corrente

A little hagiography [kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss] on "Thrillionares" from the New York Times:

Mr. Allen, who became a co-founder of Microsoft, is responsible for SpaceShipOne, the pint-size manned rocket that won the $10 million Ansari X Prize competition last year as the first privately financed craft to fly to the cusp of space - nearly 70 miles up.

I'm assuming SpaceShipOne doesn't run Mr. Allen's software...

Mr. Allen is not the designer; that is Burt Rutan, the legendary aeronautical engineer with the sideburns that look like sweeping air scoops. He is not one of the test pilots who made the competition-winning flights; they are Michael Melvill and Brian Binnie. Mr. Allen is, instead, the one who gets little glory but without whom nothing is possible - he is the guy who signs the checks. And he did what the rich do: he hired good people.

Well, um, not all the rich, eh? Say, is Kenny Lay still on the street? No, don't tell me. It'll only spike my B.S.S.

The SpaceShipOne flight made him the best-known member of a growing club of high-tech thrillionaires, including the Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, who find themselves with money enough to fulfill their childhood fascination with space. Rick N. Tumlinson, co-founder of the Space Frontier Foundation, a group that promotes public access to space, said the effort had become a geeky status symbol. "It's not good enough to have a Gulfstream V," he said. "Now you've got to have a rocket."

Hey! That rocket is almost as big as my dick!

Many self-professed "space geeks" say the possibility that entrepreneurs like Richard Branson of the Virgin Group may help regular people see the black sky - well, regular rich people, at least [ha ha!] - has drawn away much of the excitement that government-financed human space efforts long enjoyed.
(via NY Times)

In a country where what, 50 million don't have health insurance? Give me a fucking break.