Paul Allen Confirmed as SpaceShipOne's Sponsor

Shafe writes "Space.com confirmed suspicions that Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen was the secret investor in Burt Rutan's SpaceShipOne, which completed a successful supersonic flight on the same day as the centennial of flight. Allen hopes Rutan's ship will win the $10 million X-Prize to help kickstart private manned space flight."

Comments

TechTV reported this last night on TechTV live.

[the_2nd_coming]

I wonder if Paul Allen will want to be the first Private citizen into space with the first privately built space ship.

Re:TechTV reported this last night on TechTV live.

[mr_z_beeblebrox]

I wonder if Paul Allen will want to be the first Private citizen into space with the first privately built space ship.

It is good to see people with his kind of wealth putting it to work for society. The benefits of a private space market will be....well more benefits than you could imagine. (sorry about the star wars thing) If his reason for doing this is just to get to be 'first inspace in a privately owned vehicle' well then, I wish him the best of luck!

Re:TechTV reported this last night on TechTV live.

[TrueBuckeye]

I would certainly go in a heartbeat if I had the option, but I don't know of the payload capacity of SS1...can it hold passengers as well as crew?

Re:TechTV reported this last night on TechTV live.

[ScuzzMonkey]

Actually, my observation is that Gates is focused on addressing traditional charity problems and is more interested in putting out charitable money for its own sake, whereas Paul puts his funds into stuff that he thinks is cool. Some of that stuff has added benefits, which is great, and I am sure that's a factor for him--but I think mostly it's just because it's stuff that he has always wanted to do (and most likely that you or I would want to do) given a few billion dollars to throw around.

Bill invests in the Third World and putting computers in schools. Paul puts up EMP, renovates Cinerama, buys a few sports teams, and throws some cash at building better rocket ships. Which of these is someone going out and consciously adopting the 'charitable millionair' veneer and which is a regular guy that suddenly became fabulously wealthy doing the cool stuff he fantasized about before all that money?

I think they are both doing excellent things with their money, especially considering that there are so many tremendously wealthy people who don't. And it's great living in Seattle and reaping some of the benefits of Paul reliving his youth, too. ;)

not necessarily a good indicator

[social]

Allen's sponsorship isn't necessarily a good indicator that the project will be any more successful, as he has had some major slip-ups in the past. His Experience Music Project in Seattle has thus far proven to be a financial wreck.

Re:not necessarily a good indicator

[cens0r]

I wouldn't call it a finacial wreck. I have quite a bit of experience with the place as my GF is a Museum Studies grad student at the UW and interned at the UW.

Basically, people are of the misconception that Paul Allen has something to do with the museum. Technically he doesn't. He built them a building, donated his entire collection of stuff to them, and gave them funding to get started; but then they became atonomous. They aren't doing real well right now, but what museum did well in this economy?

well

[theMerovingian]

Allen hopes Rutan's ship will win the $10 million X-Prize to help kickstart private manned space flight.

If he was that worried about it, he could cough up 10 million without too much trouble. Larry Ellison's yacht cost more than that.

Allen probably just likes being the patron saint of technology.

X-Prize Redundant?

[N8F8]

The Russians are charging $20 mil per passenger for tourists. Doesn't take much for that to outcompete X-Prize for motivation.

Re:Good for Paul!

[mongbot]

It's funny that most geeks really admire Paul Allen and Steve Wozniak but hate Gates and Jobs.

You have a point.

Creating a spaceship is all well and good and will probably advance humanity in the long run. Kudos to Paul Allen for taking the initiative.

But, in purely monetary terms, Bill Gates is much more charitable. In fact, it could be argued that he's the most philanthrophic individual in history. I don't like it any more than you do, but it's true. I suppose it's a small consolation to think that some of the "Microsoft tax" goes towards charity.

Paul Allan is a JERK

[zulux]

Paul Allan bought a summer camp out from under the camp, kicked the kids off and built a multi-million dollar trophy home in it's place.

Kind of like a "Ernest Goes to Camp" without the happy ending.

more info here

Paul Allen is cool....

[The Lynxpro]

Why can't Bill Gates be more like Paul Allen and then more people would actually like him? Or maybe more like Sir Richard Branson... Just a thought...

Re:Paul Allen is cool....

[reverendslappy]

And I thought I was a cynic.

"Gates is almost completely focused on ...expanding Microsoft's monopoly."

Yeah, I guess that little "almost" in there is the 6.2 BILLION DOLLARS in grants and donations. I guess this is what prevents him from being "completely" focused on Microsoft's monopoly, right?

I'm not exactly a Microsoft apologist, but for you to sit there an dismiss such a huge amount of philanthropy as a PR campaign or tantamount to billionaire one-upmanship angers the shit outta me -- regardless of who's in question.

Maybe I'll be more inclined listen to you bitch when you donate 13% of your net worth to charity.

There's some padding...

[zipwow]

I'm reminded of KC Royals owner Ewing Kauffman in the early 70's.

I should point out at this point that the Royals were very competitive, mostly due to the money that Kauffman was putting into the club.

Anyway, the story goes that one reporter asked him if he was worried about the amount of money he was losing by owning the Royals. His reply?

"Yeah, I can probably only afford to do this another fifteen or twenty years."

If Paul Allen wants it to work, it works. That's what being in the "top 5 richest..." list is about.

-Zipwow