On May 25, 2012, an uncrewed variant of Dragon became the first commercial spacecraft to successfully rendezvous with the International Space Station.

Military engineers scrabbled over the outer surfaces of the seized commercial spacecraft.

Local media representatives broadcast these events as they happened, uploading signals to widespread information networks for eventual distribution via commercial spacecraft across the Spiral Arm.

It had the other advantage that commercial spacecraft could not mount such gadgets for defense, because the insurance companies objected to meddling with Lawlor drive installations.

But can a commercial spacecraft take off on its own from the ground, travel into outer space and land again on a runway?

Subsequent Telstar satellites were advanced commercial geosynchronous spacecraft that share only their name with Telstar 1 and 2.

It was intended to stimulate action - the development of commercial spacecraft - and it succeeded.

It was also the first commercial spacecraft to rendezvous and berth with another spacecraft.

This event marked the delivery of unpressurized cargo from a commercial spacecraft to the ISS for the first time.

In an era when NASA satellites cost $1 billion each and commercial geostationary spacecraft were $100 million apiece, that qualified as revolutionary thinking.