Lifestyle
Elon Musk is a one stop, pop culture to STEM recruiting shop, and that’s a good thing
WARNING
This column will be unabashedly full of pop culture references in honor of its topic. Check out the end of the piece for a Where’s Waldo-style treasure hunt to identify where they are. And by that I mean like the list at the back of the book. Or the companion list on the main pages under the scene descriptions. No, definitely more like the back of the book.
***
You may have noticed that Elon Musk has something of a cult following. (awkward pause for audience laughter)
Seriously, though. Have you ever wondered how the nerdy PayPal guy whose epidermis was showing a bit much became not just the purveyor of cool tech, but a standard of cool to which all others within similar realms are measured? Personally, I’ve become so accustomed to that reality that I forget there was a time when rockets couldn’t land themselves and $TSLAQ wasn’t a thing.
Speaking of cults, those guys should hand in their soda machine rings and retire already, no?
In my opinion, Elon Musk’s overall fusion of popular culture with both his businesses and public persona gives him a unique resonance with people – their resonance. And that’s a good thing when considering all the places he’s trying to take humanity.
As the “pop culture” chief executive, he clearly communicates how leading the ship of change is much more than just walking to the front and declaring himself king. He has to pitch the ship, show the blueprint, obtain the funding for construction, find the contractors, build it, employ people to run it, then campaign for customers, sell the tickets, and finally, sail the ship full of normal people, movie stars, a skipper, millionaires, their spouses, professors, and possibly someone named Mary Ann, all without crashing.
By the way, when I say “culture” I mean memes, movie quotes, cartoon references, sci-fi tributes, and Twitter conversations. Let’s assume my knowledge of philosophy pretty much begins and ends with Dr. Ellie Sattler’s outlook as conveyed to Jeff Goldblum.
Terms & conditions for “Not-a-Flamethrower”
Please use as directed to avoid unintentionally burning things down. For simple & concise instructions, we drew upon wisdom in great Dr Seuss book “Green Eggs and Ham”. #ThrowFlamesResponsibly pic.twitter.com/kgj8W8EOLJ
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) June 9, 2018
There are a lot of technical languages needed to understand the many parts of Musk’s multifaceted journey, but there’s one language that unites them all – inspiration. This is where Musk’s immersion in pop culture comes in. He knows how to derive action plans from inspirational concepts because they inspire him, too. I think this is all an amazing benefit for science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) recruiting and mainstream STEM interest.
It’s easy to get lost in the woods of what Musk is trying to accomplish if you’re not careful, and that drives people to learn more so they understand. Electric cars have things like production lines, battery chemistry, the electrical nuances of Superchargers, and business logistics; SpaceX is literally rocket science, meaning things like materials engineering, chemistry, and orbital mechanics are the blue Yoshis for Reddit cred; The Boring Company involves machinery details and political maneuvering, among other things; and Neuralink would benefit from Neuralink for a non-scientist’s true understanding of how Neuralink works.
As a layperson looking at these things, I’m surprised by what I’m willing to research just to keep up with what Musk is doing, and I’m probably a fraction of a percent informed compared to the average Musk enthusiast. Anecdotally, I think that happens because he communicates his ideas using ‘big picture’ type expressions like flying cars and great dining on a trip to Mars, which makes them relatable, relevant, and exciting. And tying it all together is the fact that he’s almost always going to do what he says he’s going to do plus more.
I mean, I’m sure Jeff Bezos is going to do all the things he’s said he’ll do with Blue Origin, but maybe what matters is less about how big your rocket is and more about how you plan to use it. The Saturn V was awe-inspiring not just because it was huge and powerful and the first of its kind. It was representing a human journey to a new frontier, and it brought a symbolic victory against an adversary that threatened the freedom of everything it touched. Falcon Heavy is awe-inspiring because of both its engineering and its role in the democratization of space travel. Starship is awe-inspiring because its first and primary purpose is to establish a human presence on another planet.
Bezos, on the other hand, has conquered human patience for the most part with Amazon and wants to give the ultra rich the ride of their life with Blue Origin. A $250,000 ticket to the Karman line for like 5 minutes of floating around in view of the Earth’s curvature is not exactly an everyday person thing. Good for those who can afford it, but not very inspiring for those who can never afford it. He’s also said things like, we’ll go to Mars “because it’s cool,” which is ironically not cool and gives the impression that he has a roommate named Patrick. SpaceX certainly has a “cool” factor, but people aren’t buying company mugs that say “Cool new hangout” across a picture of Mars when they’re filled with hot coffee.
Wow, I never knew trig would make its way into my writing…
For a specific example of Musk’s pop culture conversion to STEM interest I’m talking about, take The Boring Company. The whole venture started with a rant about traffic, was named such because it was a funny double entendre, and then was made even more amusing with Monty Python tie-ins and flamethrower merchandise inspired by Space Balls. Using pop culture, Elon Musk brought genuine, mainstream interest to the subject of public transportation logistics, no Rowan North required to give it a little extra spark.
