give it 30-50 years and we'll see repeat of these stories and photos, this time on Moon, Mars and asteroids instead of Yukon.

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mannykannot an hour ago | parent | next [-]

Harsh as the Yukon is, it is a walk in the park compared to anything in space, where there is no realistic possibility of a rush of individual prospectors.

Several areas of the ocean floor are covered with valuable polymetallic nodules [1] which are way more accessible than anything in space, yet this has not led to the equivalent of a gold rush.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manganese_nodule

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lukan 6 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

What will be the valuable resource everyone is hunting on the asteroids, that is so valuable it covers the trip there?

Gold is way too cheap (and much easier to get on earth, even if the current mines are exhausted)

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pstuart 3 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Building big ass space stations -- colonies at L4 & L5. Why haul it up from space? Perhaps rail guns on the moon might be easier...

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trhway 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

He3? The trips will be cheap. Moon will be extended weekend trips. $10/kg to LEO. I.e. $1M for 100ton ship - compact nuclear reactor, small living quarters, 70 tons ejection mass for ionic drive - that is possible today - gets you to Mars in a few months.

And in modern attention economy there is another extremely valuable resource to mine - attention of millions. At least initially the trips by IG/TikTok influencers (would be like Jack London posting TikToks as he goes instead of writing books later) will generate tremendous revenue paving the interplanetary ways for us, mere mortals.

>Gold is way too cheap (and much easier to get on earth, even if the current mines are exhausted)

With that logic Manilla Galeons wouldn't have happened :)

Edit: just looked up prices of iridium, rhodium - $6K-$10K/ounce. So just 10kg - $2M+ . Thus it looks like there is a lot of economic sense for asteroid mining once we get to cheaply launch into LEO 100+ ton items like nuclear powered ships.

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lukan 5 hours ago | parent | next [-]

And all of this ... for gold?

(even filtering sea water for it here on earth sounds a lot cheaper)

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wileydragonfly 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Been hearing about the miracle of He3 for decades. Neither one of us gets off this planet alive.

	▲	trhway 3 hours ago \| parent [-]
		I’ll get, at least for short time :) If nothing comes better, in 20-30 years retired I’ll build something like that Denmark amateur rocket. It is cheap even today, and the tech and blueprints will be widespread and available like say drones and homemade planes today. Optimistically though I think by that time ticket to Moon on SpaceX cattle class will be $100K.

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gerad 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

honestly anything outside the gravity well. it's expensive to get materials from earth to space.

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d_silin 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Yes. Yet those will be stories worth remembering.