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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."
Lesson: You don't offer "common stock" to people without following detailed securities regulations and laws. In fact, you don't mention that at all until you've consulted with people that know of these things. The president of Liftport obviously never took an Economics class where you would have learned at least that the whole stock system is very complicated and very regulated.
Good call, Washington (state). Sucks for the idea, though.
Well I would be interested to know how the State of Washinton came to these conclusions and charges. Blue Sky laws are put into place to protect un-savy investors from being taken by kinky investment opportunities, but the charges don't seem to translate into a direct blue sky violation, and at worst, seems to stem from his lack of registering with the State that he would be selling securities.
They mention that he sold to un-accredited investors, but this is allowable under Regulation D, assuming he didn't take more then $1M and that the people he took money from were previous business associates, friends, or family.
I think this boils down to an angry Washington resident that put money into this 'venture' and lost it, and now is angry.
A major plot point of Kim Stanley Robinson's Red Mars is a space elevator's outer anchor being destroyed, sending the tether falling down on the red planet and causing all kinds of damage as it winds around. Obviously such a scenario would be taken into account by current thinkers, so how do they expect to avoid this risk?
They have a website that looks as if it's been knocked together by a 13-year-old kid who wants to be a rocket scientist. If what's on display there is anything to go by the company seems to be going nowhere. "Primarily targeting the hardware of the space elevator, the LiftPort Group member companies are researching and designing the nuts and bolts in the fields of carbon nanotube production, robotics, photo voltaics, power beaming and targeting, and permanent floating structures for the ocean. Outside of that, we also are responsible for project management, web design, public relation, accounting, and legal issues for each member company of the group." So we need to do all this... we're not really sure how to do it... but give us some money and we'll work it out. If it wasn't in the news I'd have assumed it was a scam. Somebody really didn't do their homework before they made an investment.
When you say "notice how slim the margin is" when comparing 62 gigapascals needed with the 100 gigapascals achievable, that seems to be a lot to me. 48 gigpascals is equivalent to 1,000,000 metric tons falling a metre, isn't it? Sounds like quite a lot.
It's not the amount that's important, it's the percentage. Put it this way... you're pulling a 620lb trailer with your car, which, say, has your kids in it. Would you be comfortable with using a 1,000 pound test rope to haul the trailer? After all, that's an extra 380lbs! Or do you think a few hard jerks could potentially snap the rope pretty easily?
Now, "hard jerks" wouldn't necessarily be a problem with a space elevator (but maybe winds COULD cause temporary increases in tension, I don't know), but you can see that safety margin isn't a bad thing.
Sometimes it's best to just let stupid people be stupid.
In Arthur Clarke's "Fountains of Paradise" the cable was made of monocrystalline diamond. I don't know how the tensile strength of compares to that of other carbon structures, but this paper (PDF) mentions values of over 1200 GPa at certain orientations, much better than what's needed for a space elevator. So, the real breakthrough needed is how to manufacture enough monocrystalline diamond fiber at a reasonable price.
I can just imagine the PHB at Dilbert's cube announcing that he's come up with plans for a space elevator.
... if you had a fledgling company focusing on an extremely fledging idea, would you put your money into renting or buying buildings like that? Or would you perhaps start of with something smaller, like Bill Hewlett and Dave Packard?
... I just wish *I* had an action matrix!
From their Wiki page:
Our goal is a significant return on investment - whether or not - the Space Elevator is ultimately successful. We do this by concentrating on 2 things: generating profits through spin-off technologies, and learning what we need to learn, in order to achieve our long-term goals.
The Four Pillars dictate how the rest of the world interacts with us; while the Five-C's are examples of how we interact with the world. Collectively these are referred to as The Nine and are used when considering the action matrix for building our elevator to space."
Four Pillars? Five Cs? The Nine?
Who are these kids, and how did they get access to enough money in the first place that now some government entity finds them worth investigating?
Looking through page after page of their gallery section, I ask myself what photograph after photograph of empty rooms and open spaces across a very large piece of real estate says about how they're handling money. Take a look through yourself. (Try not to stumble over the poor grammar and poorly written comments.)
