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My July fund-raising campaign to celebrate the fifteenth anniversary since I began Behind the Black is now over. I want to thank all those who so generously donated or subscribed, especially those who have become regular supporters. I can't do this without your help. I also find it increasingly hard to express how much your support means to me. God bless you all!

 

The donations during this year's campaign were sadly less than previous years, but for this I blame myself. I am tired of begging for money, and so I put up the campaign announcement at the start of the month but had no desire to update it weekly to encourage more donations, as I have done in past years. This lack of begging likely contributed to the drop in donations.

 

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XCOR faces bankruptcy and liquidation

Capitalism in space: Unless XCOR can find a new investor in a matter of weeks, the company will face bankruptcy and will be liquidated.

Freedom and competition might bring wealth and innovation, but they also require risk and failure. XCOR sadly appears to be an illustration of this.

Genesis cover

On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.

 

The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.


The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
 

"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News

4 comments

  • wayne

    I don’t follow XCOR that closely– what is dragging them under? People, Process, and/or Product?
    How many employee’s do they have?

    Just speaking in general-
    Going bust is always tragic, (individually or otherwise) but is a nescessary aspect of business as a whole.
    The upside to bankruptcy; the pain is imposed quickly and contained to the Creditor’s, and all those resources are re-priced in the Market and become available to be re-deployed to their next highest value use.

  • Wayne: Do a search on BtB for “XCOR”. I cover the company’s fall step-by-step, beginning in October 2014.

  • Mark

    Enter “xcor site:behindtheblack.com” into your favorite search engine. That should work.

    Too much ambition, too little product, it would seem. Or perhaps eyes too big for their belly. https://www.roadsideamerica.com/story/3087

  • wayne

    thanks.

    Referencing “emerging new-space,” in general, I’ve often wondered if there are any parallel’s to be drawn from the early emergence of the auto-industry. The initial rise was controlled by a small number of people and stifled/squandered, then there’s an explosion of innovation and production followed by periods of consolidation & concentration. Haven’t formulated all this in my head, just thinking out loud.)
    It will be interesting to see all this play out in the grand-scheme. (The Big Old Guys have been scrambling and merging as well.)

    Any other space-related companies that are in financial-peril?

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