Talk:Elon Musk

GA Reassessment

Elon Musk

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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Article (edit | visual edit | history) · Article talk (edit | history) · Watch • Watch article reassessment page • Most recent review

Result: Strong consensus for expedited delisting. ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 15:52, 23 July 2025 (UTC)

Prior issues were raised by editors at Talk:Elon Musk/Archive 22#Good Article Concerns, though no action was taken to follow up on them. The largest issues in this article relate to stability and citations. On stability, article content has changed significantly week after week and it can no longer be assumed that there is a consistent level of quality, in addition to the various disputes that have arisen in the last six months since Musk has become involved with the U.S. federal government. As far as citations, a non-negligible amount of work would have to go into improving them, namely in the "Politics" section. The CiteHighlighter script may be useful here. elijahpepe@wikipedia (he/him) 03:11, 6 July 2025 (UTC)

Note: Please note WP:GAR: "Instability in itself is not a reason to delist an article." ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 12:03, 6 July 2025 (UTC)

• Support delisting The article has undergone over 5,000 edits since its reassessment in November 2022. To say that the article has changed significantly since then would be an understatement. This article suffers from neutrality issues (namely UNDUE WEIGHT/BLPGOSSIP problems) and poor sourcing. Some1 (talk) 11:44, 10 July 2025 (UTC)
• Support delisting. This article has a few maintenance tags throughout, including for dated statements, Sfn no-target errors and page numbers. As Some1 mentioned, its neutrality is dubious and the tone is often gossipy. Many of the cited sources are news reports without any enduring notability. On stability, the article's content continues to significantly fluctuate from day to day, as the subject is often in the news; of the past 500 edits, 50 have been reverted. Bringing it back to meeting GA criteria will obviously require a huge amount of work, and will be subject to constant scrutiny, so long as the subject continues making headlines. --Grnrchst (talk) 14:58, 21 July 2025 (UTC)
• @Rollinginhisgrave, QRep2020, Kowal2701, Czarking0, JamieBrown2011, JacktheBrown, HAL333, CommunityNotesContributor, and Rosbif73: Courtesy ping to participants in the above mentioned talk page discussion. --Grnrchst (talk) 15:00, 21 July 2025 (UTC)
• Support delisting I think going through all the criteria for this is not going to be a productive use of people's time. If this was to go to GAN today (or nearly any day of the past 6 months) it would require significant work to pass. I commend the effort of the many people who have put time and patience into this article. If some them have good arguments for why this should stay listed I am certainly open to changing my mind; however, at this time I think keeping this as a GA is not in the best interest of the GA brand, the readers, the project, or even the article itself.

Czarking0 (talk) 15:54, 21 July 2025 (UTC)

• Support delisting, despite getting this page down from 14.6K words to 5.8K, and it now being back at 7k words, there's still a lot I don't believe meets GA criteria, namely as suggested enough of the citations. I did my best trimming to summary style, but I still think there are likely undue weight issues. Fundamentally it's nothing like the original GA and would require full check to get it there. Probably the article itself should settle down before even considering nomination also, given the content disputes etc. CNC (talk) 17:39, 21 July 2025 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Proposal to describe Musk as a “robber baron” in the lead

I would like to suggest that the lead describe Elon Musk as a robber baron, potentially:

Elon Musk is an American businessman and robber baron...

This characterization has appeared in published sources rather than originating with Wikipedia editors. Robert Reich has described Musk as a “modern-day robber baron”, and The Washington Post has discussed Musk in the context of “robber baron silicon chic.” [oai_citation:0‡The Guardian](https://www.theguardian.com/business/2020/sep/17/wealth-of-us-billionaires-rises-by-nearly-a-third-during-pandemic?utm_source=chatgpt.com)

Given WP:BLP, WP:NPOV, and WP:DUE, I am not suggesting that one commentator's characterization alone establishes this wording. I am proposing discussion of whether the description is sufficiently widespread and significant in reliable sources to warrant inclusion, particularly in the lead.

Sources:

• https://www.theguardian.com/business/2020/sep/17/wealth-of-us-billionaires-rises-by-nearly-a-third-during-pandemic
• https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2018/05/25/how-elon-musk-became-an-inequality-machine/

Evrenosogullari (talk) 15:34, 14 September 2026 (UTC)

It is clearly not sufficiently widespread and significant in reliable sources to warrant inclusion if that's all you've got. This is a WP:BLP. – Muboshgu (talk) 15:38, 14 September 2026 (UTC)

The guardian does not call him a robber baron, and so with that I opt for no. Slatersteven (talk) 15:39, 14 September 2026 (UTC)

Obvious no. There needs to be preponderance of sourcing to make such characterization due and we would have to attribute if it were the case. User:Bluethricecreamman (Talk·Contribs) 16:29, 14 September 2026 (UTC)

Clearly no now. We will see the reactions after the new movie is released. O3000, Ret. (talk) 16:53, 14 September 2026 (UTC)