Martian 'Happy Face' Crater

Astroturtle writes "The two pictures shown here are taken from the same daily global image mosaic (the only difference is that each was processed slightly differently). The pictures show Galle Crater, informally known as 'Happy Face,' as it appeared in early southern winter."

They're playin' us!

[Randolpho]

Those martians are playin' with us! First they do the face, and we look closer and it's just a dune. Now they're doin the happy face.

I tell ya, they're laughin' at us, right now!!!!1!!

<dons foil helmet>

Re:They're playin' us!

[Anonymous Coward]

Martians? It's those folks at NASA!
First they pulled the moon-landing hoax, and now they're adding these touches to faked photographs in order to laugh at the general public's stupidity.

Re:They're playin' us!

[uncoveror]

For more info about those nutty Martians, or Zhti Ti Kofft as they call themselves, check out these links at uncoveror.com http://www.uncoveror.com/zhtitikofft.htm http://www.uncoveror.com/mars2.htm http://www.uncoveror.com/martians.htm

Re:They're playin' us!

[redheaded_stepchild]

Are those mouse ears on that image? ACK! The Disney-fication of Mars has already begun! Run little green men, run!

Re:They're playin' us!

[Bob McCown]

For those of you with Lynx, the photograph looks like this:

:)

Only rotated 90 degrees.

You're welcome.

What they didn't disclose...

[stefanlasiewski]

What they didn't disclose is that the Happy Face was purposely built over 20,000 years ago by 13-year old Martian OMIMers (Olympus Mons Online Instant Messenger), and that about 50 miles southwest of the giant happy face are 2-kilometer high pyramids arranged in a pattern that spells "LOL , BRB!"

Wal*Mars

[AtariAmarok]

The happy face logo is now seen on the Red Planet? What next? Falling prices on falling stars?

"Wal-Mars. Always low gravity. Always."

Hey!! Is that CowboyNeal?!?!?

[PateraSilk]

It's him, I swear!

Martians Identified!

[Asprin]

Let's see,

Big, round head....
Tiny little dot eyes....
No nose to speak of....

Holy crap! The Martians look like Charlie Brown!

Microsoft on Mars

[Anonymous Coward]

"Big, round head Tiny little dot eyes
No nose to speak of.... The Martians look like Charlie Brown!"

Heck no. That's Steve Ballmer!

Strata

[Bonker]

A while back, Terry Pratchett wrote a book called 'Strata' in which the main plot premise was that Humans were terraforming the entire galaxy planet by planet, leaving 'history' inside those planets in the form of fake fossils and layers of rock. Occasionally, a 'prank' would slip through like the boot-prints in the sediment-strata or a digitial watch embedded in a seam of coal.

They must be watching us...

[bill_mcgonigle]

...and revising their pranks based on pop culture, because the 'universally recognized' smiley face wasn't actually invented until 1963 [straightdope.com].

Re:They must be watching us...

[fstanchina]

Yes... on Earth. Maybe "they" were using smileys when the dinosaurs still ruled.

For all we know

[Tuxinatorium]

For all we know, in an alien society, that kind of expression might mean, "I'm going to kill you all, motherfuckers!!!"

D'ho!!!

[Embedded Geek]

Well, I just blew a mod point - had meant to MOD it "underrated" but clicked wrong. Fortunately, this reply will delete the mod. Apologies...

Dr. Manhattan

[the darn]

must have cleaned up the wreck his flying glass doohicky left near the face's right eye... Soory, I'm in the middle of re-reading The Watchmen...again...

As seen in Alan Moore's "Watchmen"

[Doctor Fishboy]

The Happy Face motif is seen all throught the graphic novel/comic book "Watchmen" written by Alan Moore. One scene, set on Mars, has the reader's point of view pull back from a Martian crater to reveal a Happy Face.... all it needs is the splash of blood on one corner near the left eye...

If you've not read "Watchmen", I'd highly recommend it, along with "From Hell". Both are excellent stories and the art in them is superb.

Dr Fish

Happy face

[ThumbSuck]

:-)

These articles just make your day better.

Damn, fast food restaraunts are everywhere!

[NanoGator]

When did Jack in the Box expand to Mars?

Old News...

[dnahelix]

This has been known about for quite some time! Astronomy Picture of the Day from more than 3 years ago [nasa.gov] featured this crater. Slashdot Science has been quite sucky lately!

Re:Old News... Old Crater

[EvilBastard]

'Happy Face' crater of Mars
NASA/JPL/MSSS RELEASE
Posted: May 17, 2003

It's a new picture of an old crater. The old one was offset at an angle, this one is finally "Face On" so to speak.

Sad thing is...

[Zakabog]

...some people will believe that aliens made this face a long time ago and some other stupid stuff. If aliens wanted to make something that looked like us, so we can see it and say "Wow aliens really do exist" they'd make somthing way more complex than a huge crater with two hills for eyes and a long hill for a mouth. They'd make something like Mount Rushmore, but on a much grander scale. Not a few natural things that form together to make a shape a 3 year old would draw. Or they'd leave giant complex geometric shapes. If they found a huge triangle, split down the middle to make two triangles, where one is split down the middle to make two more triangles, where one is split... till it forms a hundred small triangles or so, I'd deffinitely believe that aliens left some soft of symbols for us to find proving that they'd exist. Or maybe if there were crop circles on mars (dust circles?) I'd deffinitely believe. But until huge (complex, and not something that would occur naturally) alien symbols are left behind, on some planet other than our own, I'll keep believing that aliens exist but don't want to bother contacting us (or don't have the technology.)

for non-gui users:

[Sarin]

the happy face in the pictures look like this:

: )

(rotated 90 degrees clockwise)

clear evidence

[VanillaCoke420]

These images are clear evidence that Mars is inhabited by crazy good for nothing ravers with a soft spot for ecstacy. Very interesting. I think it's a good idea to further explore this planet.

Larger image anyone?

[thomis]

I have to thank the Martians for providing a perfect new wallpaper for my desktop... anyone able to point me to a bigger version of this?

Re:Larger image anyone?

[Midajo]

Here [msss.com] is the largest one I could Google. Somewhat flawed, unfortunately.

The one that NASA aint wancha ta see

[Tablizer]

The "real" happy face [geocities.com]

You can't fool me

[daves]

That's a crop circle!

that big a smiley :o

[vijaya_chandra]

how large'd the desktop be if that's just a smiley 8-|
(damn us; even gods have started chatting)

~ ~
printf("%s",getSigOfTheDay());

That's not the first face...

[blakespot]

Maybe this is not a SMILEY face [mindpirates.com], but it was first! And on the cover of Time magazine in the mid 80's.

blakespot

It's a sad face

[Dahlgil]

Everyone knows Martians have their eyes in their chin.