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Jeff Bezos loses attempt to block the Moon-landing contract NASA gave to SpaceX

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Re: Jeff Bezos loses attempt to block the Moon-landing contract NASA gave to SpaceX

#221

Post by avmich »

s1artibartfast wrote: post #206
Arrath wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A 'jobs agency' that has produced a whole lot of technical advancements, maybe.

That's the point. Specifically, the point is to pay for aerospace jobs if we want to compete in the aerospace market. Nasa launch contracts are the carrot for companies like spacex and others to get in the market. Various contracts keep a larger pool of engineers in the market

The idea of paying for aerospace jobs lead to steady losses in the aerospace market, until deeply capitalistic (in a sense) SpaceX came and lowered costs.

Once again: the idea that USA would keep competing on international aerospace market of launch services wasn't working before SpaceX started launching Falcon-9. Maybe the market losses are because of paying for aerospace jobs, or maybe it's just a coincidence, but USA was practically pushed out from the market, until - heavily vertically integrated - SpaceX put the launch price on their website.

I think the idea of paying for aerospace jobs in this way doesn't work.

Re: Jeff Bezos loses attempt to block the Moon-landing contract NASA gave to SpaceX

#222

Post by unishark »

Arrath wrote: post #99
meepmorp wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Congress would be dumb to pick a new horse now. You're not optimizing for the same outcomes as Congress. NASA is a jobs agency.

A 'jobs agency' that has produced a whole lot of technical advancements, maybe.

Sure compared to those same scientists and engineers doing subsistence farming or something as an alternative. But compared to working elsewhere in society as scientists and engineers it's not so obvious what an alternative world would look like. There's always a hidden cost.

Re: Jeff Bezos loses attempt to block the Moon-landing contract NASA gave to SpaceX

#223

Post by bryanlarsen »

mr_toad wrote: post #189
FreakyT wrote: post #3

It's really a shame what has happened to Blue Origin. They've gone from a promising space startup to yet another purveyor of perpetual vaporware. Where is the BE-4 engine? Delayed, again and again. New Glenn, the rocket that could actually go into orbit? Same. So far their only functioning hardware (New Shephard) is, in effect, a glorified amusement park ride. Considering that SpaceX has actually made it to orbit mul…

Is Blue Origin slow, or is SpaceX really, really fast?

Blue Origin is slow, but doesn't stand out when compared to Old Space. SLS, for instance, is also taking a very long time.

SpaceX is really, really fast.

Re: Jeff Bezos loses attempt to block the Moon-landing contract NASA gave to SpaceX

#224

Post by dillondoyle »

zamadatix wrote: post #92
dillondoyle wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe selfishly some clout at play too? I don't think sub comments add to profile upvote scores.

I think they count, never really checked specifically though and the karma system isn't exactly spelled out in detail anywhere. I'm pretty sure your downvotes to the parent and children of a comment you make don't count though - or at least I read that a few times while looking into the site initially. I bumped your comment up, if you want to find out I should be able to un-up it once you check your current number...…

It's probably a good thing points aren't the main thing.

HA that's exactly the main reason I keep an eye on it up top to know if I should check my comments to respond to someone. I'm at 1631 right now but also a couple other recent comments in the mix. Though also with that lately I've noticed more random downvotes for what I don't see any reason for.

Re: Jeff Bezos loses attempt to block the Moon-landing contract NASA gave to SpaceX

#225

Post by tsimionescu »

AngryData wrote: post #182
relativ575 wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The Earth has plenty of space, we're limited by resources, and there are no interesting resources on Mars There are new discoveries on Earth even today, after hundreds of thousands year of mankind history. What make you think we have known all we need to know about Mars? > I wouldn't be surprised to find out that we'll have a colony outside the solar system before a colony on Mars. Mars is a 8 month journey. Alpha…

What is the benefit of living on Mars, rather than a space based habitat that can attach to and mine asteroids or small moons for extra resources? Living in a "large" gravity well seems like all negatives to me in terms of expansion and resource extraction.

To be fair, living in 0g is even less plausible than living in 0.3g long term. In particular, there is a good chance that animals can't reproduce in 0g - those that have been tried have definitely been unable (including insects and chicken - there is still a chance mammals could).

