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Space

RadioShack To Co-Sponsor Lunar Mission 127

Posted by jamie from the build-and-maintain-those-robots dept.
IntelliTubbie writes: "In an 'unorthodox form of brand sponsorship,' RadioShack is teaming up with LunaCorp, a Virginia-based space exploration startup. The goal: put a robotic rover on the moon featuring the RadioShack logo. Artist's renderings of the monstrosity can be seen at LunaCorp's web site. We're one step closer to the eerie predictions in 'Fight Club': The IBM Stellar Sphere. Planet Starbucks. Yikes." Unfortunately the robot will be powered by a TRS-80 ModelII, requiring 14 extra tons of propellant (grin). More coverage can be found at Yahoo! and discovery.com; CMU is creating the H2O-seeking robot for the mission. (More.)

And on a related note for anyone interested in going to the moon in the relatively near future, MrScience writes: "I just received a link for this job in my mailbox from Guru.com, a pretty decent headhunter website. They are looking for a Financial Analyst to evaluate the NASA Academy, and "The end result will be a recommendation that the program either *is* or *is not* beneficial, and the specific reasons to justify such a conclusion. This report will then go before the NASA Administrator to justify the existence (or removal) of the program." I grew up dreaming of going to this, who wouldn't after seeing SpaceCamp?" Pound foolish, anyone?
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RadioShack Plans Lunar Mission More

RadioShack Plans Lunar Mission

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  • ...these bots will finally prove that the yanks haven't stepped foot on the moon yet!
  • I actually got to go to Space Camp back in the day -- it was a blast. We got to hear Alan Shepard give a talk, got to run a shuttle flight simulation in a mockup of the nose section (you have no idea how big that thing is...), and though it didn't work out, we were going to see a test firing of the shuttle as well.

    But the downside was they showed us that damn movie about fifteen frickin' times -- as if they knew the stuff we were doing was fun but nothing like that, so every time there was a slow moment they'd plop us down in front of a TV / VCR and play it again. It was actually the first thing we did upon arrival [great first impression guys], and several more times over the week. Ek...

    It's funny this has come up here today, I was just thinking about the camp & the movie this morning for the first time in a couple of years, it seems. I was thinkng of renting it again to see how well the movie has aged -- hopefully it has done better than, say, "Top Gun" :). The IMDB page notes that a bunch of would-one-day-be-famous actors were in it, so it might be interesting to see that... ho hum, probably won't worry about it...



  • The LunaCorp page seems to be touting "wide-open interactivity," i.e. letting Joe Q. Public drive the thing (after proving his skills on a simulator). Presumably they would set up a promotional mall event tour of some kind, e.g. $35 to drive a lunar lander for five minutes (or free with purchase of a playstation2), one day only at BurbGrove Village Mall, brought to you by Radio Shack! But that raises two questions for me:
    • It won't take any "unsafe actions," does that mean control of the device is going to be pretty much limited to "go/stop" with close supervision?
    • Can the transmissions be cracked? I can hear the script kiddies drooling already.
  • Oh come on now, let's be Realistic. :-)

    I hope Realistic isn't just a Canadian Radio Shack brand or I'll look pretty foolish. I guess for the Americans I can always do:

    Oh come on now, let's be Optimustic.

  • I'd rather they send both Howie and Teri to the moon. I dislike those commercials with a passion. Oh, and the guy who thought it was a good idea to sell RadioShack out to Compaq, MSN, and Sprint.

    I demand that they all be sent up in the mission.

    --Ben

  • Model 4D (Score:2)

    by pohl ( 872 )
    This will be marked 'offtopic' for being tangential, but here goes: the Model 4 rules the retrocomputing universe. I just acquired one, and even managed to find a hires board for it, and the Alcor C compiler (docs in mint condition). I'm going to equip it with 4 half-height drives in the bay, and write open-source ground-control software for this mission. Yes I am.

    P.S. Anybody with Model 4 stuff to sell, drop me a line.

  • One can only wonder if the probe will insist on getting a name, address, and phone number to go with every simple telemetry request. Or will it try to sell the scientists a $20 warranty on a $5 product?
  • ... is that the idea seems to be McDonalds. Read the article.
  • You do realize that Radio shack is only putting up one millon dollars. Don't you think that if space travel was that cheap, other companies with multi-billon dollar incoming would have already done this?

    They are obviously in need of more backers, with a lot more money. How likely do you think a backing from Microsoft is?

    Microsoft claim moon
    Reuters
    In a surprise move today, Microsoft has launched a capsule that supposedly contains the source code for all Windows products towards the moon. In reaching the moon, the source can then claim itself an soverign entity, with no governmental or terriestrial ties. Claiming problems with bandwidth, the source only repeats over and over 'I am a thinking entity. You need me for Age of Empires.' People around the world are stunned at this new innovation from Microsoft.

    It's expected that the legal and marketing abilities of the probe are highly advanced, enabling it to buy companies remotely and sue people for making parody web pages. Other companies are very interested in buying this technology, but when they show interest are immediately bought by Microsoft.

    Bill Gates was unavailable for comment, but Steve Ballmer stated unequivocally 'Microsoft is bigger than the Earth, we're intergalatic now. We're bigger than Jesus. You could never be as 31337 as us.' The statement then degenerated into a series of 'uNF's and 'jajajaja's.

    --
    Gonzo Granzeau

  • Yeah, and the next thing'd be "I'm sorry, Mr. Xfzyxl Splorch; I need the State on your address. It won't let me put Arcturus in. Which state is Arcturus in?"

    "It's not in a state! It's up there!" (points to sky)

    "OK, well, what's your ZIP code?"

    "Arcturus doesn't have ZIP codes!"

    (getting hufty)"Yeah, well, ah cain't do this without a state an' a ZIP code..."
  • I seriously hope that Radio Shack employee's aren't putting the thing together. Seriously, it would (1) take off... (2) Orbit the moon for three years, then (3) mail itself back to the Earth on a postcard.

