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Falling from space grace

It's hard to believe that the first man stepped foot on the moon over half a century ago.

This means that the majority of people alive on the face of the globe today weren't even alive when that monumental step was taken.

So why is it that now, 55 years later, the USA's largest (by revenue) aerospace company can't even lift a couple of astronauts into earth orbit and then return them safely to Earth?

Even more perplexing is all the noise being made about a SpaceX mission that includes... wait for it... a space walk!

Yes, we're all worried and excited about someone doing a spacewalk almost 60 years after it happened for the first time.

What on (or above) earth is going on?

Why are we now unable to achieve, even with all our fancy computers, AI, bockchain, 3D renders and NFTs, the things that were so routine half a century more more ago?

Have we just lost the courage to push the boundaries?

Has "health and safety" now usurped mankind's willingness to do dangerous stuff in the name of science and progress?

Or are we now at a point where we've lost the levels of innovation and clever thinking that got us to the moon in the first place?

In the case of the Boeing Starliner, corporate rot has probably been a significant factor in this project failing to come even close to the promises made for it. Boeing is the perfect example of what happens when a company places profit ahead of good practice and a focus on delivering a quality product at a reasonable price.

It's interesting to note how things work in the world of capitalism and business with Boeing being just another example of the same old forces at work.

Capitalism inevitably creates large corporations that make huge amounts of money. Those corporations become driven ever-harder to lift profits, lower costs and improve the payouts to shareholders. This tends to shift the control from those who do the work to those who count the beans -- as has obviously been the case with Boeing.

Improving profits by way of developing better products, more innovative technologies and more efficient methods is a slow process that also requires extra capital to pursue so there's far more to be had by simply trimming costs -- at least from the beancounter's perspective.

Once this happens, quality falls, innovation falters and you end up selling shoddy products using your previous reputation to trick customers into thinking they're still getting the best products in the market.

Once this position is reached, it's all down-hill, for everyone involved.

Eventually customers wake up to the fact that the products are not what they expected or paid for so sales crash.

With rapidly evaporating revenues, the layoffs start and the company begins an implosion cycle that can sometimes result in total destruction and ultimately bankruptcy. How many once-great US corporations are now but a memory, their name living on only due to the fact that their trademarks have been sold to some Chinese manufacturer?

Fortunately, capitalism comes to the rescue and we see one or more fast-moving, innovative, hard-working startups move in to take over the market.

In the case of space exploration and commercialisation, that startup is SpaceX who look set to basically boot Boeing out of the heavens, particularly in light of the fact that they're going to be rescuing the astronauts that flew to the ISS on the Starliner.

SpaceX will have its time in the sun but eventually, the odds are that it too will grow too big, fall under the control of the beancounters and then fall back to earth due to the pressures that ankle-tap so many of these huge corporations.

Although I don't have much time for Elon Musk, I think that SpaceX is the best thing that's happened to the manned exporation and exploitation of space for many decades and I'm hoping that he will, as promised, have those boots on Mars by 2022.

Oh... bugger!

Carpe Diem folks!

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