NASA should stop over-hyping their success

"ahh" writes:

There searching for past water evidence be examing rocks (pretty simple).

I keep wondering why they're looking for evidence of water, while they
admit that that there's ubiquitous visual evidence of it. What else
could explain the huge gully cutting through the wall of Guseve crater?

All rocks come from bedrock. It is better to get bedrock that is broken up
than bedrock that is one big sheet. The lander can only "shave" It can not
dig.

I'm not sure what difference you have in mind, but the rover can lock
5 wheels and spin the 6th down at least 30 cm.

They did imply they didn't want to go in the crater on Spirit.

When? I think you implied on landing earlier, which wasn't the
concern I heard raised. They were mostly worried about landing with
a high horizontal speed, which was apt to tear the bounce bags. That
it might also have also taken them into that crater would have been
bad luck probably if it was deep and didn't have a good way out,
unlike the lucky Opportunity.

One
reason is perfectly clear by looking at Opportunity pictures is all the fine
material collects in the hole. Dirt blows in but doesn't blow out.

Good point. I've been wondering why nobody has brought that up with
them. I'm thinking that all smallish craters on Mars should have in
them pretty-much the same wind-blown mixture of stuff from everywhere
else, based on my memories of the Viking-era dust storms. But it's an
unfamiliar environment; maybe there's just a small amount of very fine
stuff that blows around, giving a dense fog that slowly settles out to
a thin coat and sand-type drifts only shift back and forth fairly near
the area from which they originated (as on Earth, though the Sahara
blows at least as far as England).

They might also be happy that luck put them in a crater where they
would not dare to drive, as long as they think they can get out.

(Tom Merkle) writes:

If you don't have access to NASA TV and your only insight to the
briefings is what CNN shows, it gives you a really smarmy impression
and the self congratulation really does appear to be flowing, because
nobody at CNN understands what really is so exciting, so that's what
they show. But that's what CNN shows. I got a chance to watch a
webcast an hour ago and that was far different.

I've watched all the news briefings (and no CNN) and I found that just
after each landing the news briefing was considerably too self-
congratulatory, giving the impression that they though all the news
people came there to clap for them rather than to gather news. I can
tolerate the staged hugging (though most men didn't hug each other in
my formative years) in the NASA-TV "commentary" sessions, but I think
they should avoid thanking each other and their families in news
briefings. (I have no doubt that the "mission control" TV is staged
because I saw one of the bosses start some "spontaneous" applause as
an obvious response to some wispering in his ear from the TV floor
director, in a TV wide shot not aimed at them.) Especially before the
craft has barely begun it's real mission. But it's not a big deal,
and perhaps they deserve the praise from themselves to make up for the
lack of praise they should be getting from elsewhere. And it probably
doesn't hurt anything but some of the less geeky reporters who I
really don't care about anyway, as long as it doesn't impact badly on
their reporting, which it probably doesn't. Never mind.... I guess
I've been too empathetic with the reporters and not enough with the
MER people.

On Tue, 27 Jan 2004 07:34:59 GMT, (Gary W.
Swearingen) wrote:

(Tom Merkle) writes:

I've watched all the news briefings (and no CNN) and I found that just
after each landing the news briefing was considerably too self-
congratulatory, giving the impression that they though all the news
people came there to clap for them rather than to gather news. I can
tolerate the staged hugging (though most men didn't hug each other in
my formative years) in the NASA-TV "commentary" sessions, but I think
they should avoid thanking each other and their families in news
briefings. (I have no doubt that the "mission control" TV is staged
because I saw one of the bosses start some "spontaneous" applause as
an obvious response to some wispering in his ear from the TV floor
director, in a TV wide shot not aimed at them.)

Well...maybe it's not just CNN then. So I guess what's needed is maybe
a little discipline in media relations. It wouldn't take much. Just
one or two 20-30 min basic training sessions on how to conduct a press
briefing. They're smart. Just explain to them what to avoid and run
through it once and they'll get it.

