《Elon Musk》是一本关于特斯拉和SpaceX创始人埃隆·马斯克生平的传记。这本书详细描述了马斯克的个人经历、创业历程和对未来的愿景。作者通过深入研究和采访,呈现了一个敢于冒险、坚持追求科技突破的人物形象。马斯克的勇气和决心激励着读者去追寻梦想,同时也引发了对科技进步和可持续发展的思考。
Elon Musk读后感篇一
我是这本书的中文版译者,预计中文版会与英文版同步出版,我有幸先于全世界99.9999%的读者读完了这部作品。我必须说这本书对于一个当代科技企业家的调查、跟访、信息比对等各方面工作是非常深入细致的,其采访的深入程度是大部分成功企业家传记所完全不具备的,Walter对埃隆本人的跟访(he shadowed Elon)时间长达两年,除了认同埃隆本人的母亲、弟弟、同事、朋友,他还采访到的曾经与Elon发生过矛盾、摩擦、争吵、纠纷甚至政变的父亲、前妻、前女友、前同事、前合伙人,这些人也都接受了Walter的采访,具名的接受采访人数总计达到了126人,这在单一企业家传记当中也是罕见的,所以你即将看到的不是对Elon单方面的溢美之词,而是一份经过双方甚至多方信息充分碰撞以后呈现的较为完整、客观的重要事件经历还原。而且Walter称,埃隆没有干预本书的创作。 我想这是Walter本人在《乔布斯传》之后可能投入心血最多,也最为重要的一部作品了,这可能也是2023年前后数年,在中英文出版界最重要的一部人物传记了。
Elon Musk读后感篇二
以前的传记没读过。这本在各大媒体预热的火热--看摘选关于收购推的内容,生动的幕后故事把过去一年的新闻事件都串起来了。
Ren之前好像在播客上讲过跟马斯克从东海岸到西海岸的road trip,还提到一郎那辆总坏的车。
DAY1
看到第70页,延期入学斯坦福。
马一郎,的确是他母亲Maye的第1个孩子,跟错的人Errol-error哈哈。但甭管婚姻的对错,早生孩子真的是好啊,重要的是孩子他自己会长大,好好养育才是真格的。
养育最忌限制和压抑,放养也会有奇效,马一郎是个成功案例。关于他性格特质中不稳定甚至阴暗的部分,作者引述多方回忆和看法以及在此基础上的分析也很到位,不多赘述。
孩子去探索世界甚至探险,而不是过度保护,能够把勇敢决断的基因写到性格里。这对日后马一郎在一家人里率先走出南非、闯荡加拿大都起到了关键作用。
孩子形成自己的兴趣,发展自己的特长和爱好,保持与现实世界的接触和关注,能够帮助日后做出遵从内心的正确判断。择校宾大、奔赴硅谷都有赖于此。
阅读和思考,能够让人认识不止世界,而且宇宙,自然不限于眼前的一亩三分地。
但也不得不赞叹祖荫,马一郎父母两家的家庭都充满了探险和探索未知的精神。方方面面会潜移默化的影响下一代。
不难判断,安土重迁、保守、过度保护的家庭,更多的是培养打工仔和模仿者。科技上的先驱和拓荒,所需要的勇敢的探索、试错和资本,最后半句已删除。
Elon Musk读后感篇三
为在世且尚年轻的人作传,能够如此全面客观很难得。两年对传主的贴身跟班观察,对传主和身边的人大量采访,除了作者的专业,也得益于传主的开放或是不在意的心态,对成书不加干涉。因此我们能够看到一个复杂富争议的人。如作者引用莎翁: All heroes have flaws, some tragic, some conquered. And those we cast as villains can be complex. Even the best people are molded out of faults. 作者明确地指出为马斯克带来成就的一些成功特质并不能成为他那些Demon Mode中混蛋行为的借口,然而这两方面组成了他这个完整而复杂的人。正因为复杂所以吸引人。
“(Great innovators) can also be crazy, crazy enough to think they can change the world.”
