Brits in spaaaaaaccceeeee

[garbon]

200 years from now people will look back at these coming decades like we now look at the Mayflower and the times of the first North American colonies.

I'm not sure 200 years from now people will recall Branson's wank at the edge of space, but even if they do, I'm not sure they'll be looking at it positively. If we want to pull other historical analogies, they might look at him and his billionaire buddies like we look at the railway robber barons of the 19th century.

[Eddie Teach]

Probably more like Edison and Ford.

[Barrister]

200 years from now people will look back at these coming decades like we now look at the Mayflower and the times of the first North American colonies.

I'm not sure 200 years from now people will recall Branson's wank at the edge of space, but even if they do, I'm not sure they'll be looking at it positively. If we want to pull other historical analogies, they might look at him and his billionaire buddies like we look at the railway robber barons of the 19th century.

I dunno.  Contrast this with Bill Gates charitable foundation.  He's undoubtedly doing more for the general welfare of mankind that Jeff Bezos is spending $1 billion per year on Blue Origin, but look how little that seemed to matter once the pandemic hit and news about his divorce started coming out.

[garbon]

Probably more like Edison and Ford.

[grumbler]

Space flight taking place that isn't paid from the public purse it truly horrible.

I thought a good amount of the billionaire spaceflight developments are being funded by contracts with NASA, the ESA and other agencies with public funding?

Virgin Galactic is a Branson-funded project, but has no NASA/ESA interest, as it doesn't serve any of their missions.  It loses money and will almost certainly never return the investment, but Branson probably doesn't care.  It will probably be able to show a profit eventually since its costs are relatively low.

Blue Origin is mostly a Bezos project (he has provided by far the bulk of the money so far) and has landed some contracts in the tens of millions, but nothing like what it needs to become profitable.  It's gotten some outside investing, but not nearly enough to pay for anything advanced without a NASA contract.

SpaceX was founded by Musk, but has fund-raised in the private sector almost from the start.  It has gotten numerous contracts totaling in the billions and is considered profitable already.  It's pretty much a classic startup story.

Musk isn't trying to get himself into space, and SpaceX looks like the company that is going to dominate US spaceflight for the foreseeable future.  One of the reasons for that is that it followed standard fund-raising strategies and is far better capitalized than either of its rivals.  Morgan Stanley has its current value as US$100 billion, which is about 20 times the value of Blue Origin and 50 times the value of Virgin Galactic.

[Jacob]

Thanks for the additional details grumbler

[grumbler]

I dunno.  Contrast this with Bill Gates charitable foundation.  He's undoubtedly doing more for the general welfare of mankind that Jeff Bezos is spending $1 billion per year on Blue Origin, but look how little that seemed to matter once the pandemic hit and news about his divorce started coming out.

Bezos spent more on charity last year than the Gates Foundation: $10.1 Billion as opposed to $5.1 billion from the Gates Foundation (and Bezos's wife donated another $5.7 billion).

[grumbler]

Thanks for the additional details grumbler

Lumping these three together is easy, but makes little sense.

[Jacob]

I'd be curious what sort of charities they are.

[Barrister]

Musk isn't trying to get himself into space, and SpaceX looks like the company that is going to dominate US spaceflight for the foreseeable future.  One of the reasons for that is that it followed standard fund-raising strategies and is far better capitalized than either of its rivals.  Morgan Stanley has its current value as US$100 billion, which is about 20 times the value of Blue Origin and 50 times the value of Virgin Galactic.

I would be shocked if, at some point, Musk doesn't take a ride on one of his rockets.  He's just both very busy and has more time to do so compared to 70 year old Richard Branson.

He might be holding out for Mars though.

[The Larch]

Musk isn't trying to get himself into space, and SpaceX looks like the company that is going to dominate US spaceflight for the foreseeable future.  One of the reasons for that is that it followed standard fund-raising strategies and is far better capitalized than either of its rivals.  Morgan Stanley has its current value as US$100 billion, which is about 20 times the value of Blue Origin and 50 times the value of Virgin Galactic.

I would be shocked if, at some point, Musk doesn't take a ride on one of his rockets.  He's just both very busy and has more time to do so compared to 70 year old Richard Branson.

He might be holding out for Mars though.

It's just been announced that Musk will travel in the next Virgin Galactic launch.

[FunkMonk]

I'm imagining space railways that spindle throughout the solar system, radiating out of major hubs like Space Chicago, and small space stations withering on the vine because they didn't pay enough of a bribe to their local space billionaire so the spaceway got built out to a different space station. 

[Sheilbh]

I'm imagining space railways that spindle throughout the solar system, radiating out of major hubs like Space Chicago, and small space stations withering on the vine because they didn't pay enough of a bribe to their local space billionaire so the spaceway got built out to a different space station. 

"Welcome to Space Crewe - all change please"

[The Brain]

I'm imagining space railways that spindle throughout the solar system, radiating out of major hubs like Space Chicago, and small space stations withering on the vine because they didn't pay enough of a bribe to their local space billionaire so the spaceway got built out to a different space station. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g1Sq1Nr58hM

[grumbler]

I'd be curious what sort of charities they are.

https://apnews.com/article/amazoncom-inc-race-and-ethnicity-jeff-bezos-philanthropy-coronavirus-pandemic-56154051ca19fdd80c2fc003004702b0  That will give you some idea.  I'm not sure where a complete list would be.