[extropy-chat] SPACE: The next race: America's space Prize

[Adrian Tymes]

--- Mike Lorrey <mlorrey at yahoo.com> wrote:
> --- Adrian Tymes <wingcat at pacbell.net> wrote:
> > Yeah, but look at the deadline.  A number of
> people
> > (myself included) have been advocating that the
> 2010
> > goal should be something short of orbit - say, a
> > suborbital but significant distance point-to-point
> > hop, like L.A. to Tokyo, or at least Mojave to
> Maine.
> > Else one runs a severe risk that no one will show
> up
> > for the challenge in time.  (Especially with the
> > added,
> > though relatively minor, complication of docking
> > capability.)
> 
> An LA to Tokyo hop is of such significance (you need
> to reach at least
> mach 16 to do it ballistically) that if you can
> reach that its not much
> tougher to go into orbit. Bigelow's market isn't in
> Tokyo, its market
> is in orbit. Bigelow doesn't, therefore, have an
> interest in getting to
> Tokyo, unless you can prove it will get rich
> customers to his launch
> site quicker to get them into orbit for his space
> hotel.

Let me rephrase, then:

With the current deadline, there is a very high risk
that no one will even seriously try to claim the
prize by 2010 (if anyone does, it will be
semi-obvious fraudsters like the da Vinci team was
on the first X Prize: putting out press releases and
promises but little if any actual flights and
hardware).  The resulting disappointment will likely
leave the task undone through 2015, assuming no other
funding effort comes to the rescue.

On the other hand, sponsor a midway goal at 2010 and
then the full thing at 2015, and the odds are
significantly increased that service can start around
2015 - which makes it worthwhile even if the midway
goal by itself is of marginal, maybe even zero, direct
value to Bigelow.

So, no, it doesn't matter that he doesn't want to go
to Tokyo.  Just pick any two reasonably accessible
points a good distance apart - or even let the
contestants pick their own launch and landing sites,
so long as they are at least X kilometers apart.  (To
pick an extreme example, most contestants would view
Iraq to Singapore as unfeasable even if they could do
the much longer L.A. to Tokyo trip.  But who knows,
there might be a group with connections that could
find usable launch and landing sites in those two
areas.  Very unlikely, especially since this contest
is for American companies only, but it doesn't cost
anything to allow it.)