Hi — and thank you.

You're one of the very first people subscribed to Orbital Roster, and that genuinely means a lot. This is my first note to you, so I'll keep it simple: here's the essay that started the whole project.

Why I built Orbital Roster →

Space is so much bigger than the handful of names we always hear. I wanted one place where everyone — every agency, every company, every world — gets put on the map.

If that one resonates, there are a few more to read:

• Artemis, representation, and why visibility beats outrage
• Space is a global project — especially when budgets shrink
• What a rocket mishap taught me about the ground

And the thing these essays are really about — the live dashboard of who's in space right now, the lunar race, and every agency, company, launch pad and spacefarer on the map — is always at orbitalroster.com.

More soon. Thank you for being here this early — it means more than you know.

— Elio @thespacemechanic