除了人物有意思,也有一些工作上的启示:
- question every requirement
- simplify before automate
- 对于deadline 的方式不认同但值得深思:要求不合理的死线推动进程,结果是超过要求死线但仍然大大推动进程
- 反面启示:drama addict制造波动可以推动短期超负荷工作,不是有持续性健康的方式
- 马斯克手下的HR让人佩服,太难了
Elon Musk读后感篇四
马斯克在95年面临着三个选择“互联网,可持续能源和太空” 他选择先去互联网,然后再去解决能源和太空,他都做成了 我觉得他的动力还是处于小时候那种移民火星的兴趣,这是出于骨子里的兴趣 我今天看了马斯克的传记 本来之前我读传记,比如说球星传记,我是不看他们青少年时期的故事的,因为他们往往会说一些自己家庭的琐事,我认为那些其实是没有太大帮助的,我只会看在联赛中debut之后的事情,他们在其中会谈很多球队,会谈很多足球,会谈很多球星 但这次看马斯克传记恰恰是他前面的那部分更吸引我,可能真是因为我的年纪,因为我的状态,我在想自己要干什么 我看书的时候有两个点有些让我思考 第一个,里面有说很多人都没有world view,但是马斯克因为从小喜欢科幻,有很厚的comic view,所以他后来才会想去殖民火星,去发射火箭,去创建spaceX。这个是真的出于骨子里的热爱,可我的骨子里的热爱是什么呢?我反问自己,却没有一个合适的答案,就像可能有的人说因为他的母亲早年得某个病,所以他很坚定地想成为一个医生,我的这种点在哪儿呢?难道非常残酷的是如果没有这种“热爱的点”,其实就注定要平淡的过完一生,虽然平淡并不是不可接受的。 感觉马斯克他能做成spaceX,一方面是因为他自己有深厚的科幻的爱好,另一方面也是,整个美国的文化都是有那种科幻的爱好,所以在美国做这件事情的基础设施其实很好。谁说硬科幻没有作用?这些真是实打实的,促进了一个行业,私人发射火星就不可能在中国兴起的(我知道中国跟风的创业公司)。文化是真的有价值呀 第二个,我里面看到95年的时候,马斯克说自己想做的有三件事情,第1个就是当时如火如荼的互联网,第2个就是说可持续的能源,第3个就是太空。可持续的能源和太空其实都非常的科幻色彩,互联网又是时代的机遇。马斯克当时清晰的看到了这三个方向,他觉得自己应该先去做互联网,然后再去做另外的两个方向,这一点真的是对我来说很吃惊,因为他的预判太准了,而且他看得很远。我之前在大公司实习,收获最重要的一点就是说长远思考、抽象思考,如果不能抽象思考出对事物的深刻认知,那开会的时候,我的任何提议都会被驳得体无完肤的。看了马斯克之后,我现在更加确定这个能力是非常重要的。
Elon Musk读后感篇五
今年6月份,看到 Walter Isaacson 发布消息,他的新作 Elon Musk 将于 9 月12日发售,当时已经开启预售。虽然我此前已经看过 Ashlee Vance 写过的同名传记,出于对作者的信任,还是决定先下订一本。几年前读过他的《爱因斯坦传》、《乔布斯传》,都是标杆级的优秀作品,尤其是爱因斯坦的传记,旁征博引又深入浅出,我曾花了一整天的时间读完,值得推荐给每一个爱科学的人。
以我以前的购书经验,本以为书会在开售后一两个月才能到我手上,没想到9月14号就寄到了,当天晚上就迫不及待地开始读,前前后后花了9天时间,也算是在最短的时间内把这本书完完整整读了一遍。
