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[Darvi]

Sarcasm can't be easily detected over the internet.

Yes it can.

[kaijyuu]

Doesn't pointing out irony defeat the point of irony?

[Leafsnail]

Yeah you might as well just post it unironically.

[RedKing]

I'm pretty geeked on the idea. It's a startup, but it's a startup with DEEP pockets. And people at the helm like Ellison and Cameron, who aren't in this to make a quick buck, they're in it for the personal passion (and the chance to leave an indelible legacy). Which means they're not going to pull the plug just because they're bleeding cash the first several years. The early American colonies were a financial disaster for the proprietors too.

Wonder if they'll team up with Branson and Virgin Galactic somehow.

tldr: I, for one, welcome our moviemaker overlords. Dibs on signing up for the Colonial Marines.

[Eagleon]

I'm waiting for this to be an elaborate promotion for Avatar 2, upon which I will never see nor acknowledge the existence of Avatar 2. But I am curious where they're going if it's real - moon or NEO are pretty much the only choices, unless they're talking orbital solar (which would be lame in a different way), and both have their own problems.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

The costs of this are definitely going to be massive, but the profits will be even more massive if they can just exercise restraint. A decently-sized asteroid constitutes a lot of material. Of course, they don't necessarily have to go after something mundane like iron when they could capture an asteroid with high concentrations of Earth-rare materials like iridium.

[Flying Dice]

This is probably the only way we'll get into space; there isn't enough short-term profit for companies to be interested in it.

[Leafsnail]

How good are we at telling a far-off asteroid's composition?  That would seem to be the crucial thing to me.  You'd need to hit upon an asteroid made of seriously valuable stuff to be able to cart back enough minerals to make the mission commercially viable.  I guess beyond that there's the issue of whether you could safely fly into what would probably be an asteroid field.

[Loud Whispers]

And people at the helm like Ellison and Cameron, who aren't in this to make a quick buck

*Hollywood.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

How good are we at telling a far-off asteroid's composition?  That would seem to be the crucial thing to me.  You'd need to hit upon an asteroid made of seriously valuable stuff to be able to cart back enough minerals to make the mission commercially viable.  I guess beyond that there's the issue of whether you could safely fly into what would probably be an asteroid field.

I know can determine the elements on the surface of a far-away object by observing the exact wavelength of the light that reflects off of it. There are probably some other methodologies I'm missing as well.

Asteroid fields aren't dangerous. The asteroids are close together, but only in a relative sense, which in space is a long distance.

[Eagleon]

How good are we at telling a far-off asteroid's composition?  That would seem to be the crucial thing to me.  You'd need to hit upon an asteroid made of seriously valuable stuff to be able to cart back enough minerals to make the mission commercially viable.  I guess beyond that there's the issue of whether you could safely fly into what would probably be an asteroid field.

The easiest way to do so from a distance would probably be an impact probe - kick up enough debris and you can aim a spectrometer at it and figure out roughly what elements it has. But you aren't really going to know what it's really like (on the level of chipping/zapping away at it) until you get there, which is a big problem for automated equipment especially. I personally think the Moon would be a safer bet - craters mean asteroids live there already, after all, and it would eventually provide an excellent base for launching further mining efforts towards NEOs and eventually the belt.

[Loud Whispers]

Sarcasm can't be easily detected over the internet. Although I got it.

Might be because I wasn't being sarcastic
_{It's all satire woob woob woob}

sarcasm is the lowest form of wit.

loud whispers=sarcastic
sarcastic=low wit
low wit= been scared witless
loud whispers=permanantly scared

Sarcasm - The use of irony to mock or convey contempt.
Satire - Exaggeration

People don't know how to use sarcasm :|

[RedKing]

How good are we at telling a far-off asteroid's composition?  That would seem to be the crucial thing to me.  You'd need to hit upon an asteroid made of seriously valuable stuff to be able to cart back enough minerals to make the mission commercially viable.  I guess beyond that there's the issue of whether you could safely fly into what would probably be an asteroid field.

The easiest way to do so from a distance would probably be an impact probe - kick up enough debris and you can aim a spectrometer at it and figure out roughly what elements it has. But you aren't really going to know what it's really like (on the level of chipping/zapping away at it) until you get there, which is a big problem for automated equipment especially. I personally think the Moon would be a safer bet - craters mean asteroids live there already, after all, and it would eventually provide an excellent base for launching further mining efforts towards NEOs and eventually the belt.

True, but the safest bet to get to the Moon would have been to build some kind of space station first, *then* go to the Moon. Back in '69, we said "Fuck it," and went straight to the moon with no support infrastructure. That's the kind of leap forward we need, IMHO. We need someone to figure out the logistical and technical hurdles and say, "Moon? Mars? Screw that, we're going to the Belt and coming back with a mountain of gold, baby."

I live for the day when James Cameron personally pilots some kind of glorified space tug hauling a rock back with enough rare-Earths and isotopes in it to be worth the GDP of a moderately-sized nation. 'Cause I can guarantee you the 2nd Space Race would be ON.

Will it happen? Highly unlikely, at least in Cameron's lifetime. But it's worth pinning some hopes on.

[Loud Whispers]

oh, yeah, riiiiiight, no-one at allllll knows how to use it.

Now if you got that, how would you think that was sarcastic? -_-

[Loud Whispers]

Calling me a scared sarcastic personality is on topic with space Hollywood how...?