So soon? What the hell. I thought this was still on the drawing board.
Going so fast from hoping to win a NASA programs and having no flights, to recovering stages, doing propulsive landing of capsules during re-entry and abort, building a super-heavy launcher (after NASA refused to contract them for one). Who these guys really think they are? And do they make sandwiches, I'm hungry.
I think it speaks volumes about how much technology has progressed, and how little the space industry has taken advantage of that because their Excel sheets don't show any benefit from trying something even slightly out of ordinary. What SpaceX are doing isn't even particularly revolutionary, they are having a normal rocket, normal thrusters and engines, based on off-the-shelf* technology, with only a little bit of imagination here and there. And yet that's enough for them to give a new meaning to phrase "running circles around the competition". I do wish Orbital Science gets their launches to the ISS up as soon as possible, but by the time they do, Red Dragon might be circling** them from Mars orbit.
On another note, with more computing power available at our fingertips, I expect that in a few years amateur designers might be simulating flight-grade rocket dynamics in their homes and designing hypothetical rockets. I know you can't print a rocket on a 3D printer, but sure someone can start a fake fad that encourages at least some clueless managers to start crowdsourcing rocket designs? It might not necessarily lead to a spaceflight revolution, but at least it will be entertaining (as long as there aren't any settlements near the launch pads).
* OK... Sure, they have to bake their own bread, because the baker wishes to charge them a fortune, but it's still only bread.
** Slower orbital velocity? Fuck that, I declare this nitpicking – Mars is just circling us with negative velocity!
