By coincidence, the same day I planned to launch this new blog is the same day that Space Shot, the space tourism skill game, officially opened to the public. Space Shot, for those who have now been closely following its development, is an online skill game where contestants compete for a ride on Rocketplane Ltd.’s XP spaceplane. For a $3.50 fee per entry, people try to guess the weather conditions—high and low temperatures, average humidity, and precipitation total—in New York City’s Central Park each day. Contestants compete head-to-head, and whomever is closest to the actual weather conditions recorded wins and moves on to the next level. Win 17 levels and you get a free Rocketplane flight.
MSNBC’s Alan Boyle has a detailed article about the venture, going into some of the nitty-gritty issues like legal concerns (Space Shot founder Sam Dinkin tells Boyle that if any state’s attorney general complains, he “would have to lock them [that state’s residents] out” of the competition. Dinkin, who has openly discussed his plans for such a venture in previous issues of The Space Review, offers more details about the work required to create Space Shot in this week’s issue. I’ll have more to say about Space Shot in a future post.
(Disclaimer: Sam Dinkin has been a frequent contributor to The Space Review over the last couple of years, although less frequent is recent months as he devoted his time to Space Shot. However, I have not been involved in the development of the company in any way beyond publishing his articles that touched on the topic.)
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