整体来说,这本书值得一读。这本书的结构与 Vance 的差别不大,都是从马斯克的童年写到作者落笔的那个时间点,有很多信息难免会有重复,但 Isaacson 尽量回避了那些高度重复的内容。例如,关于马斯克的童年,他有更加深入的挖掘,尤其是关于马斯克在南非斗兽场一般的生长经历,他和父亲之间那种恐怖的相处模式等等,很多都是前传没有捕捉到的。
但是一些刻意避免的内容,也造成了这本书存在一些短板,例如关于马斯克2008年的生死时刻,Isaacson 并没有深入地描写。在 Vance 的书中,这段经历写得跌宕起伏,SpaceX 与 Tesla 处于绝境时,马斯克的状态、他的挣扎,最后两家公司都奇迹般地度过困难时刻,读起来确实荡气回肠。
马斯克是一个控制狂,一些重要的事情,他需要掌握绝对的控制权。在 Vance 决定写传记之前与马斯克沟通时,马斯克提出了审稿的要求,Vance 是记者出身,绝不可能答应这种无理的要求,他们拉扯了很久,最终以马斯克的妥协结束。但马斯克非常支持 Isaacson 写这本书,不但协助作者联系亲朋好友接受采访,而且让作者跟随他两年时间,参与了很多重要的工作及生活事场景。因此 Isaacson 的写作条件是无可比拟的,他能接触到更多深入的信息。
正是因为马斯克的信任和支持,Isaacson 能够捕捉到很多难得的故事和画面,读完这本书,到处都是我留下的笔记。读者很容易通过这本传记理解马斯克为什么会有那些莫名其妙的举动。
马斯克到底有多执拗?在南非的时候,为了买一辆摩托车,他可以在父亲面前持续数小时、数天念叨,直到父亲就范。后来要买电脑,他又使用了同样的招数。X.com 成立的时候,伙伴们都觉得这名字不正经,他执意要用,觉得这才是干大事的名字,以至于后来跟 PayPal 合并后没有用他取的名字,他也一直耿耿于怀。至于十几二十年后,他给自己的公司取名 SpaceX ,给孩子取名 X 、给收购的公司改名 X,那都是意料之中的事情了。他会因为女友在游戏中的一次拉胯发挥而一天不跟她说话,也会因为儿子(或女儿)与他的决裂而感到悲伤,甚至做出了出卖全部房产的决定。
Isaacson 的写作手法有点像漫威拍系列电影,一个个漫威英雄,在马斯克的创业长河中,从四面八方跟他汇合,有的不欢而散(大部分),有的在他的时间线中不断交叉,有的一直伴随在他身边(主要是家人),而这群优秀的人都有他们各自的故事,在与传主相会的时间线里彼此成就。
说大部分人和马斯克不欢而散,是有根据的。书中提及的几个硅谷大佬,比尔·盖茨、拉里·佩奇、杰夫·贝佐斯、山姆·阿尔特曼等等,马斯克都和他们闹得不开心。工作者,马斯克一言不合就开除员工,也有很多优秀的老员工实在无法忍受与他相处而辞职。在与人相处这一点上,马斯克倒是与乔布斯很像。例如,他们对 Bill Gates 都有公开的负面的评价。
乔布斯一直对微软抄苹果的图形界面耿耿于怀,他曾在评价盖茨和微软时,直接说他们没品味:
The only problem with Microsoft is they just have no taste, they have absolutely no taste。
马斯克责对比尔·盖茨在特斯拉最困难的时候做空感到愤怒,直接说盖茨是个虚伪的人:
"How can someone say they are passionate about fighting climate change and then do something that reduced the overall investment in the company doing the most?" ……"It's pure hypocrisy.
