, Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, which is great.
12:22Elon MuskAnd in that book, that book is really a philosophy book that's disguised as humor. And the point that Douglas Adams makes is that the real difficulty is understanding what questions to ask about the answer that is the universe.
12:38Elon MuskAnd that, that really we want to. We want to have. It's essentially, it's like a philosophy of curiosity, of saying, what can we do to find out more about the nature of the universe and the meaning of life?
12:58Elon MuskAnd so that's the sort of foundational element. And then from there you say, okay, well, if we want to find out meaning of life, we have to expand the scope and scale of consciousness.
13:09Elon MuskWe have to go out there and explore the stars to know what questions to ask about the universe and understand the universe. And that's my core philosophy. And so from that it was like, well, we have to make sure that Earth is good, so we have to have sustainable energy.
13:33Elon MuskWe want to build technology to travel beyond Earth.
13:37Maurice LévyAnd
13:39Elon Muskit's from that sort of core philosophy that these companies arise. In most cases I can say, how does Twitter help with that?
13:50Maurice LévyI would like to go back to Earth.
13:53Elon MuskSure.
13:54Maurice LévyAnd to the various enterprises that you contributed to create or co created or created. Let's start with PayPal. So very impressive company. Do you regret to have sold it?
14:13Elon MuskI think in retrospect, I think it was. It was good to have that. The company was acquired by ebay because there was so much talent at PayPal and that talent subsequently went on to create many other companies.
14:28Elon MuskSo YouTube, for example, was created by two people that worked at PayPal. We had, there was LinkedIn, was created from PayPal, there was Yelp, there was many other companies.
14:43Maurice LévyImpressive. Yeah, yeah, very impressive.
14:47Elon MuskYeah. So. And then. And if I'd been still working on PayPal, then there wouldn't be, you know, Tesla would not be in its current form and SpaceX wouldn't exist.
14:57Elon MuskYes, so yes, I guess the short answer. Yes,
15:03Maurice Lévyshort answer is that yes. Yeah, yeah. But now with. You would have loved to keep it again.
15:14Elon MuskWell, there is, I think, the potential to do something that is bigger than PayPal. This is sort of like the X, the sort of everything app kind of thing.
15:30Elon MuskSo I think it's somewhat poetic, like trying to get finish a task that was started about 24 years ago.
15:46Elon MuskI think it's, I think it's going to be useful. X Twitter is going to be just a very useful thing and hopefully something that is a positive force for civilization.
16:00Maurice LévyMoving to Tesla, I have, through one of our operation, done the first advertising campaign for the electric car of GM. That was the end of the 90s. So can you explain why GM and other car manufacturers have not created Tesla and why Tesla is successful?
16:28Maurice LévyWhat is the difference?
16:35Elon MuskYou talk about the EV1, basically the EV1 car that. So General Motors actually did come out with this electric vehicle one, EV1, and it's.
16:47Maurice LévyYes. You remember EV1?
16:49Elon MuskYes.
16:49Co-hostYeah.
16:51Elon MuskAnd actually so I thought when that came out.
16:54Maurice Lévy97.
16:55Elon MuskYeah, that sounds about right. Yeah, I would have, I expected there would be an EV2, EV3 and so forth. And if they had done that, actually there would be no need for Tesla.
17:06Elon MuskBut for reasons that aren't clear, GM recalled all of the EV ones, even from customers that really wanted to keep the cars. They recalled the cars and they crushed them in the junkyard.
17:21Elon MuskAnd.
17:27Elon MuskIt still blows my mind that they did this because the people who had the EV1s, they loved the car so much, they held a candlelit vigil at the junkyard where the cars were crushed.
17:39Elon MuskOkay. Like it was like, like someone was getting killed, you know, like, and it's like if somebody is holding a candlelit vigil for the destruction because they love your product so much, maybe you should make more of it, you know, I mean it's like pretty rare for candid vigils to be helpful products.
18:01Elon MuskSo I don't understand why they didn't do more. They should have and they would be the leader in electric vehicles today. But they didn't. They didn't. And so there was a need for Tesla because the, you know, at the time of starting Tesla, there were no electric vehicles being made and they were.
18:19Elon MuskSo the big car companies were not making electric vehicles. There were no startups that we were aware of making electric vehicles. So it's like, well, we should try. And I mean in the case of both Tesla and SpaceX, I thought the chance of success was maybe 10%.
