this post was submitted on 18 Jan 2024
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Former NASA administrator hates Artemis, wants to party like it’s 2008 (arstechnica.com)
submitted 10 months ago by [email protected] to c/technology
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[–] echo64 5 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (2 children)

how is the "commercial" avenue supposed to make profit if nasa isn't funding it. and if it can't, isn't it just a government program?

the dead end of commercial space is that it can only function as a factor of government work. it's not a viable industry by itself.

you can see this tale play out time and time again in other industries that have had the same problem, it doesn't end well, it ends badly.

also you don't need to do the big text

[–] [email protected] 1 points 10 months ago

how is the “commercial” avenue supposed to make profit if nasa isn’t funding it. and if it can’t, isn’t it just a government program?

NASA is not the only entity that send things into orbit.

the dead end of commercial space is that it can only function as a factor of government work. it’s not a viable industry by itself.

SpaceX does not seems to only rely on government orders.

True, NASA helped (well, it is an understatment) SpaceX, but now it could capitalize on it if the costs are the one @[email protected] pointed out.

[–] partial_accumen 1 points 10 months ago

the dead end of commercial space is that it can only function as a factor of government work. it’s not a viable industry by itself.

The alternative to this LEO space work is that taxpayers pay 6.25 times as much for the same service. Where is the logic in that?

you can see this tale play out time and time again in other industries that have had the same problem, it doesn’t end well, it ends badly.

I disagree with your assessment that it is an inevitability. However, lets assume for a moment you're right and it ends in bankruptcy for SpaceX. In the time it will have operated it will have:

  • launched over 300 times
  • proven rocket reusability
  • drastically lowered the cost of spaceflight around the globe from all providers
  • created and deployed a global constellation of high speed and low latency internet access satellites giving affordable access to many corners of the globe previously unserved
  • put an additional 42 human into orbit

If commercial space company SpaceX went out of business tomorrow, we'd still be better off than had NASA ever contracted with them.

also you don’t need to do the big text

Thank you for sharing your opinion on that.