>not many of them have launched a rocket and landed it on a barge... Are you saying this was something thought to be impossible before? >I'd like to ask what

>not many of them have launched a rocket and landed it on a barge... Are you saying this was something thought to be impossible before? >I'd like to ask what you think Musk's real intent is? Spacex is a space transportation company. Its business is getting things into space. The more it's reach, the better. Right? So ultimately they might get to mars. It is a business target. But the problem is that it is now being painted as a mission to save humanity. As a business, spacex wants to reach there as soon as possible, but for humanity, there is no urgent need to go to mars or anywhere. And what Musk is doing is creating a boogeyman of a "catastrophe" and generate fear and proclaim himself as a savior that could save us all. And this generates a lot of good will, which translate to a lot of funding. Imagine asking for funds by saying you want to run a business mining asteroids. It will get a lot less funding than a project to "save humanity. So basically, these funding is based on generated fear, funds that could have put to a better use right here and now.... >Musk is doing a great job of aiming for mars, and even if he misses he sure looks like he'll get close. Note that aiming for a business of asteroid mining or aiming to get things further into space generally will look a lot like aiming for mars. I mean, they can milk this cow as long as possible, because they are not really promising the investors that they will colonize Mars, right. It is just good will based on their "ambitions". They can discard the colonization idea, just like they did with Hyperloop, and the people will forget it just as easily....