This sort of public attention thing happens when big achievements or problems come up, sure. But there’s this one guy that keeps inspiring kids to go study STEM topics so they can work for his companies; this one guy keeps inspiring adults to start their own STEM ventures based on the ideas he’s promoting; this one guy keeps all of us thinking about what he’s doing and whether it’s going to work while admitting that, even if we have our doubts about whether it’s all feasible, it probably should work and we should maybe help it work.
Altogether, Elon Musk is a one-stop pop culture to STEM recruiting shop, and I think that’s a really good thing.
What do you think of Musk’s pop culture infusions into everything he does? Have any favorites? Any you wish weren’t a thing?
TREASURE HUNT
Find the following pop culture references in this column!
1. Bart Simpson breaks his leg
2. Homer Simpson joins a secret society
3. Titanic
4. Gilligan’s Island
5. Jurassic Park
6. Super Mario Brothers for Super Nintendo
7. Austin Powers: Goldmember
8. Spongebob Squarepants
9. Sine, Cosine, Tangent…
10. Ghostbusters 2016
Elon Musk
Tesla FSD is about to know your specific house and neighborhood better than any map
Tesla confirmed it is building a feature that lets you teach your car where to go.
Tesla is building a feature that will let drivers talk to their car in plain language and teach it exactly what to do, with the vehicle remembering those instructions for every future trip. Tesla VP of AI Software Ashok Elluswamy confirmed it this week on X after a user pointed out one of FSD’s most persistent real-world limitations is that the system has no way to receive contextual instructions the way a human driver would.
“FSD would be twice as useful in neighborhoods if I could actually talk to the car and tell it which driveway to pull into, the same way I would with a person driving me home. Right now, there isn’t really an input for telling Tesla what color the house is or giving it specific context like that. Google Maps is also notorious for putting pins on houses that aren’t actually yours.” Tesla owner Chris further noted, “It would be so cool if I could talk to the car while going down my street and say something like, ‘It’s the white house on the left, just past that SUV,’ and then have FSD remember that for next time.”
FSD would be twice as useful in neighborhoods if I could actually talk to the car and tell it which driveway to pull into, the same way I would with a person driving me home.
Right now, there isn’t really an input for telling Tesla what color the house is or giving it specific…
— Chris (@ChrissGPT) July 8, 2026
This feature would carry more weight than it might seem. Grok has been available inside Tesla vehicles since July 2025, expanded to European vehicles in February 2026, and gained a hands-free “Hey Grok” wake word with location-based reminders and natural-language navigation in the Spring 2026 update. But up to this point, Grok has had no authority over how FSD actually drives. Lane changes, braking, speed, and parking maneuvers remain entirely within FSD’s autonomous decision-making loop. What Elluswamy confirmed is that the next step pushes Grok into a supervisor role, one that translates spoken intent directly into driving decisions.
Tesla teases greater Grok FSD integration and ‘Banish’ feature ‘in about 3 months’
Elluswamy acknowledged at a January 2026 conference that while fully integrated voice control is on Tesla’s roadmap, “it opens up an entire area of testing that we have to do. For example, you shouldn’t be able to tell the car to crash, and it shouldn’t crash.” Elon Musk subsequently confirmed on June 23 that Grok voice commands will pass to FSD’s planning layer by September 2026, a three month timeline from confirmation to deployment.
The deeper significance is what this does for Tesla’s AI training flywheel. Every time an owner corrects FSD with a spoken instruction and the car learns and remembers it, that interaction becomes a data point covering an edge case that no simulation or scripted test could have generated. A fleet of millions of Tesla vehicles crowdsourcing hyper-local contextual knowledge, which driveway, which gate entrance, which side of the street, builds a layer of geographic and behavioral intelligence that competitors without a comparable fleet simply cannot replicate at the same speed or scale.
As Teslarati has reported, Tesla’s Cybercab and robotaxi operations have expanded to Miami following the Austin launch, with rider profiles already collecting preference data. Voice-taught contextual instructions linked to individual rider profiles means a Cybercab could eventually know before it arrives exactly which entrance to use, where to wait, and how to navigate the final hundred feet of any trip it has made before.
Lifestyle
Tesla app update makes Robotaxi ownership make a lot more sense
Tesla’s app now shows a live indicator when your car is actively driving itself.
A recent Tesla app update, released last week (4.58.5), gives visibility on whether a vehicle is navigating in its semi-autonomous mode or being driven by a human driver. The updated app now displays a live “Self-Driving” indicator in bright blue text directly beneath the vehicle’s speed readout whenever Full Self-Driving is actively engaged, along with the signature glowing blue navigation path that FSD users see on the main touchscreen. It is a small visual update with meaningful implications for how Tesla owners monitor their vehicles remotely.
