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Virgin Galactic Sales Watch
NY Times has an article on "the Space Tourism Race" which is interesting mostly for the following quote:
Will Whitehorn, the president of Virgin Galactic, said that 157 people have put down deposits totaling $12.2 million to fly...
A race gets interesting when folks are funded and bending metal. Paper planes come and go. We can also have an industry without a race.
Posted by Sam Dinkin at February 17, 2006 02:47 PM
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Comments
Not sure what you mean by that, Sam. Any industry with more than one player will involve ongoing races--to get the products to the market (which a much better for of race than a one-shot that's won by a single country, as we saw in Apollo).
Posted by Rand Simberg at February 17, 2006 06:22 PM
At first I thought it said Will Wheaton was the President of Virgin Galactic. That would have been pretty cool.
Posted by Brock at February 18, 2006 04:02 AM
If one company is focusing on full price sales, another on games, or one is focusing on orbital, another suborbital, then there is not much of a race. Since "race" rhymes with "space" and manned suborbital, orbital, circumlunar and lunar space were born in "races", the words are intertwined in many people's minds. Most especially editors looking for headlines. The X-Racer, X-Prize and its Cup all play to that.
Space can be a win win with all companies racing their own burn rate (of cash) against their business plan's prediction of the market. Each can go after a different market (science experiments, fast package delivery, regulatory, advertising, travel agency) and many more than one succeed.
Posted by Sam Dinkin at February 18, 2006 04:51 AM
In the classic snese, frontiers means borders.
Still, that was a thinly veiled reference to a song by Peter Gabriel. I am suprised you did not catch it.
Posted by Mike Puckett at February 18, 2006 01:20 PM
Damn,
I meant to post in the Post-National Olympics thread. My bad.
Posted by Mike Puckett at February 18, 2006 02:35 PM
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