

Startup Idea: Draw usr specified art on moon using teleoperated robot - Sudarshan
http://sudarshan.posterous.com/startup-idea-moonscribe-draw-user-specified-a

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audionerd
In 2009, David Kent Jones proposed “shadow shaping” / “shadow farming”
technology, in which robots would alter the moon’s surface in such a way that
shadows from sunlight on the moon would form company logo’s and advertising
messages.

This method, however, was clearly banned by 2005 legislature on “obtrusive
space advertising” (see: 49 U.S.C. 70109a) and potentially violates the
“Agreement Governing the Activities of States on the Moon and Other Celestial
Bodies” (that prohibits “disruption of the existing balance of its
environment”).

The Moon Treaty of 1979 specifically bans “altering the environment of
celestial bodies”

To advertise on the Moon, its environment would have to remain unharmed.

~~~
hugh3
_The Moon Treaty of 1979 specifically bans “altering the environment of
celestial bodies”_

But in a legal sense, how am I, a private individual, bound by the Moon Treaty
of 1979?

If I did choose to go and carve my name into the Moon, who would punish me?
Unless the United States (or whatever country I happen to be in) followed up
the signing of the Moon Treaty by the passing of a law which prohibits
citizens from carving their name into the moon, there's nothing they can
charge me with, right?

edit: Actually now I come to look it up
(<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moon_Treaty>) the Moon Treaty wasn't even
signed by the United States. In fact, it was signed by only thirteen
countries, none of which has the capabilities of getting anywhere near the
moon.

~~~
audionerd
Yes, the Moon Treaty was never ratified by the US. I think it's worth noting
to show both the historical precedent of respect for the preservation of the
Moon's environment, and that such respect is widespread throughout the world.

~~~
audionerd
I would disagree with the statement "nobody can afford to burn a huge logo
onto the Moon". If the only constraint is who can "afford" it, the advertising
world has some pretty deep pockets.

~~~
hugh3
How would you do it, exactly? Bear in mind that any logo visible on the Moon
from Earth would have to be roughly the size of... oh, say, the United States.

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dazzawazza
I for one would lobby my government to stop this from happening. When I look
in to the infinite wonder of space I don't want to see a fucking coke logo
slowly going by.

To quote from Sagan's The Dragons of Eden where he speculates on the Evolution
of Human Intelligence:

"A typical example of the occasional resistance mustered by intuitive thinking
against the clear conclusions of analytical thinking is D.H. Lawrence's
opinion of the nature of the moon: "It's no use telling me it's a dead rock in
the sky! I know it's not." Indeed the moon is more than a dead rock in the
sky. It is beautiful, it has romantic associations..."

~~~
Sudarshan
I understand and appreciate your sentiments. America and Australia would have
been a lot more "beautiful" without the European settlers ruining it.

But in a strange way mankind needs to move "forward" "whatever" that means. We
need to colonize the Solar system, then the galaxy and then spread to the
other galaxies.

Governments prefer to fight religious wars by spending orders of magnitude
more than the NASA budget, because it is easier to garner votes with war. It
appears as if free enterprise is the only force that will take man beyond the
gravity well of this planet.

It is natural to dislike crass advertising. But we should remember that even
Google is just an advertising company. Without Google we would have been worse
off. Yes worse off even without SEO, SEM and so on.

The situation is not black and white. Formula 1 racers are covered in Ads. But
we still watch the games and enjoy them too. The moon is our common heritage.
We cannot let it turn into an eyesore. But it will some day be mined, some
day, there will a number of ads, whether you or I or another person objects to
it will hardly matter. What we can do is strike a balance between growth and
beauty.

It will no longer be as beautiful as it was. But as a civilization we will be
better off. If you consider we are better off today than in the stone age.
That itself is subjective. But this world belongs to 6.5 billion people. It is
for them to decide quality of life v/s beauty by abstaining from exploitation.

We have taken steps like having sanctuaries, of leaving Antarctica alone and
so on... Maybe we will do something similar to the moon as well. Maybe no
development will be permitted on the visible side of the moon at all. It does
not matter. Maybe no structure larger than the limit of visual acuity will be
permitted.

Free enterprise abiding by the laws we give to ourselves has to take us beyond
the shackles of this planet. Let us be pragmatic. Every penny that the Space
industry will make will take us off this planet... not in hundreds... not in
millions... but in billions...

