Category Archives: Space

Media Criticism, Space

This Is Like A Bad Joke

13 Comments

Time has named the Ares-I the “Invention of the Year“:

TIME’s best invention of the year may send Americans back to the Moon and put the first human on Mars.

Do they even know that it can’t deliver people beyond earth orbit? On the other hand, it is really tall…

This kind of technological illiteracy is pathetic, but it’s what I’ve come to expect from the likes of Time.

[Mid-morning update]

From a reader:

My company was selected for a Time “Invention of the Year.” Hooray, we thought. Then the phone calls from Time started. A bored 20-something with a false Valley girl accent called to talk to the inventor of the thing we had been nominated for. We responded that there was no one person, it was a company-wide effort. It took, and I do not exaggerate, at least 30 minutes to get it through her head that “company” meant “more than one person.” Then the so-called fact checker wanted to know how the one person got the idea for the invention. We patiently explained that it was the company’s job to make such products and that more than one person had contributed to the idea and the building of our nifty little gadget. The fact checker did not know the difference between a pound and a kilogram, had no knowledge of basic chemistry, had never heard of the founders in our field, and didn’t even know what our gadget looked like. Subsequent calls did not remove the impression of careless indifference. Time never did get the story right.

Since that day I have never trusted a single story from Time. Not one. If the writers and editors can’t understand the difference between a pound and a kilogram, what else are they missing?

A lot. It’s a lot easier to just grab a press release from NASA PAO than to have to actually understand what the hell you’re talking about..

[Mid-afternoon update]

More thoughts on the cluelessness of this from Keith Cowing.

Popular Culture, Space

Because I Didn’t Have Time

27 Comments

Clark Lindsey has done us all the favor of reviewing The Space Review today. Like him, I was struck by Tayylor Dinerman’s completely ignoring ULA in his discussion of the “burgeoning” commercial space industry. But even more, I agree that Dwayne Day’s broad conclusion about public interest in space and space settlement from a single stupid network program is absurd:

The paradigm that near-term space can only involve a small number of people in a small habitat doing technical and scientific tasks does not lend itself to great story telling. Conflicts are required for compelling stories and lots of different types of conflicts are needed to generate enough stories for a compelling TV series. I think the “nearest” near future space scenario that could generate an interesting diversity of plots with a diversity of characters would involve a couple of thousand people populating multiple LEO space stations and habitats at a Lagrange point and bases on the Moon. Commercial, government, and international activities of various kinds would inevitably lead to all sorts of conflicts.

Let’s ignore the fact that most television shows (and particularly Big (though becoming smaller) Three Network television programs) fail, often epically. Big media, like (apparently) Dwayne, remain stuck in the Apollo paradigm of space being about a few civil servants doing science and exploration, at great government expense. Here’s an idea. Try a show about real space pioneers and see how popular it is. IIRC, “Lost In Space” actually did pretty well back in the sixties, or at least a lot better than the schlock that Dwayne reviewed. It’s not the sixties any more, but let’s give it a try anyway. It’s not like LIS was based on the NASA paradigm, so that wouldn’t explain its sixties success, right?

Political Commentary, Space

The Quality Of Mercy

3 Comments

Courtney Stadd will not have to serve any time in prison:

A former top NASA official was sentenced Friday to three years probation, six months of electronic monitoring and a $2,500 fine for steering contract money to a private client.

…The courtroom was nearly filled with dozens of Stadd’s supporters, many of whom wrote the judge attesting to his good character.

…”The government called this corrupt and a lack of integrity,” Collyer said. “I think it was a closer call than that.

“The jury found that whatever the lack of clarity in ethics briefings, it does not excuse his actions,” she said.

After Stadd told the judge he and his family have been devastated by the case, Collyer said that prison time was not needed to protect the public. However, she said, the sentence she imposed would “send a message to other government employees” to conduct themselves with the highest ethical standards.

Sounds like a sensible judge. Good for Courtney and his family. And it remains galling that no one from the Justice Department seems to be investigating Charlie Rangel.

Business, Political Commentary, Space

NGLLC Ceremony

3 Comments

Clark Lindsey has a first-hand report:

Mr. Bolden, a couple of House members and a representative of the administration all said very good things about not just the NGLLC but about prizes in general and their ability to leverage lots of innovation and productivity at low cost. Got the impression that there will be more money coming for Centennial Challenges and other prize programs.

Dave Masten and Phil Eaton gave brief but eloquent remarks.

Two former NSS executive directors were there: Lori Garver, now Deputy NASA Administrator, and George Whitesides, now NASA’s Chief of Staff. With entrepreneurial firms getting big checks via an innovative program like Centennial Challenges, which was inspired by the X PRIZE, and with space advocates in NASA management, I get the feeling that the NewSpace current is starting to flow into the mainstream.

Whatever comes of the Constellation mess, this at least is encouraging.

[Mid-afternoon update]

Chuck Divine also attended, and has more details.

Economics, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Space

None Of The Above

8 Comments

NASA Watch has a poll up on what kind of heavy lifter NASA should build. I’ve decided to do my own, proper poll:

Which Heavy Lifter Should NASA Build?
Ares V
Ares V Lite
SDLV Sidemount
DIRECT
EELV Heavy
NASA doesn’t need a heavy lifter

  
pollcode.com free polls

[Mid-afternoon update]

Wow, not much love for either flavor of Ares, at least from my readers. So far, the vast majority goes for “none of the above.”

Political Commentary, Space, Technology and Society

Congratulations LaserMotive

9 Comments

It looks like they just won almost a million dollars in the power beaming contest.

I sure hope that the administration will request a lot more money for Centennial Challenges, and Congress grant it. Tomorrow’s award of the NGLLC prizes at the Rayburn Building would be a good opportunity to make the point that, dollar for dollar, they put to shame anything else that NASA is doing, Constellation most of all.

Media Criticism, Space

Harvard Idiocy

8 Comments

Check out this editorial at The Crimson on Ares I-X:

Such an achievement augurs well: The new moon program is a shining rebuttal to detractors of America’s math and science programs as well as a promise for progress in American space exploration in the future.

To begin with, the rocket’s technical specifications are astounding. Thirty-two stories high, the Ares 1-X towers as the tallest rocket in the world. And the sight of the launch was no less spectacular than the rocket itself. The first stage of the engine brought the rocket 25 miles into the air until its fuel ran out and parachuted it into the ocean.

When Clark wrote the other day that the Ares was really tall, it was completely tongue-in-cheek, but this editorial writer seems to seriously believe that rocket height is a useful technical metric. And 25 whole miles in the air? What a spectacular achievement, fifty-plus years after the first orbital launch. But wait, it gets better:

But the true triumph of the Ares rocket doesn’t lie in its physical properties alone. It’s the less tangible inspiration the rocket will provide to future generations of American mathematicians, scientists, and engineers that makes it so important. Education reformers working with students from kindergarten through 12th grade will now be able to look to the rocket as a symbol of hope and inspiration. The Ares will encourage them to imagine even more fantastic goals and products that will be achieved after America repairs its education problem.

Yes, only the Corndog, flying a few times a year at billions per flight, will inspire the Young Pioneers, and fill them with hope. Hundreds or thousands of people going to and from orbit with their own money, reusable tugs fueled in LEO, or at the Lagrange points, on the moon, with orbital and lunar hotels? Boooorrring.

Sigh.