Extraterrestrial Real Estate for Sale

Tom Mulcahy pointed us over to The Lunar Embassy. Yes, that's right. You can purchase real estate on the Moon, Io, Venus, Mars, and, apparently the Universe. Ah, the beauty of capitalism.

Comments

Read the small print

[vik]

Uh, guys, isn't this a novelty item?

Nobody owns the moon. Ownership is prohibited by a few treaties. Details of the legal aspects of owning the moon can be found off the Artemis Society homepage, specifically in the Frequently Raised Objections section.

As an aside, TransOrbital Inc. is going to be taking pictures of the moon using a telescope in lunar orbit, so people will be able to have a picture of "their" plot if they choose.

Vik :v)

Moon Ownership Law

[Head Louse]

According to Discover: The 1979 resolution states that the moon and its natural resources are the common heritage of mankind and that the moon shall not be used for military purposes. It also declares that any benefits derived from the exploitation of the moon's natural resources will be shared, "whereby the interests and needs of the developing countries, as well as the efforts of those countries which have contributed either directly or indirectly to the exploration of the moon, shall be given special consideration."
Only problem with the Moon Treaty is that the United States and the other space-faring civilizations refused to sign it.

According to the The Artimis Project:
The Moon is a venue of "lex nullus"; that is, it is identical in legal status to the high seas, meaning that nobody can own it and everybody can go there.

Re:International Agreement?

[orac2]

The agreement in question is the Outer Space Treaty and it's been around since 1967. The US, the UK and Russia were founder signatories. The most relevant piece here is "outer space is not subject to national appropriation by claim of sovereignty, by means of use or occupation, or by any other means".

So, even if its not technically illegal to claim a piece of the Moon or Mars as your real estate in the US, the claim has no force outside the jurisdiction of the US, and the US is forbidden from extending it's sovereign territory into space. So it's pretty worthless having a claim on the Sea of Tranquility if your claim isn't actually valid there...

What time zone?

[Christopher B. Brown]

The killer question:

What time zone will it be in?

There is a tendancy to use UTC in space applications; if people start dispersing to the moon, this provides some time delay issues in communications that would result in sync issues; heading further afield to Mars would be similarly disruptive to synchronization of activities.

It's possible that one might get meaningful information out of a GPS unit from the moon, albeit with extremely screwy coordinates as they'd be relative to the earth. (Mind you, it is probable that consumer units would shut down as you'd be moving more than 999mph relative to earth's surface...)

Determining time/location will provide opportunities for new fields in vCards and for a bunch of new RFCs. I thought there was one on this, but in querying the archives, I seem to be mistaken...

"Its all just little bits of history repeating"

[Zombie_Magick]

...the northern hemisphere of the universe shall go to Portugal while the southern hemisphere of the universe shall go to Spain

Haven't we learned about dealing in land that isn't ours, lands that we can't even get to?

2001: a Real Estate Odyssey?

[mmmmbeer]

This brings to mind the recent article about Arthur C. Clarke, where he mentions his asteroid. Can I buy a plot of land there? I'd love to say I own part of Arthur C. Clarke. :)

Seriously, though, what is the point of buying this real estate? Can anyone really expect these claims to hold up if and when we do get to space? And what if we just can't live there? Oh, well, I guess we'll just have to wait and see.

Btw, does anybody really want to live on Uranus? (Sorry, couldn't help myself?)

Novelty value only

[Bruce Perens]

The Lunar Embassy states that their certificate has "novelty value only" and is not to be taken as a legal deed. Lots of people don't read the fine print.

Bruce