Talk:SpaceX

Paragraph on other ventures

I find this revert rather curious:

If the intention of the said paragraph was purely "aggrandizement by association with famous successful ventures", then I could understand why the moderating sentence was reverted. In such case however I would think the entire paragraph to be unjustified.

If however the intention of the associated paragraph was to show that SpaceX appears to be well funded (a valid reason to write the things in the paragraph), then why revert a sentence saying just that?

This issue is also mentioned in a related discussion at Talk:Falcon I. Ropers 14:31, 14 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I wrote the paragraph to be professional biographical for Elon Musk, the founder and CEO/CTO of the company. The reason why I reverted the article was the information that has been released by Musk and SpaceX has been ambiguous on the subject of the funding of the Falcon V -- we do not know whether he is taking on additional investors for the program or parts of the program. Further, we don't know Musk's pain threshhold. He might have had it with this program and is about to pull the plug on funding. While I have no reason to believe that's true, we just don't know. More neutral language than "well funded" is warranted, in my opinion. Dschmelzer 17:01, 14 Aug 2004 (UTC)

This article needs serious reworking. It reads like a company brochure. Some one other than Dschmelzer needs to rewrite it or else give it the axe. –Floorsheim 04:55, 16 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I will answer any specific criticism on the text. I don't think the question of who edits the text is of any importance. Dschmelzer 16:52, 16 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Thanks, Neuron. That quote definitely helps tie things together. It seems like there is a looming suggestion that there is something profound about this whole SpaceX and Falcon rocket thing. Could you guys do more to point out what that is to someone clueless like me? For example, is SpaceX the only privately owned company to get involved with the space industry? What are the potential consequences of improving the cost and reliability of space access by a factor of ten? And if SpaceX is not the only company involved in space, who are its competitors and what are their plans? –Floorsheim 18:26, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)

(My personal off-the-cuff view, which I'll probably try to make NPOV and integrate into the article later) Historically, space launch has been the domain of large government-contracted defense companies like Boeing and Lockheed-Martin, who really haven't been inclined to design a launch vehicle with low cost as its goal; indeed, they've arguably been inclined to do the exact opposite, since it results in greater profits. In the past few decades, many people have tried to make low-cost rockets. This was particularly the case in the 90s, with many companies trying to do this. In an interview Musk mentions that he thinks these companies failed for one or more of the following reasons: lack of critical mass of technical skill, lack of funding, and a reliance on non-existent technology. I agree with his assessment.

In the past few years we've seen something very interesting: folks who got rich off technology in the 90s and are also interested in space. Such people are similar to past endeavours, in that they have plenty of desire and ideas about getting into space cheaply. Unlike people in the past, however, they also have the funding to actually pursue their goals, and often have experience with managing successful technology companies and thus know how to attain a critical mass of technical skills. Elon Musk with SpaceX is one example, with his company working on cheap orbital unmanned launch. Paul Allen (with Burt Rutan) and (arguably) John Carmack are other examples, working on cheap manned suborbital launch. I'm not aware of any other sufficiently-funded groups working on cheap launch, with the possible exception of the enigmatic Blue Origin (owned by Amazon.com's Jeff Bezos).

Many have claimed that cheap access to space is the main thing blocking a lot of interesting space applications. Musk himself was planning on personally funding a Mars Oasis mission with the goal of putting a small greenhouse on Mars, but cancelled/postponed that and started SpaceX when he discovered that launch costs would be the primary cost of the mission. It's been claimed that lack of cheap access also keeps us from having (or putting funds towards adequately developing) things like orbital hotels, solar power satellites, off-world mining, etc.

Hmm... perhaps a lot of what I just wrote would be better off in private spaceflight. --NeuronExMachina 08:35, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I agree with all of this and add two things -- Russian and Ukrainian rockets (e.g., the Dnepr, with which the Falcon V will compete head-to-head) have been by far the price leaders up to this point and have been able to take market share from the big US contractors for non-governmental launches. There is some discussion about how much of a subsidy these Russian and Ukrainian rockets enjoy because they are derived from military hardware, so the cost comparisons are controversial. The Falcon I and Falcon V are competitively-priced against these rockets, even though arguably SpaceX does not enjoy subsidies on the costs side.

I think a large part of the US space establishment (especially military space) is hoping for SpaceX success. However, a lot of iron rice bowls will be destroyed in the US if SpaceX succeeds, so we can expect this SpaceX article to be controversial after the first successful launch. Kistler's ox has been gored already. Orbital Sciences will lose a lot if the Falcon I succeeds. Boeing will lose a lot if Falcon V succeeds. Dschmelzer 14:23, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Regarding the "BFR", I think it was around in rocket circles well before the Doom game. That said, I guess the SpaceX folks are of an age where it could be both a reference to the BFRs of old and an homage to Doom. --Dschmelzer 10:48, 09 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Big Fucking Rocket

Does anyone have a reference for this?, I've removed it pending a source--Duk 16:11, 14 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Reverted; citation added. Source document was linked at the bottom of the article, but citation made explicit now. Dschmelzer 18:03, 14 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Images

Has SpaceX or whoever shot the photo that we are using explicitly given us permission to use the photo? If it was added under the principles of fair use as opposed to SpaceX releasing this to public domain, we will need to make sure this is noted. Dschmelzer 18:09, 14 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]