    Last time I went to a Radio Shack, actually, I went to two of them, and asked for a circuit repair pen. You know, one of those pens that drops flecks of gold onto your circuit so you don't have to do a solder drop. Well, the first place, I had the guy handing me everything from RCA jacks, to coaxial cable, and the second Radio Shack called up Texas and was on the phone for an hour while I waited until they told me that they had in no uncertain terms ever heard of 'cricket, I mean, circuit repair pens.' then they gave me a free 25% off card and told me to come again...**shudders**

  • Wasn't it Heinlein who wrote a short story about spraying a company logo on the Moon? Basically silk-screening from space, so the image spread large enough to be discernible to the naked eye.
  • There are two ways to get research done: let a monopolistic behemoth bribe some academicians to work for them, so that the corporation can patent their ideas. Bell Labs, Microsoft Research, IBM. This is very expensive, because first you pay for the research when you buy their products, then you really pay for their research when you buy the exorbitantly priced patented product. The other way to get research done is to pay a smart kid to go to grad school. This is how all but a handful of the major advances in CS have been accomplished, and why they were all public domain until the patent-craze started a few years ago. (The other reason most advances are public domain is that patented ideas are quickly superceded by public ones.)

    I don't see such a stark dichotomy. A lot of really cool technologies have been invented by corporations. A lot have also been invented by government researchers.

    It's hard to know what the world would be like without those government researchers because the government sticks it's thumb in every pie, so it's not surprising that it comes up with a few plums. The fact that with enough money the government can invent things doesn't prove that the private sector couldn't have done the same.

    I find it hard to believe that TCP/IP or its equivalent wouldn't exist now without the government. It might have taken a few more years for the technology to become available to make it profitable, but it's not that hard of a problem, and there's plenty of profit in it. You're dead wrong about nothing significant coming out of corporations. I believe that Unix, ethernet, GUI's, most modern programming languages, firewire, USB, IDE, SCSI, and probably dozens of other innovations have come out of the private sector. Many of these were developed almost entirely by private corporations, and most of them are open standards today. The simple fact is that competitive forces give an advantage to companies that use open standards rather than closed ones. Observe the Linux bandwagon. I'd also argue that's why the largely inferior PC platform beat out the Mac in the marketplace: it ran on commodity hardware and didn't have a single monolithic company stifling innovation as with Apple.

    As for patents, that's an issue of bad patent law and special-interest pandering by the government, not a problem with the free market. And even if the internet had been patented in 1970, it would be in the public domain in 1984 (I think) and so it would be an open standard for the use of anyone today. The same is true of many other innovations: their inventors get monopoly profits on them for a few years, and then they pass into the public domain where they benefit the public at large. It may very well be that patents should be for shorter time periods, but that's again a problem with government policy rather than capitalism per se.

    In addition, corporations tend to take interesting technologies and make them useful. Arpanet might have been cool tech, but it wasn't useful to the masses until the Netscapes and Microsofts of the world that made it readily available to the masses.

    As for the space program improving specific products, I see this as simply a reflection of the enourmous amounts of money spent rather than on any intrinsic superiority of government financing. Had the government not spent that money the private sector may very well have invented things that were just as good if not better than the things NASA invented. Or maybe it wouldn't have been, but the fact that good things came from NASA programs doesn't prove that that was the best use for the money.
  • I am all for companies partnering up and moving forward like this. NASA has a joint venture [nasa.gov] thing going on with Dreamtime as discussed in last weeks slashback [slashdot.org] . Why shouldn't corporations do this to? If NASA's ever dwindling federal budget is preventing this type of lunar exploration then they will need to do commercially exploitive things like this as well. RadioShack partnering up with LunaCorp for this type of mission could be a great thing if handled correctly. Every program that NASA has put together has benefited us as a civilization directly and indirectly with new technologies. No need to list them here as most /.er's probably know of atleast 3 (not including TANG) off the top of thier heads. Unfortunately, i fear that this venture will lead to tons on IP trademarks/patents designed to benefit a select few pockets. I am not against making a buck or two but there has to be some benefit to all of US (read civilization as a whole not just the already deep pockets of corporations). I wonder what thier take on the technology involved is. Hopefully, the science aquired on this mission won't go the route [slashdot.org] of some of the companies [celera.com] involved in the human genome project. Commercial space ventures are an inevitable event that needs some form of government supervision/regulation before it gets out of hand. What bothers me about this venture is that a) LunaCorp is a privately owned corporation b) RadioShack is a publicly owned corporation c) Buzz Aldrin is now a (albeit heroic) civilian d) It would appear that NASA is out of the loop on this deal. I did not see a mention of NASA's involvement in this anywhere on the LunaCorp site even though there are several shameless plugs for Carnegie-Mellon. Rather conspicuous, no? If you are curious go check out The Artemis Project [asi.org]. The Artemis folks have carefully thought out most of the issues and thier plan seems cogent for the most part. IAAMOAC - so are you
  • This would be the single best way for Microsoft to paint their opponents as opposing progress generally as opposed to being calm, rational human beings: sponsor a lot of visible science exporation, and then say "Well, we have to pay the lawyers fees. As good citizens, we support the laws and rulings no matter how far fetched of the DOJ and the FTC, so we regret it but in good conscience we have to pull the moon mission now ..." heh.

    timothy

    p.s. This is not to say that MS does not already sponsor quite a lot of research now! Only that it would be a stunning PR move for them to one-up the U.S. space program, which -- being a public program -- can't tell its ass from your pocketbook.
  • roystgnr:

    I can't speak for anyone else, but I am all in favor of this, think it's a great thing. I think the government's big, clumsy hands have held the exploration of space back for the past 20 years, despite the admirable successes of the early years of NASA. (At least some former NASA bigwigs have said approximately the same thing ...)

