Now now Old Crab.......I will gently hold your hand.....jump on your back and cart you up there!!!! .....Isn't it absolutely delicious???!!!!!!!
I hope I live long enough to be able to maybe see somebody I know go up there.....aw hell I'd probably never pass the physical....but then again......

Dang!!!! We ought to start a pool.....have a contest or drawing.....and whoever wins.......gets to go......the contest must of course include the originator of the idea even if she can't skin
YET........

Gee paxx.......what's got your boxers in a bunch? I promise not to pick my nose up there ok?....the whole concept of what just occurred up there is that there were NO remnants..no discarded anything from this clean flight......and it was a hybrid fuel.....just give it a little time........or maybe I'll see if feline will go over there and dump some candy coated chocolates on you til you cheer up

it's already starting to be a mess out there...

Too late. It have been a mess since 1970s. There's tons of crap out there.

This Old Crab is shocked and stunned by paxx incomprensible attitude-teehee. >

Private companies have been launching satellites into orbit for years. That's nothing new. This is about private manned spaced flight.

It's not as if governments won't continue to regulate it. The SpaceShipOne folks did have to secure permits and get permission to proceed with their launch.

History has demonstrated that once technology becomes available to the private sector, progress increases dramatically. Companies are drivin to innovate by competition. That is something the US space program hasn't experienced since the 1960's. That is what makes this so significant and exciting.

ROFLMAO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

doesn't look a bit like me >

hahahaha

once technology becomes available to the private sector, progress increases dramatically.

Indeed. That's why I'm so excited! As long as there is people willing to take risks there will always be progress.

What happends if we send all the space garbage in the sun? if thats bad why not another sun?
Just pack it and boost it on its way.

Yes, XX, there's already tons of crap up there, as I said. We should be working on making it better, not worse.

Yes, Mike, private companies have been launching private satellites for years, but to do so, they have to get their satellites lauched by NASA (or by another country's space program), which isn't given to everyone to do.  But al of a sudden, if it only cost $50,000 to send your own private satellite up there, can anybody imagine our sky in say 20 or 50 years?

Hopefully, if this ever happens, it will be very very very stricly regulated.

But in general I must say that I don't understand why people put more trust over a private company that has no ties whatsoever to them, than over a government that represents its people, is elected by its people, and that can be impeached by its people. The governement is you, a private company is not...

I suppose we put faith in our governments to regulate the industry. But we have more faith in private companies to innovate and accelerate the development of technologies. I think a lot of space enthusiasts have just been annoyed by the apparent lack of progress made by government space programs in the last 20 to 30 years, and the prospect of commercial involvement gives us hope that technology will advance more rapidly now.

pixel, my bro is an f-16 crew cheif, with aims to work for lockheed martin in jet propulsion. we have a lead!!!

come on, we could make a ship like wallace and gromit. and go to the moon. and eat cheese.

private industry has been launching satallites for years.. now mass, manned orbital space flight in the private sector can take off very fast.

You gota love space, eating cheeze on the moon would be fun, some celebreties allready bought moon space. I saw that on Unscrewed on Techtv, I think its 20 an acre not sure.

Gotta love capitalism.  Now who did they buy moon space FROM?

OK, moon space for sale. Only $20 per acre.  Send me the money and it's yours!

paxx,

The government is nearly always less efficient than private companies. There is no effective mechanism for culling out the little bureaucratic fiefdoms, as without any competition, there's no incentive to improve or replace. As for the government being accountable, that's true in theory, much less true in practice.

As long as there's competition in the market, the individual has more control because they can choose to change sources if necessary. You can't change sources on a government initiative, you're stuck with it.

As for all the junk (and / or potential junk) that's in orbit, if it becomes enough of an issue that it becomes profitable for a company to specialize in junk removal, then companies will come along to deal with the problem. It certainly isn't a priority for the government.

What happends if we send all the space garbage in the sun? if thats bad why not another sun?Just pack it and boost it on its way.

Sure, at the moment it only costs $ 10,000 to launch 1 kilo gram of stuff into space so that wouldn't be to expensive

Make a giant vacum like in spaceballs lol

Why ship em to sun? Just bump em back to earth if it's too small to burn all way to surface and impact.

or make a garbage planet like in Futurama. We need a Smelloscope too.