Picture Painter-in-Chief is basically Elon Musk’s job title.
Yes, technically I am sure he is brilliant and just as capable as the senior engineers he employes. But the guy is doing so much, he can’t be in the weeds doing the research and math and all the nitty-gritty.
He’s really more like the storyteller or picture painter. This is his main role. The latest video for his latest endeavor, The Boring Company, is the best example of this. (Embedded at the end of this post.)
Normally, you’d watch something like this and think, “This is science fiction, never going to happen.” But Elon has defied the odds so much and is in such an influential place of power and has gained so much goodwill he has absolutely reignited the 60s era space race imagination of the country.
Because of this, he now releases a video like this and instead of being dismissive about it we think, “Yeah, I can see that. Why not? He could probably do it.”
And maybe even more importantly we think: “If he can do it, what else can I do?”
It’s an awesome world to live in when we have these storytellers able to dream a dream and have enough of a track record of success and goodwill behind them that the world believes that dream!
And it’s awesome to live in a world where we have brave men doing hard things and inspiring everyone else to imagine and paint beautiful pictures of an improved tomorrow.