Come on Up (to the ISS) You're the Next Contestant 120
Ender writes "The Voice of America and the NY times (Free registration, yetti, yatta ...) are running articles informing us that the Russian space Agency Rosaviakosmos has an agreement with Moscow to send a TV contest winner to the International Space Station. All contestants would train for space flight during the programs and this would show the audience how cosmonauts are trained prior to their space flight." Boy bands are ineligible.
Bob Barker (Score:2, Funny)
What happens when someone gets voted out? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:What happens when someone gets voted out? (Score:3, Funny)
ahh man life could not get sweeter!!!
Sweeter (Score:2)
dam (Score:2, Flamebait)
Any chance of crossover shows with other reality shows? Personally, it makes more sense to me that the winner should get to stay on earth.
Crossover shows? (Score:2)
Don't cross the memes (Score:2)
Crossing "talent search" and "big brother" shows seems to be popular in the UK (and elsewhere) right now - eg Fame Academy [bbc.co.uk] and Pop Rivals [popstarsonline.net]. Many people would agree with the sentiments expressed in this Guardian article [guardian.co.uk] though.
Oy.... (Score:5, Funny)
Space Suit... (Score:1)
Re:Oy.... (Score:2)
Re:Oy.... (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Oy.... (Score:2, Funny)
I guess it'll have to be doggie style then, where you can grab the young lady's hips. Some sort of elastic band round both bodies to put the bounce back perhaps.
Do they need research subjects ?
sex in orbit and why we need gravity (Score:4, Funny)
Up until people actually watch it. Take a minute to try and visualize sex in an environment where there's no "up" or "down" and where astronauts/cosmonauts actually have to be strapped to a wall in a sleeping bag in order to get a good night's rest.
This is approximately what would happen: they'd get naked. Some fawning over the appearance of zero-gee boobs and thingies. Oral sex to start things off, natch. The sixty-nine position is interestingly easy when you're both floating, but they're not watching where they're drifting, and the two partners keep banging their feet and backs into walls and boxes while they float through the compartment. Plus they have to hold each other's legs tightly the whole time, because there's no gravity to keep them pressed against each other.
Then they actually try intercourse, missionary position to start, and quickly discover the woman has to wrap her arms and legs around her partner to do anything more, because the least brush causes the two floating bodies to drift away from each other.
So they've got that worked out, but after a few minutes the woman's legs are getting tired from doing all the work. And the audience wants to see different positions, right? So the man tries to get on top -- no good, there's no "top" or "bottom" in space and he keeps pushing her hips away.
He tries doggy style. Same problem. He tries it again, this time holding her hips in a death grip, which kind of works except that her legs keep bouncing away from his, causing her torso to drift upward and away. So doggy style with his legs wrapped around hers again, except that makes it impossible for him to get any decent leverage.
The video camera focuses on her zero-gee boobs. It has to, there's nothing else interesting to watch. Finally it's determined that if she grabs ahold of two straps on one wall with her hands, wraps her ankles in another strap on the floor, she can keep herself at a kind of ninety-degree position so that he can take her from behind, albeit twisted ninety degrees to the left.
They finish the act in that position, too frustrated to try and figure out any others right now. The ratings have already plummeted anyhow, seeing as MTV offers more action in any given half-hour of programming than this.
Re:sex in orbit and why we need gravity (Score:3, Funny)
The most interesting part is spared in the parent article... the shot. This gives new possibilities. Not trying who can shoot it over the longest distance but rather trying to shoot in a way that keeps it airborne for the longest time period.
Boy, I AM dirty today...
Re:sex in orbit and why we need gravity (Score:1)
i have two words to contribute... (Score:2)
money... shot.
Sent to space (Score:5, Funny)
Also at CNN (Score:4, Informative)
How I imagine it. (Score:5, Funny)
A Boy Band star is "voted off" the space station and stuffed into an air lock.
Re:How I imagine it. (Score:1)
Well (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Well (Score:1)
As long as the contestants aren't a statistician, a mathematician and a different kind of mathematician.
Personally I don't mind what happens as long as they don't get sent to that planet of the apes. Wait a minute, that was earth.....
Re:Well (Score:2, Insightful)
If Survivor ISS will get more money into the space program im for it. Plus, tell me you wouldn't wanna see a porno filmed in zero g?
Re:Well (Score:2)
's about time, too! (Score:1)
Re:Well (Score:3, Insightful)
Degrading? NASA and its cronies have the bizarre idea that the only people who should go into space are those with the "right stuff" but what I see is a bunch of people playing with expensive toys and not producing anything that advances manned space exploration.
The people who deserve to go into space are anyone and everyone who can justify their place there economically. Whether that's a scientist doing product development, a tourist spending money earned on earth, an industrialist mining asteroids or a porn star shooting videos, all have a better claim on space than some astronaut who commutes to NEO and back just for the sake of it, on the taxpayer's dime.
