[At-Large] X marks the spot - a small spot

[Mike Arbrouet]

Perception of luck can be subjective but success in business
entrepreneurship requires intelligence, hard work, determination,
resilience and innovative mindset. I tend to attribute Mr Musk's success in
those categories.

Luck can take one so far. It's statically unfair to invoke luck when the
guy has built/led/run/invested in companies such as Tesla, SpaceX,
Neuralink, the Boring company, OpenAI, ...
Credit when credit is due.

On Fri, Jul 28, 2023, 3:03 PM Antony Van Couvering <avc at avc.vc> wrote:

> No doubt he has the right; we shall see if he has the ability.  Perhaps he
> is a genius, or perhaps there is a decent statistical chance that someone
> from a privileged background can get lucky three times in a row, and blow
> it on the fourth.
>
> On Jul 28, 2023, at 12:06 PM, Mike Arbrouet via At-Large <
> at-large at atlarge-lists.icann.org> wrote:
>
> Sounds like someone is not a fan of Mr Musk. The way I see it: his money
> (of which he has plenty), his companies, and consequently his decisions.
> And given his successful track record, I wouldn't bet against him.
>
> On Wed, Jul 26, 2023, 7:03 PM Evan Leibovitch via At-Large <
> at-large at atlarge-lists.icann.org> wrote:
>
>> So apparently a certain purveyor of rockets, tunnels and electric cars is
>> infatuated with the letter "X" to the point of destroying decades and
>> billions of dollars in accumulated brand value in renaming Twitter. Most
>> involved in tech are I'm sure aware of this already.
>>
>> Why am I posting this to ICANN mailing lists?
>>
>> To call attention to the stupidity of confusing domains with brands,
>> something in which many domain sellers -- mainly speculative domain
>> re-sellers -- gleefully engage.
>>
>> Apparently Mr. Musk seems to believe that acquiring "X.com" from
>> Facebook -- along with some cosmetic redesigns -- constitutes a rebranding.
>> Let this episode be a warning to others who would use a domain as a primary
>> branding tactic, forgetting that:
>>
>>    - A great number of tech companies have trademarked uses of the
>>    letter X
>>    <https://edition.cnn.com/2023/07/25/tech/meta-microsoft-trademarks-new-twitter-name/index.html>
>>    for web services, most notable among them the aforementioned Facebook. So
>>    this is not an issue of Musk being able to bully smaller companies;
>>
>>    - Then there's Microsoft, which has some such trademarks of its own
>>    and produces an obscure, little-known computing device known as an "XBox";
>>
>>    - Most people using Unix and Linux for their desktops have been using
>>    software known as "X" for decades (though it is being phased out ... very
>>    slowly).
>>
>>    - Also consider that doing searches for "X" on the Internet is ikely
>>    to find paths to very family-UNfriendly parts of the web. Consider the
>>    American "X" rating given to films before 1990.
>>
>> Let this be a cautionary tale, unfolding before us in real time. A domain
>> name is at best a minor part of branding strategy that must consider many
>> other factors. Paying a substantial sum for that second-hand domain will
>> not be the answer to your problems, and may indeed introduce new problems.
>> And especially beware of domain resellers passing themselves off as
>> branding experts.
>>
>> Evan Leibovitch, Toronto Canada
>> @evanleibovitch / @el56
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