Slashdot Mirror
The Space Shuttle Returns
An anonymous reader writes "NASA's Return to Flight site details the space shuttle's to return to active use. The Flash intensive site features details on the mission, the crew, and the shuttle itself. Additionally, the site features none other than Scott Bakula as Captain Archer on the bridge of the Enterprise (USS, not STS)."
It's looking for revenge. "Earth, you killed my brother... and now it's your turn to die!"
Flash intensive site, a Scott Bakula video, and a front page Slashdot article.
Well, I'm guessing that NASA got that bandwidth sponsorship afterall.
Lets just hope we're not gonna see an article on Slashdot talking about another delay for launch due to limited funds.
I'm a virgo and on Slashdot. Coincidence? Yes.
What has changed:
1. Bold Catchers
The bolt catchers is now a one piece design
2. Bipod ramp heaters
Foam taken out
3. Wing sensors
The sensors will alert mission control and crew if things go pear shaped.
4. Orbital Boom Sensor System
The 50 foot Canadian built boom will enable the crew to check on the skin health of the shuttle.
5. Cameras and tracking
There will be cameras on the shuttles underbelly.
Nazi Pope Emblem
Turned out it was cheaper to pay NASA to create a real Star Trek than to pay Paramount to produce season 5 of Enterprise.
...Additionally, the site features none other than Scott Bakula as Captain Archer on the bridge of the Enterprise...
Scott should feel proud, he sahres something in common with NASA: both he and NASA have experienced crashing and burning.... Probably not the most appropriate joke, but then again I hate olitical correctness.
The Flash intensive site features details on the mission, the crew, and the shuttle itself.
I'm glad they spent $7,500 on an ultra-flash-intense site. Your tax dollars at work.
Until Paramount cancels the program.
Can we do something? Maybe if we all pledge money now, they won't cancel the shuttle after this season.
Raise your children as if you were teaching them to raise your grandchildren, because you are.
It's look like that's flash enabled sites that I see on www.shockwave.com
http://www.michel.eti.br
It's been a long time
Since the last shuttle flight
There've been some changes
And a hell of a lot of gripes
But I can see the ship on the gantry now;
Nothing's in our way!
And they're not gonna hold at T-minus-10
We won't miss our window today!
'Cause I've got faith in Discovery!
I'm goin' where the SRBs take me!
I've got faith in Atlantis!
If we break down she'll come an' get me!
I've got faith in George Bush!
And on the budget funds he'll send me
I'll go all the way to Mars...!
'Cause I've got faith (I've got faith)
I've got faith in these shuttles of ours!
Cut to Scott Bakula in elaborate Mission Control set:
"Hi! I'm Scott Bakula! You might remember me from such cancelled sci-fi shows as Star Trek: Enterprise and Quantum Leap..."
Link troll
HI O WISE PRINCE. WHT TOOK U SO DAM LONG?
"Al, why haven't I leaped yet?"
"Ziggy says you can't leap until the site gets one million visitors"
And you Need A Spelling Accessory known as a dictionary. Let me paypal you 5$ to get you started on your thrilling journey of NOT LOOKING LIKE A FOOL!!!!
Having saved a few cents on O rings here, a few cents on insulating foam there and another few cents on leading wing edges they can now afford to hire the best web artists and B list TV stars to build a really cool website. ;-)
Seriously speaking, I'm all for NASA communicating what they are doing but I prefer there older sites which have been more content driven and highly functional rather than "flashy".
The least you could to is use proper grammar when criticizing someone else's spelling.
Just what we need, another generation inspired to become astronauts because it means "we can have sex with green women in bikinis".
Don't blame Durga. I voted for Centauri.
Or: "Some Linux Advocates Surf Here. Damn overclocked Trekkies!"
Don't blame Durga. I voted for Centauri.
I love it when a government agency spends money on self-promoting hype rather than something substantial.
Insert witty sig here.
Scott Bakula, an entertainment figure, on behalf of the NASA marketing dept. hyping the shuttle program to the entertainment-starved masses (rhetoric). :).
And Arnold would become the gov. of California, and Jesse "The Body" Ventura of Minnesota.
It's interesting what life starts to look like from a country that is inundated with entertainment.
... What's next on this list?
Does Nasa *really* need the support of the masses who sit in front of their weekly TV shows? or do they already have it? Should the NASA crew members not be making the cameo apperances since they are the *real* "heroes"? Scott Bakula is an actor who will never step into space. If it comes down to entertainment factor, might as well use Mickey Mouse as a spokesman (cool factor ruled out
Calling it a "National Security Risk" NASA should propose to buy out the ST franchise, keep production of ENT going at full tilt as material for the only people who seem to care about exploring fans. Just another better use of taxpayer's money than the way in Iraq.
Gotta do something when even your president vowing to save the space program and push it to new goals can't get you the funding you need.
At least this way if it can convince enough people to give a damn about the space program, it'd less likely that congress will keep cutting its budget.
Are they kidding?