Re:Well (Score:3, Interesting)
Well said.
My favourite (verbal, undocumented AFAIK) Buzz Aldrin quote:
"I never imagined that space exploration would mean parking cargo in low earth orbit"
So sure, if that's all we're going to do, let's do it for profit, not for knowlege. Jeezus, we know how to park cargo in orbit.
Further, if the trillions pumped into NASA really can't be made to pay off, then we should do some pretty harsh assessment of what the purpose of a space program is. I don't mean that we should can it, I mean that we should skip the screwing around and just start flinging brave souls out in rickety generation ships to nearby systems on the honest basis that we're 99.9% confident of condeming them (and their possible children) to death, but that if we wait until we're even 10% confident that we can get a foothold on another planet, we'll never go, because our actual research has effectively stalled and we have neither the will to push it on, or the guts to accept failure.
Re:Well (Score:4, Insightful)
You cannot get funding for a program if it doesn't capture the hearts of those paying for it. NASA had that with the moon landings, but they've let the public's imagination slip away to the point that most people don't consider space exploration worthwhile.
They can send NSync, the Backstreet Boys and Britney Spears up all at the same time for a weightless concert, who cares if it gets other more vital projects necessary funding? If the ISS isn't kept in the public's view, if they're not reminded on a daily basis how important and exciting it is, then it'll end up just another SkyLab with it's most noteworthy event being it's fiery re-entry.
Re:Well (Score:1)
Space travel as Entertainment (Score:3, Interesting)
Haven't you heard? The ISS is no more. (Score:1, Flamebait)
But to earn the trip back to earth... (Score:5, Funny)
Monty Hall: "Would you prefer to take one more tour of the station, or would you like what's behind door #2?"
Contestant/Winner: "I'll take Door #2 Monty"
Contestant/Winner: "Wait...that look like an airlock....WHOAAAAAAA!!!!!"
Monty Hall: "Should have taken the tour".
Re:But to earn the trip back to earth... (Score:1, Funny)
RSA knows what happened to CONTOUR (Score:3, Funny)
It's better (Score:3, Funny)
Russian Roulette!!
It wasn't a bad show until they ran out of contestants!
Re:It's better (Score:1)
would suck to play and lose (Score:4, Insightful)
And how ironic is it that its the formerly communist governments that are making this stuff possible? I'm sure a scifi writer from the 1950s would still have the game show by those wacky Americans, but would probably soom that we'd do the space travel side as well...
Re:would suck to play and lose (Score:1)
Play the odds. (Score:3, Insightful)
I'd argue that that's part of the price of playing. If anybody goes into this program without *expecting* that they're not going to be picked, I have little sympathy for them (ditto people who put winning the lottery into their budget).
Sucks that the space program is degraded to this (Score:3, Insightful)
Also is this a setback for NASA? Possibility, but I think there is a larger issue for NASA here. Some Stories from Scientific American I believe shed light on the issue Has the Space Age Stalled? [sciam.com] and Lost in Space [sciam.com].
A larger issue that is discussed in both articles is that many young Americans are loosing their attachment to NASA and the space race. This could be a costly mistake. This prize winner wont help NASA, but I don't think they are going to kill the space program.
Medevo
Re:Sucks that the space program is degraded to thi (Score:2, Interesting)
The sad fact is that anything that is bad for NASA is probably good for the space industry. NASA is a massively inefficient bureaucracy and its gotten that way because it was always a prestige organization that never had to justify its existance economically.
About the best thing the US govt. could do would be to pay off or securitize NASA's debt, then sell it in an IPO. As a private company, it would be highly incentivized to both produce useful work and capture the public's imagination.
Re:Sucks that the space program is degraded to thi (Score:2)
True, very true, but be wary as this could have negative problems. NASA should be privately audited, and have pieces of it split off to maintain cost/benefit. We still do need a solid PUBLIC organization for space and space related science, and NASA has done that (with a price tag). The conversion should be slow enough to not hamper research, but can still cut the crap off of NASA
Medevo
Re:Sucks that the space program is degraded to thi (Score:4, Insightful)
Might one argue that this is the opposite of the problem NASA has? It ISN'T thinking about the bottom-line - it is thinking of its pride!
Just think - if Bill Gates is willing to pay his way for a ride into space, why SHOULDN'T NASA let him do it? Now, it should definitely not cost the public a single dime - he should pay for all costs associated with the trip. However, to say that he shouldn't be allowed simply because it doesn't advance science is just pride. Basically you're saying that his money isn't good enough for you.
The Russians have opened space to the public. Sure, most people can't afford it - but most people can't afford a $14,000 plasma HDTV either... The Russians aren't afraid to make money on space travel, and neither should NASA.
