Or just read "The Year When Stardust Fell" or "In the Days of the Comet" for other examples. Many would say more interesting ideas, because they're not simple monster movies.

I never tried to mold my daughter, but I also made sure that opportunities for science and technology were there for her. There were numerous signs along the way that she was headed in the direction of the sciences. She's always been interested in critters - We used to go to the Maine seashore, and one of our big activies there was exploring tide-pools. She "adopted" woolie bears in our front yard one fall, building villages for them. When she was in 5th grade, I read "The Hot Zone" with her. For years after she kept a picture of the ebola virus on the wall of her room, and we still trade ebola news over a decade later.

She got her bachelor's and master's degree in biological sciences, and started her PhD. About a year in, she discovered that she really didn't like the life sacrifices of the PhD lifestyle required, especially of a woman. She also realized that she likes the outreach side of science more - bringing science to students and others. She's managed to find a job in that field, while her husband continues to work on his PhD.

She's one terriffic daughter and person.

You forgot to mention that Peter F. Hamilton weaponized some of his tattoos. I presume that's at least part of the reason for your "awesome".

Earth has been advertising itself for more like a half-billion years. An atmosphere with free oxygen is rare, at least we haven't found one yet out of the explanets we've discovered. To be sure, we haven't studied the atmosphere on very many, but at the very least we know how to do so, at least for some.

There has been some suggestion of merely chemical processes that can give rise to free oxygen in the atmosphere, but I don't know how likely (or un) those processes are, and whether they cause the levels the Earth has, especially with traces of methane present at the same time.

We know our atmosphere has been biosculpted, and that would be something others could have seen for half a billion years.

One must assume that any alien civilization capable of interstellar travel would know at least as much as we do about the relevant technologies. That would include something Keplar-like, only better. You don't want to take your first interstellar steps to a place with no relevant planets.

More value was returned to the shareholders. After all, what are they there for, to provide a solution where the free market acts to optimize the situation for both provider and customer, or to use a de-facto monopoly to maximize shareholder value?

We keep launching stuff into space, and launch cost is always a concern. This isn't new business, this is existing business. Even if only structural components could be space-source, and not the electronics or optics, it can still be a financial win.

That depends on the destination for the final product. If you're building something for use off-Earth, using space-based resources from construction allows you to eliminate launch costs for the weight of that thing.

This of course presumes that the launch cost of your asteroid harvester is less than the launch cost of what you're building with the materials. Then again, if one Earth-launched asteroid harvester can get enough raw materials for more than one space-built asteroid harvester, you're on your way. Or to put it in a more Slashdot-memetic way:
1 - Launch asteroid harvester.
2 - Use harvested materials to build more asteroid harvesters, plus other neat space-based stuff. Repeat.
3 - Profit!!

I'm guessing that the problem here is that there can either be executive salaries for chocolate (and coffee) companies in the US, or there can be adequate revenue for sustainable chocolate (and coffee) agriculture outside the US.

Of course we know which is more important.

Say that their business class service is not sufficiently functional and it's a Comcast problem. This problem will presumably be shared by other Comcast customers, if it's IP address based. It renders their service less valuable, and can be a reason for business class customers to choose another option. They may be losing business today because of this problem.

Perhaps good for people who read, "The Virtue of Selfishness."

To be fair I'm taking that title at exactly its face meaning and coming to the same conclusion as you. However I remember some E.E. Doc Smith books had the "Principle of Enlightened Self Interest" that I could potentially buy into, so I'm still leaving the door just a squeak open for Ayn Rand on this. But only a squeak.