Three billionaires successfully executed civilian space missions this year. The founders of Blue Origin, Virgin Galactic and SpaceX.
Bezos and Branson decided to venture out themselves on their space odyssey. Their intention to go on the space flight might have been to demonstrate its safety by risking their own lives. However, they faced criticism about inconsiderately spending insane amounts of money on their space joyride at a time when a large section of the society on the earth below was facing financial hardships in the COVID economy.
Musk pulled off his company’s first civilian space flight very differently. He could very well have but he didn’t go himself. A Netflix series shared with the world the stories of four citizen astronauts who would embark on this mission. Mission branding? Inspiration4. Can inspiration be criticized? Probably not. Like charity. The mission was linked to fundraising for children’s cancer research. The result? Only good press. Even though there was a billionaire on board.