bfe

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211.
by bfe 15y ago
It's long been standard IP management to weigh between patents and trade secrets based on the specifics of a case.
212.
by bfe 15y ago
As part of their testing they actually pass a stainless steel nut through the kerosene and liquid oxygen lines into the engine while it's firing, something that would make almost any other rocket engine explode. It sounds like to say they d
213.
by bfe 15y ago
This article discusses how SpaceX seems to be able to get things done faster, for less expense, and with better performance, than any of its competitors -- partly because they care more about the end result of being able to send stuff and p
214.
Is SpaceX changing the rocket equation?(airspacemag.com)
295 points by bfe 15y ago|88 comments
215.
by bfe 15y ago
SpaceX is a few bells and whistles away from a human-rated Crew Configuration of the Dragon spacecraft with seating for seven. Their initial contract for unpiloted cargo flights of Falcon 9 / Dragon to ISS charges an average of $133 million
216.
by bfe 15y ago
One question they apparently do ask of every candidate is, "What can you do better than anyone else in the world." I think being able to have an answer for that is a worthy goal.
217.
by bfe 15y ago
You didn't say if the cosmologist is theoretical or experimental. A scientist would need a solid experimental record to be very competitive as a mission specialist astronaut candidate. (And of course an applicant for pilot astronaut has bas
218.
by bfe 15y ago
When I was in college I made a laminated pocket-size printout of the Astronaut Candidate Basic Qualifications and carried it in my wallet every day, and it actually inspired me often to study harder and to go running. I think it's hard to o
219.
by bfe 15y ago
This isn't really news. Minimum wage in China is set per province, and different coastal provinces at different times have been posting significant minimum wage hikes, even competing with each other's wage hikes, for quite a while now. But
220.
by bfe 15y ago
There's more than one "other McCarthy" and even more than one Senator McCarthy. It's useful not to confuse them.
221.
by bfe 15y ago
There are lots of little things you can do to avoid liabilities, and it looks like they're putting a lot of thought into that. I see this as potentially kind of the airbnb of transportation. I'm going to try it out.
222.
by bfe 15y ago
You certainly don't need to have that scale of resources accumulated under one individual's ownership to launch massive, heroically selfless projects for the betterment of humanity. Rather, from the perspective of an individual, there are l
223.
by bfe 15y ago
I've done published research where we started by using data from a gravitational lensing search for black holes, and used data they had collected but disregarded on very distant stars. A mere 100 years ago, there was not an astronomer on Ea
224.
by bfe 15y ago
That just assumes that accumulation of wealth is necessarily due to extracting it from the general economy rather than by generating wealth for the economy at large. Without debating the relative merits of Microsoft's contributions in parti
225.
by bfe 15y ago
Imagine though if we had a thousand Bill Gateses who each had a hundred billion dollars, and the brains and determination that got them that money, to throw at one or more of the projects mentioned above. Can there be such thing as too much
226.
by bfe 15y ago
Billionaire-scale conspicuous consumption is certainly overrated. But Gates's own example shows how wonderfully useful and fulfilling it can be to have tens of billions of dollars to mobilize in a really heroic cause, like working to eradic
227.
by bfe 15y ago
I remember predictions written in the 1990's of toilets that would automatically provide early screening for cancer. How much of their millions in R&D goes toward that?
228.
by bfe 15y ago
This TechCrunch article has one of the densest concentrations of spelling, grammar, and punctuation errors I've ever seen, and the headline is both specious and contradicted by the article. EDIT to add: that was fast - they've now taken dow
229.
by bfe 15y ago
It's the replicator, not the transporter, that instantly creates any meal on Star Trek.
230.
by bfe 15y ago
tl;dr: Congressman Rohrabacher (R-Boeing) is "shocked" that NASA would consider rejecting a plan that would have created an artificial need to order a bunch more expendable rockets, even though NASA already found that the plan would have be
231.
by bfe 15y ago
The infinite runway is the key point of "ramen profitable", not comparison with market wages. The latter differs enormously between a founder who just dropped out of college versus one who's switching out of a highly successful position in
232.
by bfe 15y ago
Two outstanding books that will help anyone get started regardless of whether they have any coding background are Learn Python the Hard Way by Zed Shaw, and Land of Lisp by Conrad Barski.
233.
by bfe 15y ago
If it's incapable of being built, the patent examiner is supposed to reject it under section 101 for failing to be useful.
234.
by bfe 15y ago
Certainly not! Especially being the forerunners of their new model. I just meant that SVA and AH could , if anybody anywhere could, and if they so desired, have concentrated their resources to try to set up a new program that emulates YC.
235.
by bfe 15y ago
It really just boils down to, networking your way into a strong personal introduction is a trivial task compared with one hundred other far more challenging aspects of launching a successful startup, and every VC in the world knows this and
236.
by bfe 15y ago
From what I've heard about a different VC firm, even though they have a business plan submission form, they literally never contact people who submit through it, and rely exclusively on personal introductions. They also made the point that
237.
by bfe 15y ago
Since the moment they announced their formation, AH has consistently said they are completely stage-agnostic, and Marc had a previous history of investing personally in very small initial angel deals.
238.
by bfe 15y ago
Interesting that both SVA and AH responded to the success of YC not by setting up separate programs to emulate it, but by coalescing around it. This clearly made sense for Milner as a relative newcomer but the other two groups had no shorta
239.
Ben Horowitz for CEO of HP: five reasons why he'd be better than Meg Whitman(bfe242.posterous.com)
2 points by bfe 15y ago|0 comments
240.
by bfe 15y ago
Sometimes people can change themselves. That just tends to be much less likely than changes in traction or market.

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