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Official: No One Is Going To Win the Google Lunar X Prize Competition (theverge.com)
The X Prize Foundation announced today that no one is going to win the foundation's competition to send a spacecraft to the Moon. "Only five finalists remained in the Google-sponsored Lunar X Prize competition, and in order to win any grand prize money, the teams had to launch and complete their missions to the Moon before March 31st, 2018," reports The Verge. "But with only two months until the deadline, no team is ready to launch, so Google will keep the prize money instead." From the report: The Google Lunar X Prize was established in 2007 as a way to help lower the cost of getting to space. So far, only government agencies have landed on the lunar surface, with missions that have cost many millions and even billions of dollars. That's why the X Prize Foundation, which sets up global competitions, challenged teams with developing and launching robotic lunar landers using mostly private funding. The idea was to make them come up with creative methods for getting to the Moon on the cheap. Landing on the lunar surface was only part of the challenge. Teams had to travel up to 1,640 feet (500 meters) on the Moon too, as well as do live broadcasts. The first to fulfill all these requirements before the deadline would receive $20 million, while the second place team would get $5 million. Other smaller purses would be awarded to teams that did special tasks, such as completing an orbit around the Moon before landing. "As a result of this competition, we have sparked the conversation and changed expectations with regard to who can land on the Moon," the X Prize Foundation said in its statement. "Many now believe it's no longer the sole purview of a few government agencies, but now may be achieved by small teams of entrepreneurs, engineers, and innovators from around the world." A Google spokesperson also told CNBC that the company is "thrilled with the progress made by these teams over the last ten years."
And two days old, in true slashdot fashion:
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Only if you convince him to trade his house for your cell. Good luck, schizo.
2 tru
some things we're losing to uncle sam's endless ambitions.. sing along.. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lRjItDLnAwc .. add your own personal losings list.. better days ahead, good sports with good spirits prevail,, hang on to your hemisphere.. thanks again....
I honestly can't imagine many people thinking $20 would come anywhere close to justifying the cost of what Google was asking for.
The Old Negro Space Program
Why would any private enterprise want to waste money going to space? So far nobody has made money going to the Moon, and certainly not any further to Mars.
Getting to space is the least costly, its staying in space that's the real issue. People would be living on the Moon now if it was riddled with diamonds or had some valuable commodity. Then you would see companies running to invest.
nice one... view more at http://www.coracle.in/
Because we never landed on the moon,. if we would, trip would be 50$ one way by now...
... this problem would have been solved long ago.
AC comments get piped to
Every other millennial-conceived sci-fi fantasy will meet a similar fate. Sorry your parents lied to you about, well, pretty much everything. Reality doesn't care. Mars in five years? Don't make us laugh.
NASA: North American Street Apes
And we're really just like Jonas, in a sealed waterproof galley.