作者在采访甲骨文创始人 Larry Ellison 时,他谈到了乔布斯和马斯克的异同。两人都受益于强迫症,这是他们最大的相同点。不同之处在于,乔布斯格外侧重产品设计,但是对生产线没那么关注,也从没到过中国的工厂。马斯克不仅深度参与产品设计,也格外重视产品制造,他买下丰田的工厂之后,甚至直接在生产线中间放了一台办公桌,底下放了一个枕头。
不过如果要比作者给乔布斯和马斯克写的两本传记,我觉得还是乔布斯的传记更好看。
最后补充一则在中文媒体误传的新闻及书中的两处编辑错误。
这本书出版后,中文媒体流传着“马斯克曾要求前女友cos守望天使”这则新闻,我看了一下传记里面的描写,没有任何地方写了这是马斯克要求的。首先是马斯克说,女友(Amber Heard)让他想起守望先锋里的角色“天使”,于是 Amber Heard 花了两个月设计,从头到脚 cos 了这个角色。
原文如下:He told her that she reminded him of Mercy, his favorite character in the video game Overwatch, so she spent two months designing and commissioning a head-to-toe costume so she could role-play for him.
两处编辑错误如下:
图说中标注的“2008”应为“2018”(P275)
图中圈出来的 China 应该是Crimea(P431)
Elon Musk读后感篇六
Kindle阅读体验只能说是一般,看不懂的词汇里大概有一半在自带字典里没有释义。不过作为穷学生,免费已经是顶级体验了。(查了一下原著大概200多,而且读的时候也不会自带字典)随想
科幻是很重要的文化形态,尤其在科技加速发展的时代,它具有指导未来人类社会形态的价值,Musk的宇宙视野就来源于此,大多数儿童对科学、技术和工程的兴趣也来源于此。
全球视野会让人骄傲,宇宙视野会让人谦逊。
人类对事物的认知:过度推崇-疯狂诋毁-回归理性。
好奇心、好胜心都是人类再自然不过的天性。对星辰的探索不过是对好奇心往科技欠发达方向的引导。
务实的理论是工具,且如今并不难寻找。
费米悖论的一种解释可能只是,宇宙太广大了
我们生活在文化符号的诅咒中。传记最大的作用就是破除盲目崇拜。
如果说对世界做了有益的事就是加分,有害的事则是减分。那么普通人可能加分不多,但减分少啊。伟人可能加分多,但错误造成的减分也多。因此大可不必妄自菲薄。
人们不是偏爱创新者,人们只是偏爱充满戏剧感的创新者,(大众认知里“无趣”的创新者通常只出现在专业课程里)无论什么时候,获取名气始终和拿捏人性挂钩。
Musk的创新(将互联网的敏捷思维推广)对老旧产业(汽车和航天)很管用,但现代产业(脑机接口和Twitter)则未必。脑机接口方面,底层科学的确需要耐心,但有时适当的目标push可以有效整合现有技术开放本可以存在的产品。
1. While other entrepreneurs struggled to develop a worldview, he developed a cosmic view.
2. I was born for a storm, and a calm does not suit me.
3. He found it surprising and frightening that technological progress was not inevitable. It could stop. It could even backslide. It only improves if a lot of people work very hard to make it better.
4. It’s not the product that leads to success. It’s the ability to make the product efficiently.
5. Question every requirement; Delete any part or process you can; Simplify and optimize; Accelerate cycle time; Automate.
6. If you don’t end up having to restore 10 percent of the parts you deleted, then you didn’t delete enough.
7. All technical managers must have hands on experience; It’s ok to be wrong. Just don’t be confident and wrong; Never ask your troops to do something you’re not willing to do.
8. Skills can be taught. Attitude changes require a brain transplant.
9. The only rules are the ones dictated by the laws of physics. Everything else is a recommendation.
10. Musk mixed, as he often did, vision and hype
11. One method Musk used when a problem got hairy was to turn his attention to designing a future vision of the product
12. Musk’s lofty goals are usually accompanied by practical business models.
13. I’m always open to evidence from physics experiments.
14. Play life like a game; Do not fear losing; Be proactive; Optimize every turn
15. I think there’s a distinction between freedom of speech and freedom of reach
16. “I believed in a strict meritocracy, whoever is doing great work, they get more responsibility.”
