I knew I had a good video copy of this! 

2008 Mars Society Convention in Colorado, I was sitting there getting the audio and knew I had a video camera rolling too but darned if I couldn't find it for posting. 

There was one last box of assorted stuff being kicked around after the LA move and finally I got to the bottom of it... And found Elon Musk making a long ago clear path to what is only now getting mainstream, or even mainstream among Space Industry folks.

PLEASE get all the way through it to the questions, it starts as a current status report that may be a bit dry but it gets very very interesting.  Does current SpaceX work continue on the strategic path stated in 2008?

I recently met a mother of a young Space kid.  He's a great young man, has done SpaceCamp and visited SpaceX and has the bug.  I sent her this note about my impression of active periodicals and thought that in case there were others who knew of smart kids, or anyone looking for a good item to donate to school libraries, it might be of some help...

Small World.  Last year I was getting my hair cut in North Hollywood and to fill the down time I was reading the 2011 Space Report from the Space Foundation. There was a guy there who kept looking over at the book and as we were waiting for the credit card machine to come back from the dead he introduced himself as a "friend" of a small local satellite company and he was amazed that someone who didn't work for BigOldSpace would be owning - let alone reading - the Report. 

...

Well, if you're in a small group living on the faith of staying under the radar till you have your patent flying, and hoping just to make each payroll, here's your chance to save some of that precious money.

Today it went public that Planetary Resources is for real.  You can't get more mainstream than USA Today.

Now then, before you start laughing and quoting Boeing's reasons it can not work, there is an important book you have to read.  Or don't read it and just stay misinformed... as I used to be.

The Amazon.com review of "Islands In Space":

In previous incarnations of Smithvoice.com I coded in monitored and unmonitored discussion features.  Over time these just kept getting debates off topic and randomized so I cut the feature and now when I get a note I respond personally when I get the time.  I've gotten better relationships out of this than LinkedIn, and it keeps me from being bogged down by hundreds of blind linkbacks from people who aren't even interested in the stuff here.

I usually keep these private, but I got this one the other day and wanted to share it and my response.  Why?  As my neighbor Jerry Pournelle implies on his Chaos Manor project: 'Because it's my site, and I can do what I want' :).

Here's the note...

Robert Goddard, The American "Father of Rocketry."

If you know a little about Goddard then you know that he believed and proved and DID great things when "Experts" ridiculed him and his work.  A legendary story is that in 1920 The New York Times tried to discredit his science saying that propulsion would not work in a vacuum... and only did a public correction after Apollo 11 was impossibly reaching the moon.

Far as my reading tells me, Goddard figured that most any good idea can be made real and the biggest ones are the ones most worth the effort.

So I wonder if the good doctor would have liked the name of the 50th Annual Space Symposium at his namesake Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland:

"Dreams and Possibilities: Planning for the Achievable"

Why didn't they just call it: "How to keep getting a paycheck in the Space Industry without really trying."

In case you missed it...

http://www.thedailyshow.com/full-episodes/tue-april-10-2012-elon-musk

Third and fourth segments of the show... starting a bit past the half.

I have a bunch of classic Manned Spaceflight related books, several with copyrights partially owned by Wernher von Braun. Recently I noticed that some of these books are now getting high prices even if the copies are torn up.

I started wondering if AIAA or Apogee might be interested in reprinting some of them because the fact is that many of them are still valuable in that their technical information is in no way out of date, not to mention that some of them were a heck of a lot better written than many that have come out since.

I did some checking and in some cases I found that no one appears to openly own the copyrights anymore. Significant works from the late 1940s through the early 70s by several of the most respected names of the then-beloved American industry seem to be up for grabs.

Looking a bit deeper I learned some shameful and distressing things about the current citizens of the United States of America.

One of the all-time most amazing reasons to visit the Kennedy Spaceflight Center is that on most days you can just walk in and sit down and hear - and speak WITH - actual legendary Astronauts. 

The sessions are done in a full AV auditorium where there are plenty of cameras... all turned off far as I can tell.

I've never seen anyone govt or private passing vids or auds around, so I recorded this and here it is for you.  If you want a higher quality version, let me know.

Kennedy Space Center Astronaut Encounter January 1st, 2011

Jerry Carr Skylab "4" (3rd crew).  If you've read A House In Space by Cooper then you know this guy was a fuggin pistol.  I was beyond proud to meet him.

One of the all-time most amazing reasons to visit the Kennedy Spaceflight Center is that on most days you can just walk in and sit down and hear - and speak WITH - actual legendary Astronauts.

The sessions are done in a full AV auditorium where there are plenty of cameras... all turned off far as I can tell.

I've never seen anyone govt or private passing vids or auds around, so I recorded this and here it is for you. If you want a higher quality version, let me know.

Kennedy Space Center Astronaut Encounter Dec 31 2010

Sam Gemar, Shuttle STS-38 (November 15-20, 1990), STS-48 (September 12-18, 1991), and STS-62 (March 4-18, 1994)

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/peter-navarro-and-greg-autry/was-newt-a-lunatic_b_1246090.html

It's the comments that get ya.

I gotsta say... the talking about GPS and mentions that every bit of data you hear, read and see (from corporate monsters or your auntie Ethyl) is bounced at least once off a sat, just can not break through the heads of people. It just doesn't. People truly believe that the 15 or so humans they see every day and the 10 or so they see on magazine covers are the whole of the planet. and the whole of universal civilization. We the people, mostly, are happily dumb in that way.

But maybe instead of saying "Tang" and "GPS"... hand even a standard idiot a subscription to NASA Tech Briefs. If they try really hard to follow it then they would see that *MONTHLY* the Space Industry delivers stuff that makes this world incrementally better year after year.

Interesting Los Angeles Developers Meetup at Blank Spaces on Wilshire. John Shiple of FreelanceCTO.com talking about Tech Trends and getting your business to be a business.

Here it is in Flash audio. (iPeople please use a 'puter or android. Jobs is dead but his restrictions on you live on)

No.  I do NOT believe this... but it is fun :).

Yesterday it finally came up to the public level, that there is some possibility that Phobos Grunt was a victim of ... something.

Check it on the Register here.

Now, here's the fun.  Last month some say Putin made a veiled statement about HAARP or something else being used agains Russia.. in the form of "tone" (interpreted by nuts as 'frequencies') being set followed by a "signal" being sent. 

[more]

My copy of Groom Lake had been at my doorstep yesterday afternoon, finished it early this morning.  Go into it with low expectations, it's not bad, and if you know the LA area and Joshua Tree it's fun.  If you recall that Burbank, specifically the Bob Hope Airport, was the original Lockheed "Area 51" then the shipping address is a neat part of the ploy. 

Anyway, I check the logs for smithvoice and know when Marshall and Johnson are peeking (Al Razaq... got ya), but don't scan enough to notice when a local drops by.  This morning I was walking home from Peets on Ventura and an acquaintance happened up to me and said with a smile "So do you feel a little silly about pushing Phobos Grunt?"

I had to say it... "Did you read Groom Lake?  What'd you think of Desmond?" :)