Interesting. In my mind as well, it's too early for manned missions - everything we'd do will be similar to Apollo again: Short visits to show we can, then ther

Interesting. In my mind as well, it's too early for manned missions - everything we'd do will be similar to Apollo again: Short visits to show we can, then there's no plan to actually turn these achievements into a self-funding endeavour. I applaud what SpaceX does because it extends our capability to do things in space and industrialize it. You need an industrial base to permanently house people. This is mostly just opinion and dreaming but: I don't think we'll have people driving mining rigs on the moon, drinking a beer in their moon bar and missing home. I don't know whether human maintenance can even be a thing because regolith is so vicious to anything operating on the moon - you'd need so many people fixing the robots. That's why the real challenge is coming up with more robust automated systems. I think new approaches to industrial operations can come from this (and maybe even post-scarcity approaches for Earth, if we see it's possible) if we have to plan and realize a remotely operated (or even automated) factory/mining site. Other than on Earth, there are no space constraints, everything is almost the same material, environmental effects on the moon are not a problem (yet). Any industrial site does not have to have the form factor of a terrestial one, it can be the size of ten airports and mostly consist of flat surface, where a few robots are driving around, moving tools and parts and goods. But just as with human spaceflight, we have to find the business case for it.