The selling pickaxes to gold miners formula only works when people are pretty sure there is gold. Funding development of orbital smelters would be an incredibl

The selling pickaxes to gold miners formula only works when people are pretty sure there is gold. Funding development of orbital smelters would be an incredibly risky proposition given that pay-off would be contingent on someone else figuring out asteroid mining or something. And as for "boring things". Same type of deal. It's risky throwing money at a problem that only has a payoff if someone else succeeds their own high risk activity. Like Bigelow currently has no staff, and has totally missed all of its planned milestones. Especially for the boring stuff, you're also going to be cramped up against someone selling solutions that just apes whatever the ISS does. Does only have instant coffee, and not having real laundry, and having to sleep strapped into a sleeping bag kind of suck? Ya. But YOU'RE IN SPACE (and that's roughly just the same thing as camping). The novelty alone should be enough to tide you through your entire first generation of customers.