Besides YC investing in founders first (which I do believe is correct, having gone thru 2 batches), to quote the fictional S. R. Hadden from the book and movie "Contact," by the late, great Carl Sagan:
"First rule of government spending, 'Why buy one when you can buy two at twice the price'."
In other words, I believe this is also a strategy in maximizing investment exposure to great ideas. YC Invested in _both_ Box.net and Dropbox.
yep. I found this by simply visiting my local municipalities and easily dug up 3 generations of ancestors and immigration records. It was fun, I learned far more, and cost me $0.
He worked with our group a bit in YC S16. He helped us rename our company to a better brand that targeted are demographic better. Was a pretty reasonable guy, soft spoken, logical, easy to work with and gives blunt advice.
This is a local startup in my hometown, I have been following them for 4 years or so, and have met the founders on several occasions. Decided to pull the trigger on a reservation for a seat for ~2028 flight. Excited to keep tabs on their progress.
This is awesome. As a fellow (dare I say luddite), technologist that hates the centralized greed digital internet tech has enabled with media, vinyl records are an outstanding hold out for individuals to still archive (and OWN!) their music. Thank you for investing in the movement with your valuable hours in making this app.
I don't think a Falcon Heavy would retain enough fuel once getting itself in orbit with 0 payload to give enough delta-V to the entire Artemis Space vehicle. That burn has to (generally) happen in a single TLI burn. So there is actually a minimum quanta of delta-V for the mission I don't think FH could meet.
You're welcome to run this in Orbital STK if you like.
I worked a NASA grant with a few others, combined, we had about 75 years of experience in our fields between the 3 of us. We demonstrated onboard computer vision labeling of geographic features of Jovian ice moons using an emulated BAE RAD750, and a very minimal neural network trained on existing Gallileo imaging data. We were very close to getting into talks to be a Tech Demo on Europa Clipper. Then, a random NASA program manager shut it all down because "I just know, you cant run a CNN labeling on a RAD750," despite the fact that we had easily reproducible hard evidence that it was possible.
That was the day I lost a lot of faith in NASA, they are not the organization they used to be.
"First rule of government spending: why buy one when you can buy two for twice the price" - Fictional billionaire R.L. Hadden, in Carl Sagan's "Contact"
The SLS delivered a crew capable Space Vehicle to Lunar orbit, and the space vehicle returned a crew capable capsule back the Earth. The lift capacity of FH is not capable of that.
This is all about SWaP: Size, Weight, and Power.
Starship is _required_ as part of the TLI trjaectory to refuel SLS with cryos. NASA will keep flying SLS however, to demonstrate to the public and congress that it was not setting a pile of tax dollars on fire.
LH2 as a fuel was a mistake, high ISP, but well, the turbopumps, plumbing, valves, etc, not to mention REFUELING LH2 ON ORBIT to replenish evap.
Starship imho will lapse SLS in the next year or two. From a perspective of demonstrated spaceflight capabilities per unit cost, it will lapse it the first time Starship makes an uncrewed flight around the moon and re-enters a capsule that is recoverable with a human survivable water or land landing. Key qualifier there is per unit cost.
Point is, Starship lapses SLS once it matches demonstrated spacelfight capabilities on sheer demoninator of cost.
I live on the Space Coast (also work in the industry, and thus, have access to well - rumors). The SLS (Senate Launch System as we call it here) was pretty cool to watch in person for the uncrewed mission. Nevertheless, as Destin pointed out, it has some massive challenges and headwinds NASA and contractors are cemented in and must accept the SLS is the selected system we are going with.
Rumor (please take it for what that is worth - rumors) are, many here are very suspect of even a 2025 crewed flight.
I started flying in 1999, and I have to say, this article more closely resembles my flying then than my flying now. Dual VORs, one with ILS, no LORAN, obv no GPS, and all pitot/static vacuum gauges. Not CHT, I think it had an EGT, no fuel flow or digital engine monitor. I remember when I went from a C152 to a C172 and finally a 200RG Arrow, one of the biggest learning curves was folding/unfolding your maps faster to keep up and keep a clean sterile cockpit.
Its hard to state how much aviation has progressed in the last two decades.
Everything about this is wonderful. I do as much of my writing on a mechanical typewriter as I can, I use a rotary phone, and listen to vinyl records. This kid takes it to a whole new level and I'm so happy to see someone passionate about being a luddite in the new generation
Second this. I worked in Sales Engineering for 5 years, ended that career selling a $25MM solution to the CEO of a fortune 100. There is no secret sauce, and it is all learnable. The key skills are interpersonal. I know its hard to do as an engineer, but most of (enterprise) sales is shutting the F up, listening, carefully listening, earning trust, and learning to navigate stakeholders and what their potential incentives are to help you.