[startupfounder]

Should read: " China, the most populated country with the second highest GDP, trumps Elon Musk and James Cameron, two individuals who self funded their own exploration company and project."

What was the cost to China for this stunt $1b, $2b? I bet they paid much more then Elon and James.

"Meanwhile, a spokeswoman for China's manned space missions said the program, which began in 1992, would cost a total of almost 40 billion yuan (US$6.27 billion)."

[gokhan]

SpaceX's success is extraordinary, but I'm sure it would be much more harder to reach where they are without the helping hand of NASA, years of government backed research. They can also hire scientists and engineers trained on-job by NASA, again funded by American public.

Elon Musk couldn't do what he did in South Africa, for example. It's just like being a startup in the wally, everything is more smoothe there.