18:34Elon MuskSo I just felt like, I thought it would be successful, I thought it would fail.
18:38Maurice LévyA good lesson now moving to the kids dream, which is to become an astronaut and not to build rockets. How you move from the idea that every child has I would be an astronaut to I will do reusable rockets.
19:03Maurice LévyYeah,
19:08Maurice LévyYou forgot.
19:09Elon MuskNo, I'm trying to compress the story so that they're not too long because the story is actually quite long because I didn't start out wanting to do the rockets.
19:19Elon MuskAt first I was going to do this philanthropic mission to Mars called Mars Oasis. And then as I started investigating the, what it would take to launch this mission to Mars, just a little greenhouse, basically it was intended to inspire the public and I started understanding more about what rockets could be used.
19:43Elon MuskI actually went to Russia a few times to try to buy some of their nuclear missiles, minus the nuke, that's extra. So that was pretty wild being in Russia in 2001, negotiating to buy two of the biggest missiles.
20:07Elon MuskBut it became clear that the
20:12Maurice Lévyunless
20:12Elon Muskthere was something new with rockets,
20:17Maurice Lévythat
20:17Elon Muskwas the fundamental issue. The cost of access to space was the fundamental issue. So it wasn't a question of trying to increase the public's desire. Public's desire for space and exploration is very high.
20:29Elon MuskBut there needs to be a means, there needs to be a way, and there needs to be a radical improvement in the cost of access to orbit. So I was like, okay, well I'm going to try starting a rocket company and see if it's successful.
20:46Elon MuskBut I like said, I, I told people at the time because, because people would say to me, let's tell me this joke of like, what's the fast, you know, what, what's the, you know, how do you go from, sorry, sorry, I'm getting a little hot under the collar here.
21:07Elon MuskI think a lot of people are. So they'll say, what's the fastest way to make a small fortune in the rocket industry? And the punchline is you start with a large one.
21:19Elon MuskSo, you know, it was tough going for a while. Our first three launches failed. Fortunately the fourth one succeeded. If the fourth one did not succeeded, SpaceX would not exist.
21:31Elon MuskSo it was a very close call.
21:34Maurice LévyFast forward. You created or you co created OpenAI? Yes, ChatGPT has been incredibly success, incredibly successful. It the fastest growing ever story. And after having created OpenAI, suddenly you say, oh, we should have a pause.
22:03Maurice LévySome people say, oh, it's because he has not done it.
22:09Elon MuskWell, I mean, I didn't think anyone would actually agree to the pause, but I thought, just for the record, I just want to say I think we should pause.
22:18Elon MuskI don't think that
22:21Maurice Lévythe why do you want to. Should pose.
22:24Elon MuskWell, I think there's a real danger for digital superintelligence having negative consequences. And so if we are not careful with creating artificial general intelligence, we could have potentially a catastrophic outcome.
22:43Elon MuskSo now I think there's a range of possibilities I think the most likely outcome is positive for AI, but it. But that's not every possible outcome. So we need to minimize the probability that something will go wrong with digital superintelligence.
23:01Elon MuskYes. So I'm in favor of AI regulation because I think advanced AI is a risk to the public and anything that's a risk to the public, there needs to be some kind of referee.
23:13Elon MuskThat referee is the regulator. And so I think that. That my strong recommendation is to have some regulation for AI.
23:22Maurice LévySome regulation for AI, yes. Which is what you want also for Twitter?
23:28Co-hostNot sure.
23:29Elon MuskRegulation, I guess there's plenty of. Plenty of regulators. Sure.
23:34Maurice LévyOkay. So speaking about Twitter, you have made a big bet on Twitter. You said it a few minutes ago that you paid too much. Yes, yes. And you are now going on to Twitter 2.0 or 3.0, which I understand it's a full scale reinvention of the company.
24:06Elon MuskYeah. Evolving the company very rapidly.
24:10Maurice LévyThe company is changing quite dramatically. There are a lot of controversy about Twitter. So I have in fact three very quick questions. The first one is, why have you decided to acquire it?
24:26Maurice LévyThe second is what was wrong at Twitter to make you acting? And the last one is not the last last of the three, because there are many other questions is why do you believe that you will be successful and you will be.
24:45Elon MuskWell, thanks.
24:48Maurice LévyI can imagine. I can't imagine that you will not be.