Re: Jeff Bezos loses attempt to block the Moon-landing contract NASA gave to SpaceX

#226

Post by WalterBright »

tigershark wrote: post #220
WalterBright wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Only because of resources limitation in the ‘60s. Doesn't matter what the excuses were. It was supposed to work, it failed, and Armstrong took over and saved the mission. > Nothing to do with the catastrophic bugs Most every software bug today, once rooted out, looks like a mistake only an incompetent programmer would make. Except the best programmers make these mistakes, because humans are fallible. If I recall co…

SpaceX had no RUD or any problem whatsoever because of software during the commercial crew test missions. Which RUD caused by a software bug are you referring to?

Some of the early (unmanned) landing failures, if I recall correctly.

Re: Jeff Bezos loses attempt to block the Moon-landing contract NASA gave to SpaceX

#227

Post by WalterBright »

WalterBright wrote: post #143
WalterBright wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> silly little PR stunt The media has been grossly unfair to Bezos. What Bezos actually did was risk his own neck in the first manned flight of a totally new rocket design. It was a massive display of faith in his engineering team. Musk didn't do that. Branson didn't do that - and earlier test pilots of his craft died. As for the BO rocket being totally automated, that was the original intent of the Mercury missions,…

Personally, though, I would have taken with me as passengers the chief mechanic and the chief engineer, just to ensure the rocket works well!

Y'all might be interested that the Air Force used to take the chief mechanic along for the check ride after an overhaul. It wasn't policy, but it happened a lot. It ensured the airplanes got overhauled properly.

It's a good thing. I've also always been happy to fly on a 757. (I worked on the design of flight critical parts for it.)

Re: Jeff Bezos loses attempt to block the Moon-landing contract NASA gave to SpaceX

#228

Post by brag »

anonporridge wrote: post #170
AYBABTME wrote: post #164

Anyone has insight into what BO's problems are? I heard that they had leadership problems but otherwise a top notch staff. People love to flame Jeff Bezos but if you look at his management of Amazon, I wouldn't dismiss him casually with regard to BO. He might not have the engineering chops of Musk but I'm sure he can put the right leadership in place to turn this ship around, now that he'll be focusing on this full t…

Talking to some friends who work at Blue Origin, one of the ways they compete for talent from SpaceX is by promoting a healthier, sustainable work culture. While this is great for individuals, it also attracts a lot of people looking to coast. And of course the highly motivated, intelligent people who are willing to put in more time to make cool shit happen aren't going to settle for a distant runner up. I suppose th…

They replace the workforce with all the eager new grads. They will continue to use employees till they burn out indefinitely

Re: Jeff Bezos loses attempt to block the Moon-landing contract NASA gave to SpaceX

#229

Post by TaylorAlexander »

tzs wrote: post #152
cronix wrote: post #137

Maybe BO will one day actually do something noteworthy on their own, rather than trying to prevent SpaceX from moving ahead because they actually do things. Bezos also recently tried to block Starlink's modified expansion plans[1] saying it was unfair to his conceptual Project Kuiper (conceptual because it doesn't yet physically exist vs Starlink which is in beta service and expanding). Amazon isn't even using BO to…

> Maybe BO will one day actually do something noteworthy on their own, rather than trying to prevent SpaceX from moving ahead because they actually do things. You don't consider being the first to successfully launch and land a VTOL booster noteworthy [1]? [1] https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2015/11/the-f...

> first to successfully launch and land a VTOL booster

They were not the first the launch and land a VTOL booster. According to the article it was the first VTOL booster to fly above the Karman line and then land safely. But SpaceX had a flying VTOL booster in 2012-2013. [1]

Actually it's amazing because Blue Origin made that flight in 2015, and five years later they made basically the same flight but with people in it. Meanwhile SpaceX nailed orbital landing, is reusing orbital boosters like crazy, released the Falcon Heavy, and has made remarkable progress on the Mars Rocket. And BO still hasn't made orbit.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grasshopper_(rocket)

Re: Jeff Bezos loses attempt to block the Moon-landing contract NASA gave to SpaceX

#230

Post by hiyer »

Well, if $3 billion is all it costs to send someone to the moon why doesn't he do it himself instead of asking NASA to buy his services? Probably NASA probably has some other hardware, know-how, and people that Blue Origins doesn't. But how much would that cost? Another 10 billion? 30 billion? Bezos has plenty to spare for that too.
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