    Heck, I want to see a Microsoft / McDonalds / AT&T moonshot! (Doesn't have to be those companies necessarily, but you get the drift ...) I would like to live on the moon, at least for a couple of months! Make it a free-trade zone with sales tax but no income tax, and we'll fill the place up :)

    timothy
  • How about, rather than just a checkbox, create your own budget in the section called "How would you like to see your money split up between the different government institutions?" Politicians wouldn't even have to worry about planning a budget anymore, it would be completely democratic use of the tax money. Y'know...if nothing else, I would LOVE to see what the budget would end up like... anyone care to put together an advanced online "budget voting booth"? And don't forget that field "Secret government programs that we won't tell you about"... :^)
  • isn't it redundant to say 'two pole DPST?' He needed the model with the long curved handle which in the ON position is at the South Pole, and in the OFF position is at the North Pole.
  • Excuse me, but a Radio Shack store is a retail business. The clerks only need to know the stock well enough to help people find something. They don't need to build things, they don't need to design electronics.

    They either have to memorize enverything in the store and catalog, or they have to learn at least enough about the stock to categorize them well.

    Of course, people who know something about electronics are more likely to apply for work at an electronics store so the clerks are a little more likely to know something about the subject. But experts will be elsewhere -- in electronic repair shops, installing business radio systems, punching holes in targets in the university accelerators...

  • Anyone remember a 20/20 (long running american investigative news program) report on engineers at a missile guidance system manufactuer using Radio Shack resistors, capacitors, etc. in the guidance systems for MMX missile and other long range (continental) nuclear ballistic missiles? For those who don't; Seems they had not only underbid on price, but on time. The company couldn't wait for the government tollerance tested parts so they went down to the local Radio Shack and picked up the parts. Built the guidance systems and shipped them out under budget and before the due date. When the government tolerance tested parts arrived, they just threw them in the trash as they were no longer useful. I believe the finding of several boxes of government electronic parts is what triggered the investigation. The governments parts were tested to within .05% or so of tolerance, while Radio Shacks gold resistors give you 5% at best. They never did a follow up to see if the guidance systems were recalled or whatnot, but since the program ended with the information that the guidance systems were already installed in the missiles, and the missile were already placed in bunkers that all further information was classified.
  • Look at the cover of the current issue of Popular Mechanics [popularmechanics.com]. Above "MOON VACATIONS" is a lunar hotel with the Mariott logo.

    For a more thorough essay on starting to commercially explore space, see "Rockets, Redheads, and Revolution" by James P. Hogan. One of the chatty chapters between stories is about why government has stifled space exploration, merely by being the only entity doing so. (It's probably in the "Science Fiction" section of your library/bookstore)

  • But the issue isn't whether government should fund certain basic research--it should. The issue is whether a private business can also pursue that area (albeit expecting financial gain eventually), and whether other businesses can help with sponsorships, partnerships, etc. Do you really want government proscribing such ventures, even if one conceivable outcome is less government funding for other projects?
    >KFW
  • Radio Shit on the moon?

    Can I go home now?
  • Not really... :-) However, the reality as that governments allready are using things like this to justify cutting down spending for basic research. So, how do we address this? I'll admit that I'm strongly biased in favour of basic research, there are allready enough people out there who would like to see no spending for basic research at all, so making it just a bit worse can make things really bad.
  • I'll fly a rocket with Barney on one side and the Windows logo on the other.
  • At least your friendly Radio Smack Salesman tried to help. Last time I entered the store, my salesman who was quick to find me and ask if I needed any help in what I was looking for immediately threw his arms up in dispair and exclaimed, "I'm a business student!"

    Business must be really good for them to stay in business.
  • ...at least Microsoft isn't sponsoring the mission...

    "Gentleman, we have.... a fatal error! Abort! Abort"

    ..or worse yet, Fry's Electronics.
    .
  • Cheap parts? What Radio Shack do you shop at? Thier components are way over priced. You want cheap you have to shop at a place like Active Electronics, or buy them in bulk of 50's and 100s.
    I don't cosider them mid-level...I would rather buy from Walmart than Radioshack. And that is sad.

  • It's a bad way to run a country, but I think it would be interesting to see what people would enter. I think that putting together a web voting booth to track that kind of information would have to be done very completely (IE, make sure that the people can only spend what they have to, make sure they're aware what cutting the money would mean) and maybe they'd bitch a little less about what they pay in taxes.

  • Radio Shack used to be a good place to shop for novelty items and parts back in the 70's when ham radio, science and technology was all the rave back then. Then I remember Mr. Tandy must have kicked the bucket and no longer was featured in his little fireside chats in the catalogs. He must have been the inspiration, because in my opinion the whole chain went downhill from there.
  • Anywhere from six months to a year from now we'll see a post on /. announcing that LunaCorp filled for chapter 11. I'd bet any amount of money that this will never happen and that many of the people working at LunaCorp know it will never happen!
  • If you had gone to the page, and realized that all it was was a notification that you had been trolled, you might not have had to ask that question.

  • Realistic stuff is sold in USA too. BTW, The Edge in Electronics (snooty mall stores full of cell phones and other small devices), and Computer City (big computer megastores the size of a supermarket) are also owned by Tandy/Radioshak.


    The regular .sig season will resume in the fall. Here are some re-runs:
  • Now, I not only can go to Radio Shack to get those spare cables I need, but soon I'll be able to get that spare meteorite I've been dying to have.

    There's certainly nothing wrong with the commercialzation of this type of thing. The government funding is terrible, and the public is on-again/off-again about funding space exploration with their own tax dollars (see the mars hoo-hah several years ago, versus the general lack of interest now).

