Actually, Apollo served many purposes, some of which were constantly at odds. It had an arbitrary deadline because it had to hit a marketing window. As the visible success of a landing became more of a reality, there were more constraints put on budget and overall mission; resources were plentiful when something daring and impossible was being pursued and public excitement was a frenzy, but less so when it was following through on engineering. Finally, after the landing was successful, the interest in exploration and science was not enough to keep consumer interest and several later flights were canceled.
It is easier to draw parallels with something like the iPhone (where new models come out to reignite the frenzy) than something as mundane as an operating system.
Ken
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Ken Laskey
MITRE Corporation, M/S H305 phone: 703-983-7934
7515 Colshire Drive fax: 703-983-1379
McLean VA 22102-7508
