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Elon Musk unveils first tourist for SpaceX 'Moon loop'
- nkoren 8y agoWhy did https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18011723 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18011723 get pushed off the front page so quickly?
- dba7dba 8y agoIt is weird. We just heard a private person is spending hundreds of millions of dollars to help fund a flyby of the moon. Strange undeed.
- frgewut 8y agoI suspect publicity created by this will easy recoup all expenses.
- lawlessone 8y agoHow?
- isostatic 8y agoWhen you have billions it's irrelevant, no more than the average joe dropping $10k on a holiday
- joering2 8y agoSlight correction: when you have billions, but found your projects in big part by government subsidies. If you pay taxes in USA, you partially own tiny bit of every single conpany other than x/paypal that Musk ever -funded-
- dba7dba 8y agoIt is strange because this is a big announcement, that is concrete with real money and people (more soon to be announced). By Elon Musk. But there doesn't seem to be much love for him by the press. Is it because Elon offended the press few weeks ago? I don't understand why press thinks it is above some criticism?
- makepanic 8y agoIt somehow got deranked from #2 to #23 in 5 minutes: http://hnrankings.info/18011723/ http://hnrankings.info/18011723/
- de_watcher 8y agoThere are some "sensational" notes that are a bit meh for my taste. Maybe that's why people downvote.
- smcl 8y agoYou can't downvote a story though - or do you think people flagged it instead?
- shawn 8y agoA positive interpretation is that the original piece wasn’t very substantive, and tossing it off the front page was a way to make room for the more-substantive articles (which we’re now commenting on). A less positive interpretation is that voters have very little say over what goes on the front page — or more specifically, what stays.
- nkoren 8y agoMeanwhile, this BBC story about it got taken from #1 to #75 in 10 minutes: http://hnrankings.info/18013406/ http://hnrankings.info/18013406/ This isn't happening with other stories. The system is clearly being gamed.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- jf- 8y agoThere’s a certain level of Musk fatigue. An increasing number of people seem to be tired of his antics.
- zaroth 8y agoThe discourse may be a bit spicy but by no means flame war territory. The story certainly isn’t clickbait or overly political. It’s certainly the most newsworthy thing of the week IMO. Dear Mods, Put it back. And deduct 100 points from whoever flagged it off.
- shawn 8y agoNote that “users flagged it” often isn’t true. For example, mods flag many comments manually, at which point the rest of the community believes users flagged it. It’s easier to enjoy HN if you just accept you don’t have a say. For better or worse, the old times are gone. But it might be possible to resurrect it in a new form.
- jf- 8y agoBecause you stand over the mods shoulders watching them? How do you claim to know this and that it wasn’t flagged?
- Fri31Aug 8y agoCommenters are high as fuck.
- therealmarv 8y agoElon Musk and his companies are master in unveiling and announcing visions but not in delivering. I wonder if there is a special word for that in marketing... let's see if they will make it till 2023... wish them luck though.
- aargh_aargh 8y agounderdelivery (perhaps deliberate) https://www.marketingterms.com/dictionary/underdelivery/ https://www.marketingterms.com/dictionary/underdelivery/
- brennebeck 8y agoThis doesn’t feel like what the OP is really trying to convey. At least not with the strict definition provided at the link. My interpretation of OP is something akin to “selling the sizzle”, I.e. being able to get any project bought into, unveiled, etc. with little/nothing, but it’s not quite at the level of vapor ware. Just my take.
- therealmarv 8y agoyou got me! Thanks... exactly my thoughts.
- chrisper 8y ago>I wonder if there is a special word for that in marketing Snakeoil?
- aloisdg 8y ago> In the computer industry, vaporware (alt. vapourware) is a product, typically computer hardware or software, that is announced to the general public but is never actually manufactured nor officially cancelled. Use of the word has broadened to include products such as automobiles wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vaporware https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vaporware
- 8y ago
- peteretep 8y agoHalf of Elon is apparently a treasure of humanity, and the other half is some giant unstable douche. How do we arrange an intervention such that the guy getting high on Joe Rogan and harassing expats doesn't bring down the guy doing the good stuff?