    My only problem with this is the sneaking suspicion that Radio Shack just sees this as an opportunity to dump off the mounds and mounds of useless and worthless Tandy components....
  • As a former radio shack employee (1 year ago), let me take a moment to comment on just how ridiculous radio shack's priorities are. They spend god knows how much money on this promotional space launch, while all the store computers still don't have something as basic as a CD-ROM. Most of the cellular phone credit checks and activations (at least in the southeast region) still have to be written down manually on a form and called in to the service provider's already overburdened and undermanned customer support. Thus, the time spent on cell phone activation and credit was ususally 15-20 minutes longer than it had to be. Just one more example, Radio shack used to have their POS Terminals at the counter running as terminals of a SCO unix server in the back. Well, Radio shack replaced the dumb terminal system with Windows 95 computers whose POS application that has almost no GUI functionality at all. It has all the ease of use drawbacks of a text based dumb terminal with all the instability of windows 95. Then, there's the server for those computers in the back running (or rather, crawling along with) windows NT at on a machine with (I believe)32MB/120mhz. Radio Shack claims to be the technology superstore, but they don't have the slightest idea about how to use computers effectively in a business environment
  • This is only the beginning. The heavy hitters have only just noticed all of the rest of the solar system and the universe. I sure wouldn't want to be left sitting on my front stoop with a beer in my hand and a puppy in my lap when this ship leaves the dock.
  • ..why anyone would be bothered by this. It is wonderful that private enterprise is getting behind space exploration. The only way you and me and otherwise 'normal' people will ever get to space -- or even get the benefits of permenant human space habitation -- will be if it is done privately. (Please remember most of the great 'voyages of discovery', from Marco Polo to Columbus, were mercantile ventures).

    Anyone who is bothered by the spectre of filthy lucre driving mankind forward is welcome to try building a spaceship out of the spare change they find behind the couch. As for me, I will cheer on any corporation that puts its money behind mans' advancement. Go, Radio Shack! (But you still make crappy computers)

  • Haiku (Score:2)

    by 575 ( 195442 )
    Lunar robot fails
    Transmits crappy images...
    Quite "Realistic"

  • Good News: Radio Shak will give them a remote control car.

    Bad News: It can only turn right, and batteries are not included.

    If you ever played with one of the cheap RC cars they sell at Radio Shak this should be funny, if you haven't played with one, reach for some spare change, go down to RS and buy one. You owe it to yourself as a geek. When you get bored with it, there are all kinds of things you can do with the cheap little RC mechanism.


    The regular .sig season will resume in the fall. Here are some re-runs:
  • Corporate Government Future?

    I dont understand people who dont recognoize tha this is not a new thing, and its not necessarly bad, either.

    Take, for example, the Hudson Bay Company. It was given, by royal proclamation, control of Hudson Bay's dranage basin, ie, something like 1/20 of the land mass of the earth.

    And they did a prety good job of ruling the place (and colonizing it, with significntly less blod shed then the Amercian colonized their west). They even kept prety good scientific records (tempartures, migtation pattern, etc (granted they were significant to there main LOB)).

    When the time came, the sold off there massive land holdings to the new country of Canada.

    But your not realy disagreeing with me, so this rant may be in the wrong thread. Ultimatly, there are good companies, and there are bad companies. Just make sure you dont support the evil companies :)

  • This is totally awesome. Why haven't we thought of this before. The privatization of any industry leads to its explosion of growth and innovation. I mean look at the internet, it started out as a government/educational thing and then people figured out you could make money with it.

    Space exploration is no different. I would love to see a RadioShack robot on the moon or a communication outpost on Mars sporting the ATT logo. This is all good stuff, I say promote it.


    Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
    NPS Internet Solutions, LLC
    www.npsis.com [npsis.com]
  • I'm all for anything that advances space research, just as long as the companies backing the missions don't try to attach any strings to the missions.

    Seeing as how a corporate government seems to be the wave of the future, it makes it that much more important to vote with your dollars. Support companies you believe in.

    Seeing as how the real government still has lots of guns and missiles. Vote.

    Seeing as how we're on only one of what now seems to be millions of planets, support space research.

    --
  • Let me beat the grammar police on this one -

    definately has no a in it...

    it's definitely.

    Now you can abuse my comment.

  • I feel sorry for autronauts who have to talk to those sales people to explain what they need. First of all, it's more technical than most parts they sell now, and second, RadioShack employees can't speak english very well, just wait until they get some intergalactic employees.

    :-)

  • Are you SURE about that model number? The model II had a 64 column screen and floppy disk drive out fo the box. Never used cassettes.

    You're thinking of the model I level 2 machine. The "level 2" meant that it included Microsoft Basic instead of Radio Shack's.

    The 8-bit MODEL II computer was able to outrun IBM's (claimed-16-bit) PC for VisiCalc or other first-generation software (until Lotus started writing directly for the 8088).

  • If you read the LunaCorp History and Mission statement, these corporate bastards are planning to set up a robot infrastructure that will benefit corporate interests only, i.e. using the moon as a place to launch rockets as delivery vehicles or setting up some kind of ridiculous theme-park or Mattel tie-in with their robots...

    This is not about logo placement... What one should ask is why should we be allowing these few people with corporate interests to use the moon simply for profitable purposes... I mean, why spend money on space exploration anyway, when there are so many CORPORATE evils on this planet right now???!!!

  • Won't it look like if McDonalds... (Score:3)

    by Alex Belits ( 437 ) on Friday June 16, 2000 @02:11PM (#997374) Homepage
    sponsored a gourmet chefs contest?
  • Yeah!! The awesome TRS-80!!!

    ...programming in Color BASIC!

    ...saving programs and files in cassete tape!

    Memories from my childhood are returning fast!

  • It's near the very beginning, where the camera is pulling out from within the trash can in the Narrator's office. He also mentions the "Microsoft Galaxy." (If you have a chance to grab the DVD, do it; it's packed full of extras on a separate disk. Plus, the film rocks.)

    On a side note, while "Species II" was truly one of the worst movies of the '90s, it does open with a funny scene of a spaceship approaching Mars in preparation for the first landing n the planet....and as the ship moves across the screen we see that the side is completely covered in billboards and logos. Sadly, the film went waaaaaay downhill from there...but that's another story.

