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I 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 sp

I 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 ago
Because good leaders eat last.
perilunar 8y ago
Because he’s not expendable yet.
pluma 8y ago
Same 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 ago
He doesn't want to die.
TangoTrotFox 8y ago
Why 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 ago
He 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...
- noir_lord 8y ago
  They take our low interest loans against their assets. The super rich don't have a lot in liquid cash, it's all tied up.
- Expez 8y ago
  > 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. He takes out loans with his shares as collateral to get spending money. Why not just sell? Because he expects the shares to appreciate more than what he'd pay in interest and/or to retain the shareholder vote.
danieltillett 8y ago
Really I can't beleive the answers to this question. The real answer is for all the stress he is under right now he is not an idiot.
Svoka 8y ago
During the live event this was one of the question on Q&A. Yusaku told that he'll probably invite Musk on a ride with him. He smiled and told something on-par "why not".

I 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 ago

Because good leaders eat last.

perilunar 8y ago

Because he’s not expendable yet.

pluma 8y ago

Same 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 ago

He doesn't want to die.

TangoTrotFox 8y ago

Why 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 ago

He 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...

noir_lord 8y ago
They take our low interest loans against their assets. The super rich don't have a lot in liquid cash, it's all tied up.
Expez 8y ago
> 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. He takes out loans with his shares as collateral to get spending money. Why not just sell? Because he expects the shares to appreciate more than what he'd pay in interest and/or to retain the shareholder vote.

danieltillett 8y ago

Really I can't beleive the answers to this question. The real answer is for all the stress he is under right now he is not an idiot.

Svoka 8y ago

During the live event this was one of the question on Q&A. Yusaku told that he'll probably invite Musk on a ride with him. He smiled and told something on-par "why not".