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Marsoweb

Posted by michael on from the marzipan dept.

EyesWideOpen writes "Scientists preparing for Nasa's next Mars mission have created a website to help them choose potential landing sites on Mars. Marsoweb enables scientists to view more than 44,000 high-resolution images of the red planet; the images combine all the available data about the surface of Mars."

3 of 42 comments (clear)

  1. A good method of garnering public support by Cloudmark · · Score: 3, Insightful

    All in all, not a bad idea. By involving members of the public in the mission and keeping them informed and interested, the mission planners can work towards guarantying broad public support. In an era of increasing fiscal restraint, that critical for the success of any lare-scale, high-cost initiative.

    This type of plan has worked for Zoos and other groups (post pictures of possible landscapes, get people's opinions, etc) so why not for the space program? Furthermore, the site does have intrinsic educational value and is a great resource for students, particularly at the post-secondary level.

    ~Cloudmark

    --
    "Be proud to be a fighter" - Martial Arts Adage
  2. Billions of dollars, and this is what they plan? by AVIDLY+INTERESTED · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Methinks I smell the sickly scent of a public relations campaign. I mean, are we really supposed to believe, that, even with their huge budget, NASA is incapable of finding a good landing site on Mars? They already landed on the planet a few times, they know places it is possible. For a manned mission it may be a bit more complicated, with water (or ice) needed, and perhaps a few other things, but seriously, a website to decide this sort of stuff? They are showing, what was it, 44,000 images, to scientists who may find (at a guess) a few thousand possible landing sites. I am supposed to believe a NASA bigwig is going to say to his dedicated team, "Hold everything, we've just had an email from someone who works at a high school in Belgium. He reckons slide 38,233 is a good spot. That's the breakthrough we were looking for."
    Yeah, right!

  3. Re:Billions of dollars, and this is what they plan by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    You know what, pal... scientists need to get at this data, too, to help choose the site.

    NASA releases all of its space-exploration data publicly. So, why not have the web site containing the maps for the scientists be accessible to everyone?

    They could have easily locked this up behind a secure site. Instead, they used the Web for what it was originally intended for... the public dissemination of scientific data, to aide the scientific community.