IMO people who are seeking approval tend to not go out of their way to be assholes quite so often ("pedo guy" incident, for example).
> His character, at the impressive level of 95, reflected not only a significant time investment but also a high degree of expertise.
> Musk’s performance has sparked skepticism about whether he genuinely leveled and equipped his character himself.
> The prevailing sentiment in the gaming community is that Musk doesn’t typically invest much time in video games, but instead leverages gaming achievements to draw media attention.
https://www.notebookcheck.net/Elon-Musk-embarrasses-himself-...
That was the most "the emperor wears no clothes"-moment I've ever witnessed in my life. I play more PoE than I care to admit, and it was obvious within mere seconds that he has absolutely no clue what's going on.
It was absolutely surreal to watch.
It is also so bizarre to brag about rankings for games where the grind to end game is a massive time sink. It wasnt like he was some LoL god where there is no grind only skill.
Yea, that’s called narcissism. Their only drive in life is to be admired, and it’s much easier to lie and deceive to reach that goal, than doing something that’s truly praiseworthy
End of the day though, why does it matter his true motivation? If I was working at one of his companies, as long as the paycheck cashes and the stock options are legally mine, if his motivation is money-based or attention-based or he's a true believer, I'm getting money and I can feed my kids.
It's not like I'm going to get the chance to talk with him personally and get to know him and sus out what it is, either, so it's all just pointless theorizing. What we, the general public "know" is a result of various people with their own agenda pushing their owna viewpoints? Does the man know anything at all, is he a total charlatan, or is he smart and gets it? Hit refresh on a different subreddit and get a different answer.
The thing is, he _had_ this. He had all of Reddit worshipping him. He had the press. He had the tech-internet.
Then he knowingly blew it all up overnight to ally with Trump.
I think the reasons why are pretty clear: a son-who-loves-me became a daughter-who-despises-me and his companies got repeatedly hamstrung by California Democrats.
But if his root motivation was truly just approval, he would have taken it on the chin and accepted slower growth of his other ambitions. So it's a little more complicated than that.
He blew it up years before that with his "pedo guy" false accusation drama.
He's an action junkie.
In both cases he saw inefficiencies and just wanted to spend the energy he's always been overflowing with to improve things. I don't know about Musk but my friend hates mediocrity and saw everything as something he can improve.
In another case I was in car, for a long trip, with someone else (who was working to become an... Ambassador: hardly the tech type!) and that person would constantly comment on what could be done enhanced.
Something something about personality types, the builders, etc.
Those who only ever want to spend the money of --and benefit from the wealth created by-- others are going to dismiss it all as "people who are after money" but it's more complicated than that and you can't generalize people.
I know several doctors for example: two of them are clearly money-driven (one of them literally told me "I'd never ever teach medicine, I'm in this only for the money") but most of the others I know are just happy to help people be more healthy.
I've got another friend, not rich at all, he's working an additional job as a firefighter: sure it brings some money, but that's not the reason. He's also an action junkie. He was there driving ambulances during Covid: to be helpful, for the action, etc.
It's not all about money. Thinking it's only about money is a mindset that often comes from those who want the money of others (through taxes).