VicenteOlisipo t1_jdjlmnt wrote on March 24, 2023 at 9:23 PM

Reply to comment by CurtisLeow in Advisory group backs European human spaceflight program using commercial approaches by Zhukov-74

Also, lol at the idea that private space companies didn't use massive subsidies from NASA and the Pentagon to get started.

CurtisLeow t1_jdjme0n wrote on March 24, 2023 at 9:29 PM

They did, but most of those subsidies have gone to ULA, Lockheed Martin, and Boeing. They didn’t go to the market leader, which is SpaceX. That was Cedric O’s point, that the money needs to be spent more efficiently.

VicenteOlisipo t1_jdjmrro wrote on March 24, 2023 at 9:31 PM

Hm, yes they (also) did. Both directly and through subsidising or buying services from its clients. Some of which run by the same guy.

sithelephant t1_jdkdt6g wrote on March 25, 2023 at 12:50 AM

Buying a service from someone cheaper that you can source that service elsewhere is not actually a subsidy.

VicenteOlisipo t1_jdkl1ms wrote on March 25, 2023 at 1:47 AM

Play whatever semantic games you want, loads of federal money went into developing the private tech instead of going to NASA or other federal tech funding. I'm not saying it was a bad bet, I'm saying is we can't just achieve the same results but adopting similar looking policies except without the money.