I agree, there's a time and place for self-congratulations and over
effusive displays of pride and emotion. It's called the OSCARS. While
anyone can be happy about an event going right, it's the going into
the 'I'd like to thank my agent, and my lawyer, and my 4th grade math
teacher, and Jesus..' that gets really old.

Tom Merkle

On Tue, 27 Jan 2004 07:05:40 GMT, (Gary W.
Swearingen) wrote:

"ahh" writes:

There searching for past water evidence be examing rocks (pretty simple).

I keep wondering why they're looking for evidence of water, while they
admit that that there's ubiquitous visual evidence of it. What else
could explain the huge gully cutting through the wall of Guseve crater?

A lava flow according to them, but yes there is water everywhere. Does
not that ground look a touch wet to you?

Cardman
http://www.cardman.com
http://www.cardman.co.uk

"Gary W. Swearingen" wrote in message

briefings. (I have no doubt that the "mission control" TV is staged
because I saw one of the bosses start some "spontaneous" applause as
an obvious response to some wispering in his ear from the TV floor
director, in a TV wide shot not aimed at them.

That's how rumours and stories get started and spread. You have no idea who
the guys were, what was "whispered" by the "TV director", or why he was
clapping. Geez, give the assumptions and ridiculous suspicion a rest. You're
not being brainwashed.

Jon

Cardman wrote:

A lava flow according to them, but yes there is water everywhere. Does
not that ground look a touch wet to you?

No. BTW, liquid water cannot exist over almost all the Martian surface --
the pressure is too low. I believe that's the case at that location.

Paul

"Jon Berndt" writes:

That's how rumours and stories get started and spread. You have no idea who
the guys were, what was "whispered" by the "TV director", or why he was
clapping. Geez, give the assumptions and ridiculous suspicion a rest. You're
not being brainwashed.

Good of you to point that out, and I well-considered that before
sharing my conclusions. But I'm not worried about being brainwashed;
I thought everying knew their (and anyone's) celebrations were
affected by the presence of public cameras. I just thought it was
funny and sad evidence of the ineptitude of NASA PR. Here are more
details that might give slightly more credibility to my
interpretation:

The floor director was obviously that -- frequently seen scurrying
around and wispering to the on-air hostess and her guests, with that
typical ducking under the camera motion. The director scurried over
to the boss who had earlier been an on-air guest and was then standing
away from the hostess among the consoles. The rather minor event
which obviously prompted the whispering occurred just before the
whispering without any spontaneous applause which didn't come until
the whisperer scurried away from the boss (after only 1 or 2 seconds
of whispering) who then immediately roused his crew.

Stephen Souter wrote in message ...
In article ,
(Hobbs aka McDaniel) wrote:

Maybe part of the problem is just how they
communicate with the public. Their press conferences are geared up for
people with only a 7th or 8th grade education. It comforts that audience
to hear the kinds of stuff spouted at the press conference. Somebody
like you needs a higher level of info to think about.

Press briefings are geared towards those who are not specialists in the
field(s) in question. That includes those with university degrees in
other fields. Someone with a doctorate in medicine or physics or media
studies watching on NASA TV, for example, can be expected to have had
more than a 7th or 8th grade education, but that does not necessarily
mean they would not also be at sea if Squyres et al started spouting at
them the specialist jargon of the practicising geologist.

I picked 7th/8th grade because in the mainstream movie business that is
considered to be the understanding level of the majority of viewers
and it seems to me that NASA has added a lot of showbiz techniques to
their public presentations.

Those who want the more technical details will need to wait for the
scientific papers to be published,

-McDaniel

On Tue, 27 Jan 2004 12:57:41 +1100, Stephen Souter
wrote:

In article ,
(Hobbs aka McDaniel) wrote:


Those who want the more technical details will need to wait for the
scientific papers to be published,

What! You want us to have patience! This is the twenty first century
man! We got 24 hour new channels that display rover updates every two
hours!

Tom Merkle

It's the LAYERING of the rocks which is getting the scientists excited.....

http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2...ianiplanum.htm

" If the hematite occurs as a thin layer within a pile of layers, then it's
likely to have formed in a long-ago lake"