Winklevoss Twins Going to Space, Via Bitcoins

They use their go-to currency to book on Virgin Galactic
By John Johnson,  Newser Staff
Posted Mar 5, 2014 4:05 PM CST
Winklevoss Twins Going to Space, Via Bitcoins
Cameron, left, and Tyler Winklevoss in a Jan. 28, 2014, photo.   (AP Photo/Craig Ruttle)

Virgin Galactic has signed up two more high-profile passengers to space: the Winklevoss twins of Facebook fame. In a blog post, Tyler wrote that he and Cameron had paid for their tickets using their favorite currency—bitcoins.

  • Tyler's take: "It is in this vein that Cameron and I contemplate our tickets into space—as seed capital supporting a new technology that may forever change the way we travel, purchased with a new technology that may forever change the way we transact."
  • MarketWatch's take: "Rich twins buy tickets on unproven spaceship using suspect virtual currency." (Full story here.)
Tickets run $250,000 apiece, and the first flights could take place this year. No word on whether the Winklevii will be on the same flight as Justin Bieber or Ashton Kutcher. NBC News notes a weird trivia nugget: They would be the first twins to go into space simultaneously. (Mark and Scott Kelly haven't gone up together.)

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