Elon Musk Feelings Got Hurt

Elon Musk said Friday that his space company could not keep funding the Starlink satellite service that has kept Ukraine and its military online during the war, and he suggested he was pulling free internet after a Ukrainian ambassador insulted him on Twitter.

To be clear, the Ukrainian Ambassador insulted Musk, after Musk said. that the Ukraine should stop fighting, accept the annexation of its territory, and let peace reign.

A proposition that sounded silly to anyone who's ever read the children's book "If you give a Moose a cookie".

Musk also said that Taiwan should become a Hong-Kong like territory of China and end they silly independence thing.

One of the reasons I will never buy a Tesla.

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DeWayfarer · 61-69, M

Unfortunately I knew this was a publicity stunt from the beginning.

I really never trusted Musk's motivations in anything. Even his SpaceX program is solely for the very wealthy. Even his giving William Shatner a free ride to space was a publicity stunt. 😡

Moving Tesla to Texas was all about his own profits. No where else can he get away with environmental concerns because Texas has no environmental laws and is a right to work state.

His wanting to take over Twitter is only to have a publicity platform in order to promote his own businesses.

When he talks about his concerns for the world is only to promote himself and the wealthy and no one or nothing else.

ElwoodBlues · M

@DeWayfarer

I really never trusted Musk's motivations in anything. Even his SpaceX program is solely for the very wealthy.

That may be true of SpaceX tourist rides. But, to be fair, for putting satellites & other material in orbit, SpaceX rules.

Between 1970 and 2000, the cost to launch a kilogram to space remained fairly steady, with an average of US$18,500 per kilogram. When the space shuttle was in operation, it could launch a payload of 27,500 kilograms for $1.5 billion, or $54,500 per kilogram. For a SpaceX Falcon 9, the rocket used to access the ISS, the cost is just $2,720 per kilogram.

Mar 2019 https://theconversation.com/how-spacex-lowered-costs-and-reduced-barriers-to-space-112586

SpaceX costs so much less because their stage 1 boosters & engines are reusable. SpaceX pioneered booster that can retain a bit of fuel, descend, and land safely on an unmanned ship.

None of this makes Elon Musk a good person, but NASA, USAF, and many communications companies use SpaceX because they have the lowest cost to orbit.

DeWayfarer · 61-69, M

@ElwoodBlues look at his whole outlook. Read some of his talks about what he wants to do. It's all for the very wealthy.

Not a single thing is for everyone. It's for the very wealthy only.

His philosophy is if you are not wealthy you don't deserve it.

This includes having kids, which he has many.

I simply can not support that kind of world view. And it's prevalent in every his does. Take advantage of the poor, promote the very wealthy.

Northwest · M

@ElwoodBlues All those stats are from pre-private space industry, when everything was run by NASA.

Cost is now very comparable, if you look at all the contenders. He may be ahead, schedule-wise, but the Bezos company is far more advanced, based on one's perspective.

Bezos is totally focused on building a space infrastructure, similar to the "trading posts" along the Oregon trail, while Musk's company is focused on doing one-shot deals.

In time, the Bezos strategy will pay off big, for general purpose space travel.

BTW, SpaceX did not pioneer re-usable rockets. The research on this predates Musk's first wet dream. SpaceX's rockets are "partially" re-usable. Everyone is moving in that direction. In time, the vehicle delivering people to space, will only have two parts, the part that flies to the edge of space, and the "saucer" section, that takes them all the way up. The main section flies back. Paul Allen's company pioneered that, but the company is going nowhere since his passing.

I get to listen to all the SpaceX gossip, at one on my local pizza joints, where the SpaceX engineers gather for Pizza, beers and loud brags.

ElwoodBlues · M

@Northwest I looked for a while for a modern table comparing cost of kg to orbit for Blue Origin, SpaceX, Ariane, etc, but I couldn't find one.

Looks like Blue Origin has done 47 satellite launches. ULA has about 150 launches under its belt. SpaceX is doing 50+ launches per year these days, including crew and resupply the ISS; they have maybe 200 launches total. I think Ariane just does launches for French companies these days.

Northwest · M

@ElwoodBlues The real story is sort of murky and complicated.

Arianne has done close to 300 individual rocket launches, delivering multiple satellites per launch.

Amazon has a contract to launch its satellites with Arianne, roughly 85 launches to put about 3,500 satellites in LEO. Bezos is not going to with SpaceX, and his space strategy is not focused on launching satellites. Starlink has close to 2,500 satellites up there already.

In reality, it costs about $20 to put 1Kg in LEO (low earth orbit). That's if you use methane, which is what the Falcon uses.