Elon Musk vows ‘thermonuclear lawsuit’ as advertisers flee X over antisemitism::Tesla founder threatens to take action against media watchdog ‘the split second court opens on Monday’
Elon Musk vows ‘thermonuclear lawsuit’ as advertisers flee X over antisemitism::Tesla founder threatens to take action against media watchdog ‘the split second court opens on Monday’
Does it? I expected better of Wikipedia, so I checked, and both Musk’s page and Tesla’s avoid simply listing him as a founder by explaining the situation, i.e., that he was an early investor. Even the sidebar for Tesla, Inc. just links to a subsection rather than listing names.
Just a note to add, addressing a related talking point that inevitably comes up:
It’s a very common piece of misinformation that he was determined to be a founder in a court of law. That never happened. It was part of an agreement to avoid a lawsuit. It’s a lie that the relevant parties could all live with as part of a larger settlement.
I like to ask Musk apologists, “Do you need to found a company to be that company’s founder, yes or no?” If they waffle or say “no,” there’s no point continuing in good faith, because they’re not serious people. It’s not hard to say “Okay, that’s a bit of a fib, he should be called an honorary founder, but blah blah blah…” But if they can’t even do that, then they aren’t operating based on reality.
I will respond to this by asking “is registering the name of a company the only thing that counts when founding a company?”
Because that’s what the original founders did. They registered the name. No patents, no designs, no engineering, no staff. They registered the name, then went searching for VC money.