24:51Elon MuskWell, thanks so. Well, obviously I was on Twitter as a. As a major user and even before the acquisition closed, my, my Twitter account was the most interacted with account in the world.
25:09Elon MuskSo my. I guess I would be. I'm pretty closely attuned to what's going on with Twitter. You know, I get a feel for how is it shifting one way or the other.
25:21Elon MuskAnd generally I was concerned that Twitter was having a negative effect on civilization, that it was having a corrosive effect on civil society. And, and so that, you know, anything that undermines civilization I think is not good.
25:39Elon MuskAnd, you know, go back to my point of like, we need to do everything possible to support civilization and move it in a positive direction. And I felt that Twitter kept moving more and more in a negative direction.
25:52Elon MuskAnd my hope and aspiration was to change that and have it be a positive force for civilization.
26:00Maurice LévyIt is not perceived like this. People are very happy to listen to that approach, but the perception is very different.
26:15Elon MuskWell, I think it depends on, and I think if somebody is a regular Twitter user, I think most people would say that their experience has improved. We've gotten rid of 90% of the bots and the scams and the various bad things that were happening, we've gotten rid of.
26:38Elon MuskNow at this point, I think 95% of the child exploitation material that was on Twitter, which was a shock to see. The amount of that, that was really terrible.
26:47Elon MuskSome of that had been going on for 10 years and no action. So I think we've done a lot of good in that respect. And then I think we've also done things like we have open sourced the algorithm, so we're trying to be as transparent as possible.
27:06Elon MuskSo Twitter is the only social media company where you can see the actual code of the algorithm. So it's not like some secret black box.
27:21Elon MuskI mean, the way to build trust is, the way to build trust is not, take my word for it, it's, let's show you exactly how it works and full transparency.
27:32Elon MuskAnd we're also going to be showing like, if your account is in any way affected by the Twitter system, you can see it clearly and just, you know, moving in, I think a good direction, I think the recommendation algorithm.
27:50Elon MuskAnyway, I don't want to go on too long for Twitter, but I think it's, I think it's actually quite good and that those who are on the Twitter system, I think generally think it's good, good.
28:00Elon MuskThe, you know, we are seeing all time highs in usage. So at least you know, for the public out there, they are using the system more. So we're seeing pretty significant week over week growth in usage.
28:18Elon MuskSo, you know, the public is speaking with their time and if they're putting their time on Twitter, that's a very good signal. So that, that's, that's very positive.
28:31Maurice LévyWhat would you say to advertisers who left Twitter to convince them to come back?
28:42Elon MuskYeah, actually I should say that maybe with a few exceptions, almost all the advertisers have said that they've either come back or they said they will come back. So actually I feel pretty, pretty optimistic about the future.
28:59Elon MuskAnd yeah, so, you know, we're really, at this point, I believe, actually I'm not aware of any advertiser that is either they've either come back or they said they'll come back.
29:11Elon MuskI'm not aware of any exceptions. There probably a few exceptions, but overall I think it's, it's very positive.
29:17Maurice LévyGood. So we will have now a broader conversation. We will ask Crystal Edeman from Orange, the CEO of Orange, to join us as well as Antoine Arnaud from LVMH and Asmita Dube from L' Oreal, we have to move in order that they add chairs.
29:42Maurice LévySo come here now. Why? Elon, while they are arranging, there is. Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. There is one question. Yeah. That I would like to.
30:08Maurice LévyTake a. So finally we are all together again. So I had another question, but I will save it for later and I will give the floor to Christel Crystal, the man who is the CEO of Orange.
30:29Maurice LévyAnd she is very much excited about putting some harsh difficulties question to you. Let's go.
30:39Co-hostNot sure that's so difficult. So I like to talk about the
30:45Elon Musksocial networks and I was sure if
30:50Maurice LévyI heard what you just said.
30:53Co-hostObviously, social networks and Twitter have been a fantastic tool to develop free speech and open debates that may be were not possible before that.
31:03Elon MuskSure.
31:04Co-hostNow there's also another side of it, which is that there can be some disinformation. Fake news.
31:13Elon MuskFake news?
31:13Maurice LévyWhat?
31:14Elon MuskThat's crazy.
31:14InterviewerFake news.
31:15Maurice LévyBelieve it or not. I don't believe you believe that.
31:17Elon MuskWait, how do I know this is real?
31:21Co-hostNow the question is. And actually I think there's a flip side indeed to social networks and there's a code of conduct that the EU has proposed this information recently.