Does Nasa want to be taken seriously? Does America want to be taken seriously ? Do you have any fucking clue on how ridiculous the whole thing sounds ? "Hi, I am bla-bla-bla...as captain of the space-ship enterprise bla bla bla....just like Nasa bla-bla-bla"....are you FUCKING KIDDING ME????
This is a space agency, for heaven's sake. This looks like one of those commercials on robocop, except its actually happening. The USA has become so full of children-like adults that this is actually happening. You have a fucking moron for a President, who babbles like a child, and you have your government's agencies treating you like retards, pumping pseudo-information at you through useless videos featuring children's entertaining.
Who came up with this notion? When will they be shot?
I am not American, and no, I am not one of the Anti-American fanatics you are thinking of. I just get worried when I see the most powerful country in the world treating its citizens as children, because I start to think that well, what if they are right? You only have the power to destroy the whole world about a hundred times or so. Please make sure your government understands you are grown-ups.
Or better yet, put some grow-ups on the government.
Turns out the opening theme in the evil alternate universe is much better. Diane Warren and the Bon Jovi sound-alike thankfully must have been killed in the evil universe.
tell me, when did you last explore a Trekkie?
Don't blame Durga. I voted for Centauri.
Isn't that a bit presumptuous?
A postage stamp sized video that takes 100% of a 3ghz machine to play.
Well done NASA, you guys rock.
... is awful. it sucks big time. I'd hate to have to browse that site using a 56k modem.
How do we know it's not the Scott Bakula's evil Mirror Universe twin?!?
Bruce
Non-Flash Version Text Only Version
PR is absolutely mission critical work for NASA.
If they lose public support, they lose funding, it's as simple as that.
If this web package was purchased for even as much as 1 million dollars, it was money well spent, possibly one of the most important line items in their budget.
Using Scott Bakula, while of debatable wisdom to those of us who hated Enterprise, shows astounding good sense on the part of someone at NASA. We can debate about whether Shatner or Stewart would have been better, but at least they're in the right ballpark.
But the site looks sharp, it's informative to a lay-person, and tries to make the shuttle program seem real in viewer's minds.
The only gripe I have is the CPU hit for playing the video. What codec is that?
disclaimer: I think the shuttle should be scrapped and we then return to capsule based launches which were cheaper and safer even with 60's technology.
how come they aren't slashdotted yet...
"Al, why haven't I leaped yet?"
"Ziggy says--DEADBEEF?"
"Great, does that mean I can leap now?"
"Umm...nope."
"Wait--did you install Windows on Ziggy again?"
"Umm...yes. Sorry Al."
"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!"
Lets face it. The space shuttle is dangerous, very. They can mitigate the risks involved but never even come close to eliminating them all. Strapping a bunch of people to something akin to a small Nuclear bomb is never going to be safe.
I hate to be the one that breaks up this party but I fully expect to see this one go the way of the last two. What will that do for the space program?
I wouldn't call it self-promoting hype, I would call it assurance of continued funding. See, they are a government agency, which is funded by the US taxpayers. And as such, believe it or not, the taxpayers could decided to stop funding it. So any good agency that wants to keep their funding must ensure their funders know what sort of good stuff (tm) they are getting for their money.
In other words, NASA isn't assured anything, and it is vital for them to keep their PR efforts front and center to assure their continued operations. Frankly, people would be bitching if they did the opposite.
Well, they're flying a white elephant anyway, so what's an additional couple million?
Why not have an actual NASA person do the intro? It's a pretty sad joke when you need the Captain of a failed fictional show to generate hype about the return to space for manned missions. Cause you know an actor is far more qualified than a Rocket Scientist to tell you about the importance of the Space Shuttle in the endeavor of space exploration. What ass-clown in NASA PR team is responsible for this? It's revolting that NASA needs to resort to Flash-porn and hype. Damn you unwashed masses!
"Dammit Jim, I'm a doctor not an aerospace engineer!"
You have two hands and one brain, so always code twice as much as you think!
Yes, I hate it when our government institutes created to advance science in our country try to inspire the next generation. I hate it when they present science and technology in a manner that captures the imagination of the public. Don't they know the place of science in this country - they should just stay in their cubicles out of the public eye where they belong.
What better spokeman for NASA than the captain from a scifi show that was canceled for lack of funding and public support.
Seems all too familiar...
Of course, at my high school, one of my friends told the guidance counseler that he wanted to be a beach philosopher. (You know, sit on the beach, play bongo drums, occassional say pot-inspired wisdom. Not a bad job if you can get it.)
From one of his popular books, or Nova episodes, or something:
Average Person, not recognizing to whom he's speaking: "Excuse me, sir, but why do you have Feynman diagrams drawn on the side of your VW Microbus?"
RF: "Why not? I'm Richard Feynman."
