Reconsideration

On Fri, 07 Apr 2006 04:46:10 -0400, in a place far, far away, Jim
Kingdon made the phosphor on my monitor glow in
such a way as to indicate that:

a lot of alt.space advocates are realizing that COTS will have a much
smaller market if ISS isn't completed

Depends on the size and nature of the market that the alt.launcher
company is aiming for. ISS could be 2x or 3x the size of the
satellite market (very roughly, and depending on all kinds of
assumptions about both what happens with ISS and with satellites).

So it isn't necessarily a bad idea to try for the ISS business, but it
is a smaller volume than what people are thinking of in terms of
tourism. And, for many startups, smaller than the volume that will be
required to make the case for the upside potential of a cheaper/more
operable new launcher.

Not to mention all of the hoops and additional design costs in an
attempt to meet NASA's visiting vehicle requirements (that they'll
waive for themselves, just like "human rating").

On Thu, 06 Apr 2006 19:13:29 -0400, in a place far, far away, Monte
Davis made the phosphor on my monitor glow
in such a way as to indicate that:

"Jorge R. Frank" wrote:

if only because a lot of alt.space advocates
are realizing that COTS will have a much smaller market if ISS isn't
completed

What a concept!

ISS has been such a fine whipping boy for dissatisfaction with NASA,
Clinton, Congress, Russia, international space efforts in general, and
high-inclination orbits, that one could easily forget it is the only
(and will remain for some time the largest) DESTINATION for manned
orbital flight and cargo.

"Largest" by what (useful, in terms of building a market and driving
low-cost transport requirements) metric?

One might suggest that if your goal is "airline-like" transportation
between earth and destinations in LEO, it's kind of stupid -- cutting
off your nose to spite your face -- to ignore or verbally trash the
destination that exists in favor of Bigelow Hiltons to come.

And one might similiarly suggest that it won't be all that useful for
that. Like it or not, we'll have to wait for the hotels for
sufficient market demand.

Rand Simberg ) wrote:
: On Thu, 06 Apr 2006 06:10:36 -0400, in a place far, far away, Jim
: Davis made the phosphor on my monitor glow
: in such a way as to indicate that:

: Rand Simberg wrote:
:
: Umm, maybe you haven't realized it yet, but that was Rand's
: April Fools post.
:
: Pat's always been a little slow on the uptake, albeit amusingly
: so...
:
: I was buying it hook, line, and sinker until I got to the part where
: he realized Mark Whittington has been right all along. :-)

: Well, I did save that for the end. I didn't think it fair not to
: offer *some* clues...

: About the only worse way he could have overplayed his hand was to
: concede that Eric Chomko or Brad Guth had been right all along...

: ?!

: You mean they haven't been?

Certainly, not according to you. But when has Brad ever said anything
sceptical about commercial spaceflight? I'm pretty sure he's a true
believer, right along with you on that one.

Eric

Rand Simberg ) wrote:
: On Thu, 06 Apr 2006 07:01:02 -0400, in a place far, far away, nimcha
: made the phosphor on my monitor glow in such a way as
: to indicate that:

: He had me going up until about paragraph 3 or so (I think "We have a
: space station, if we could just muster up the gumption to finish it"
: was about when I stopped asking myself, "gee, what has Rand gotten
: disillusioned about and what new direction does he see?").
:
:
: I was actually feeling sorry for him, but twas all a sham.
:
: Gosh and woe, how will I ever get by without the sympathy of Patrick
: Flannery?
:
: You tricked me, too, although I was fooled mostly by your follow-up
: excoriation of a guy who said 'April Fool's' in your website's
: comments...

: Well, it was still April 1st at the time.

But by the time your post came through NNTP to the rest of us it was!

Eric

Rand Simberg ) wrote:
: On Thu, 06 Apr 2006 06:55:36 -0400, in a place far, far away,
: (Eric Chomko) made the phosphor on my
: monitor glow in such a way as to indicate that:

: : Umm, maybe you haven't realized it yet, but that was Rand's April Fools
: : post.
:
: Yep, the most sense he's made ever and it turns out to be a joke.

: The fact that you think it's the most sense I've ever made makes the
: joke all the more hilarious.

Yes, to you. Time will tell, just how funny vs. accurate you were with
your little 'joke'.

: All I did was repeat all of the (to me, silly) space policy arguments
: that I've heard over the years, and many people took it as a serious
: post.

Well, in lieu of the setback of SpaceX, what were many of us supposed to
think? How deep is the financial well?

