Live data from Hacker News

You Promised Me Mars Colonies but I Got Facebook

linkedin.com

11–20 of 230 posts

Re: You Promised Me Mars Colonies but I Got Facebook

#11

A lot of really stupid shit is going to happen in 2020, but if Starship makes it to orbit and Crew Dragon successfully launches astronauts, those are the only events anyone will remember in 100 years. (Come, on tell me with a straight face you remember anything else important that happened in 1903)

Replace Crew Dragon with Starlink, and I agree.

Re: You Promised Me Mars Colonies but I Got Facebook

#12
It sounds like people are forgetting the world before Facebook. Isolated, repressed locations, limited flow of information from tiny amounts of sources. The Connected-Information Age seems to have brought on some great advances and has been self-sustaining from a profitable perspective. Sure, the worlds' governments could have spent billions / trillions building bases on Mars or even terraforming it. But for what purpose? And for how much misery would earth have to endure for all that effort?

Re: You Promised Me Mars Colonies but I Got Facebook

#13
post #10
post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don’t want to sound as a fanboy, but IF (and this is a huge if) Elon succeeds on his mission to make humanity a multi-planentary species, he’ll be remembered as a greatest human who has ever lived for a very long time

If humanity ever does become a multi-planetary species, it will be because Elon contributed to a process that will still require decades, if not centuries, of effort beyond his death to achieve. He will not in any way be solely responsible, or deserving of that level of recognition, although I don't doubt that his fans will consider him as such anyway.

of course that would be humanity’s effort. But we can only remember leaders

Re: You Promised Me Mars Colonies but I Got Facebook

#14
Only 4 more years until Elon Musk puts a $30,000 Tesla on Mars where solar power roofs cost the same as conventional.

I believed it until about 3 years ago, when I realized spaceX is Elon's government subsidized advertisement for his other projects. Also the 30k car is never coming. And the roof price is loaded with astricks to be 'correct".

We really need to wake up to the next gen marketing tactics.

Re: You Promised Me Mars Colonies but I Got Facebook

#15

A lot of really stupid shit is going to happen in 2020, but if Starship makes it to orbit and Crew Dragon successfully launches astronauts, those are the only events anyone will remember in 100 years. (Come, on tell me with a straight face you remember anything else important that happened in 1903)

I still think the Voyagers 1 and 2 are bigger feats.

Moon landings were cool as an indirect way to develop ballistic missile technology in such a vast scale that nowadays the world's peace relies on this kind of deterrence - Good. And they gave as huge tech advancements as added benefits. Moon landings in 2020s are vanity projects for billionaires with very diminished added benefits. The apollo program was staggering. The N-th moon landing will be 'meh'

Re: You Promised Me Mars Colonies but I Got Facebook

#17

It sounds like people are forgetting the world before Facebook. Isolated, repressed locations, limited flow of information from tiny amounts of sources. The Connected-Information Age seems to have brought on some great advances and has been self-sustaining from a profitable perspective. Sure, the worlds' governments could have spent billions / trillions building bases on Mars or even terraforming it. But for what pur…

Also would like to add, sheer advances in compute and software lead by Facebook and others has enabled much cheaper space travel than what was possible in 1970's - 80's. This type of stuff is getting cheaper every day, so why be selfish because you "want to see it in your lifetime?" It'll happen. I don't care if it happens in 20 years, 200 years, or 2000 years.

Re: You Promised Me Mars Colonies but I Got Facebook

#18
post #13
post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If humanity ever does become a multi-planetary species, it will be because Elon contributed to a process that will still require decades, if not centuries, of effort beyond his death to achieve. He will not in any way be solely responsible, or deserving of that level of recognition, although I don't doubt that his fans will consider him as such anyway.

of course that would be humanity’s effort. But we can only remember leaders

What I'm saying is that, by the time it happens, Elon is going to be a footnote in someone else's story.

Re: You Promised Me Mars Colonies but I Got Facebook

#19

It sounds like people are forgetting the world before Facebook. Isolated, repressed locations, limited flow of information from tiny amounts of sources. The Connected-Information Age seems to have brought on some great advances and has been self-sustaining from a profitable perspective. Sure, the worlds' governments could have spent billions / trillions building bases on Mars or even terraforming it. But for what pur…

>It sounds like people are forgetting the world before Facebook. Isolated, repressed locations, limited flow of information from tiny amounts of sources.

Facebook is not the internet. This problem was solved long before 2005.

Re: You Promised Me Mars Colonies but I Got Facebook

#20
There's also a factor of iterativeness. I think everyone here will appreciate the value of designing something you can do step by step, with value at each step of the way. You don't have to go zero to 100 immediately. You can course correct. You can revise. You learn from 0-50 to do 51-100 better.

Facebook can be built that way. Google too. SpaceX, maybe not so much. It's simply a harder and more expensive and riskier investment to do something that has so much startup cost before you start to get any value or pivotal learnings back.

Post reply on HN