Guest: Walter (Walt) Anderson. Topics: Walt rejoins the space community after seven plus years & talks about it all! You are invited to comment, ask questions, and discuss the Space Show program/guest(s) on the Space Show blog, http://thespaceshow.wordpress.com. Comments, questions, and any discussion must be relevant and applicable to Space Show programming. Transcripts of Space Show programs are not permitted without prior written consent from The Space Show (even if for personal use) & are a violation of the Space Show copyright. NOTE: Walt's comments and opinions are his and his alone, some may be controversial, & some of you may be offended. As I said at the end of the program & on various blog posts during the week before this program, The Space Show believes Mr. Anderson has as much right to speak freely on The Space Show as any other guest. We strongly believe in second chances for people and new beginnings. We are an educational program and we air all sides of complicated issues & do not shy away from controversy. Walt Anderson is not an exception to Space Show policy. On a personal note, I wish Walt great success in his new ventures and in fulfilling his deep commitment to expanding space for the benefit of us all. All listeners are encouraged & welcome to post comments about this program on The Space Show blog with civility being the only requirement for your comments. During the first segment of our discussion, I asked Walt to tell us how the space industry has changed during his absence from the business. Walt talked about many changes for the better, noting the change in government policy which is now supportive of the private space industry. A listener asked him about his thoughts on NewSpace being ready for prime time investment. Walt had much to say on this topic & specifically mentioned three prime areas including resource usage & asteroid mining/capture, SSP, & space habitats. From this discussion, Walt talked about management team importance & quality. Walt was asked about technology changes & his getting up to speed with new technology. He had interesting things to say so don't miss it. Next, our discussion took a different turn as Ben asked about movie & TV prison stereotypes, prison friends, running the "biz" from prison, etc. Walt spoke openly and directly in response to Ben's questions. He also had much to say about prisoner treatment in our federal prison system. Carl emailed in to ask Walt about federal liens against him & what happens to any new monies raised for new business ventures. Does the government seize such funds raised? Walt openly addressed these concerns. In our second segment, Trent from Down Under asked about the upcoming SpaceX mission to the ISS and Nanoracks. From here we started talking about MirCorp & the efforts to privately buy Mir, Walt's role in that, what happened with NASA, Dan Goldin, even Dennis Tito. Walt discussed the electrostatic tether project & what happened just a day too late. Rick Tumlinson called & also talked about Mir, Dennis Tito, & this early commercial attempt to buy the Mir Space Station. At my request, Rick told us about his new Earthlight Institute project. Near the end, Walt was asked about suborbital space developments & citizen science projects. Final discussion topics included his preference for either human spaceflight or commercial robotic missions, asteroid and lunar mining, & NASA budget issues. Walt left us with a set of thoughtful concluding comments so make sure you hear them. Please post your comments/questions on The Space Show Blog. If you want to email Walt, do so through me & I will forward your note to him.
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