I wasn't aware the US owned the Moon or the rights to it...

It doesn't, and the Outer Space Treaty is very clear on that.

The weakness in this FAA scheme (if it is something they would actually implement, which I doubt) is that it would apply to US companies only. I would argue that the '67 OST already gives a right to non-interferance to your operations on a celestial body, and that the FAA does not have the power to grant more than that, except within a purely US context.

At the Europa day on the Hill last summer, I ran into a 90 yr old Harry Finger (the former head of NERVA) who remains absolutely convinced that this technology (which was ready for flight tests back in the Apollo period) is essential for human travel to the planets, and needs to be revived.

Looking at the delta-V requirements for a human Mars mission, I can't say I disagree with him.

IANAL, but I believe that the actual rights-holders would need to go to court to establish their rights, and, yes, if they won a judge could invalidate promises made by the other parties. Likewise, I believe a judge could declare an actual rights-holder incompetent, and invalidate their grant of rights. A last-minute deathbed grant of rights into the PD might be subject to that kind of attack, if the heirs thought it wasn't proper, or the dying author / composer was no longer competent.

Just because some article says something doesn't make it so. If you want to play this game, I would strongly recommend you get competent legal advice.

(As it happens, I have received legal advice in this area, and it sure didn't agree with what you said.)

IANAL, this is not legal advice, but I agree with your argument.

The only ways out I see would be if your heirs tried to convince a judge you were not legally competent to make the PD assignment at the time you made it (or, of course, if someone came along and said they also had some rights in the work in question, say by being co-creators). So, there would always in practice be a little risk, but after 35 years? That seems like a stretch.

Specifically, the PK post highlights that thanks to the way copyright termination works, even someone who puts their works into the public domain could pull them back out of the public domain after 35 years.

Really?

So, I should infer that all of those "irrevocable" open source licenses are meaningless, because the grantor of the rights could just change their minds? Somebody sure should let RMS know.

IANAL and all that, and this is for sure not legal advice, but when I have gotten such advice, it was always along the lines of, be careful what you place in the public domain, because you won't be able to change your mind. I am sure I would not want to go in front of a judge and say something along the lines of, "yes, I told people this was public domain, but they were silly to think I actually meant it."

The Hydrogen line is at 1420 MHz (AKA 21 cm). That long wavelength is why this dish can be made of high tech chicken wire, instead of having a solid surface.

Not that you would know it from the summary, but they have revived the dish, not the Satellite. They are receiving natural radio waves, nothing from TIROS.

So, they have shown that they can mount a receiver on an existing radio telescope, and receive radio waves.

That's cool and all, but not exactly newsworthy.

Since they always let the terrorist stuff through, so as not to tip their hand, when will the spammers start disguising their messages as jihadist cal to arms?

I would find such statements more convincing if I hadn't heard Marvin Minsky say almost exactly the same thing in 1975. And, yes, he was talking about all of this happening in the 1980's.

The problem isn't the machines, it's the people running the machines (and the people controlling those people). Journalists, willfully ignorant or otherwise, are so far down on the list they don't really matter.

So, Bitcoin wil be subject to volatility, like every other currency and precious metal in history, and that will cause troubles for the people who actually extract the stuff. Who (aside from anyone in the mining business) knew?

Maybe, in cases like this, the notion of a "jury of your peers" should be extended to include technical competence. In other words, instead of asking the prospective jurors about their views on the death penalty, they could ask about their knowledge of DNS or BGP.