I think its appropriate to rehash what is always brought up about space. It won't happen until companies are making money from it and I mean from something other than just performing the mission. Currently, there is a TON of money being made in commercial space with respect to communications satellites in GEOs, some MEO, and emerging LEO. There was money to be made and the commercial world stepped in. We have around a dozen satellites going up each year.

With respect to humans in space, there hasn't been a market to drive a need for it. Mining and things along that route are too much of a risk for commercial companies to move to. A fundamental question any company asks is what the other guy is doing. Right now, the only other human space flight guy is NASA with the ISS. LEO is space but not by much so the commercial world has mainly focused on space tourism - something that they know will work since we've been doing it for decades. That's not to say that its easy by any means but the risk involved is much smaller than doing something beyond LEO.

IMHO, the moon makes sense because NASA needs to be the one to push the risk they took to get to LEO out to the Moon. Only then will commercial space follow. Take the CRS (Commercial Resupply Service) missions, for example, which are currently flown by Orbital ATK and SpaceX. These are commercial companies who are delivering supplies to the ISS. Not to offend anyone but I will focus on Orbital ATK for my example since they represent what people think of when they think of the free market. They are a company out to make money and are responsible to shareholders. They will do what makes sense to survive. SpaceX is an oddity since it is are financially responsible to no one and is led by someone who plans to die on Mars.

The risk to fly to ISS was acceptable enough for Orbital ATK to take. While the primary mission remains to resupply the ISS, what is less publicized, is the money being made by an emerging market for space in LEO. This includes Nanoracks, who can't stuff enough of the things on the spaceships, along with other more science based experiments. The market is growing.

NASA has to be one to give the markets some data to calculate the risk to within some level of confidence. The problem with a mission such as Mars is that it will take a long time to reduce that risk. Take a look at how many shuttle flights make folks comfortable enough to accept risk to ISS. The same would happen with Mars but would take much longer (generations). The article makes that painfully clear.

The moon offers what the ISS has become. Routine flights to that destination will recreate what we have today with CRS. That is the reality - again ignoring SpaceX at the moment. Once a company such as Orbital ATK thinks it makes sense to go to a Moon base for financial purposes, we'll be where we are today with respect to ISS. Then NASA can focus on pushing that further (to Mars or elsewhere) but it makes sense that they don't leave the Commercial world behind too far. If they do, we end up with more Apollo type missions - successful but not permanent achievements.

I will chime in as a hardcore player and someone who uses the OtherOS function as well.

I have Ubuntu installed for the sole purpose of running a webcam server using the PS3 eye. I use it to keep an eye on my dog who stays in the living room and just as a general checkup on the house. I did not want to pay for a wireless webcam or drag my entire PC into the living room when I could get the same capability for much cheaper. The ability to run a simple webcam server has allowed me to watch the cam anywhere through my Iphone (ISpyCams app) as well. At the same time, I run Folding@home on the machine when I run the webcam and occasionally use it to semi-skype chat with my family by having them watch my streaming cam and me watch theirs on a huge plasma screen TV.

When I am at home I pretty much only play online with games such as BFBC2. Before this update, this was the greatest thing in the world. To be able to watch my house anywhere on the iphone and have an awesome gaming machine.

Now, I can either lose this Linux capability for no reason or not play online.

For a while someone had setup a simple proxy which allowed you to not update and still play online. This seemed like a good solution until about a few weeks ago Sony got around to blocking this as well.

They are obviously being more aggressive in this than they let on.