    Glad you're feeling better, BTW.

  • My local Taco place (Taco Johns) has stickers on their drive-up windows that says something like "Protected by Radio Shack Security". I always snicker to myself when I see that - I bet that strikes fear into the hearts of criminals.

  • No, you're right, it must be senility setting in. It was 64 columns, 128x48 graphics. :)

    On the other hand, the Model II did have cassette backup. I have vivid memories of how much it sucked.


    --

  • What does Radio Shack have to do with this? Is this a publicity stunt for them? I have the feeling that people find it easier every day to do something like that.
  • Oooh, Robot Wars [robotwars.com] on the Moon, now that I gotta see! It can be no holds barred in weapon types too, as there wont be any spectators closer then a light second or so. I'm building mine with a MAD device too, so the best anyone could do against me is a draw!

  • Re:Radio Shack? (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    perhaps you should read the article?

    Under terms of the deal, the giant electronics retailer will provide LunaCorp with money to finance the expedition. In return, RadioShack gets to place the company logo on the rover as well as in several terrestrial venues.

    You're a lazy whore.
  • What's wrong with Radio Shack sponsoring a trip to the Moon? Why nothing at all, you lousy communists out there. And there's nothing wrong with using lasers to turn the Moon into a giant Pepsi symbol, either. That's just good old fashioned capitalism, you hippies! If you ever worked a day in your life, you'd know that! And if Coca-Cola wants to distribute star maps to schools where Ursa Major is now labelled as "The Coca-Cola Polar Bear", well, we've got kids looking at the stars, don't we? Isn't that good enough, you lousy stinking beatniks?

    Up with capitalism! Down with beatniks!

    I vote that the National Academy of Arts and Sciences auctions off the right to the names in the Periodic Table of the Elements. What's the difference whether it's called Mercury or AOLium? Not a lick, you heathens. No difference at all.

    Get with the program, or get the hell out of the way. Understand?
  • It's a cool idea, and nice to see RadioShack trying to stay up, which isn't always like them. But it bugs me a little in the article how RadioShack wants the PR for it. They will get it I guess, but I don't think NASA should turn their missions into advertising.

  • What a waste of time. In my college, you could get a LOT of CH3CH2OH-seeking robots with no effort or expense!
  • This bestoes me with alot of confidence...last time I walked into a Radio Shack I asked the guy behind the desk for a set of RCA jacks. And he had no frikken clue what I was talking about...
    I wouldn't be surprised if this thing fell apart trying to take off.
  • Powered by the Zilog Z-80!
  • Yeah. I had the same experience asking for a weatherproof sealed two pole DPST toggle rated for at least 30A at 12V.

    I had to spend twenty-five minutes explaining what I meant, but it got it..
  • would they use any parts from radio shack?

    they shouldn't forget to give radio shack their zip code, phone number, and they probably should join the battery of the month club.

  • There's room on the moon for both public and commercial interests.

    If you read the LunaCorp History and Mission statement, these corporate bastards are planning to set up a robot infrastructure that will benefit corporate interests only, i.e. using the moon as a place to launch rockets as delivery vehicles or setting up some kind of ridiculous theme-park or Mattel tie-in with their robots...

    Why would this only benefit corporate interests? Personally, I'd be taxing the hell out of them in the process. The government can make a buck on this, which will hopefully be put back into space research.

    This is not about logo placement... What one should ask is why should we be allowing these few people with corporate interests to use the moon simply for profitable purposes... I mean, why spend money on space exploration anyway, when there are so many CORPORATE evils on this planet right now???!!!

    Yeah, and while we're at it, why feed the starving children in zimbabwe when there's starving children here now?

    There are any number of reasons to get a firmer toehold in space. Some of them are humanitarian, like the research that can be done that way. I expect that in order to create good PR, companies with orbital whatevers will be glad to provide some space on their platforms or craft or what have you for scientific exploration. Sure, it's $10,000 a pound, so you want to make it nice and light, but that makes them look like heroes.

    Some other reasons are purely commercial, but will result in a better life for many of us, kind of like Teflon, Velcro, Bakelite, or Kevlar, let alone Nylon. All of those inventions (which coincidentally are all plastics, unless I forget my teflon history) were created solely for profit, but they enrich our lives. Velcro ended up being quite handy around hospitals. Who even knows how many lives kevlar armor has saved? Bakelite has the characteristic of being non-flammable, which has been pretty handy for electrical devices for quite some time now.

    By extension, there are some things which should be easier to do in space, like Foam Steel, which I'm looking forward to. I don't much care if the government or a private interest makes those things happen, so long as someone does. Having the materials be available for a high price is better than not having them available at all.

  • you're giving them a lot of credit... I think it'll fall apart....in workshop that they build it in

  • I'm All For It (Score:3)

    by tealover ( 187148 ) on Friday June 16, 2000 @12:16PM (#997391)
    Since most Americans have an aversion to giving up any up their "hard earned" pay to taxes, this may be the wave of the futuer. Let corporations fund these missions so they can deduct it from as a tax write-off. I'm all for anything that advances space research, just as long as the companies backing the missions don't try to attach any strings to the missions.
  • Sure, RadioShack, we'll sell you advertising space on our lunar lander. Just give us your name, address, telephone number, and zip code......
  • It's only a matter of time before a ton of companies start commercially exploring space...
  • Yes. I have no doubt that your local Radio Shack clerk will be building this thing. I also have no doubt that they'll be using the same crappy parts they stock in their store.

    People are going to read this story and post things like, "Radio Shack sucks. I know, because I've been in their store." My guess is that Radio Shack's role in this endeavor is limited to dumping money on it.

  • This isn't as bad as one might think (Score:5)

    by DranoK ( 18790 ) on Friday June 16, 2000 @12:18PM (#997395)
    Please read the articles if you haven't already.

    This isn't like the sole purpose of this "monstrosity" it to gain advertising for Radio Shack. Radio Shack is helping fund a commercial company for their projects. When you think about it, this is a good idea.

