Another place that could use this might be places like public libraries, where pretty much all you need is a working browser. Plus, a place like that could give some nice exposure to Linux.
And obviously Chinese intel has capitalized on this - succesfully directing the US Air Force to it's embassy during the Serbian fiasco a few years back...
Any "wealthy adventurer" will be in space representing him/herself, not humanity.
Besides this, space travel is too expensive for individuals to undertake on their own - barring the Bill Gatesian megarich types. Similar historical endeavors that rich adventurers embarked on were nowhere near as expensive as space travel is today, even relative to the technologies and economies in their days. The current NASA budget (around $15B yearly) is enough only to launch a couple of probes and a few shuttles every year, and maintain the current meager rate of development of new flight technologies. Well-known pilots of the 20's had to hire small teams to design and build their plane, but not an entire aerospace corporation or two like you for any successful spacecraft built so far. No one tycoon is going to want to expend so many resources on one task (no matter how cool).
I tend to see the development of space travel as being more like that of seagoing travel in the West. Early on, trading centered around Europe, especially the Mediterranean and Northern Africa, and didn't really spread much. Who could forget Columbus' famous trip to "India," paid for by the Spanish gov't of the time? It took a while before permanent settlements and serious commercial operations got set up across the Atlantic, which unlike (nearby) space least leads to places with a breathable atmosphere. So... it may be a while before we have a serious extraterrestrial presence, is there really a rush? (Besides the small but ever-present possibility of asteroid impact, that is...)
It's worked for our family... of course, here in Boulder, everything is happy fairies and unicorns and talking trees and rainbows, so it's probably just us:p
Slashdot Mirror
yay for tech jewelery
I'm holding out for Farm-driven satellite equipment.... dust your crops from space!
Another place that could use this might be places like public libraries, where pretty much all you need is a working browser. Plus, a place like that could give some nice exposure to Linux.
Does this mean there's been a rash of marriages in Washington?
And obviously Chinese intel has capitalized on this - succesfully directing the US Air Force to it's embassy during the Serbian fiasco a few years back...
Slashdot... where the GNU Public License became a verb ;)
Any "wealthy adventurer" will be in space representing him/herself, not humanity.
Besides this, space travel is too expensive for individuals to undertake on their own - barring the Bill Gatesian megarich types. Similar historical endeavors that rich adventurers embarked on were nowhere near as expensive as space travel is today, even relative to the technologies and economies in their days. The current NASA budget (around $15B yearly) is enough only to launch a couple of probes and a few shuttles every year, and maintain the current meager rate of development of new flight technologies. Well-known pilots of the 20's had to hire small teams to design and build their plane, but not an entire aerospace corporation or two like you for any successful spacecraft built so far. No one tycoon is going to want to expend so many resources on one task (no matter how cool).
I tend to see the development of space travel as being more like that of seagoing travel in the West. Early on, trading centered around Europe, especially the Mediterranean and Northern Africa, and didn't really spread much. Who could forget Columbus' famous trip to "India," paid for by the Spanish gov't of the time? It took a while before permanent settlements and serious commercial operations got set up across the Atlantic, which unlike (nearby) space least leads to places with a breathable atmosphere. So... it may be a while before we have a serious extraterrestrial presence, is there really a rush? (Besides the small but ever-present possibility of asteroid impact, that is...)
Yes, but for Sun, the software was as much a way of selling their hardware as anything else.
This from the same Air Force that tried to develop a weapon to smash a hole through the ionosphere in the '60s to disrupt Soviet communications...
It's worked for our family... of course, here in Boulder, everything is happy fairies and unicorns and talking trees and rainbows, so it's probably just us :p