Eric

Rand Simberg ) wrote:
: On Thu, 06 Apr 2006 07:21:13 -0400, in a place far, far away,
: (Eric Chomko) made the phosphor on my
: monitor glow in such a way as to indicate that:

: : Actually, I am making my living right now off a major aerospace firm,
: : though as a consultant. It's in fact not in my financial interest for
: : CEV to die, but I still think that it's a misbegotten program.
:
: Yeah, you're a consultant to a program you don't believe in. Sort of
: reminds me of a prude that turns to prostitution.

: Consultants aren't paid to "believe in" programs. They're paid for
: sound technical advice and services. In fact, what often makes a
: consultant valuable is their ability to be more objective about a
: program than those who have a deep stake in it.

I know what a consultant is and what they do! Geez. It does pay though to
have a belief in what you're doing.

h (Rand Simberg) wrote:

Bigelow and Branson have been talking hotels...

Got orbital elements for talk? How much delta-v required? What's the
docking setup?

The problem is that the market for ISS is so trivial...

Gosh, I forgot about the huge booming orbital market out there
already.

it drives to the wrong technical solutions

Gosh, I forgot about all those superbly optimal technical solutions
out there already.

I seriously doubt that [COTS] will be seen in the
future as having played a major role in opening up space.

Must be fun looking back instead of being stuck here in 2006 with the
rest of us.

Look, I'm not advocating that alt.space organize itself around it; I
didn't even mention COTS. But I'd like to see a little more
imagination applied to what ISS might *become*, including
out-of-the-box thinking -- different ownership arrangements, modules
other than those currently in the plan, a slow orbital plane change,
whatever -- rather than what I do see... which is 99% "it's
government, it was dumb, it's sucking money from the RttMoon, it's
just going around in circles, it's not the marvelous Space Station
Freedom we fantasized 22 years ago."

Maybe it *is* a lost cause -- but I'd like to see that conclusion
emerge from some thought, rather than from distaste for a past that
can't be changed and "we'll build much cooler stuff from scratch."

Rand Simberg ) wrote:
: On Thu, 06 Apr 2006 07:00:55 -0400, in a place far, far away,
: (Eric Chomko) made the phosphor on my
: monitor glow in such a way as to indicate that:

: Let me reiterate. I want to be wrong, proven wrong.

: That's good, since you get your stated heart's desire every day,
: multiple times, often in hilarious ways.

All that said, none of this makes you right, Rand. Never forget THAT part
of it. Again, if you truly are some sort of representative for commercial
spaceflight (which is what this post was about -that part you deleted in
your intellectually dishonest way), then no wonder it has no proven track
record. In short, they'll need more than the likes of you to have success.

Eric

On Sun, 09 Apr 2006 09:25:27 -0400, in a place far, far away, Monte
Davis made the phosphor on my monitor glow
in such a way as to indicate that:

(Rand Simberg) wrote:

Bigelow and Branson have been talking hotels...

Got orbital elements for talk? How much delta-v required? What's the
docking setup?

The problem is that the market for ISS is so trivial...

Gosh, I forgot about the huge booming orbital market out there
already.

Trivial compared to what's needed, not what else currently exists.
The prospects for large hotels are much better than those for large
government science labs.

it drives to the wrong technical solutions

Gosh, I forgot about all those superbly optimal technical solutions
out there already.

I seriously doubt that [COTS] will be seen in the
future as having played a major role in opening up space.

Must be fun looking back instead of being stuck here in 2006 with the
rest of us.

Look, I'm not advocating that alt.space organize itself around it; I
didn't even mention COTS.

You were talking about how great ISS would be for the market. Right
now, that equals COTS.

But I'd like to see a little more
imagination applied to what ISS might *become*, including
out-of-the-box thinking -- different ownership arrangements, modules
other than those currently in the plan, a slow orbital plane change,
whatever -- rather than what I do see... which is 99% "it's
government, it was dumb, it's sucking money from the RttMoon, it's
just going around in circles, it's not the marvelous Space Station
Freedom we fantasized 22 years ago."

ISS is like Shuttle--it's fundamentally unaffordable for anyone except
a government from an operational standpoint, even if it were given
away.

On Sun, 09 Apr 2006 09:30:26 -0400, in a place far, far away,
(Eric Chomko) made the phosphor on my
monitor glow in such a way as to indicate that:

Rand Simberg ) wrote:
: On Thu, 06 Apr 2006 07:00:55 -0400, in a place far, far away,
: (Eric Chomko) made the phosphor on my
: monitor glow in such a way as to indicate that:

: Let me reiterate. I want to be wrong, proven wrong.

: That's good, since you get your stated heart's desire every day,
: multiple times, often in hilarious ways.

All that said, none of this makes you right, Rand.

Who said it did?