    Commercialization, unfortunately, is one of the best ways to continue funding space research etc. Personally, I think some of the major advances in space technology will come from the commercial sector, as they have the potential to have a very large budget (as well as actually make money off their work some day). Radio Shack is donating a lot of money for this company's research. Why is it so wrong they want to be acknowledged for that? Why would Radio Shack fund them if they can't put their logo on it? Or brag about being it's sponsor? No corporate sponsor is going to donate a large sum of money totally anonymously.

    And if logos are so bad anyhow, why don't we get rid of all the NASA ones on the space shuttles? God forbid that they advertise... ;)

    Peace,
    DranoK



    That is not dead which can eternal lie, and with strange eons even death may die.
  • *Joking*

    President "I am here tonight addressing America over the resent launch of our new Millitary Defense Satalite. Due to the massive costs of the system, we had many large companies and other countries help in the funding. Iraq, K-mart, and RadioShack all volunteered to help build it also. Iraq's leading terrorist group designed the OS and software to be run. K-Mart employees along with RadioShack worked together in mexico to build the satalite. We, the government, feel we have made good choices and have a strong product. There will be regulary scheduled mission that we will check it out and to replace batteries.

    Reporter: Mr. president!

    President: Yes?

    Reporter Wouldn't it have been cheaper to not use those companies since you'll have to go to space more often now?

    President: DOH!

  • Did anyone see this on the "Apollo Grand tour" page:
    This also means they [the rover] can chat about their situation with people on the home planet. The rovers will be able to handle dozens of telephone and e-mail conversations simultaneously -- providing a brand-new way for you to be part of the exploration adventure.
    I hope they make sure scripting isn't allowed before they send it up. I can see the headlines

    Email Virus strikes rover! - It just sits there and now only responds with 'I Love You' ...

  • Since no one else has mentioned this, why did they choose this company instead of the Artemis project, which has the same goal and has been around far longer?
  • Seems like "space mission" is now one of the options available on the "500 Electronic Projects" lab.

    "Wilson! WHY IS THE SHUTTLE LAUNCH NOT ON SCHEDULE?"

    "We've lost all the little white wires on the shag rug in the living room, sir."

    Or worse, try going into Radio Shack for an ablation shield and having one of the three things happen...

    1) They don't have any parts, but would you like to buy a "Genesis" brand Stereo for twice the cost of other brands? (conspiratorial wink) They've got Sony guts, you know".

    2) Mall security shows up and demands to know which hacker group you're with. Radio Shack throws the FBI switch in a panic, worried that they've got another Mitnick on their hands.

    3) The damn thing takes AA batteries, and that's the only bin of batteries that's empty.

  • Early this week RadioShack has announced plans to open five new locations on the moon. The new stores will be selling components to astronauts needing repairs and any visiting extra-terrestrial customers.

    RadioShack feels that a location on the moon will better serve interplanetary visitors who may not wish to expend the resources involved in making an earth landing.

    A RadioShack spokesman was quoted as saying, "Our interplanetary customers are having too difficult a time both in getting through customs and in finding a suitable method of payment. These new locations will more easily serve these customers by offering our products for purchase in several of the galactic currencies."

    The spokesman was unable to comment if Elvis really went home, or if Shaq was really from another planet.

    --
    Eric is chisled like a Greek Godess

  • On second thought, even the mod 1 had 64 column screen. I'm fairly sure that NONE of the Radio Shack computers ever had a 40 column screen. 64, 32, 80. Never 40.
  • Who cares whether they attach 'strings' or not! As long as the technology is being developed by companies in the US, then it will benefit the US.

    Frankly, I'm not impressed with the way congress has handled funding for NASA.

    If mainstream corporate America started dumping money into the space program, it would only help those of us who hope to someday be able to go up in space, even if its as a tourist.


  • And if logos are so bad anyhow, why don't we get rid of all the NASA ones on the space shuttles? God forbid that they advertise... ;)

    I caught the smiley at the end, but still, what NASA does is far from advertising. Putting their logos on shuttles (and pretty much everything they send up) is more public relations. They are trying use this to increase public awareness of their existence; without public awareness and support, NASA would cease to exist. Corporations, on the other hand, are trying to push their image just to sell their product to consumers and draw an even bigger profit.
  • No, NO, NO!

    It an Eludium Q-36 Explosive Space Modula-TOR!

    I'f you're going to make a joke, get it right!
  • Maybe it's just my accident-affected memory, but I don't remember anything about Planet Starbucks from Fight Club.,, which I thought was an excellent film, BTW. :)

    Thanks,
  • ...at least Microsoft isn't sponsoring the mission...

    I'm actually surprised that Microsoft hasn't gone and sponsored some large undertakings like this just to boost their public image. Maybe it wouldn't be a lunar rover, but what if they decided to "donate" the computer systems for the space station? In exchange for some giant Microsoft logos on the side of it, we'd have a space station running one of the most stable operating systems known to man!
  • From the website! Since a lunar day-night cycle runs for 29.53 Earth days, robots must be built to survive two weeks of worse-than-Arctic-cold followed by two weeks of boiling-water heat. It is the long periods in each extreme that make it hard to find ways to survive - batteries for heaters, for example, must keep working without a solar recharge for more than 14 days straight. !!!! Don't they know there is no day or night on the moon, the same side always is towards the sun!!! (Except I guess if you call a lunar eclipse night!) Increadible!!!!!
  • You mean, it's all "Moon robots for Hitler"? ;-)
  • I'd also argue that's why the largely inferior PC platform beat out the Mac in the marketplace: it ran on commodity hardware and didn't have a single monolithic company stifling innovation as with Apple.

    Also, the PC was created by IBM, the big bad wolf before Microsoft came along. Apple was created by Jobs and Woz, a pair of nice college dropouts, while IBM has been ruled by MBAs even before Business Administration schools issued Masters degrees. Yet, Apple computers have an expensive closed technology, while the PC is the closest thing we have today to "Free (as speech) Hardware".

