Additional possibility to participate in a flight

SpaceShipOne has an outer camera taking photographs published on Scaleds' Homepage.

This in principle proveds the possibility of realtime virtual reality.

Ben Bove in his SF-story "Retrun to Mars" (retranslated german title "Rückkher zum Mars") lets one of the private astronauts produce a short special movie that after sent to earth is a Virtual Reality.

I don't know wether this is possible already but it would provide the possibility to participate on a flight very close to be onboard the vehicle without being on board really. This can be sold at very low prices to very much people and thus increasing rvenues to a large amount.

What about this? Is it possible already? It would be much more than a movie only and people would have to pay for it because they require more than a PC and the internet.



Dipl.-Volkswirt (bdvb) Augustin (Political Economist)

only problem with that is it's REALLY hard to simulate the real g-forces of a launch, and as far as i know, impossible to simulate zero-g for any length of time.

Even without the g-forces, the video and audio alone would be a real thrill.

I've seen the International Space Station 3-D film at the Rocket Center in Huntsville, Alabama and my wife had to hold on to the rail to feel "safe".

Just by the visual motion, your mind reacts as though you are accelerating. Of course zero g can't be done in a theater. But the view of Earth is still awesome.

As suborbital flight for revenue-paying passengers takes off, I would expect such videos to be a basic marketing tool.

Hello, traveler,

that's the point I had in mind - VR would provide cheap experience of space and marketing effects in one.

TerraMrs you're right and I thought about that as traveler does - the lack of experiencing multiple Gs and zero-gravity not only doesn't better - it's providing reasonable advantages.

The VR cuases the visual impression of being in space - that's much less than being in space really. People buying ths service pay less than those doing the real travel... - and should as consequence really get less than those paying the higher price.

Getting less at a less price they get an impression not only as an a´dventure but as an increase of the basis to decide wether to participate in a real flight or not.

Additionaly the realtively large number of people paying for the VR may pay a sum of revenues that allows a significant reduction of the price of real flights. On the other side they may cause reduction of VR prices by cuasing mass production advantages becoming relevant. So the idea might prove to serve as a significant motor of the growth of private space travel markets.

This post partly is touching the section of this board considering the financial barriers to private space travels - but it should remain here.

To what degree such VR is possible today? Sigurd, do you know something about this? Is this question something of interest in constructing games?



Dipl.-Volkswirt (bdvb) Augustin (Political Economist)

the guy i'm working with in a lab at the local university is developing a platform (mainly for the challenge) which will let someone move like they normally would through a 3d environment, which could easily be expanded for a game. i don't know many details since i just started working for him, but it's definitely something alot of people are doing stuff with.

Sounds like only the software is left yet - hardware is already available: Onboard-cameras, transmitter, VR-helmet, VR-handshoes and the additional VR-periphery Th guy you are mentioning is working on.

This is single-person VR - might be sold at the markets. What about muli-person VR like the VR theater traveler is talking of? The tickets have to be kept cheap. In Germany an average Cinema ticket is sold at prices of up to 10 Euro - perhaos 15 dollars (I don't know the actual exchange rates). If it were possible to get 1 million people worldwide to each VR-transmission during a suborbital flight at that price providing profit for the theater and a significant share for the space travel firm my idea would be a success. Is it possible to build the periphery you are reporitng in a size sufficient for at least a hundred people? That woud be great I think.

If the space travel firm would get a share of the ticket price of 1 dollar by one flight it would get 1 mio. dollars in additon to the passengers' tickets. ! mio. dollars are equivalent to 10 flights and these 10 flights didn't cause any propellant or launch costs (assumed price per real flight = 100.000 dollars). If in each flight 1 mio. people would participate by VR 30 flights would cuase a revenue of 30 mio. dollars - the investment in SpaceShipOne. This means that perhaps less tghan 11 mio. people were sufficient or the price of the VR-ticket might be increased.

But is 1 dollar as share of the ticket price for the space travel firm realisitc especially concerning the new periphery etc.?



Dipl.-Volkswirt (bdvb) Augustin (Political Economist)