~~~
hugh3
_America and Australia would have been a lot more "beautiful" without the
European settlers ruining it._

If we're going to play that game, then Australia would have been a helluva lot
more beautiful if the Aborigines hadn't got to it either. As soon as they
showed up they killed off most of the awesomest wildlife (goodbye, Diprotodon)
and burned a helluva lot of the forests down.

~~~
Sudarshan
sure...

I would go onto say we should not have not moved out of Africa at all.

Most people would agree that we humans somehow end up making places less
beautiful by own standards by inhabiting them and exploiting them.

But we NEED to do it. We can just ensure that we restrain ourselves from
crossing a commonly accepted limit. I had never suggested turning moon into a
billboard in the sky.

Think of it more like rock painting made by a caveman. in certain restricted
parts of the moon.

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mikecane
Hmph. Ten years after it occurred to me, someone else has this idea in their
head. At the time, Microsoft was dominant and branching into everything. I
figured they'd deploy microrobots on the Moon that people could drive around
for a fee. I called it Microsoft Moon.
[http://mikecane.wordpress.com/2007/09/13/so-no-microsoft-
moo...](http://mikecane.wordpress.com/2007/09/13/so-no-microsoft-moon-after-
all/)

~~~
code_duck
Microsoft? Why would you have (even in jest!) thought Microsoft might do
anything of the sort? Someone else would have to do it successfully first,
then they'd copy their business model.

~~~
mikecane
This was before Google even existed. It really was a vastly different world
when Microsoft seemed like a juggernaut getting into everything. And I think
right around then they had created the precursor to what everyone now thinks
of as just Google Earth. MS had something like it first -- I forget its name,
though.

~~~
code_duck
Sure, I remember that too. I guess MS did seemed to headed in a stellar
direction circa 1996 or 97. To me, they lost their shine as the internet
picked up steam... I'd say 92-96 was the end of the golden age of the desktop
computer as envisioned in the 80s. Just three years later, everything was
dramatically different in a way only the savviest people would have expected
in 1990.

------
Sudarshan
The comments on HN have made me wiser. I have decided to abandon this idea
altogether. Sorry for wasting ur time. Let me explore some more constructive
ideas...

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pnathan
Yeah, uh, sounds a lot like like "hay, dudez, let's use the moon as a restroom
wall. lol!"

I mean, I know we're moving towards cyberpunk dystopia, but, come _on_ , can
we not have this kind of poop being floated?

~~~
Sudarshan
You bring up a very important aspect of quality control. i.e. How to prevent
it from turning into a restroom wall. Of course it will go through an
editorial process.

Something magical has prevented HN from turning into a rest room wall when
many others have failed. "Processes" and communities can make that magic
happen. Anyway as I said elsewhere I have abandoned the idea :).

I love the community here... Validating an idea can get over in a few hours
especially if the decision is to toss it away...

~~~
pnathan
Yeah, HN has a pretty narrow focus and has a conscious effort to maintain its
quality.

OTOH, reddit, digg, 4chan, pretty much every newspaper with comments - they
all turn into hives of idiocy and depravity really quick (although 4chan might
have simply started there. :X)

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rwmj
There's a Robert Heinlein book where having a logo on the moon is postulated.
Anyone remember what that was called? Anyway, this is no way a new idea, and
it's a terrible idea too.

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edge17
_From the Lunar X prize teams we know that it nearly fits within a 30 million
budget._

how so? from the lunar x teams I know, it is _exactly_ the opposite.

~~~
Sudarshan
Well not that it fits exactly, but that is the order of magnitude of the
expense. At least many videos of the glxp are saying so...

But hey only the winner gets to keep the cash. They are in it for the learning
so that they can become part of the industry.

~~~
edge17
i think the cost of a booster is roughly 30m at best :)

~~~
Sudarshan
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceX#Launcher_versions>

These are GTO numbers... but the bots r tiny in Kgs I guess...

The glxp teams share the rockets i guess... The robots must be cheap at least
in terms of materials used... in relative magnitude to the launch... I could
be wrong. Engineering the bots does not get paid apart from the learnings and
future opportunities...