- Faaak 8y agoHow a guy smoking a joint can trouble you is beyond me.
- swarnie_ 8y agoDefinitely not the securities fraud or slander on Twitter?
- ben_w 8y agoAgreed that weed itself is irrelevant (though I literally don’t believe that $420 wasn’t a drugs reference even though it’s been explicitly denied), unlike violating the rules about manipulating share prices and the defamation on Twitter. Looks to me like chronic overwork. How do we convince him to take a holiday?
- swarnie_ 8y agoMaybe the £420 comment was a typo for $240 and his resent public meltdown are intentional in order to tank the company and buy it out cheap. Ill get the tinfoil now...
- dagw 8y agoIt's not the smoking a joint part that is troublesome (and let's face it, he didn't really 'smoke'), but the how and when and why part and what it say about his judgement (or lack of it). Unless you buy the theory that he did it to cleverly deflect attention away from something else.
- 8y ago
- treydey 8y agoA bit ironic that Yusaku Maezawa wants the mission to be about "World Peace" when the $200+ million he most likely spent could be better served on Earth. Just call it what it is, a wish to be part of something bigger.
- nkoren 8y agoWhere do you think that money is being spent? They don't just haul it into space and shovel it out an airlock.
- treydey 8y agoObviously it's being spent on developing the rocket. My issue is that he specifically states that the mission is about "inspiring world peace". There are clearly better ways to inspire world peace than taking a lap around the moon.
- ben_w 8y agoFor $200 million? I can’t think of any. Remember the world economy is approximately half a million times bigger than the amount of money being spent on this. Even the most recent summer Olympics (which are, I think, supposed to be world peace promoting) was 655 times more expensive.
- treydey 8y agoThere are numerous ways to address world peace such as through education, technology, medicine etc. According to this paper by the WHO and UNICEF there was a shortage of about $11 billion for immunization. How many hundreds of thousands could be saved from a $200 million donation? http://www.who.int/choice/publications/p_2007_Scaling-up_Immunisation.pdf http://www.who.int/choice/publications/p_2007_Scaling-up_Imm...
- ctdonath 8y agoCommoditizing space travel may save the human race. That's Elon's point & goal.
- jeandejean 8y ago"an important step toward enabling access for everyday people who dream of travelling to space", provided you're an everyday billionaire :-D.
- Shivetya 8y agoI have zero issues with this. The rich tend to adopt or do what the rest cannot very early and a good many things do trickle down. Just look at all the safety features on entry level cars these days, most used to be pure luxury items. Even the idea of an affordable EV. the go into your home and see every day items and just look at the price changes on big ticket items. I remember the days in the 70s when flying was too expensive for families to consider. Even making a long distance call was reserved for special events. I don't suspect travel in space will be that way in my life time being that I am in my fifties but I can hope.
- andromedavision 8y ago> The rich tend to adopt or do what the rest cannot very early and a good many things do trickle down... I remember the days in the 70s when flying was too expensive for families to consider. Electricity as well. The very first few installations of electricity in homes by Edison were in Pierpont Morgan's home and soon followed by Morgan's friends' homes. It makes logical sense too that it should be this way because early on, tech is usually very expensive and highly experimental such that if it fails, only the rich can afford the losses and upkeep.
- lawlessone 8y ago>the rich tend to adopt or do what the rest cannot very early and a good many things do trickle down. I imagine the poor would adopt things too if they had money.
- codeulike 8y agoThe eventual plan is for a ticket to mars to be 'affordable', thats what hes referring to. He sketched out how it _might_ be possible in that Interplanatary speech a few years ago
- nmeofthestate 8y agoScheduled for 2023 - I do hope this doesn't interfere with the SpaceX Mars missions.