31:34Co-hostTwitter just decided to walk away from it. So is this because Twitter doesn't respect the fact that information needs to be moderated? And actually you've been pretty vocal on content moderation.
31:49Co-hostSo just what are your thoughts on that?
31:52Elon MuskWell, I'm generally a fan of that. We should have free speech as much as possible, as much as is allowed by the laws of any country. So, you know, I think that, you know, say for France, we should allow things that are allowed by law, and if the people are want the laws to be different, then pass a different law and we'll adhere to that law.
32:20Elon MuskBut for Twitter to go beyond the law, that, you know, that doesn't seem quite right to me. I think we want to allow the people to express themselves. And really, if you have to say, when does free speech matter?
32:36Elon MuskFree speech matters. And it's only relevant if people are allowed to say things that you don't like, because otherwise it's not free speech. And I would take that. If somebody says something potentially offensive, that's actually okay.
32:54Elon MuskNow, we're not going to promote those offensive tweets, but I think people should be able to say things because the alternative is censorship. And frankly, I think if you go down the censorship route, it's only a matter of time before censorship is turned upon you.
33:13Elon MuskAnd then, so that's why it's important you know, in the US You've got the First Amendment, freedom of speech amendment, and you say like, why did they do that?
33:25Elon MuskWhy did they pass that amendment? It was because they were not able to say what they wanted to say in the countries that they came from, and they wanted to make sure that they could say what they wanted to say.
33:36Elon MuskSo I believe in freedom for the people to say things and that even if somebody said that, it's actually in some ways a sign of health if people are able to.
33:47Elon MuskIf someone you don't like is able to say something you don't like, rather than try to suppress that, you say like, you know what, that's a good sign because that means I can say things and that person will not like what I say, but I can still say it.
34:00Elon MuskAnd that's a really big deal.
34:09Co-hostIn this country. Freedom of speech, that's something that's very at the core of our values. But now if we look at young people and being in the digital field and we provide digital services that people use, there's also a move towards cyberbullying and harassment, which I think it's also our role to educate young people on how to use the technology and make sure that because some behaviors, I mean, on Twitter or other social networks can actually have devastating effects on people.
34:41Co-hostIs Twitter doing something about it or would you be willing to engage with other players? Actually, at Orange, we do a lot in that space.
34:48Elon MuskSure,
34:52Co-hostthat's true.
34:56Elon MuskI think Twitter is for sure willing to engage with others. And as I said, the overarching goal is to have Twitter be a force, a positive force for civilization.
35:06Elon MuskAnd, you know, so. And if you're on the platform and you're being harassed or bullied or whatever, obviously that's a negative experience. So, you know, what we're doing is we call it sort of freedom of speech, but not freedom of reach, which is that if you, yes, you can say offensive things, but then your content is going to get down rated.
35:32Elon MuskSo if you're a jerk, your reach will drop. So, yeah, I think that's the right thing.
35:45Maurice LévyAntoine, I don't know if you will be competing with l' Oreal to launch the future fragrance for Elon Musk. And the brand must. So you have to compete very hard.
35:58Maurice LévyBut maybe I know that you had already the lunch, but there is now the dessert. So you can put your question.
36:06Co-hostAll right, first of all, in the name of le group, Les Ecour, Le Parisien, thank you very much for being here. This group is a co host of Vilatec and it's great to have you and welcome.
36:19Elon MuskSo change.
36:20Co-hostChange of subject from Twitter. At LVMH, our oldest maison is called Clos des L'. Ambre. I saw you enjoyed good wine. It's 650 years old. Louis Vuitton was founded in 1854.
36:37Co-hostOur most ancient American maison Tiffany was founded in 1837. The sum of the years of existence of all our maison at LVMH is 8393 years old.
36:52Elon MuskWow.
36:53Co-hostTesla is a teenager, right?
36:55Maurice LévyYes.
36:55Co-hostYes, 19. 19 years old.
36:57Elon MuskYeah.
36:57Co-hostAnd its market cap is already higher than lvmh.
37:00Maurice LévySo it's a question of age.
37:04Elon MuskYeah.
37:06Co-hostSo first question, first question. How much longer are you going to make us look so bad? Second question, more serious. Do you feel the creation of value is more challenging in traditional or innovative business?
