How SpaceX Became a Major Player in the U.S. Space Industry

Hello, and welcome to another weekend installment of Reading List where I show off some of the great science and tech reads you might have missed (while continually reading gizmodo dot com). This week's narrative big hitters comes from Motherboard, Wired, Quartz, and The New York Times. Take a break from trying to put together that last-minute halloween costume, and do some good, old-fashioned internet readin'.

• Technology can help make us all something more than human. We're already seeing how military exoskeletons can multiply our strength beyond what is humanly possible. But Motherboard takes another angle and instead asks another important question: How will technology change sex? [Motherboard]


• Take a second to explore Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Notice its cleanliness. No pornography, dick pics, or violent gifs. That's not because of users' inherently kind nature. Moderators shield us from the worst that could pop up in our feeds so that we can live in blissful ignorance. But they still have to live with the gross and horrific images they see every day. [Wired]


• SpaceX's meteoric climb from startup to industry leader is unprecedented in the field of space exploration. What started as a billionaire's starry-eyed project became a massive company, recently grabbing NASA's huge $2.6 billion contract. Here's how a Elon Musk and the SpaceX was able to achieve so much in only 12 years. [Quartz]


• The restaurant reservation system is outdated. After a phone call reservation turns into a no show, empty tables become increasingly bad for business. Several new apps and restauranteurs are finding new ways to monetize the process, to help customers keep their reservation promises, and also fight against scalpers looking to cut them out of process altogether. [The New York Times]

Image by Kevork Djansezian/Getty Images

from Gizmodo http://gizmodo.com/how-spacex-became-a-major-player-in-the-u-s-space-indu-1650748458