Category Archives: Technology and Society

Business, Economics, Political Commentary, Technology and Society

Crowdfunding

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Where does it go from here?

Traditional capital flows from nonprofits to investment banking are being disintermediated. People, causes and businesses that need capital have access through the internet, social media and crowdfunding platforms to capital that they simply could not access before. As this trend grows, crowds will demonstrate a different sort of wisdom, sometimes funding causes that foundations wouldn’t or entrepreneurs that VCs wouldn’t.

The JOBS bill was one of the few bi-partisan things that Congress had done recently that will actually help the economy and provide more opportunities for true wealth and job creation.

History, Media Criticism, Philosophy, Political Commentary, Social Commentary, Space, Space History, Technology and Society

Space Casualties

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…are a necessary tragedy.

My column on this week’s anniversaries, in historical perspective. Actually, it’s a 500-work summary of the book.

[Update a few minutes later]

Right on cue, some idiot comes up in comments with the usual, “End human spaceflight. If you want science, send a robot.”

Of course, the word “science” didn’t appear in the piece.

Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Social Commentary, Space, Technology and Society

Challenger Day

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On the 28th anniversary of the event (and my birthday), Mollie Hemingway (to whom I gave a copy of the book at the Ricochet podcast Sunday night) has already read and reviewed it over at The Federalist. I would clarify this, though:

He suggests that NASA consider returning to an R&D function consistent with its original charter, otherwise getting out of the human spaceflight business entirely.

I don’t necessarily want them out of the human spaceflight business entirely, but I do want to get them out of now-mundane things like getting people (or anything) into orbit, and focus on the systems they need to go beyond. We have a commercial launch industry, and they should avail themselves of it instead of trying to compete with it.

[Afternoon update]

Molly has a post up at Ricochet, with a lot of discussion in comments.

[Bumped]

[Update a while later]

I was particularly gratified by this:

In any case, the book is just wonderful. I’m not someone who’s particularly interested in space exploration (though I have gone to many Space Shuttle launches and landings, so maybe I’m selling myself short). I’m definitely not someone with much knowledge of the space industry. And I wasn’t sure if this book would be so technical or wonkish as to be inaccessible. It’s not. It’s just a really engaging read with a compelling story about human nature, risk and reward.

That was what I was aiming for.

Business, Economics, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Space, Technology and Society

Does Virgin Galactic Have A License Problem?

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It would be nice if they did. That would be a lot easier to deal with than their real problem, which is propulsion.

As Jeff explains, there’s a lot of misunderstanding about the nature of spaceflight regulation in the US, both here and across the pond. As I noted on Twitter:

This, from Jeff’s article, is a good summation of the license situation, despite the recent misleading stories about it:

The emphasis on a lack of a commercial launch license, then, is something of a red herring. Virgin doesn’t need a launch license now to continue its testing regime, isn’t late now in receiving one, and given current law, there’s no reason to believe the Virgin won’t receive one before it plans to begin commercial flights, so long as as it can demonstrate the vehicle’s safety to the uninvolved public.

Yes.

[Afternoon update]

Jeff Foust also has a summary of the London Times article that’s behind their paywall, with some corrections.

[Update a couple minutes later]

If the reporting is true, and they really are finally running away from the hybrid, and particularly the rubber hybrid, as fast as possible, I wonder what the implications of this are for Sierra Nevada? Will they continue to promote hybrids, and will they still use one in Dream Chaser assuming it flies in three years? I’d bail on it myself and just buy something from XCOR, but they have a lot of PR invested in the technology, thanks to Jim Benson.