    When the IBM management thought they had made a mistake in opening their technology, they tried to go back to a closed specification, with the PS/2 series. That was their real mistake: IBM never fully recovered from the PS/2 fiasco. It seems that they have finally learned their lesson now and are supporting Linux for all their products, even the 390 series mainframes.

  • ...I want sponsorship by "The Honeymooners." (Yes, I'm old.)

    T minus three
    T minus two
    T minus one
    To the moon, Alice!

  • I saw this story on Yahoo(!) News this afternoon and thought it looked like /. material, but as I was copy-and-pasting the URL I noticed it was 20000616.... double doh! Just now I realize that this month is 06. I though it was from 30 days ago! Poo on me! There goes my last chance at a submission ;).

    Anyhoo, RadioShack is most definately involved in this just for the PR that it will create, and their expected profit - they plan on selling games based on the mission for $35 a pop, sez Yahoo. It's the same marketing philosophy that put Pizza Hut's logo on the side of a Russian rocket [slashdot.org] less than a year ago. At least now they've gotten a business plan that's worth more than just mindshare - imagine every child under 13 years old bugging their parents for the Moon Mission Game or some crap... mad dough to be made.

    At least this time, if they actually do got to the moon, I'll feel it's been worthwhile.

  • Don't worry, they'll probably listen to Reason.

  • Which is not to say that they've opened the specs for the 390's; they're only supporting a free OS on it. The 390 is still as closed as an Apple. =)

    I agree with the grandparent of this post that I've underestimated the contributions of corporations. Specifically, AT&T did a lot of wonderful things between '75 and '85 with Unix, C, and C++. They knew then that some degree of openness was good. Sun could learn a lot from them with regards to Java.

    I believe MIT and SAIL were the founding institutions for GUIs. The fact that corporations have made such things far more useful to the mainstream is not surprising. This is a fine process: universities and the government invent a technology, put it in the public domain, and corporations polish and market it. But since firms did not invent most of the technology, there is competition and wonderfulness. If Netscape had invented HTML, or Apple could patent the very idea of a GUI? The computer world would be in deeper shit than it is now.


  • I loved that game, what were the three sectors of TriOptimum? Military, Science, Consumer? :)
  • There is no "good" or "evil" involved in capatilism. There isn't even "legal" and "illegal" anymore. All that's left is cost/benifit analysis and profit. And any company that decides against something for any reason other than a bad cost/benifit analysis is going to get sued for not maximizing profits, and therefore, "harming shareholder interests"
  • Whoops. First space tourist [bbc.co.uk] just announced today. Unfortunately, he's riding up to Mir rather than a commercially-launched device -- but Mir is becoming a commercial enterprise anyway.
  • In a sensational turn of events the International Olympic Committee yesterday unveiled its plans to send an unmanned expedition to Saturn. During a press conference Huan Antonio Samaranch, President of the International Olympic Committee, was quoted as saying:

    We are delighted to have this opportunity to forever link in the mind of the public the famous rings of Saturn with the Olympic rings. Our scientists are currently working on the problem of making Saturn's rings intertwine in the Olympic pattern in a way that would be visible on Earth through an ordinary binocular. I think this is one of the most exciting projects the International Olympic Committe has ever embarked on.

    The expedition is currently palnned for early 2004. Both NASA and the European Space Agency expressed their interest in participating in the project.

  • The 390 is still as closed as an Apple. =)

    And much more closed than a 360, which came with circuit (discrete transistors!) schematic diagrams and operating system source code.

    I'm all for openness in technology, but I do think patents have a fundamental reason to exist. If you are the first to come up with a creative idea, you have the right to reap its benefits. Only thing is, the US Patent Office seems to be ready to concede patents based on the size of the soliciting organization, instead of original thinking.

    How about patents for living beings? They have existed for thousands of years, but the USPO gives patents to companies who send researchers to interview people (read indians, natives, aborigines, etc) who have been using those plants or animals for centuries. Where is the justice in granting a patent to someone whose only job was asking the tribe shaman about a herb and forwarding the answer to the USPO?

  • I'd feel sorry for RadioShack, if I didn't hate them as a company. This website doesn't give me much confidence in LunaCorp's rover-building abilities. I smell extortion (or at least fraud), and judging by the quality of their products, RadioShack is stupid enough to deserve it.

    For example, the page "comparing Mars Polar Lander to IceBreaker" has a picture of Mars Pathfinder on the surface of Mars (anyone who follows NASA, even just through NY Times headlines, knows MPL crashed a long time ago, and that the one that landed was Pathfinder), and would have an artist's rendition of their mission if they'd got the URL of the graphic right. And no text whatsoever to redeem them. Ouch.

    Hmmmm... Just looked at their site again... I wouldn't be surprised if the entire company was just one artist that made all those renditions. There's hardly a complete sentence anywhere. Their only products seem to be educational CD-ROMs - mebbe Radio Shack execs saw this, got confused, and offered the guy millions of dollars if he'd build them a space probe. The projected cost of the mission is $130mill.
    (I really don't like RadioShack, in case you haven't noticed.)

    I just looked at more pages of this site, and realized that Slashdot (and especially the guy who suggested that this be posted) should be very, very embarrassed. Good reference to Fight Club, tho. Just saw it. Great movie.

    Ramble on!
    mfspr r3, pc / lvxl v0, 0, r3 / li r0, 16 / stvxl v0, r3, r0
  • Well, yes and no. Corporate sponsorship does seem to be the 'wave of the future', and corporations can generally do these sorts of things more cheaply than NASA. (And of course Radio Shack won't be using their own humiliating parts or employees in the rover, any more than my college cafeteria caters our fund-raising dinners.) However, as other posts have noted, there are often more strings attached than when the government initiates the research.