37:23Elon MuskWell, first of all, it's an honor to be here and speak with you, so thanks for having me. You know, evaluations are a strange thing because, you know, sometimes I've said, hey, I think the stock price is too high at Tesla.
37:38Elon MuskAnd then the stock price goes up. I'm like, okay, so if you tweet,
37:44Maurice Lévyis it going up or down?
37:46Elon MuskNo, the crazy thing, I mean, when I've created, I think the stock price is too high almost always it goes up. So I don't know, it's, it's strange thing.
37:56Elon MuskSo I guess in the case of Tesla, the really, the value of the company is primarily on the basis of autonomy. So in my opinion, because if you look at our total vehicle output, it's, you know, be almost 2 million vehicles this, this year or something like that, but that's, that's still only 2% of total vehicle production.
38:22Elon MuskSo then why is our market cap so high? And it's because the potential for autonomy is that the value of autonomy is so high that even, even if you have a discounted percentage probability of autonomy happening, that is still incredibly valuable.
38:42Elon MuskSo the average passenger car is used only about ten hours a week. So an average of about one and a half hours a day. But if you have an autonomous robotaxi, the utility might be 50 or 60 hours a week out of 168 hours.
38:57Elon MuskSo now you've got a vehicle that costs the same but has five times the utility. So it's so gigantic a change that that's really, I think, the main driver of our value.
39:11Elon MuskAnd although I've said this before, I think we will solve autonomy soon.
39:16Maurice LévyDid you expect that Tesla will be at this level of market cap?
39:22Elon MuskNo, I Did not expect Tesla be
39:24Maurice Lévyat this level because it's just extraordinary and fair, by the way.
39:31Elon MuskI mean, I don't set the price,
39:33Maurice Lévyso you don't said.
39:35Co-hostJust another quick question. I tried mid journey the other day.
39:40Elon MuskYeah, midjourney is amazing.
39:42Co-hostRight. And I asked the software to make a Louis Vuitton advertising campaign with only two words. So here. It's a bad question for you, Maurice.
39:50Maurice LévyRight.
39:52Co-hostIf.
39:52Maurice LévyIf you are. If you want to put me out of a job.
39:56Co-hostThat was my question. Do you feel this advertising production industry is going to be threatened by AI?
40:06Maurice LévyBe careful. Be careful.
40:09Elon MuskNot at all. It's totally safe. I mean, AI is definitely going to be a massive disruptive force. I mean, AI is probably the, the most disruptive technology ever. I mean, the crazy thing is that, you know, the, the advantage that humans have is that we're smarter than other creatures.
40:30Elon MuskLike if we got into a fight with a gorilla, the gorilla would definitely win. But we're smart, so. But now for the first time, there's going to be something that is smarter than the smartest human.
40:42Elon MuskLike way smarter than the smartest human. And as you can see from the journey, the art that AI can create is incredible. It's so beautiful and it does it, you know, within seconds.
40:54Elon MuskSo we're at. I mean, I think, you know, there's that sort of saying, may you live in interesting times, which I think is like not exactly a good thing.
41:07Elon MuskSo sometimes. But, but would we actually live. I think we live in the most interesting of times, the advent of AI. And I actually thought to myself at one point, like, should, you know, do I really.
41:20Elon MuskWould I really want to be alive at this point? Like, let's say that there is some AI Armageddon that happens, some sort of AI apocalypse. I think I would still be.
41:30Elon MuskWant to be alive at this time to see it, you know, hopefully not, not cause it, but it's. It's just a. I think we live in an extremely interesting time, you know, because the things that you see AI being able to do now, it's going to do much more with each passing year.
41:54Elon MuskCars will absolutely drive themselves better than any person could drive. Will have humanoid robots, like. So Tesla's developing a humanoid robot. We call it the T800.
42:09Co-hostIt's.
42:10Elon MuskYeah, some people get that joke.
42:17Elon MuskIt's a Terminator.
42:19Maurice LévyWe can tweet that.
42:22Elon MuskYeah. But if you, if you like to say, what is an economy? An economy is GDP per capita times capita. Now what happens if you don't actually have a limit on capita if you have an unlimited number of sort of people or robots, it's not clear what meaning an economy has at that point because you have an unlimited economy effectively.
42:49Elon MuskSo on the good side, the plus side of AI is that I think we are heading for an age of abundance where any goods and services that you want, you can just have.
43:02Elon MuskSo that's, that's the, that's the, the positive side of, of, of AI future is an age of abundance.
