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Readers! A November fund-raising drive!

 

It is unfortunately time for another November fund-raising campaign to support my work here at Behind the Black. I really dislike doing these, but 2025 is so far turning out to be a very poor year for donations and subscriptions, the worst since 2020. I very much need your support for this webpage to survive.

 

And I think I provide real value. Fifteen years ago I said SLS was garbage and should be cancelled. Almost a decade ago I said Orion was a lie and a bad idea. As early as 1998, long before almost anyone else, I predicted in my first book, Genesis: The Story of Apollo 8, that private enterprise and freedom would conquer the solar system, not government. Very early in the COVID panic and continuing throughout I noted that every policy put forth by the government (masks, social distancing, lockdowns, jab mandates) was wrong, misguided, and did more harm than good. In planetary science, while everyone else in the media still thinks Mars has no water, I have been reporting the real results from the orbiters now for more than five years, that Mars is in fact a planet largely covered with ice.

 

I could continue with numerous other examples. If you want to know what others will discover a decade hence, read what I write here at Behind the Black. And if you read my most recent book, Conscious Choice, you will find out what is going to happen in space in the next century.

 

 

This last claim might sound like hubris on my part, but I base it on my overall track record.

 

So please consider donating or subscribing to Behind the Black, either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. I could really use the support at this time. There are five ways of doing so:

 

1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.

 

2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation. Takes about a 10% cut.
 

3. A Paypal Donation or subscription, which takes about a 15% cut:

 

4. Donate by check. I get whatever you donate. Make the check payable to Robert Zimmerman and mail it to
 
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652

 

You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above.


The state of Virgin Galactic

The state of Virgin Galactic. Key quote:

One of the great things about Galactic is that it’s still built on a non-government market — that is to say, the individual spacefarer market, the space tourist market, call it what you will. As you know, we’re now over 400 people [who have paid deposits for a spaceflight], and over $55 million dollars in deposits. None of that is based on a government program. I think that’s really encouraging. It’s a sign that there are markets outside the government, and that you can build a human spaceflight business around those markets.

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

8 comments

  • Kelly Starks

    Excluding Virgin Galactics orbital work which is focused almost solely on the NASA market.

  • Chris L.

    Kelly,
    I didn’t know Virgin was offering orbital flights to anyone, let alone NASA.

  • Kelly Starks

    VG recently allowed it was co funding 2 companies development of launch systems to support the possible commercial crew transport (crew to ISS) contract for 2015-2020, and specified they would also carry tourists with the crews.

    Note they mentioned it could also support Bigelow station, that wouldn’t be enough to warrent development.

  • Kelly, so didn’t you just contradict yourself? How’s that cognitive dissonance going?

  • Chris L.

    If there is a market for suborbital flights (and VG obviously thinks there is), why wouldn’t there be a market for orbital ones?

  • Chris, why even ask? The Russians have sold every seat they’ve ever made available. They haven’t even discovered the price point yet. Worse yet, they force the customers to go through the horrible cosmonaut training, and they do it. They recently just announced they’ve increased production to provide 3 more seats per year starting in 2013. What more evidence do you want?

  • Kelly Starks

    > Kelly, so didn’t you just contradict yourself?

    How?

  • Kelly Starks

    > If there is a market for suborbital flights (and VG obviously thinks there is), why wouldn’t there be a
    > market for orbital ones?

    Theres obviously some market. But at the $50 million per seat the Rusians are chargnig for a ride on the Soyuz, they’ve only found a couple buyers. Not a real problem given the Rusians can’t build a lot of Soyuz, and its currently fully booked just carrying the handfull of folks the ISS can support. (Effectivly to fly a tourist a NASA or Russian (or other) astrounaut doesn’t get to go.) But that size tourist market, of a couple folks ever couple years, is to small to warrent designing or building stuff just to support tourists. If the cost was a lot less, you’ld likely get a lot more tourists. But no one knows how many at what cost, so they can’t work out a profitable busness plan.

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