Dwayne Day described a bet he had on the progress of commercial human spaceflight, yesterday. The guy who lost the bet to him responds.
15 thoughts on “A Lost Gamble”
Comments are closed.
Dwayne Day described a bet he had on the progress of commercial human spaceflight, yesterday. The guy who lost the bet to him responds.
Comments are closed.
“There is a lot of uncertainty when combining the possibly failing magazine industry with the possibly rising NewSpace industry. ”
Why anyone would think that a print magazine could survive is a mystery.
Both Asimov’s and Analog SF are experiencing increasing total circulation, due to electronic editions. This reversed a long term down trend in their paper circulations.
I can’t see a print magazine of anything being a good idea in this day and age.
Most info in print mags are obselete by the time they hit the shelves anyways.
The underlying question of the slow pace of progress has more to do with expectations I think. Popularity is a funny thing. Popularity breeds popularity. Things are often slow before that feedback loop kicks in.
People with vision see past those slow points while those without are the naysayers. …it’s like predicting all the horses will lose in a race and then bragging about being 95% correct. Yup. This takes no skill at all, yet naysayers seem very proud of this non ability.
Freedom requires both vision and failure. I have a low opinion of those that disparage either.
+1 to Mike Puckett. A print magazine is something to be horded or thrown away immediately. The cost of production, not just the writing but the printing, makes them cost prohibitive in both time and money. The information in them are old and the pleasure of paying for waxy paper is not worth the hassle of disposal.
So when you throw in a subject that occurs infrequently and irregularly, then it’s not a hard bet to make.
Rand, if all you wrote about was space and NASA; then I would have moved onto other blogs that posted more often long ago. Fortunately, I come to read your views on space and NASA, and stay to laugh at your trolls.
Before writing off magazines you need to understand their nature. There purpose is not to inform. Their purpose is to advertise. Content is the hook to get you to see the advertisement. This is why they have such a thing as qualified subscriptions which are free. Readers do not pay the cost of production. Advertisers do.
So, when you think of a magazine, think of it as a kind of flyer. Look at it that way and yes, electronic media will take some of it’s readers but never all.
Remember, people thought radio would go away because of tv.
Fair enough
If you do like to read print magazine, there are a number of sites that have regular deals on them. Great x-mas gifts. Bought my sister 4 years of Rolling Stone for $5 or something.
Last I checked, Barbers, Dentists and Doctors still have waiting areas, and not every client has 4G, yet.
In terms of predictions, its well to remember what Arthur C. Clarke wrote in his “Profiles of the Future” on advancements in technology. Its never not linear but always on a curve, starting slow and then building. We are still on the slow part for the development of the commercial sub-orbital industry.
Of course the early focus on tourists and the X-Prize didn’t help, as it’s hype greatly distracted the industry and they skipped over the real bread and butter markets in education, research and science that would have been early enables for craft like SpaceShipOne, even in its one person design prior to its redesign to meet X-Prize specs.
OK. Why so called “commercial space” is so slow.
First off, most of these aren’t businesses but peculiar breed of space outcasts, that survive in the margins. Those that are businesses, are held back by the existing primes to forestall erosion. It is a “sawtooth” curve that cuts both ways.
Such businessmen are rare. They get more traction in any other business, so they really, really, really … have to have a strong stomach to endure space.
nooneofconsequence
And don’t forget all the space advocates “helping you” by pushing for NASA programs or schemes like the X Prize that create the impression in the investor community that space is either about government contracting or a circus.
If you like print magazines, all the ones at Borders are now 40% off. The liquidators are trying to sell them fast since they have such short shelf lives.
Here’s something slightly different, but relatively on target: Why newspapers are not doing well in the web either.
I particularly hate autoplay vids. Usually they start verbally assaulting me when I’ve got twenty tabs open and no idea where the offending ad is (a small side vid at the bottom of a long article that has nothing to do with what they are advertising usually.) I usually just mute my speakers.