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Competing with SpaceX is about as hard as competing with Boeing on passenger planes - except Boeing is also a corrupt, disorganised wreck and SpaceX isn't. And

Competing with SpaceX is about as hard as competing with Boeing on passenger planes - except Boeing is also a corrupt, disorganised wreck and SpaceX isn't. And unlike Boeing, SpaceX is also an airline, and it's also a passenger. Build some competitive product and SpaceX will refuse to launch it - and launching it with anyone else will be extremely expensive and also just impossible due to their low capacity and scheduling years in advance. Try building launch competition and SpaceX will easily undercut your prices because they don't even need launch revenue to succeed anymore. Try building both... and you will never get enough qualified engineers, know-how, and funding, just because no one will fund a copy of Boeing(plus a lot of other things), or Intel. And it is already a thing a lot more complex than Boeing or Intel.

ben_w 7mo ago
> Try building launch competition and SpaceX will easily undercut your prices because they don't even need launch revenue to succeed anymore. A) not when you're the Chinese government B) not when the rockets are now 3D-printable C) even without that, that sounds to me like an obvious monopoly abuse lawsuit, and even if the US doesn't take that seriously any more, it's the fig leaf needed for all other interested nations to use existing tools for trade manipulation to "level the playing field" > Try building both... and you will never get enough qualified engineers, know-how, and funding, just because no one will fund a copy of Boeing(plus a lot of other things), or Intel. Clearly not true because competition already exists for each part separately. Even from other US billionaires, let alone internationally from nations who see the USA as a threat. But also this pertains to previous point about Musk himself being a threat to this position, he's poisoning his own well of talent.

ben_w 7mo ago

> Try building launch competition and SpaceX will easily undercut your prices because they don't even need launch revenue to succeed anymore. A) not when you're the Chinese government B) not when the rockets are now 3D-printable C) even without that, that sounds to me like an obvious monopoly abuse lawsuit, and even if the US doesn't take that seriously any more, it's the fig leaf needed for all other interested nations to use existing tools for trade manipulation to "level the playing field" > Try building both... and you will never get enough qualified engineers, know-how, and funding, just because no one will fund a copy of Boeing(plus a lot of other things), or Intel. Clearly not true because competition already exists for each part separately. Even from other US billionaires, let alone internationally from nations who see the USA as a threat. But also this pertains to previous point about Musk himself being a threat to this position, he's poisoning his own well of talent.