Tag lost or not installed.
http://dayton.hq.nasa.gov/IMAGES/MEDIUM/GPN-2000-0 01363.jpg
. html
t ifacts/ HS-Enterprise.htm
"The Shuttle Enterprise rolls out of the Palmdale manufacturing facilities with Star Trek television cast members. From left to right they are: Dr. James D. Fletcher, NASA Administrator, DeForest Kelley (Dr. "Bones" McCoy), George Takei (Mr. Sulu), Nichelle Nichols (Lt. Uhura), Leonard Nimoy (the indefatigable Mr. Spock), Gene Rodenberry (The Great Bird of the Galaxy), and Walter Koenig (Ensign Pavel Checkov)"
taken from http://grin.hq.nasa.gov/ABSTRACTS/GPN-2000-001363
This is the Space Shuttle Enterprise, which is not usually counted among the shuttles. It's not spaceworthy, and was made to test Shuttle landings from the air (among other non-space tests), and was releasted from atop a (large) airplane for its flights, as shown here:
url:http://www.nasm.si.edu/research/dsh/ar
There's tons more on the (Space Shuttle) Enterprise, it's supposedly in the Smithsonian and you can see it in person - just google.
But looking back historically, that photo has a lot more class (even without Shatner - was he making another record? Okay, ESPECIALLY without Shatner!) than this thing with the series Enterprise (I haven't even seen it - the video doesn't play for me on Firefox 1.0.3 - NASA's not down with Firefox?) and the heroic but failed attempt at saving it.
Tag lost or not installed.
http://www.nasm.si.edu/research/dsh/artifacts/HS-E nterprise.htm
Yes, I had used the preview button with parent, I just didn't READ it carefully.
Tag lost or not installed.
I just placed all of my tax refund and a substantial portion of my savings at several different british online bookies, betting that the mission gets them all killed. At 25:1 I am looking at being able to leave this shithole and buy my brother's lot and double wide in Corpus Cristi and spend my days fishing and my nights selling shit on ebay.
The 70s show and a song called 'Disco Inferno' comes to mind when I read this NASA Propaganda machine release. I visited the NASA website to help their congressional money machine hit count metric for yucks and was rather entertained to find the astronauts selling hard their jobs. I almost believe their B$ until the guy so carelessly stuttered that this would be the safest shuttle flight yet... How can that be with NASA actually cutting safety to get this lauch out the door? I laughed, and then realized there is no shortage of people that have been sold the promise of space walks in return for their lives.
--- Old Time NeXThead
bullshit, slashdot said the shuttle would die forever like 2 weeks ago, and now its in its glorious return,what next?
To your Disclaimer, they Are... Every single CEV design has a capsule based reentry.
t s. html
http://exploration.nasa.gov/documents/cer_repor
here's all this money for a flash site when voyager is getting pulled. *grumble*
I saw the shuttle flame out after launch. The tower looked strange. There also appeared to be a bail out in water. ......46318
Would anybody know how? I've decompiled the main flash file as well as the vid.swf file, but can't locate where the video actually is on the web.
Care to correct it for me, professor?
Real world:
* Pound for pound, none of the 60's launch systems were significantly cheaper than the Shuttle.
* None of the 60's spacecraft flew enough times to make any statistically valid judgement as to their safety. Reading any decent history of manned spaceflight shows numerous problems and close calls on both sides of the Curtain.
Erm... Soyuz?
So. Bakula will never get into Outer Space eh? hahahaha If Bakula and the rest of the Screen Actors Guild members decide to ante up $1.6 million, you'd be surprised how fast they (William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, Checkov, Gil Gerard & Erin Gray) could get there... AHEAD OF THE SHUTTLE... http://www.newpath4.com/forsalespacecraftenginecon stantpowertheory.htm . All S.A.G. need do is hire the Space-X people to design my craft. I've already got the engine AND the design for the craft to utilize it. And while Americans may laugh and chuckle and jeer as they always seem wont to do, other countries are finding my web page rather interesting. As the hurricanes, earthquakes & tsunamis increase from the ever-so-slight global weather changes, the Shuttle becomes terribly SMALL. It doesn't even qualify as a "starship". It's a flying turkey that needs 9 months to get to the next dead planet beside us. Which would be just fine if we weren't destroying Planet Earth so much faster. We're turning Earth into Mars a great deal faster than we can turn Mars into Earth. We need for an engine that can be mass-produced quickly, an engine that can run cars AND is Space-capable. And that's what I have. A Model-T to the Stars using an engine worthy of Vulcans... Riley, http://www.newpath4.com/ .
Soyuz only seems safer, when in reality, the two are about even. It is true that when you factor in total deaths on Spache Shuttles you come up with a larger number. Soyuz crew: 3, Space Shuttle crew: 7. Crash for crash, bodies pile up faster from space shuttle crashes, and that's when they have the same failure rate.
Failure rate and fatality rate are different ratios, and "safer" is so damn subjective....
Like what I said? You might like my music
More palatable for the vast non-geek audience out there... most people don't like to read reams of text to have an idea of what the next mision of Nasa is about...
Budgetwise I don't beleive a flash site is going to break the bank...
My $0.02