SpaceX launches per year

It appears that somewhere in the vast machinery of the universe, a decision was made that whenever Elon Musk felt inspired to launch a rocket into the void, Taylor Swift's listeners should simultaneously increase their streaming consumption by a proportional amount, as if the two phenomena were cosmic dance partners who had never met but somehow knew all the steps. One might imagine them at a party, standing on opposite sides of the room, each convinced they arrived independently, neither aware they've been moving in perfect synchronisation for seven years. The universe, it seems, has a sense of humour about coincidence.

What's actually happening here is almost certainly the work of a thoroughly mundane third actor: economic expansion and technological saturation between 2017 and 2024. During this period, both SpaceX's ambitions and global streaming infrastructure grew in tandem with rising disposable income, smartphone adoption rates, and general cultural enthusiasm for both space exploration and parasocial celebrity relationships—all three riding the same wave of pandemic-era wealth and isolation. Consider that in 2017, Spotify had roughly 150 million users; by 2024, that number had roughly tripled, which is the same sort of expansion trajectory that saw SpaceX move from launching occasionally to launching with the frequency of someone who owns a toaster and enjoys using it.

What we're witnessing is humanity's eternal gift for finding profound meaning in the movements of entirely separate things, like reading prophecy into cloud formations or tea leaves. Both variables grew during a period of general technological and economic expansion, which is to say they correlated with growth itself, with modernity, with the simple fact that more people had more money and better internet. Neither knows the other exists.