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Two Radically Different Approaches to Private Access to Space (gizmag.com)
Zothecula writes: Commercial spaceflight company World View came a step closer to carrying tourists to the edge of space with a successful test flight last weekend. At Page, Arizona, a one-tenth scale replica spacecraft was carried by high-altitude ballon to a height of 100,475 ft (30,624 m) to demonstrate the technology that is intended for use in a full-size version slated to begin commercial flights next year. And with a note on the other end of the size spectrum for private access to space, reader Habberhead writes: As reported first by Wired Magazine and followed on by others including Discovery News, start-up company ThumbSat is aiming to provide turn-key access to space for students, experimenters and citizen scientists with a new femto-satellite and creative business model. Small payloads and experiments in space for $20k, including the launch? Sign me up!
Please tell me about these exciting problems you think you'll solve floating around in a deadly vacuum towards empty hostile rocks. That's better?
Recycling of resources is the obvious huge one. Extracting space resources for use on Earth is another.
Only Space Nutters look at a planet teemng with life and water nad air and think they have to leave, but look at empty, hostile, dry, barren, radiation-blasted Hells and think "abundant water".
That teeming life also means Earth is poorly suited for a lot of industrial uses. Doing heavy industry in desolate places of space means we can get those benefits without the usual consequences of doing them on Earth (like massive pollution).