The feature was first spotted in the wild by X user Jordan Camina, who shared video of a Hardware 3 Model S displaying the new animation through the app while driving. That detail is significant because it confirms the update is not limited to newer HW4 vehicles. It works across hardware generations, and Tesla confirmed it will eventually support all vehicles regardless of chip platform once both the app and vehicle software are updated. The vehicle side requires software version 2026.20.6.1, which has reached nearly 40% of the fleet so far, as monitored by NotaTeslaApp.
The feature makes the most practical sense when viewed through the lens of Tesla’s expanding robotaxi operation. In a robotaxi context, the owner of a vehicle generating ride revenue has a direct financial and safety interest in knowing whether their car is operating under autonomous control at any given moment. The app’s new FSD indicator gives fleet owners exactly that visibility, the same way a logistics company monitors whether a delivery driver is following the planned route. It also carries implications for Tesla’s insurance model. Tesla’s own insurance product prices premiums in part based on FSD engagement rates, and real-time visibility into when FSD is active creates a feedback loop that could eventually tie directly into policy pricing. For individual owners who have opted their personal vehicles into the robotaxi network, the update effectively turns the Tesla app into a fleet management dashboard, one that tells you whether your car is earning money, whether it is driving itself to do it, and whether everything is operating the way it should from wherever you happen to be.
Tesla expands Robotaxi to Florida, marking its third state for autonomy
As Teslarati has reported, Tesla launched unsupervised robotaxi rides in Miami this summer, a milestone that makes a remote FSD status indicator significantly more practical than a cosmetic feature. When a vehicle is operating as a robotaxi without a driver present, the owner or fleet operator needs a reliable way to confirm autonomy is engaged. The app now provides exactly that.
As noted by NotATeslaApp, The update also arrived alongside a hint buried in the same app version that Tesla plans to use the cabin camera to verify driver identity before FSD can be activated. Pairing identity verification with a live autonomy status indicator points toward the infrastructure Tesla is building for a fleet of driverless vehicles that owners can monitor the way you would track a package delivery.
Elon Musk
The Boring Company just doubled its tunneling power in Nashville
The Boring Company’s Prufrock MB2 is commissioned and ready to mine beneath Nashville’s streets.
The Boring Company’s second tunnel boring machine, Prufrock MB2, is officially ready to dig in Nashville. The company confirmed the news on X, posting: “Prufrock-MB2 is ready to mine in Nashville! MB2 commissioning is complete, including the brief 11 rpm rotation shown here. Will MB2 catch up to MB1, who had quite the head start? And Prufrock-MB3 ships in August!”
MB2 arrives with meaningful improvements over its predecessor. Lessons learned from the launch and operation of MB1 have already been applied to MB2 to improve efficiency and prepare the machine for launch.
Traditional tunnel boring machines operate in a stop-and-go cycle, digging roughly five feet, halt, erect precast concrete segments to line the tunnel wall, then resume. That repeated interruption is one of the main reasons conventional tunneling is slow and expensive. Prufrock is designed to install the tunnel liner simultaneously with mining, eliminating the need to stop every five feet. The machine also skips the need for excavated launch pits. Prufrock arrives on a truck, tilts down, and launches into the ground within 24 hours. And when the tunnel is complete, it emerges from the ground and drives to its next launch site on a trailer, eliminating the need for expensive cranes or pit excavation. The machine is also fully electric and runs with zero people in the tunnel during normal operations, controlled remotely from a surface operations center.
Prufrock-MB2 is ready to mine in Nashville! MB2 commissioning is complete, including the brief 11 rpm rotation shown here.
Will MB2 catch up to MB1, who had quite the head start?
And Prufrock-MB3 ships in August! pic.twitter.com/TTrMql2aRg
— The Boring Company (@boringcompany) June 17, 2026
It won’t be long before we hear of another major update on The Boring Company’s Music City Loop project – a planned underground transit network beneath Nashville that would move passengers in electric vehicles through a series of tunnels at highway speeds, and bypassing surface traffic entirely. Nashville was selected in part because of its strong rock conditions that suits the Prufrock machines well, and relatively less regulatory hurdles.
Progress has been steady on multiple fronts. All 37 permits and approvals required ahead of tunneling have been obtained, out of 45 total. Key wins include a fully executed TDOT tunnel permit authorizing 25 miles of tunnel, unanimous airport authority approval for a Nashville International Airport station, and the city’s first residential station agreement serving downtown tower residents.
With MB1 already tunneling, MB2 now commissioned, and MB3 shipping in August, Nashville is becoming something of a live proving ground for scaled tunnel boring. The broader ambition is not limited to one city. The Boring Company’s stated goal is to make underground transportation a practical alternative to surface roads across major metro areas. Nashville is one of many cities, including a successful Las Vegas tunnel system, where that idea is being put to the test at real speed.
Tesla readies its autonomous Cybercab and Robotaxi cleaning service
SpaceX reveals Starship Flight 13 launch date
