Jeff Findley writes:

I've got to disagree. When you're flying high enough above the earth
that the vehicle is flying through vacuum then that vehicle is flying in
space. Flying people in space on a relatively short suborbital trip is
manned space tourism as much as a 20 minute sight seeing helicopter ride
is aviation.

But is a journey that takes 20 minutes or so "tourism"?

From Wikipedia:

The World Tourism Organization defines tourists as people who "travel to
and stay in places outside their usual environment for more than
twenty-four (24) hours and not more than one consecutive year for
leisure, business and other purposes not related to the exercise of an
activity remunerated from within the place visited."

I have no problems with calling suborbital rides spaceflight (albeit a
short flight), but the word "tourism" feels just... wrong.


Jochem

--
"A designer knows he has arrived at perfection not when there is no
longer anything to add, but when there is no longer anything to take away."
- Antoine de Saint-Exupery