43:09Maurice LévyFrom the advertising side, I must say that we are using AI since many years and it is helping us a great deal. And, and this tool that we are already using and I think it will be helping us to do even faster, some very good ad, it will be probably long time before they replace the creative minds.
43:35Maurice LévyAsmita, maybe you have an opinion on that and maybe you can. Asmita is the CDO of l' Oreal and she knows a lot about digital. So maybe you can tell us a little bit about advertising and AI and put your question to Elon.
43:53InterviewerSo I'll pick up from advertising and from what you said before about Twitter. So now we know that Twitter is expensive and we know that it aims to have free speech.
44:04InterviewerThe question I have is about winning the advertiser's trust to be a preferred social media platform in the current context, where the expected revenue, you know, in 2023 is lower than 2022.
44:19InterviewerYou have brought in new leadership, Linda. So I wanted to know that how will we win that trust and will Linda have the time, the support, the freedom? Because she's an advertising expert.
44:32InterviewerSo, so will she be able to manage the situation and how.
44:36Elon MuskYeah, I think Linda is great. So I think Linda is going to do amazing things for Twitter and obviously understands where advertisers are coming from, very deeply understands the concerns that advertisers have and I think we'll do a great job in addressing those concerns.
45:00Elon MuskA key part is say like if you're an advertiser, what content do you want to appear next to and depending upon what advertiser, you know, the sensitivity of the brand.
45:12Elon MuskIf you're for example, say Disney and you're advertising a children's movie, then you want to have, you know, all ages content, you know, and by the way, Disney is one of our biggest advertisers.
45:24Elon MuskSo it's really just making sure, sure that the content adjacency matches what a brand is comfortable with. And then there's some cases where the content is like, you know, there's not going to be any advertising because nobody wants to advertise next to it.
45:43Elon MuskAnd that's going to be some of the more controversial stuff.
45:45InterviewerYeah, I have a follow up on that, you know, because we were talking about content. You have just made the announcement that there will be ad revenue sharing for creators.
45:57Co-hostYes.
45:57InterviewerYeah. And that has a condition it will be done when they are verified bluetic creators. And the advertising is to verify bluetick users.
46:06Elon MuskYes.
46:07InterviewerNow if with that, how. How does that impact your focus on subscription revenues? Because to be blue tick, you know, there's a subscription versus advertising revenues focus.
46:21Co-hostYeah.
46:22Elon MuskSo a big part of like when you say, like, say how many impressions does something get? You say like, well, were those impressions real or not real? You know, was it, you know, a computer just running 100,000 fake accounts?
46:37Elon MuskBecause that obviously doesn't count because the computer's not going to buy anything. So that's why our focus is on verified users. Because. Because we are admittedly conflating verification and subscription at Twitter.
46:52Elon MuskSo you could say like verified subscriber or something like that. It's not possible to game that. So, you know, it's real, you know it's solid and you know, it's not a computer.
47:03Elon MuskSo that's why it's, that's why we're focused on that is to ensure the authenticity of the views and that it really, that real people are seeing what's going on.
47:14Elon MuskI mean the sheer amount of bot and scam and spam activity in social media is insane. And we're talking about AI. It's very obvious that especially with today's AI, the computers can pass every like, are you a human test?
47:30Elon MuskIn fact, I think they can pass are you a human test better than a human, you know, sort of, you say like identify a traffic light or something, something like that.
47:38Elon MuskOkay, let me tell you, Tesla can identify a traffic light. So if we're, you know, and, but even like open source AI stuff right now can pass all of the, the human tests.
47:49Elon MuskSo you have to have something that there's better authentication than. Than that. Yeah.
47:55InterviewerThank you.
47:56Elon MuskYeah.
47:56Maurice LévyI think that confidence and trust is something which we lose fast and that we regain slowly. I have no doubt personally that Twitter will gain back the trust provided that you do the right thing.
48:15Maurice LévyAnd I'm sure that you will do the right thing. So this something which is probably just a hiccup in the time, but you need to do the right thing and I'm sure that you will do it.
48:29Maurice LévyI have two small questions, one which is regarding Ukraine. You have helped enormously Ukraine at the beginning with Stalin. And I think we owe you a lot because without access, access to Internet and without access to communication, the war would have been finished.
49:04Maurice LévyWhat is your take on that experience?