17. “I decided l’d rather be burned out than bored.”
18. “I’m going to spend the next few days off with my wife and daughter, but if I take a whole week off, my brain gets fired.”
19. I don’t think misgendering people is cool. But it’s not sticks and stones.
20. He thought of it as a technology company, when in fact it was an advertising medium based on human emotions and relationships.
21. It wasn’t because it was truly necessary. He did it because it was in his nature to love the drama.
22. (Aim high)Iterate fast, take risks, be brutal, accept some flameouts, then try again
23. Twitter had become a de facto collaborator with the FBI and other government agencies.
24. He was doing the very things that he claimed to disdain about the previous overlords at Twitter.
25. The neural network did not work well until it had been trained on at least a million video clips.
26. Technology revolutions usually start with little fanfare.
27. The most ironic outcome is the most likely.
28. Both his accomplishments and his failures were epic.
29. One can admire a person’s good traits and decry the bad ones.
30. But would a restraining Musk accomplish as much as a Musk unbound?
31. Sometimes great innovators are risk-seeking man-children who resist potty training.
Elon Musk读后感篇七
我的第一本全英文传记 读的传记太少 这个五分没有足够的比较. 一口气binge reading读完还是非常爽的 真切感受到了elon的一些attention seeking的特性和他surge & challenge rules的作风。有被inspired到,时不时的我就会把自己和elon进行对比 看看自己在他的处境里会做出怎么样的决定。 我不会成为elon 也不想成为elon 但是不妨碍我欣赏他身上的一些品质. 不知道为什么看完这本书之后 我的第一个映入脑海的场景就是elon代表人类和外星人 和自豪地沟通但是被外星人一下拍死的 画面.
摘抄:
关于Elon Musk自己的性格:
没有共情能力,他不在乎和你的关系,他在乎是否事情能够做成。我们从历史的今天回去看一个伟人,我们不清楚也不在乎这个人是不是一个nice guy, 对周围的人好不好,历史对他的评判就是 他最终做出了什么样的事情。Elon genuinely did not care if he offended or intimidated the people he worked with, as long as he drove them to accomplish feats they thought were impossible.
非常喜欢冒险,别人都是减少风险,他反而是一直增加风险,因为他要完成的梦想太遥远太有风险。He is the total opposite of limiting risks. His risk addiction can be useful when it comes to driving people to do what seems impossible. He is amazingly successful getting people to march across the desert. He has the level of certainty that causes him to put all of his chips on the table. It’s okay to take risks and fail and learn. A pattern was set: try new ideas and be willing to blow things up.
非常喜欢火急火燎,做什么事情一定要发个卫星,定一个非常离谱的目标。坏处是做了一些不必要的事情,而且完不成目标很伤士气。但是因为这样的urgency,让大家每天都冲冲冲,虽然没完成自己的目标,但是至少比行业的其他人都要厉害了。 Musk's habit: Setting unrealistic timelines that transform his "wow" notion from being completely insane to being merely very late. To his word, a maniacal sense of urgency is our operating principle. He has an insane sense of urgency and push everything to the extreme. Sometimes his insane schedule produced the impossible, sometimes they didn't, so it's 50/50. People who work with him learn that never tell him to say no, instead just saying you're going to try, then later explain why it doesn't work out. The reason why you need to have something like this is that even though we fail to meet most schedules or cost targets, we still beat all of our peers.
Pretend we are a startup about to run out of money, he said at one of those sessions. Faster, faster. Please mark any time a date has slipped. All bad news should be given loudly and often. Good news can be said quietly and once. How do you keep urgency? It's the lifeline of a company.
非常需要聚光灯和别人承认他的工作 甚至通过法律手段让大家承认自己的工作 他不是the humble low key type: Musk really needs attention and credits. When people are missing credits, he will get really paranoid.