Honestly
But whatever
Whoever designed level 61 in Frozen Bubble is a sadistic bastard.
i did provide documentation regarding the risks. pages of risks, in fact. i'd be happy to send you a copy of the prospectus that was used... if you would like to see it, send an email to info@ my company address, and reference this slashdot conversation. the prospectus talks all about the problems associated with building the SE, along with the general acknowledgment that this thing has so many unknown risks.
however, the state didnt think that was sufficient....
i'd like to point out that not one of our investors is angry about our performance or our effort. they all knew this was going to be difficult.
thanks for your interest, and i appreciate your concern.
take care. mjl
michael laine
president, liftport group.
I was thinking of mars myself--- after the moon, we should build one on mars-- although one on mars would be more handy sooner rather than later.
Democracy Now! - uncensored, anti-establishment news
I don't know if anybody noticed, but we seem to have some feedback from Michael Laine of LiftPort himself. Since he logged on as Anonymous Coward, his remarks are coming out at 0, below the radar of most readers. It seems no moderator has considered elevating his comments, or is not convinced that the writer is indeed Michael Laine of LiftPort.
Mr. Laine - if that is really you, I would suggest that you log on, so that your comments will at least start out at 1 and thereby become visible. If you wish, drop me a note, and I will interview you (via email or Skype) on behalf of Slashdot. (Click the contact-me link on my web page). Of course you can expect to be properly authenticated in the process.
I just got off the phone with Michael J. Laine, President of the LiftPort Group. In a previous comment, I had noted that there was some direct feedback from Mr. Laine, but his comments came out at 0 because he logged on as AC. Since I felt no one had noticed his comments, I offered to interview him on behalf of Slashdot, and he contacted me and accepted my offer. I was able to authenticate that indeed I was in touch with the real Michael J. Laine. I must say it was very interesting conversation. In the end it was agreed that I will prepare a list of questions for Michael, mostly based on Slashdot comments posted here, giving him a chance to respond to each in his own words. If you wish to add to the that list, pose your question here and now. I hope to be able to submit the completed interview within 24 hours, and then it will be up to Slashdot editors if and when to post it.
TropicalCoder
This "company" has got a lot of coverage over the last few years on Slashdot. This is not because of anything that they have done, but because of the type of company they are. The opportunity to go to space and participate in the creation of extra-terrestrial colonies and worlds is the dream of every nerd wishing to escape the mundane realities facing them.
Anyway, the first time I saw the website for Liftport, they had pictures of LEGO MODELS laying on carpet taken with a cheap digital camera, and poorly drawn visualizations that looked like pictures out of books about the future that I read when I was in the 3rd grade. These guys have built a toy that can climb ropes, and that's about it.
When I was 10 years old, I started a spy company and opened up shop in my bedroom. This was fantasy mind you, but I don't see how it's any different from Liftport. Follow your dreams, yes, but don't be a fool either. Seriously, these guys have done nothing more advanced than your average high school science project, but because they surround themselves with the vernier of a registered corporation that somehow legitimizes them?
LS
There is a fine line between being a cultivated citizen and being someone else's crop. - A. J. Patrick Liszkie
When I saw the name "Michael Laine", I didn't really think anything - it's a plain and potentially common enough name. Then I read the linked PDF and saw the adress, and realised that I know this particular "Michael Laine" personally.
.com era he spent quite a while trying to get people (including me) to invest in a variety of web based businesses without so much as formal business plan. The accomplishements of TEKnology-Laine largely exist in Michael's vivid imagination. (Even back then it struck me that his main source of income was business grants and investors - with little in the way of actual customers.)
He's been floating around the Bremerton business scene for around fifteen years involved in/shilling for one dubious business idea after another. Back in the
I'm not surprised he's finally fallen afoul of the law. He's been in a bit of trouble off and on because the building he bought back in the 90's was partially paid for by a grant based on his claims to already have a viable technology business and his promises to expand it and bring jobs to the city. A promise not entirely broken - but also one on which he's not expended much actual energy on fulfilling.
Let's see what a little Googling brings to light about his recent career.
Hmm... Here's a fascinating little piece, it seems he is not repaying a loan advanced for the purpose of building a nanotube factory. In this article he admits to the failure of a business prominently mentioned in many articles about Liftport. (As well as admitting he didn't actually graduate from college as he implies in his bio.) Here we find that Liftport actually went belly up nearly two months ago. (Mostly because the investors couldn't - or wouldn't come up with the money to pay for the building he owns, but occupies less than 25% of.) This article from nine months ago shows a familiar pattern from his TEKnology-Laine days, with one scheme starting to unravel - he's off shilling for another.