[mariusz79]

Still the question remains - why risk bad pr if this doesn't work. and why not concentrate on building the telescope first and proving that they can do it before asking for money? At this point it looks like they are trying to run "your picture in space" business, not asteroid mining.

[ramidarigaz]

I think they're pushing the "picture in space" as a sort of hook to gather public interest. Large scale public interest in their projects has the potential to bring in larger funding from entities that might otherwise not be interested.

Personally I think this is an excellent idea. The picture in space is a great little incentive to get people to take a closer look at the project.

Of course, there is the risk of failure and the bad PR that goes with it. That said, the list of endorsements they have is pretty impressive, and pushing the idea that a first grader could in theory direct the satellite to take a picture of his or her choice could give them a huge boost in interest.

[mariusz79]

Well people may be excited about them getting already to 100k. Problem is 50% of that money comes from people who spend 1k or more - three of them spend 10k each. So I don't see potential for a failed Kickstarter campaign which would be a disaster for them

[mariusz79]

they are suppose to be in asteroid mining business, that they said could bring trillions of dollars in profits. Why do they care about the public? There is something fishy going on here :)

[nitrogen]

Why wouldn't they care about the public? The local copper mining operation often buys advertising to boost its own public image; why not an asteroid mining operation?