[HarperCollins]
Kategoria: Książki / Literatura obcojęzyczna
of aerospace engineering.When the Heavens Went on Sale
tells the remarkable, unfolding story of this frenzied
intergalactic land grab. Through his trademark immersive reporting,
Ashlee Vance...
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A momentous look at the private companies driving a revolutionary
new economy in space, from the New York Times bestselling author of
Elon MuskWith the launch of the Falcon 1 rocket in 2008, Elon
Musk's SpaceX became the first private company to build a low-cost
rocket that could reach orbit. And that milestone carried major
implications: Silicon Valley, not NASA or nation states, was
suddenly cemented as the epicenter of the new Space Age. Start-ups
and the wealthy investors behind them began to realize that the
universe-ungoverned and infinite-was open for business. Welcome to
the Wild West of aerospace engineering.When the Heavens Went on
Sale tells the remarkable, unfolding story of this frenzied
intergalactic land grab. Through his trademark immersive reporting,
Ashlee Vance follows four pioneering companies-Astra, Firefly,
Planet Labs, and Rocket Lab-as they build new space systems and
attempt to launch rockets and satellites into orbit by the
thousands. While the public fixated on the space tourism being
driven by Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, and Richard Branson, these new
companies arrived with a different set of goals: to make rocket and
satellite launches fast and cheap, thereby opening Earth's lower
orbit for business-and setting it up as the next playing field for
humankind's technological evolution, where we can connect, analyze,
and monitor everything on Earth.Vance has had a front-row seat and
singular access to this peculiar and unprecedented moment in
history. When the Heavens Went on Sale travels through private
company headquarters, labs, and top-secret launch locations around
the world, including California, Texas, Alaska, New Zealand,
Ukraine, India, and French Guiana. He chronicles it all in full
color: the private jets, communes, gun-toting bodyguards, drugs,
espionage investigations, and multimillionaires guzzling booze to
dull the pain as their fortunes disappear.With the most detailed
and intimate reporting of Vance's career, When the Heavens Went on
Sale reveals the spectacular chaos of the new business of space,
and what happens when the idealistic, ambitious minds of Silicon
Valley turn their unbridled vision toward the limitless expanse of
the stars. This is the most pressing and controversial technology
story of our time, a tale of fascinating characters chasing
unimaginable stakes as they race to space.