If NASA wants to factor in the cost of lost opportunities (due to having room for one less scientist) or wear and tear on the shuttle, or any number of other costs - fine. But the cost shouldn't be "not gonna do it for any price"...
Besides, stuff like this makes space travel more appealing to the public, and probably would boost their funding anyway. (As if John Glenn's journey was really just for scientific value!)
Re:Sucks that the space program is degraded to thi (Score:2)
Perhaps we need a Private Company that would allow people to go into space, and not interfere with science. The problem is that the technology for private corps is a few years away and people want to go into space NOW.
Medevo
Re:Sucks that the space program is degraded to thi (Score:2)
It reminds me of how when the Soviet Union fell apart, Rosaviacosmos had to resort to shooting milk commercials and other stuff aboard Mir. It was embarrasing for the cosmonauts, to have the once-proud Soviet space program reduced to scraping by on cheap stunts.
Its been done before (Score:2, Informative)
"Get Moose and Squirrel!"
Read More (Score:4, Informative)
http://www.ortv.ru/ [www.ortv.ru] and here http://www.ortv.ru/ [www.ortv.ru]
Remember to use Babelfish [altavista.com] or some other translator if you can't read Russian.
I wouldn't want to be a contestant. (Score:5, Funny)
Oh wait, that's IIS.
This is just cheap sensationalism... (Score:3, Funny)
Re:This is just cheap sensationalism... (Score:2, Funny)
OK. But jettison him out of the nearest airlock anyway. The Russians would benefit greatly from improved Russo-American relations.
This is the story,... (Score:3, Funny)
and an airlock.
It's been done (Score:3, Interesting)
I believe it is also being done on the Norwegian TV2 (no relation between the two).
Trip to MIR? (Score:2)
Yeah, That Would Be Pretty Sweet (Score:1)
Sorry, I need help.
You won! And you'll be going up... (Score:3, Funny)
What about liability? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:What about liability? (Score:1)
The rest of the world isn't at that level...yet.
Re:What about liability? (Score:2)
Woah, Ahmericun alert!
The Russians (as in "living in Russia"? You know, the non-US country?) are hardly affected by the current state of "this" (meaning US, I suppose) country.
Liability suits taken to an insane level, and then two notches beyond that (what did that woman in he recent case against Philip Morris get? $28 billion(!?) 28 BILLION dollars?!?!? - Gasp, gasp, gasp - Insanity) do not exist outside USA. In the rest of the world, we base claims on actual damage done, not the carrying capacity of the defendent.
Back to space accidents: Russians do not think like Americans do on these issues. If you paid $plenty to get on a russian mission and it challengered, the russians would just say (to your family) "Very bad. These things happen. What? Pay you? Why?". Harras them enough and they would say "OK, you'll get standard loss-of-life compensation, $5,000. Now get out before we let the dogs eat you."
Re:What about liability? (Score:2)
Re:What about liability? (Score:2)
No, they emphatically would not buy insurance. Why should they? Do you buy insurance before buying an ice cream, just in case you spill it down the front of some lady, causing her to sue you for, I don't know, sexual harassment?
In Russia the situation is the opposite. People do not sue even if there's plenty of reason to do so. They'll just bite the sour apple, bitch a lot, and have another shot of vodka:-) (of course, this is all changing as we speak, though I doubt they'll ever get as bad as the Americans :-)
fuck registration (Score:4, Informative)
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 9:47 p.m. ET
MOSCOW (AP) -- Russia's biggest television station said Tuesday it was teaming up with the country's space agency to create a reality show that will be literally out of this world.
The show will follow contestants as they go through the rigorous training required for cosmonauts, and the winner will spend a week on the Russian segment of the International Space Station, said Channel 1.
The station said it planned to send the first winner to space in the fall of 2003.
A recent attempt to combine space travel and entertainment failed when pop star Lance Bass was excluded from the crew that is to fly to the space station this month.
Bass, of the group 'N Sync, was unable to come up with the $20 million fee, and Russian space officials said he would not be part of the crew despite weeks of training. A seven-part television documentary was planned around his flight.
The reality TV project will ``demonstrate the space achievements of our country and give the winner a chance to go to space,'' Channel 1 director Konstantin Ernst said.
Space agency spokesman Sergei Gorbunov said the agency had signed a preliminary agreement for the show with Channel 1.
Gorbunov said any television viewer would be apply to participate in the project. Through tests and competitions, the participants will be narrowed to 15-20 people, ``who will then undergo the medical examination necessary to be admitted to special training'' at Russia's cosmonaut training center, he said, according to Interfax.
In the past two years, Russia has sent two paying tourists to the space station as a way to raise money for its cash-strapped space program. California millionaire Dennis Tito and South African Internet tycoon Mark Shuttleworth paid about $20 million each for their trips.