49:10Elon MuskYeah, that was, I mean, that whole situation is very complex.
49:17Maurice LévyNo kidding.
49:19Elon MuskYeah, it's really, really complex. As you point out, Starlink did play a pivotal role because Russia had actually taken out all of the satellite communications and all of the ground communications except for Starlink, who was the only one that was still operating.
49:36Elon MuskAnd even today it is still the only one that is effective at the front lines. And Starlink today is the backbone of the Ukrainian military communications. So, you know, I thought it was important to help out and.
49:56Elon MuskBut I, but I do, I do hope for some kind of resolution soon because I think it's terribly sad that the flower of the youth of Ukraine and Russia who don't want to be there, that they are dying in trenches right now.
50:14Elon MuskAnd I sure hope we can figure out some means to peace soon.
50:27Maurice LévyThe last question is going back to this crowd. You have a lot of startupers, you have a lot of young people who, who want to be successful. What are the two or three pieces of advice that you would give them?
50:45Elon MuskWell, you have a question over there?
50:47Maurice LévyYes. Do we have a microphone? Because Elon has accepted to take question from the floor shallow.
51:08Maurice LévyA microphone.
51:17Maurice LévyGo. You have the mic? You go. Yes.
51:21InterviewerOkay.
51:22Co-hostHello.
51:24Maurice LévyI don't know why you got the mic, but please go.
51:27Elon MuskAll right, so I had a question about all of your different companies and projects in the past 10 years. There's a pattern that I've seen to have identified.
51:39Maurice LévyShort question.
51:40Elon MuskEvery single one of your companies would work a lot better on Mars than on. Sure, it's really hard to make a b vacuum in on Earth, but on Mars it's a lot easier safely for Tesla.
51:57Elon MuskElectric cars obviously are the only one. Yeah, yeah. And I mean SpaceX is obvious.
52:05Maurice LévyOkay, yeah, give the mic back.
52:08Elon MuskYeah, yeah. I mean me and Mars should get a room basically. I love Mars.
52:18Maurice LévyOkay,
52:23Maurice LévyNo, no, no, no. Now I want that to give the mic.
52:27Elon MuskSorry guys. Okay, sir, what's the question?
52:32Maurice LévyWhat is the question?
52:33InterviewerMy name is Nayel, co founder and CEO at ClickUp we make AI tiny. So Tesla is one of our target.
52:41Elon MuskWe'd love to work with you, Alan. And my husband is actually Exmobiline who
52:47Interviewerhave carry like the infrastructure on MLOps.
52:50Elon MuskOkay, okay, sure. Oh, oh,
52:59Maurice Lévyokay.
53:04Maurice LévyOne last question, guys.
53:07Co-hostWhatever.
53:08Maurice LévyYeah, okay.
53:08Elon MuskI'm fine with it. However long you want to do it. No, no, yeah, totally crazy.
53:14Maurice LévyAliji.
53:15Elon MuskYeah, hi.
53:17Co-hostThank you for being here. Dr. Albez. I'm the head of researcher Space neuropsychology lab. We are working on the mental health to help human to go to mass. Actually.
53:33Elon MuskSure. That's great.
53:34Co-hostOkay. So the question is, how do you think for human beings?
53:42Elon MuskWell, I think. I think you'd want to have a very good mental health on a trip to Mars. Make sure everyone's sane. Because you don't want someone opening at the airlock in the middle of the night.
53:55Elon MuskSo I think sanity is very important if you're going to Mars.
54:08Elon MuskPlease, we're just going to descend into chaos.
54:13Maurice LévyJust take it.
54:18Maurice LévyOkay. You would get. Okay.
54:21Co-hostOkay.
54:21Maurice LévyOkay.
54:22Co-hostThank you.
54:23Maurice LévySo I'm Nathaniel Ackerman from.
54:25Elon MuskOkay, I think we're going to just. It's going to be chaos.
54:29Maurice LévyCan you.
54:29Co-hostYou hear me?
54:38Elon MuskHey, great T shirt.
54:43Maurice LévyYou talked about the European regulation, Elon, and you know that there have been many amendments due to LLM deployment. Do you think how can we integrate the use and actual use of this LLM in a non controlled way in the current discussion?
55:07Maurice LévyCan you make it short? Thank you.
55:11Elon MuskYou're asking about never safe LLM use.
55:14Maurice LévyOkay, just a second. No, please. It will answer the question.
