Maybe—just maybe—sending billionaires into space isn’t such a bad thing

Enlarge / A rendering of a spacewalk happening outside of a Crew Dragon spacecraft. (credit: SpaceX)

One of the most visually appealing Super Bowl advertisements on Sunday night starred Matthew McConaughey dressed as an astronaut. The advertisement begins with suggestive images of McConaughey in space only to find him in a hot air balloon.

"It's not time to escape, it's time to engage," McConaughey says as his balloon traverses green countryside, cityscapes, and a wedding. "So while the others look to the Metaverse and Mars, let's stay here and restore ours. The new frontier, it ain't rocket science. It's right here."

The ad ends with a hashtag, #TeamEarth, and was evidently bought by Salesforce to burnish its image as a company working for the good of humanity and our planet. Consultants apparently convinced Salesforce that the best way to do this was by shaming billionaires who are fascinated by and investing in space. Which is interesting, given that Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff is an investor in SpaceX and has said, "Space is a huge category that we should invest in."

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