Elon Musk’s Mission to Mars

#1

Post by sravfeyn » Fri, Nov 02, 2012, 1:43 PM UTC

Elon Musk’s Mission to Mars
wired.com

Re: Elon Musk’s Mission to Mars

#2

Post by thinkingthings » Fri, Nov 02, 2012, 2:04 PM UTC

Elon Musk is a leader of our generation, with vision that most of us can only dream of.

Re: Elon Musk’s Mission to Mars

#3

Post by catch23 » Fri, Nov 02, 2012, 2:16 PM UTC

There's one interesting quote in the article:

Musk: I can’t tell you much. We have essentially no patents in SpaceX. Our primary long-term competition is in China—if we published patents, it would be farcical, because the Chinese would just use them as a recipe book.

If your process/ideas are sufficiently complex, it reduces competition if you don't file a patent.

Re: Elon Musk’s Mission to Mars

#4

Post by libraryatnight » Fri, Nov 02, 2012, 2:16 PM UTC

I was telling my dad the other day this is a guy I could see my kids or grandkids using as a subject for a school report. Such an interesting person.

Re: Elon Musk’s Mission to Mars

#5

Post by hi » Fri, Nov 02, 2012, 2:21 PM UTC

If you have't already seen it, Kevin Rose interviews Elon Musk: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L-s_3b5fRd8

Also, Neil deGrasse Tyson talks about if there was a space race with China the US would be on Mars in 18 months: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=c...

It would be truly amazing if a private company was the first to set foot on another planet.

Re: Elon Musk’s Mission to Mars

#6

Post by cobrausn » Fri, Nov 02, 2012, 2:22 PM UTC

catch23 wrote: post #3

There's one interesting quote in the article: Musk: I can’t tell you much. We have essentially no patents in SpaceX. Our primary long-term competition is in China—if we published patents, it would be farcical, because the Chinese would just use them as a recipe book. If your process/ideas are sufficiently complex, it reduces competition if you don't file a patent.

One of the supposed points of patents is that the inventor shares knowledge with the world in exchange for temporary monopoly. If the patent is not enforced (such as in China), then there is no incentive to file. It might be smarter, from a business standpoint, to just keep the knowledge to yourself.

Re: Elon Musk’s Mission to Mars

#7

Post by sho_hn » Fri, Nov 02, 2012, 2:22 PM UTC

thinkingthings wrote: post #2

Elon Musk is a leader of our generation, with vision that most of us can only dream of.

Lots of folks have a vision of a mission to mars. What counts is the execution.

Re: Elon Musk’s Mission to Mars

#8

Post by indiecore » Fri, Nov 02, 2012, 2:26 PM UTC

sho_hn wrote: post #7

thinkingthings wrote: post #2

Elon Musk is a leader of our generation, with vision that most of us can only dream of.

Lots of folks have a vision of a mission to mars. What counts is the execution.

To be fair to those folks most of them aren't billionaires.

Re: Elon Musk’s Mission to Mars

#9

Post by crooneys » Fri, Nov 02, 2012, 2:26 PM UTC

sho_hn wrote: post #7

thinkingthings wrote: post #2

Elon Musk is a leader of our generation, with vision that most of us can only dream of.

Lots of folks have a vision of a mission to mars. What counts is the execution.

I'd argue that vision implies the ability/willingness to execute, whereas dreaming is just that. Musk seems to have the execution down so far!

Re: Elon Musk’s Mission to Mars

#10

Post by cletus » Fri, Nov 02, 2012, 2:30 PM UTC

catch23 wrote: post #3

There's one interesting quote in the article: Musk: I can’t tell you much. We have essentially no patents in SpaceX. Our primary long-term competition is in China—if we published patents, it would be farcical, because the Chinese would just use them as a recipe book. If your process/ideas are sufficiently complex, it reduces competition if you don't file a patent.

It's actually worse than that. Tech companies routinely use a combination of patents, trade secrets and copyright to make the shared knowledge (patents) basically useless but an exceptionally good defensive and offensive weapon. I recall this came up with Intel and other companies reverse-engineering the Netburst bus.

EDIT: removed point about first-to-file as prior art would largely invalidate such attempts beyond a very narrow time frame.