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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)."
You know guys, I'd mod you up if I had the points. I'm amazed at what comedy can result from my own stupidity.
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".
I love it when a government agency spends money on self-promoting hype rather than something substantial.
Insert witty sig here.
I'd heard worse career advice. Usually from guidance counselers.
Doesn't it seem odd to accept career advice from someone whose job is to give career advice to high school students? 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.)
Besides, there are worse reasons to go into space. And for those, we have President Bush.
Kierthos
Mr. Hu is not a ninja.
Parent Post Writes
This is what that troll "Flexible Typhoon" linked to
"http://www.google.com/url?sa=X&oi=dict&q=htt
Which was redirected to
"http://unspun.mithuro.com/content/view/62/"
which has nothing to do the with space shuttle, but rather a "anti-religion" site.
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!
Of course they need the support of the masses, they foot the bill!
More than anything else Nasa needs the public to be excited by space like they were in the 60's. If it takes Scott Bakula to do that, then so be it. Obviously I'd prefer the public to fall in love with the actual astronauts again, but that's not going to work when they're this deep into a rut. If they can build some excitement with b-list celebrities and--more importantly--high-profile missions, then they can use astronauts to publicize themselves.
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.
I'm no expert on space travel, so I'm sure someone more informed than I can fix the numbers, but a little research has told me that there have been between 2 and 9 shuttle missions a year between 1981 and now, with a 2 year hiatus after Challenger. Assume, the average is 4 per year, for 22 years, that means that there have been 88 shuttle flights. I'm fairly young, so I don't remember most of the space program, but I can only think of two Shuttle disasters, Challenger and Columbia. That gives the shuttle a success rate of 97.7%. That doesn't sound all that dangerous to me...
Of course, each failure is by definition fatal and expensive, but I wouldn't call the space program a failure or overly dangerous.
The Saturn I, IB, and V boosters all had a 100 percent success rate during launch. There have really only been 4 major disasters in the nearly 50 year history of spaceflight, and only three of them fatal (Apollo 1, and the two shuttles. Apollo 13 being the 4th, and nonfatal disaster)
They can mitigate the risks involved but never even come close to eliminating them all.
That statment applies to LIFE. The same can be said of cars, airplanes, boats... horses... Life is risky. Period. the question is, do the benifits outweigh the risks. I'd say yes, but I'm sure there are those that disagree.
Yep. I figured that's what you thought I meant.
It's true, they do have the NASA channel, but it's boring as hell. I love space, and even I can't watch it for very long. Half the air time is 'out the window views', which is more of a TV screen saver than an actual program.
I'd really like to see them hire a professional Hollywood TV company to produce their material. Make it more interesting, more engaging, and more accessable to Joe Public.
Some people still think MIR is in orbit. My grandmother thinks the shuttle goes to the moon, other people think we've never been there.
They have a long way to making the public aware of what they're doing, what they're actually there for, and some of their accomplishments, other than the high publicity milestone events.
/sig