55:21Elon MuskWas it about safety in LLMs or. Sorry, I didn't hear. The whole question is like safe application of LLMs or what is it? The regulation at the European level was
55:35Maurice Lévyconceived when we did not talk about LLMs. So what would you integrate in the current negotiation at the European level to integrate the LLM? Okay. And protect from the use.
55:57Maurice LévyOkay. It's okay. When the regulation has been created, LLM didn't exist. So what would be your suggestion regarding regulating LLMs?
56:09Elon MuskWell, I think more broadly there should be regulatory insight into LLMs and really any other form of AI. I mean there's. I'm not sure. I don't think LLMs are the ultimate form of AI.
56:27Elon MuskI mean there'S sort of an inside joke on AI of like who do you think will be the. The American president in 2032? Diffusion or transformers? Those are inside jokes.
56:39Elon MuskBut yeah, it's like, what does that mean? But that like might be a real. It might be real. So yeah, so we will have the.
56:52Maurice LévyJust a second. The two latest questions. One here and one in that region. So go ahead. See that?
57:06Maurice LévyI mean, no, if we don't listen to the question, we will not be able to continue.
57:14Co-hostAnd we have. Every. Every year we have a Palma race which is 13 under 30. My question is what business young people should focus on.
57:27Elon MuskSure.
57:34Elon MuskWell, I think generally, I think it's important to focus on something.
57:37Maurice LévyI don't think. Go ahead.
57:39Elon MuskSorry.
57:40Maurice LévyI think
57:43Elon Muskyou want to focus on something that you are personally passionate about, that you personally care about. It's very hard to be motivated for a product that you don't really feel strongly about.
57:54Elon MuskAnd it doesn't have to be high tech. It could be in any, in any field. Just it's gotta be a product that you feel is really needs to be there.
58:04Elon MuskThat and something that you personally love. And I would listen to your instincts on, you know, do you love this product or service? Because it's kind of impossible to know what do other people love?
58:16Elon MuskBut if you love it, that's a good sign. And that could be small to large. Any kind of any field. It doesn't have to be high tech. But if you don't love, if you don't really love the product that you're making, if you can't, like a good test would be that you can't wait for this product to be on the market.
58:39Elon MuskAnd if that's the case, you're going in the right direction.
58:44Maurice LévyGreat.
58:49Maurice LévyThe last question we have, we have a French,
59:00Maurice LévyWe have a French saying which is,
59:14Maurice LévyNo, no, you, you, not the kids.
59:42Maurice LévyNow to pose the.
59:45Elon MuskHe's asking for neuralink and about the human testing and he's very excited. When do you think that we will be able to start testing in our virtual world? VICTORIA VR
1:00:00Maurice LévySure.
1:00:01Elon MuskWell, so neuralink is. First of all, I want to show everyone, if you may be worried about neuralink, that you will see neuralink is going to be a fairly slow process because anything that's done in humans, it's very slow.
1:00:15Elon MuskSo sometimes people think that this suddenly we're going to be chipping everyone's head and then before they know it, everyone's connected to the Internet and then we're in trouble with your brain.
1:00:26Elon MuskSo it's going to happen very slowly. Hopefully later this year we'll do our first human device implantation. And this will be for someone that has sort of tetraplegic, quadriplegic, does not have, has lost the connection from their brain to their body.
1:00:44Elon MuskAnd we think we should be able to, that person will be able to communicate as fast as someone who has a fully functional body. So that's going to be a big deal.
1:00:54Elon MuskAnd we see a path beyond that to actually transfer the signals from the motor cortex of the brain to pass the injury in the spinal cord and actually enable someone's body to be used again.
1:01:07Elon MuskSo essentially shunting the signals past the broken point and restore potentially full body use to someone that has completely lost the connection. And, I mean, you can imagine, like, if, say, Stephen Hawking were alive today, what a problem, Profound change that would be.
1:01:28Elon MuskAnd so that's our first application. And if it's looking like that, the first case will be later this year. So.
1:01:40Maurice LévyFantastic. No, I would like a very, very warm rose of applause to Elon Musk.
1:02:12Maurice LévyOkay. Thank you. Thank you. Oh, thank you.
1:02:16Elon MuskI just want to say, you guys are great. You guys are. I mean, it's so inspiring to see so much energy and so much positive energy in the room.
1:02:25Elon MuskSo this is very inspiring for the future.