会想很多很远的不切实际的事情,这是为了给现在遇到问题的自己和团队打气,给自己的信仰充值。 Even as he was wrestling with the Nevada and Fremont Tesla factories, Musk found time each week to look at the renderings of the type of amenities and accommodations that Starship will have for passengers on a nine-month trip to Mars.
One method Musk used when a problem get hairy was to turn his attention to designing a future version of this product.
关于创业:
专业领域的知识被overrated, 就连Elon Musk并不是什么都会的天才,他对于火箭的大部分知识也就是30岁左右的时候 开始疯狂通过读书和专业的人交流习得的。开始学习永远不晚。找到专业的人他通过线下组织兴趣小组来先找到第一批人然后通过第一批人来介绍其他的人
He went to the Palo Alto Public Library to read about rocket engineering and started calling experts asking to borrow their old engine manual. Musk began gathering rocket engineers for meetings at a hotel near the Los Angeles airport.
One Saturday night, without much warning, he flew to Seattle to fight the entire Starlink team. He brought with him eight of his most senior SpaceX rocket engineers. None of them knew about satellites, but they all knew how to solve engineering problems.
一个人如果无法承担风险,他是不能够成为一个公司的cofounder的 If someone is unwilling to invest in a company or take risks, the person shouldn't qualify as a founder.
This is how civilizations decline. They quit taking risks. And when they quit taking risks, their arteries harden. Every year there are more referees and few doers. That's why Americans can no longer build things like high speed rail or rockets that go to the moon. When you have had success for too long, you lose the desire to take risks.
时时刻刻要搞明白WHY, 时时刻刻要挑战自己的想法。规则都是人定的,要理解为什么要有这样的规则: Who wrote that? Why does it make sense? All requirements should be treated as recommendations. He repeatedly instructed that only immutable ones were those decreed by the laws of physics.
Design设计和工厂一定要在一起,和用户越近越好. 如果设计 + 产品 + 开发是同一个人就好了,为什么现在的公司都是两个人,能不能 有产品能力的设计 和产品能力的开发 + project manager 能够更高效的做事情。这有点像apple 和 airbnb的 design driven culture了.
可以犯错,但是要确保错了之后不要再错。但是一定要动作快,否则会把自己耗死。It's okay to make wrong decision than making late decision. You can make wrong decision, go find issues and fix. If you just wait and don't do any decision, we die. It's okay to be wrong. It's totally okay. You don't have to be perfect.
和Costco恰恰相反,where他们希望员工带的时间越长越好,这样可以减少新员工的培训成本。但是Elon的公司里,其实churn rate非常高。他与其大家疯狂干 也不要一群老人在那里打酱油。Elon likes fresh blood. He doesn't mind people leaving. He is more concerned with a phenomenon he calls "phoning in rich", meaning people who have worked at the company for a long time and because they have enough money and vacation home, no longer hunger to stay all night on the factory floor. 因此 People who work for Elon Musk not necessarily will sustain because Elon Musk requires and asks for really high maintenance people. If you are looking for work-life balance at some point in your life, they will usually move on and find a better place.
寻找和找到一流的人才是最重要的:
Musk went to Cornell and sent a note to some engineering professors inviting them to bring one of their most favorite students to lunch. This is a brilliant idea to attract talent.
态度 > 能力
When hiring or promoting, Musk made a point of prioritizing attitudes over resume skills. And his definition of a good attitude was a desire to work maniacally hard. Musk hired these people on the spot.
关于生产制造
先都手动的跑,手动的跑顺了,把不必要的步骤都剪掉了,再自动化。千万不要先自动化,代价很大。 Musk introduced automation everywhere and then he has to remove automation to increase efficiency because there are things that cannot be done properly by automation. The experience became a lesson that will become part of Musk's production algorithm. Always wait until the end of designing a process after you have questioned all the requirements and deleted all the unnecessary parts before you introduce automation.
我最喜欢的关于做事的部分
关于更宏大的 我无法有结论的问题: