Space: the final frontier for the planet's wealthiest?
On 20 July, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos became the second billionaire in a matter of weeks to take a flashy joyride into space. The date was significant, marking 52 years since the first moon landing in 1969.
Nine days previously, another billionaire, British business mogul Richard Branson, had also taken off for the edge of space. A third billionaire, Tesla and SpaceX founder Elon Musk, has reportedly reserved a seat to visit space with Virgin Galactic, Branson’s company.
What’s the point of these intergalactic endeavors? The three billionaires claim it’s a necessary, almost philanthropic, investment in the future of humanity.
Bezos, who founded his Blue Origin rocket company more than 20 years ago, ultimately wants to build space pods, in which “trillions” of people would live and work — an idea thought to have been influenced by one of his Princeton professors,…
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