This article touches on something that I’ve been shouting from the rooftops whenever Palantir and Peter Thiel companies get discussed:
Palantir is almost certainly “not that special.” It is fundamentally very boring data analysis software and its main differentiator is being available for/targeted at government clients.
The company has committed major marketing blunders by giving itself a creepy vibe, which is a well-deserved reputation, down to the very name of the company. These errors are unnecessary and unforced self-sabotage.
Palantir’s own marketing oversells the capabilities and in doing so also oversells the creepiness of the product.
It’s also worth pointing out that Peter Thiel is not some kind of evil genius villain figure, he’s just a guy who got lucky off of PayPal and Facebook and has some garbage opinions.
People like Peter Thiel and Elon Musk probably underestimate the damage their Bond villain reputations bring to their companies in the long term. Maybe they’ll never be financially impacted by that reputation but it’s very hard to see the what-if hypotheticals play out.
For example, the refreshed Model Y, Ys, Model 3, and even Cybertruck should all be selling better than they are. About 1 in 10 Teslas I see on the road have one of those anti-Elon bumper stickers on them. These are customers who otherwise love the product that will never buy it again. Volkswagen Group is outselling Tesla in Europe and it’s hard to argue that brand reputation isn’t involved in that trend.
Maybe this doesn’t matter because China is all Tesla cares about, and the vehicles still sell extremely well, but still…most car company CEOs are nameless figures that customers have no connection to.
> The company has committed major marketing blunders by giving itself a creepy vibe, which is a well-deserved reputation, down to the very name of the company. These errors are unnecessary and unforced self-sabotage.
I'm pretty sure this was very intentional and not a marketing blunder in any way.
It has long been a shtick of Alex Karp to be vague in answering questions where and how Palantir software is used.
I also don't think you can put Thiel and Musk, or rather Palantir and Tesla, in the same bucket here.
Tesla wants and needs to sell to common people. Palantir doesn't.
My understanding is they are essentially traditional management consultants with fancy data analytic dashboards instead of PowerPoint decks and charge an even more obscene premium for the privilege.
Might be your ISP's DNS censoring the domain name, it happens to me for different ones depending on whether I am in Spain or in Germany at the moment when I click the link.
It might work if you manually change the TLD part of the URL.
What I did was get the IP address when it worked and add it to "/etc/hosts" so it works when on another network.
This article touches on something that I’ve been shouting from the rooftops whenever Palantir and Peter Thiel companies get discussed:
Palantir is almost certainly “not that special.” It is fundamentally very boring data analysis software and its main differentiator is being available for/targeted at government clients.
The company has committed major marketing blunders by giving itself a creepy vibe, which is a well-deserved reputation, down to the very name of the company. These errors are unnecessary and unforced self-sabotage.
Palantir’s own marketing oversells the capabilities and in doing so also oversells the creepiness of the product.
It’s also worth pointing out that Peter Thiel is not some kind of evil genius villain figure, he’s just a guy who got lucky off of PayPal and Facebook and has some garbage opinions.
People like Peter Thiel and Elon Musk probably underestimate the damage their Bond villain reputations bring to their companies in the long term. Maybe they’ll never be financially impacted by that reputation but it’s very hard to see the what-if hypotheticals play out.
For example, the refreshed Model Y, Ys, Model 3, and even Cybertruck should all be selling better than they are. About 1 in 10 Teslas I see on the road have one of those anti-Elon bumper stickers on them. These are customers who otherwise love the product that will never buy it again. Volkswagen Group is outselling Tesla in Europe and it’s hard to argue that brand reputation isn’t involved in that trend.
Maybe this doesn’t matter because China is all Tesla cares about, and the vehicles still sell extremely well, but still…most car company CEOs are nameless figures that customers have no connection to.
> The company has committed major marketing blunders by giving itself a creepy vibe, which is a well-deserved reputation, down to the very name of the company. These errors are unnecessary and unforced self-sabotage.
I'm pretty sure this was very intentional and not a marketing blunder in any way.
It has long been a shtick of Alex Karp to be vague in answering questions where and how Palantir software is used.
I also don't think you can put Thiel and Musk, or rather Palantir and Tesla, in the same bucket here.
Tesla wants and needs to sell to common people. Palantir doesn't.
> Tesla wants and needs to sell to common people. Palantir doesn't.
But common people are also employees[1], voters[2] and shareholders[3] and are getting increasingly vocal:
[1] https://www.linkedin.com/posts/sandyacarter_with-ai-trust-is...
[2] https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2026/jul/09/mps-urge-la...
[3] https://www.barrons.com/articles/palantir-stock-price-human-...
It is a risky strategy but if people believe they are creepy they believe they are powerful.
But from what I understand
[1] USA Today is still using Palantir
[2] This might have an effect in 2027 or it might not
[3] The majority of shareholders still voted against that proposal
So in the end, these people getting vocal has pretty much no real effect.
Palantir is absolutely special.
They're allowed to pay employees market rate.
My understanding is they are essentially traditional management consultants with fancy data analytic dashboards instead of PowerPoint decks and charge an even more obscene premium for the privilege.
Buy their book; How to Manipulate STEM Ignorant Old Pols for Fun, Profit, and World Domination
The "Bond villain reputation" seems to work quite well for Palantir marketing.
https://archive.ph/ahmBz
Why do these archive links never work for me?
Might be your ISP's DNS censoring the domain name, it happens to me for different ones depending on whether I am in Spain or in Germany at the moment when I click the link.
It might work if you manually change the TLD part of the URL.
What I did was get the IP address when it worked and add it to "/etc/hosts" so it works when on another network.
great tip, thanks!