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SpaceX Profitable as Musk Pulls in NASA Contracts, Google Cash

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Re: SpaceX Profitable as Musk Pulls in NASA Contracts, Google Cash

#61

Post by jsonau »

skadamat wrote: post #24
josephjrobison wrote: post #17

I love how the writer phrased Google's incentive for investing as "Google has a practical goal in linking up with SpaceX. It wants to beam the Internet to hard-to-reach regions of the planet so it can take in more advertising revenue." While... "'Space-based applications, like imaging satellites, can help people more easily access important information, so we’re excited to support SpaceX’s growth,' Google spokesman A…

Agreed, it's a bit silly to assume that all Google cares about is ad revenue. Plus, improving internet accessibility and making more revenue aren't mutually exclusive. Why do self driving cars? Def no ad revenue there.

Assume self-driving car is perfected, Google can easily offer better mobile/local ads for both business and consumer because of context.

Show popups ads of ongoing/upcoming events of the current street you are on. Going to the movie theatre, recommend a nearby lunch spot. Feeling lucky? Let the car plan your weekend

This bring huge potential to ads

Re: SpaceX Profitable as Musk Pulls in NASA Contracts, Google Cash

#62

Post by JoeAltmaier »

jsonau wrote: post #61
skadamat wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed, it's a bit silly to assume that all Google cares about is ad revenue. Plus, improving internet accessibility and making more revenue aren't mutually exclusive. Why do self driving cars? Def no ad revenue there.

Assume self-driving car is perfected, Google can easily offer better mobile/local ads for both business and consumer because of context. Show popups ads of ongoing/upcoming events of the current street you are on. Going to the movie theatre, recommend a nearby lunch spot. Feeling lucky? Let the car plan your weekend This bring huge potential to ads

"I'm feeling lucky"

Re: SpaceX Profitable as Musk Pulls in NASA Contracts, Google Cash

#63

Post by enricobruschini »

mrfusion wrote: post #7
Animats wrote: post #5

If SpaceX can fly out their 2015 manifest, that will be impressive. This is the year the Falcon Heavy is supposed to launch. Their first manned flight has apparently been postponed; it's been "2-3 years" away for 2 years now.[1] I notice they've stopped putting dates on their manifest for future flights.[2][3] SpaceX is doing a great job, but they're behind their own schedule. They're two flights behind on ISS resupp…

How will the spaceport in Texas help?

Would have made sense to build it closer to the equator? As from my orbits class the more you get closer to the equator, the bigger is your launches time-window to hit the target orbit. Texas sounds unreasonable, does anybody knows/sees other good reasons?

Re: SpaceX Profitable as Musk Pulls in NASA Contracts, Google Cash

#64

Post by djloche »

trose wrote: post #58
freehunter wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well the reason for that is because they're given exclusive access to basically launch a missile from US airspace. With a mere change of payload, that rocket can be used to deliver a nuclear warhead. So yeah, it's pretty prudent to have background checks, massive amounts of oversight, and many kill switches. An even if you have all the best intentions, it doesn't take that much to accidentally crash into the ISS and…

To be fair, it's pretty improbable to accidentally hit the ISS. It takes really precise maneuvers and calculations to get there on purpose.

I think the case would be more like you accidentally used the thrusters too much at the last minute and tore a hole in ISS. Or your docking mechanism failed horribly and showed safe when it was not safe

Re: SpaceX Profitable as Musk Pulls in NASA Contracts, Google Cash

#65

Post by avmich »

threeseed wrote: post #56
pbreit wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Aggressive scheduling is a tactic. Because no matter what the schedule, human nature dictates that things are likely to slip.

Spin it all you want but a failure to meet schedules isn't really acceptable. You either failed to deliver or failed to manage your project estimation process.

Sounds an awful lot as a managerspeak. Estimations are hard - and in general, it's hard to make predictions, especially for the future, and here we're talking about estimations of a future moment.

Re: SpaceX Profitable as Musk Pulls in NASA Contracts, Google Cash

#66

Post by rkuykendall-com »

enricobruschini wrote: post #63
mrfusion wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How will the spaceport in Texas help?

Would have made sense to build it closer to the equator? As from my orbits class the more you get closer to the equator, the bigger is your launches time-window to hit the target orbit. Texas sounds unreasonable, does anybody knows/sees other good reasons?

They are almost as far south as they can be and still be in the United States, which is where the company is based.

Re: SpaceX Profitable as Musk Pulls in NASA Contracts, Google Cash

#67

Post by toomuchtodo »

enricobruschini wrote: post #63
mrfusion wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How will the spaceport in Texas help?

Would have made sense to build it closer to the equator? As from my orbits class the more you get closer to the equator, the bigger is your launches time-window to hit the target orbit. Texas sounds unreasonable, does anybody knows/sees other good reasons?

As rkuykendall-com mentioned, its as far south in the US as you can get without overflying other land, and they've gotta stay in the US to prevent ITAR violations.

[+] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Traffic_in_Arms_R...

Re: SpaceX Profitable as Musk Pulls in NASA Contracts, Google Cash

#68

Post by avmich »

greglindahl wrote: post #46
sandworm wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is to assume that those customers care about economic benefit. Frankly, if cost were their only concern, the US military would have abandoned ULA and gone with SpaceX long ago. I'm reminded of the first calls (90s->2002, not the later programs) for bids to replace the KC-135. There were only two real contenders, Airbus and Boeing. Airbus's first reaction was essentially: "why even bother."

When you're launching a $2B satellite, saving $60mm on the launch is not a slam-dunk. The Air Force had a series of launch failures that made them extremely conservative. Sure, I think they ought to be moving faster with SpaceX, but you should give them credit for having some serious concerns.

A lot of that $2B cost comes from requirement that everything should just work, and therefore thoroughly tested, because customers don't want to have it broken in space where no one can fix things and have to send another one... which costs $2B... see cyclical reasoning? If launches would be cheaper, customers could afford to make less expensive payloads - after all, if it breaks, they can just send another one.

A primary reason why payloads are so expensive is because launch services - used to be - so expensive. With lowering the launch price payloads can become cheaper.

Re: SpaceX Profitable as Musk Pulls in NASA Contracts, Google Cash

#69

Post by jdpage »

edgyswingset wrote: post #51
frandroid wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The business model in a self-driving car is THE SELF-DRIVING CAR...

... unless they're interested in taking in a loss for each vehicle or only selling to the richest people in the world.

The business model for the self-driving car is a computer-scheduled, dynamically-provisioned taxi service cheap enough that nobody needs to own a car in the city. Because self-driving cars don't need to park (they can just move on to the next assignment or deprovision), if they catch on then in-city parking decks can be redeveloped into business space or park space.

Re: SpaceX Profitable as Musk Pulls in NASA Contracts, Google Cash

#70

Post by TaylorAlexander »

threeseed wrote: post #56
pbreit wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Aggressive scheduling is a tactic. Because no matter what the schedule, human nature dictates that things are likely to slip.

Spin it all you want but a failure to meet schedules isn't really acceptable. You either failed to deliver or failed to manage your project estimation process.

You say that, but there aren't a lot of options in the space business, and even SpaceX with delays is better than other available options. They are slowly improving deliveries as they learn to understand a product and business model that no human beings have ever offered. To say they should do all this and never miss a delivery date is to misunderstand the economics of the space flight industry.

That said, it will be an exciting time when SpaceX launches are so common and regular as to seem boring.

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