- perilunar 8y agoWhy would it? Yusaku Maezawa is paying a “non-trivial” amount of the development costs, and it’s the same rocket.
- simonh 8y agoA trans-lunar flight might be very useful as a test flight before the first Mars mission anyway. Going to Mars will be an extremely risky venture to start with and the first few vehicles probably won't be coming back even if they make it, so it also makes sense to extract a bit of economic value out of the vehicle beforehand.
- booleandilemma 8y agoI thought Elon Musk was a “total fraud”? https://nypost.com/2018/07/21/elon-musk-is-a-total-fraud/amp/ https://nypost.com/2018/07/21/elon-musk-is-a-total-fraud/amp...
- laurencei 8y agoI wonder why it's not Elon himself? He can obviously afford it, and it is clearly his passion, so why not take a once in a lifetime opportunity and head into space?
- xrayzerone 8y agoBecause good leaders eat last.
- perilunar 8y agoBecause he’s not expendable yet.
- pluma 8y agoSame reason he said he won't be the first person on Mars? He understands the risks and isn't willing to jeopardize his vision (nor his life).
- Fri31Aug 8y agoHe doesn't want to die.
- TangoTrotFox 8y agoWhy would you think it'd be a once in a lifetime opportunity? The whole point of this is stepping into a new domain of technology and humanity where what this man is doing will one day become as accessible as flying around the world is today. And more importantly, the risk:reward of failure involving Elon is bad. Right now he's managed to spark a number of competitors such as Blue Origin and Virgin Galactic, but these companies have yet to achieve much of anything and it's not out of the question to consider that if Elon died tomorrow, we might enter into another 50 years of space stagnation. Contrast that against the pleasure gained from a space voyage and it's just a bad risk:reward ratio, even when the risk is mostly negligible.
- onion2k 8y agoHe can obviously afford it Can he? He definitely has the potential to be massively wealthy. If Tesla/SpaceX/BoringCo/etc exit at some point he'll walk away with '*&^@ you money', but until then he doesn't seem to have that much. According to Bloomberg he's in debt with personal loans to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars[1]. To be honest though, I don't really understand how normal money-you-buy-stuff-with works for people who are billionaires when most of their wealth is in stock and options. [1] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-08-16/musk-picks-his-coziest-bank-goldman-sachs-to-help-go-private https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-08-16/musk-pick...
- sixstringbudha 8y agoOh look! Elon Musk farted. And it is on top on HN.
- manicdee 8y agoIs HN supposed to be for people interested in tech startups or not? Is SpaceX a massively successful startup or not? Is the focus on Elon perhaps a stark reminder that success is often a matter of chance, and that not all startups are lucky enough to have their Gwynne Shotwells and Robert Muellers?
- davidhyde 8y agoWhy, when Elon is mentioned in a bad light is his birthplace always mentioned by the British media. As if the reader is too stupid to grasp that an individual can become disagreeable all by themselves. Why bring South Africa into this article: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-45551895 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-45551895 and not this one about space and the future. It hurts tourism which is very important for GDP there.
- celticninja 8y agoI'm no defender of the British press but I think its reasonable to mention his place of birth. Have a look at the reporting around this article, "Japanese billionaire..." is mentioned by almost every news source, Richard Branson is referred to as British Billionaire by overseas press, so perhaps you want Musk to be described as South African billionaire but that would t be accurate and calling him a US billionaire, while correct is not the most accurate way to describe his nationality. So they mention that he was born in South Africa and most people can then work out the rest, I will US based but is an immigrant from South Africa.
- orcdork 8y agoGoogling for 'Musk "south africa born"' (https://www.google.com/search?q=musk+"south+africa+born" https://www.google.com/search?q=musk+"south+africa+born") seems to have articles on both sides of the argument (including one calling him the real life tony stark).
- a_imho 8y agotldr Japanese billionaire and online fashion tycoon Yusaku Maezawa, 42.