[samtheman]

“You probably also want to fire off a high-speed little spacecraft, to get there in a couple of thousand years if we can speed it up a bit, and sit and wait for it to send back some pictures. Someone’ll be sitting at a laptop a thousand years later and it’ll be 'OK here it comes, we’ve got an email'.”

More likely what will happen is this:

We launch a probe that will take a thousand years to reach its planetary target. But a hundred years later, we're able to launch probes that are 10 times faster. And a hundred years after that, probes that are 100 times faster. So by the time that first probe sends back it's "email", it will be an quaint historical artifact, nothing more.

[RandallFlagg]

More likely what will happen is this:

We launch a probe that will take a thousand years to reach its planetary target. But a hundred years later, we're able to launch probes that are 10 times faster. And a hundred years after that, probes that are 100 times faster. So by the time that first probe sends back it's "email", it will be an quaint historical artifact, nothing more.

...and by THEN, the postage rate inflation will backrupt the country who originally sent the probe, and Obama's great-great-great-great-great¹⁵ grandfather will have to pass a stimulus package.