6 Replies to “Speaking of Dillers…”

  1. That’s great diller content right there.

    The public loathing of the billionaire space race is magnificent.

  2. I don’t really have anything against these guys doing what they want with their billions, although I have no doubt there are plenty of Amazon employees who’d prefer a raise to their boss in outer space. We’re told Bezos has always dreamed of going to space, but realized dreams can backfire. Once they’ve been to space, what’s left for these guys? I recently watched a very good Miles Davis documentary where he says something like “God doesn’t punish you by taking things away, but by giving you everything you want.”

    These launches also reek of overconfidence. They went fine, but that won’t always be the case. The kinds of people who’ll fork over $250K for a ride likely believe bad things won’t happen to them, but spaceships are complicated. I’d want to know who has the final say on launches. NASA management infamously overruled their engineers who urged them not to launch the Challenger space shuttle that blew to bits back in the 80’s. If NASA can succumb to pressure to launch, I’d think a commercial spacecraft could as well. Would these companies listen to their engineers, or pushy second-tier CEO passengers, shareholders, or their PR staff?

  3. The Hugh Laurie show Avenue 5 – a fine addition to the canon of “Shit Goes Wrong In Space” – has some familiar overtones:

    Avenue 5 is the luxurious passenger ship owned by eccentric billionaire Herman Judd, which is heading back to Earth. A malfunction on the ship causes it to go off course, and it will now take three years to get home.

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