    When are congress[wo]men going to remeber their history?! Everything is being privatized now, as a continuing legacy of Reagan's "dismantling government" platform. Certainly, government is being dismantled, but somehow it isn't getting any cheaper.

    There are two ways to get research done: let a monopolistic behemoth bribe some academicians to work for them, so that the corporation can patent their ideas. Bell Labs, Microsoft Research, IBM. This is very expensive, because first you pay for the research when you buy their products, then you really pay for their research when you buy the exorbitantly priced patented product. The other way to get research done is to pay a smart kid to go to grad school. This is how all but a handful of the major advances in CS have been accomplished, and why they were all public domain until the patent-craze started a few years ago. (The other reason most advances are public domain is that patented ideas are quickly superceded by public ones.)

    So, in the short term, I can see why it's tempting to think that Radio Shack and Lunacorp going to the moon is a good thing. We all want to see the space program continue, but NASA is so underfunded that all they can do is send the shuttle up and down, up and down.... But most of the technological advances that make 2000 different from 1960 were invented or improved by the space program--rubber, plastic, microprocessors, tennis shoes, etc.

    I doubt these bozos are going to come up with anything comparable to the inventions of the space-race geniuses, but some corporation like them could. And unless the government starts filling in the gaps Reagan left behind, the next great advances will all be patented by corporations which could get unimaginably big and powerful, and patents will become as effectively permanent as copyrights today.

    Believe me, this is not the solution. The next ARPANET will not be invented by RadioShack.

  • Daddy, I want a Radio Shack moon lander for Christmas!!!

    Next thing you know, you will be able to buy weapons grade plutonium from Home Depot. (They already sell everything else you need to make a bomb.)

    What's next in the joint venture of the suits and the whitecoats?

  • That was my very first computer, bought by my dad in 1980 (model II). 16K of memory (upgraded from 4K), 2Mhz Z80 (no 8080s, baby), 40x16 char screen, upper case characters only (my dad was too cheap to buy the upgrade), 80x48 pixel B&W graphics, Incredibly unreliable cassette-tape storage. We later got the 5 1/4" floppy drive; 135K/floppy, about 80K left with bootable TRSDOS on it. Even back in those days, it seemed pretty skimpy though. :)

    Trivia 1: A one-second time delay loop in BASIC was "for i = 0 to 500:next i"

    Trivia 2: The command line editor used 'vi' keys. Who says Bill Gates didn't know anything about Unix?


    --

  • Re:This isn't as bad as one might think (Score:2)

    by Anonymous Coward
    And if logos are so bad anyhow, why don't we
    get rid of all the NASA ones on the space
    shuttles? God forbid that they advertise... ;)

    Good Lord! I can just see the cover-up when the Grays pull the space shuttle and impound it for operating unmarked and without plates. (Are you *trying* to feed the lunatic fringes?)

    Do you have *any* idea where their tow yard is? You think making the long haul out to Encino to pick up your towed car is a bear! And the bulbulous tow-being behind the security grille. The human mind simply can't handle that yet.

    On the flip side, they replaced the junkyard dog with a species that's not unlike the girls you see in anime -- if you don't mind front *and* back breasts. (I don't... rather convenient, actually)

    Man, I gotta get out *LESS*
  • Where does Jamie get this prejudice from? Is a brand label from a company I know to be fairly ethical so bad, especially considering that this lander may not be possible without them. Live video from the moon, wow this is very exciting.

    Horrendus? The lander is just about the finest looking space vehicle I've seen in a long time, especially with its retro 50's styling.

    The less people who think space if just for elitist academics and big government the better off we are. Most /. readers have no patience with crass-commercialism like the inflated prices of cheap goods *cough* Stabucks, but this is a venture that will be beneficial to consumers and has nothing to do with shameless marketing and shoddy products, they aren't planning on projecting commercials down to Earth.

    Whatver lands on the moon will have some symbol on it, be it a NASA globe or a radioshack R, just because MS is evil doesn't mean you should be projecting your ignorant prejudice on this product.

  • I caught the smiley at the end, but still, what NASA does is far from advertising. Putting their logos on shuttles (and pretty much everything they send up) is more public relations. They are trying use this to increase public awareness of their existence; without public awareness and support, NASA would cease to exist. Corporations, on the other hand, are trying to push their image just to sell their product to consumers and draw an even bigger profit.

    OK...let me see if I've got this straight.

    When NASA puts logos on stuff, it's "public relations" designed to increase public awareness of NASA, so that they get money from the public indirectly through taxes and continue to exist, and that's GOOD.

    When a corporation puts logos on stuff, it's "advertising" designed to push public awareness of their image, so that they get money from the public by selling their product to consumers in exchange for profits, enabling them to continue to exist, and that's BAD.

    I'm so glad you pointed out that clear dichotomy between "public relations" and "advertising".

  • Fine by me. (Score:4)

    by roystgnr ( 4015 ) <`gro.srengots' `ta' `yor'> on Friday June 16, 2000 @03:48PM (#997440) Homepage
    Let corporations have the moon; there isn't a government on Earth that seems to want anything to do with it. You'd think polar ice and martian microbes would be enough to spark a little more public interest, but I suppose everybody's much more worried this year about how to save the Ponzi Security system.

    What are you afraid of? Are Radio Shack sponsored rovers going to cause traffic problems between our thriving lunar cities? Are their communications frequencies overlapping important bands that the NASA Lunar Observatory uses? Are their rocket landings going to disturb the aluminum refineries and the ice mining operations?

    I know, I know, it's a corporation on the moon, so it must be a horrible thing for humanity. I just happen to think having nobody on the moon, three decades after Apollo, is worse.

    So I hope they get all the financing they need, send as many rockets as they want up there, and bring back video from any place they can drive a rover. I particularly hope they drive by all the old Apollo sites; maybe seeing an overturned American flag through the eyes of a Radio Shack toy will wake up a few people.
  • They have cheap components for just about everything

    Including night-vision goggles and Minuteman guidance systems.

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