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ThestralDragon t1_j7s5oc3 wrote

Reply to comment by ragnarmcryan in SpaceX prepares for a massive test this week: Firing all 33 Starship engines at once by upyoars

It wasn't a gift, you paid for services which were delivered

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funkboxing t1_j7sfx3d wrote

We paid to develop those services, but ownership of the results of all that development are privately held.

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coldblade2000 t1_j7sx63v wrote

If I have a construction company and am hired by the government to build them a warehouse, it doesn't mean the government then owns my fucking house

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funkboxing t1_j7w89bb wrote

A functional analogy would be if you accepted government funding to research and develop a new construction process that you'd then patent.

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coldblade2000 t1_j7w9l0y wrote

>you accepted government funding to research

It'd be nice if you actually pointed to this "research funding". I looked over and all the money SpaceX was given by NASA was "service contracts" which are fulfilled or being fulfilled, or the Commercial Crew Program. In this one, SpaceX didn't receive money in the first round. In the second, seed money was first given to a few companies like BlueOrigin, Boeing and SpaceX to develop technologies for crewed vehicles. In SpaceX's case, their proposal was making their ALREADY EXISTING Dragon capsule human-rated, and finishing its abort system. The Falcon 9 had already flown various resupply missions to the ISS by then. The rest of their funding was NASA paying SpaceX to render services, or specifically making changes to SpaceX's vehicles for NASA's purposes

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funkboxing t1_j7wclov wrote

I guess if you don't consider paying for services yet to be developed as funding research, then yeah- I suppose that didn't happen.

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Bensemus t1_j8flh1j wrote

It's not that simple. Blue Origin had issues in the HLS contract because they tried to avoid NASA's R&D sharing requirements. NASA allows some stuff to be reserved as trade secrets but not everything. Accepting NASA money means you need to share technology with NASA.

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hallowass t1_j7shwyu wrote

Same with the space shuttle, the cost to maintain the shuttle was nearly the same as just building a new one.

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funkboxing t1_j7siei7 wrote

The STS wasn't privately owned.

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Emble12 t1_j7u2mzo wrote

Why does it matter if it can get what NASA wants to space?

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funkboxing t1_j7uhz2m wrote

Why does it matter what subsidies we give the petroleum industry as long as they put gas in stations for us to buy?

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Emble12 t1_j7w62ju wrote

If they’re doing it cheaper and maintaining standard, sure

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funkboxing t1_j7w8f9x wrote

Then why do they need public funding?

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Emble12 t1_j7w9cxl wrote

NASA gets the public funding. They choose how to allocate it, such as contracts to launch companies.

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funkboxing t1_j7w9v7q wrote

NASA isn't privately owned.

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Emble12 t1_j7wa6hc wrote

Yes, it’s a government agency and allocated government funding. It’s then up to NASA to use that funding, such as investing in and buying contracts from private companies.

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funkboxing t1_j7wd0zm wrote

And if NASA contracts a company to develop a system you think the IP for that system should belong to the company?

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Emble12 t1_j7xvzgu wrote

Depends on the contract, for most old space contracts NASA takes operations and so should have more ownership, but for new space contracts the company takes most operations and so has a right to control their assets.

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