So many delays
Perhaps Branson should take on Crossrail as well.
Passengers that go into space aboard Virgin Galactic's SpaceShipTwo won't just experience weightlessness: they'll also get to watch themselves float in a giant mirror and enjoy decor designed to remind them of Earth's oceans and deserts. We know Virgin Galactic today revealed the interior design of Beardy Branson's space bus …
Having just watched the awful marketing speak video, I don't need six minutes of micro gravity to achieve a queasy stomach.
If I was offered a seat for free, I would snap it up but even if I had that kind of money I wouldn't part with the equivalent price of a very nice villa with a pool and orange groves where I live.
It occurs to me that as nice and thoughtful as the interior design is in the Spaceship, it made no mention of sick bags or aerial vomit collection.
Having just watched the awful marketing speak video, I don't need six minutes of micro gravity to achieve a queasy stomach.If I was offered a seat for free, I would snap it up but even if I had that kind of money I wouldn't part with the equivalent price of a very nice villa with a pool and orange groves where I live.
There are vastly less expensive ways of feeling sick in micro gravity for a few minutes, for example this and this. Although if I wanted to feel dizzy and sick at the same time, I'd just drink six pints of snakebite.
When people said "take nothing but photos, leave nothing but footprints", I guess they meant big black smudgy carbon footprints.
Just think - they can use up all those Virgin Australia meals
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The spaceplane was designed to provide “safety without distraction, quietly absorbing periods of sensory intensity and offering each astronaut a level of intimacy required for personal discovery and transformation."
Helping things along are “halo windows” that “are used to subtly reflect back and therefore elevate the human responses to each of the contrasting stage of flight.”
What a complete load of pretentious, meaningless, utter bollocks drivel.
Thinking about it, why not?
Wouldn't it be great if every time you sat on the toilet for a number two - the bathroom was suffused with the beatiful glow of your now revealed anaLED BumLumination - reflected gently from the bowl?
Maybe a restful blue for your number 2 - with the option of a brighter mode to show your underlings that the sun shines out of your arse.
What idiot thought that include 10 minutes of countdown in a YouTube video would be worthwhile. It's already a stupid idea for a livestream, but nobody is going to watch 10 minutes of a countdown. So I skipped over all the talky parts until I got to the so-called "cabin reveal". I didn't find that it revealed all that much about the cabin. On the other hand, I found hilarious the fact that the pilots are in full gear with masks and an oxygen supply, whereas the passengers . . not so much.
I'm sure the passengers will be soo reassured by that.
I cannot be the only one to notice that this experience is exclusively for the super-rich, and gives them a short anecdote to amuse their equally well-heeled friends at dinner parties. I also cannot be the only one to notice that this tells the future generations that the only way to achieve your dreams is through money, and lots of it, further increasing the unhappiness in our society that is dominated by us have-nots.
This is capitalism, and we are living it every day.
I know a couple who are signed up (AFAIK they're the only married couple with both going, they certainly were a few years back when the Observer interviewed them). They're well off, they're Cambridge techies, but definitely not super rich(*). It's just that the husband has wanted to go into space since he was young and when he asked his wife she said "well, why not?"
(*) Not even a second home, never mind a yacht.
They're well off, they're Cambridge techies, but definitely not super rich(*). It's just that the husband has wanted to go into space since he was young and when he asked his wife she said "well, why not?"
A single anecdotal exception doesn't disprove a general rule. Especially one so rare that it is reported in a national newspaper.
Of course it will be packed with the super-rich. Does anyone seriously believe otherwise? It's Concorde at 40 times the ticket price. 99.9% celebs and fund managers, plus a couple of bucket listers blowing their savings.
Of course it will be packed with the super-rich.
The super-rich are the top 0.1% or maybe 0.01% of the wealth statistics. These days ~14% of UK households are worth more than £1 million, so could afford a VG ticket if they wished to(*). 14% isn't super anything, even if they're richer than the average.
The super-rich buy a ticket on Soyuz or set up their own space program, they don't fly Virgin.
(*) Before anyone states the bleeding obvious, yes it might involve remortgaging or selling their house. Obviously every choice has an opportunity cost, which is why most of us wouldn't take a suborbital flight even if Branson wasn't involved.
"I cannot be the only one to notice that this experience is exclusively for the super-rich, and gives them a short anecdote to amuse their equally well-heeled friends at dinner parties."
On the other hand, that's more or less how the airline industry started too.
So apart from the facts that:
- It's not a reveal of _a_ spaceship cabin because its CGI.
- It's not a reveal of _the_ spaceship cabin because the "spaceship" will have 4 seats, not 6.
- It's not a reveal of a _spaceship_ cabin because it doesn't reach space.
the rest of it is probably perfectly accurate.