We’ve noticed a major increase in blogosphere chatter over the past couple weeks about space tourism. This isn’t just a simple case of a few over-anxious techno-geeks lamenting that our recent rollover into 2007 hasn’t yet produced the flying cars and robot servants promised to them as kids. No longer a vague, pie-in-the-sky dream, this is indeed a very real phenomenon— and a new space race has begun, not between world superpowers, but between private companies.

Several companies are planning to offer commercial space flights to private customers beginning next year. The first flights will reach sub-orbital altitudes of about 80 miles, and will last a couple hours with a few minutes of true zero gravity.

Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic is on track to be the first company to offer commercial spaceflight in 2008, but Benson Space Company and Rocketplane are close behind. Amazon.com founder Jeff Bezos has had recent success with his Blue Origin company, and PayPal tycoon Elon Musk has left cyberspace for SpaceX A slew of other companies have cropped up as well, including Space Adventures, XCOR, Armadillo Aerospace, and Starchaser. And to celebrate the introduction of Windows Vista, Microsoft and AMD have sponsored an online puzzle game with a grand prize of a seat on the Rocketplane. Bigelow Aerospace has even launched the first inflatable space habitat (from an abandoned NASA design) in 2006, and is planning to launch a prototype space station/hotel by 2010.

According to a recent NASA study, 10 million people would want to travel to space if it could be done with reasonable safety, comfort and reliability, and at an acceptable price. Safety issues in the U.S. were recently placed under the jurisdiction of the FAA. Prices are currently anything but “acceptable” to most people (tickets currently range from $200,000 to $300,000), but might we be able to expect that eventually, after an initial rush of wealthy travelers, the quickly-burgeoning free market would eventually lower the price to be within grasp of a bigger demographic.

These companies realized that somewhere along the line, NASA accidentally or intentionally fumbled the ball, and this left room for both a potentially huge commercial market, and a new opportunity for private companies to help further the loftiest dreams of mankind. Financially speaking, space technology companies previously had primarily one customer— the U.S. government. Now the field is widening. Public companies like SpaceDev have already made a killing selling components and technologies to these new start-up companies. The question is, will these new companies take off and be able to expand enough to maintain a stable, permanent, and exciting economic sector? We will soon see.

Tags: Consumer-Generated Media (CGM) //