#1 Learnings from Gamestop and deep dive into NASA's Artemis program
Perspectives on this week's technology happenings
How to read these weekly technology shots? Hey guys, welcome to the first essay of ‘weekly tech shots’. This format would be in addition to what we write as Knowledge Shots. My aim with this new format is to share my perspectives on the technological happenings around and make the readers think/build their own perspectives on the topics. The perspectives that the readers build could be similar to mine or the total opposite, or somewhere in between, it doesn't matter. The only thing that matters is, having a perspective, using which you can make decisions and probably modify those perspectives even further by talking to other people. Read this post of mine regarding ‘mechanism of thinking‘, if you wish to explore further how perspectives become facts.
What these essays and this format aren’t is the conceirge of information/happenings around the tech industry. I am only going to write about things that are interesting technology-wise and have a perspective to explore. That said, the topics that are explored aren’t just facts and are worth discussions, listening to other perspectives, and brainstorming. Hence, I wholeheartedly welcome anyone who wishes to brainstorm on these topics, in-fact the secondary aim of Knowledge Shots in general is to make friends.
Hence, overall I recommend reading this with a fluid mind, asking questions to yourself like ‘but what if‘. We will publish in this format every week for free on this same substack. So if you wish to join in, go on and press the subscribe button below. You can contact me by email at pranavdotexe@gmail.com, or on Twitter.
What can we learn from the GameStop saga? — 28% of Americans bought GME and other viral stocks in January. A factor contributing to this statistic might be the ‘ease of buying stocks’ that technology has led to. So, is there a need to moderate losses that happen due to lack of financial knowledge? The only way to do this while still keeping the markets free (by not regulating ease of access in brokerage tech) is to develop EdTech counterparts that promote financial education or include financial education as a core subject in the school curriculum.
Another way of seeing this: The side effects of capitalism is that individual finance plays a major role in that person’s happiness. That means a nation’s happiness index depends on how they ensure financial safety or the steps they take to promote financial education.
Another crazy idea is: If universal basic income or at least universal basic services are available, then personal finance is just the thing you do for hormones (earn for adrenaline, spend for dopamine, take financial risks for adrenaline). Losses, in this case, might not affect someone mentally.
Sidelining a bit, but you would like this perspective (skip this paragraph if you wish): You might think, geez where did this hormones thing come from. I believe most of the talented guys having all-the-financial-knowledge on and off the WallStreetBets and in-around this saga, were there for the adrenaline. For instance, if Chamath is worth a billion, and he throws a few 100k’s i.e. X/10000th of his worth — it’s worth the adrenaline you get, no matter win or lose! So naturally, there comes a time in life when finance isn’t something that decides whether we live or die, it turns into ‘let’s have fun’, like some legal ecstasy. Why do sports cars sell? Why people celebrate buying a house in India? Why people try to impress whom they needn’t? Why people buy what they don’t need to? — because in ‘most’ cases it’s worth it, ‘for them’. Now when we think about financial education from this perspective, the teaching shouldn’t be clauses like you shouldn’t do this and that et cetera. Financial education must be teaching the process of deciding ‘if it’s worth it or not‘, and ‘what happens if you do this or don’t‘.
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Will NASA’s Artemis be the biggest public-private endeavor ever to be executed? The aim of the Artemis program is to explore the lunar surface in a sustainable manner and to develop a permanent settlement for humans on the moon. To keep the costs economical for such an endeavor, the hardware components used in the missions need to be reusable. Reusability brings more complexities, but still, it’s a no-brainer given the number of private capabilities that exist today (unlike the 60s and 70s).
The total Artemis program is for now divided into three parts:
‘Artemis I’ (scheduled Nov 2021) will be an uncrewed mission to the Moon’s orbit (gateway orbit) and back. The aim of this mission would be to test NASA’s Space Launch System (SLS), and the ESA+NASA developed Orion Spacecraft. The Orion Spacecraft may also test some capabilities in the Moon’s orbit.
‘Artemis II‘ (schedule August 2023) will be a crewed Moon flyby mission using the same SLS and Orion system. This mission might also take some secondary payloads, like CubeSats for the lunar orbit. The CubeSat payload may also assist future Artemis Support Missions in building the gateway.
‘Artemis Support Missions‘ would be a group of launches and missions using private launch vehicles (from Electron, Falcon, and Vulcan series) to set up an orbital gateway and before that station required resources in the gateway orbit aka the near-rectilinear halo orbit. This orbit is the region where minimum propulsion power is required, hence allowing a solar-electric propulsion system for the gateway (to be developed by MAXAR, as Jim Bridenstine mentioned in 2019). Like ISS, building the Gateway would also be a collaboration between many government agencies like ROSCOSMOS (probably for docking/multi-purpose module), JAXA (for Internation Habitation module, and Logistic Resupply module), ESA (Communication module), and CSA (for gateway Robotics modules). Once the gateway is ready, it would be used as a docking destination for payload as well as crewed missions. The benefit of having a gateway is that you can access many parts of the Moon (like the poles, equator, et cetera). Before ‘Artemis III’, the gateway would be used to launch many rover-based in-situ resource utilization (ISRU) missions.
Finally, ‘Artemis III‘ (scheduled October 2024) aims at landing astronauts on the Moon’s surface. The combination of assets produced by public-private efforts in Artemis I, Artemis II, and the Artemis Support Missions would be used for Artemis III. Since this mission involves landing on the moon, it would consist of a new reusable asset — the Human Landing System (HLS). HLS will be developed in collaboration with many private companies, like Blue Origin, SpaceX, and Dynetics.
This doesn’t end Artemis missions will keep going till at least the end of 2030. This decade will probably be the most awesome space, I am predicting at-least one launch a month (if not a week) from the industry around the world. Hopefully, we might also see some underdogs leap ahead. After a slow start to the decade, the Space industry might finally lead us to the ideals of the Roaring 20s.
There’s much to talk about Artemis, especially details on the in-situ resource utilization, and also how Moon might get commercialized. Can we finally innovate business models that space commercialization? Before I write about these questions, I would like to discuss the perspectives you all have. Reach me on Twitter or email me at pranavdotexe@gmail.com, if you wish to schedule a chat.
I started in the middle of the week for this issue. I might cover more topics next Saturday. If you love this new format and want to stay in touch. Click the button (choose the free issue).
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