Slashdot Mirror
Space Elevator Company LiftPort In Trouble
TropicalCoder writes "The LiftPort Group, founded four years ago with the lofty dream of building a stairway to heaven, has seemingly reached the end the line. The dream was to develop a ribbon of carbon nanotubes 100,000 km long, anchored to the Earth's surface and with a counterweight in space, providing a permanent bridge to orbit. Elevator cars would be robotic 'lifters' which would climb the ribbon to deliver cargo and eventually people to orbit or beyond. Now LiftPort has all but run out of funds, and the State of Washington's Securities Division has entered a Statement of Charges (PDF) against LiftPort Inc. dba LiftPort Group and founder Michael Laine."
In his book, High-Tech Ventures, Digital Equipment Corporation pioneer Gordon Bell analyzed various factors in the potential success of startups.
As I recall, one of his great big red flags was any product whose development entailed more than two technology breakthrough.
Yeah, here it is (PDF). He says, flatly, "A successful startup cannot be based on more than two breakthroughs in the state of the art. And for each area requiring a breakthrough, an alternative technology should be available as a backup."
So, by this measure, the Wright Brothers needed breakthroughs in engines and airframe design... so success was possible.
As for LiftPort, I think I've lost count of the number of breakthroughs they need.
And I'm not sure what their backup technology would have been if, by any chance, the carbon nanotube strategy turned out to be unfeasible.
"How to Do Nothing," kids activities, back in print!
If you're going to say "shit" say "shit." Don't say "S...". Using dots instead of letters doesn't conceal what you intend to say so isn't any politer. All it does is make it look as though someone has the right to stop you using the word.
Aide-toi, le Ciel t'aidera - Jeanne D'Arc.
It seems that a good place to try something like this would be the moon. It's relatively close, it has no wind to complicate things, it's gravity is dramatically less, so we could probably build it with today's materials science, and it would make getting on and off the moon dramatically easier.
After all, if your goal is to swim the English Channel, you might want to try swimming across a pool first.