Comment by lazaroclapp
12 years ago
SpaceX comes with, well, an astronomical (snicker) level of risk attached to it. So I suppose the idea is that SpaceX might well end up being worth a lot more than WhatsApp, but WhatsApp and its user base are worth a lot now. It is also unlikely that they will end up not being worth anything in the future (if we hit a second dotcom bubble WhatsApp might end up being worth a lot less than their current valuation, but like AOL, it won't be literally worth nothing). SpaceX might.
There is also some level of tragedy of the commons problem going on, in which SpaceX benefits all of us every time they successfully test a new design, but it only benefits their investors when they manage to get mining rights to the moon or set up martian tourism or the like. Goals which are possible - which is the impressive thing - but still very risky bets.
> when they manage to get mining rights to the moon or set up martian tourism or the like
I always wonder if people actually seriously believe this.
We are many, many decades away from this being even close to a reality.
>>We are many, many decades away from this being even close to a reality.
If there aren't companies like SpaceX (or governments doing similar work) we'll never be any closer to that reality. Mines on the moon and O'Neill cylinders in space aren't going to pop into existence in 2098 or something, they're going to be built on top of the foundations being laid by SpaceX (and others) today.
Maybe SpaceX will last long enough to profit from it, maybe they won't. It's still a better use of $1 billion of Google's money than another social network or whatever.
No, we're not decades away, we're dollars away. A base on Mars in feasible with today's technology, see for example the Mars Direct plan by Zubrin. The only thing we need are about 30 billion dollars, that's like eight aircraft carriers or 1/3 ISS.
The Beagle landed on Mars and was unresponsive. The last SpaceX test rocket failed to land. If all we need is money then there would be no failures that would result in masses of tourists dying or billions of dollars in mining equipment being destroyed.
But alas the world doesn't work like that. It takes time to repeat the design, build, test process until you get it right. And no throwing money at the problem doesn't result in a quicker solution:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brooks's_law
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Says who?