Contest is now open for... (Score:1)
Re:Contest is now open for... (Score:1)
Re:Why are they letting the Russians do this stuff (Score:2)
Space is only for the elite, for now.
The ISS is a mockery. (Score:4, Insightful)
Where's the ships travelling to Mars?
We've done jack since going to the moon. We only went there because 'We can't let the Russians beat us!'
You know, I'd like to travel beyond Earth before I die. The Russians seem to be the only ones who have figured out the fact that I'm not alone in that wish. If not for them, I'm sure we won't have viable space tourism for a few hundred years.
Re:Why are they letting the Russians do this stuff (Score:5, Insightful)
NASA has already sent up people who don't really belong. Politicians, for example. OK, they had some training. But, then, so do the people in the $20 million category. It's not like they're selling tickets on a Soyuz like, for example, airlines sell tickets on 747s. A hell of a lot of training goes with that ticket.
When Dennis Tito went up, I and others thought NASA's objections were at best disingenuous, at worst outright lies. The man had been an aerospace engineer and had received months of training before his trip. Yet NASA proclaimed how difficult his trip made things for them. I thought, what if something unexpected went wrong on the station not connected to that little trip? If the system was that fragile, it was a disaster waiting to happen.
NASA needs to develop technologies that are more robust. The country needs space technologies that are able to recover from at least minor problems. The Russians have done that to some extent.
And, of course, with each of these tourists Russia earns some badly needed hard money for their struggling program.
Re:Why are they letting the Russians do this stuff (Score:3, Insightful)
The space industry needs cash, and it needs popular, populist acceptance and "buzz," so that it can get still more cash. Increase the number of flights -- for whatever reason, 'cause Lance Bass wants to write a sonnet, who cares? -- and the science will follow naturally.
"Every Tom, Dick and Harry... incompetent civilian... making a mockery... compromising the amount of scientific work that can get done..."
Your post reeks of elitism. The faster we can re-populate the space program's labcoat dilletantes with hard-hatted journeymen, the faster scientific work -- or any work of lasting value -- will get done. Arachnologists may be irritated by this, but one boy band singer is worth 12 Zero Gravity Spider Web Exepriments.
My daughter is four years old. She wants to be an astronaut when she grows up. If we all do our part to de-geekify space travel, her dream is much more likely to come true.
It's like Linux in a way (Kee-rist, I don't believe I'm saying this...). It will only ever enjoy popularity on the desktop rivalling that of MS or even Apple if it is marketed as something other than a "geek thang," if it becomes cool not because it is safe and reliable, but because celebrities use it and the media trumpets it. Of course, "we geeks" then lose one of "our own," but like any child whom we nurture through young and difficult years, the final proof is in its introduction to the "rest of the world."
The Space Program is moving out of its parents' basement. God Speed!
Re:Why are they letting the Russians do this stuff (Score:1)
I'm sure your daughter, like everybody's kid, wants to be an astronaut. Unfortunately, we don't have the resources to send everybody's kid up there. So we have to pick and choose, and the people who get to go are the people whose experiments need to be done in zero-g. Pretty geeky, but it's the only way to make fair decisions. As for making space travel "cool" and commonplace...well...not in our lifetimes.
Bottom line is, if we want to make a tourist space station, fine. But I'm not interested in financing Russian tourism with my tax dollars.
Re:Why are they letting the Russians do this stuff (Score:1)
Ratings (Score:1)
Like Survivor (Score:4, Funny)
I think they should play this like survivor, but with survival being the actual goal. Instead of giving the contestants any training, make them go into to space and try to not die. The last one to not die is the winner and get's a trip back to earth.
If it looks like more than one person is going to survive, they can have competitions - who can survive outside without a suit the longest, who can survive Bass's music the longest, who can drink the most tang without peeing or throwing up (Road Rules reference), who can ride the ISS's Robotic arm as a broncing bull for the longest, etc. This could be the ultimate in Dead Reality TV - and since it is in outer space, don't need to worry about lawsuits, or murder convictions : )
This isn't actually a bad idea (Score:2)
This isn't really much different from how the American space program recruitment used to work: you look for prmising kids, fly them to Florida for Space Camp, and then try to get the best of them to become astronauts, meanwhile keeping taxpayers interested in funding the space program.
Re:This isn't actually a bad idea (Score:2)
Only one thing will promote the concept of space travel and make money in space, and that's wholesale commercialization, such as mining, manufacturing and power generation, then evetually colonization as an offshoot of needing workers for the space-based industries.
Anything else is just fluff, massively and unsustainably subsidized by the political pork barrel.
been there done that (Score:1)
could link to it, but its in noerwegian anyway..
Re:been there done that (Score:1)
"Premien er ei romferd, men enno er det nokre usikkerheitsmoment omkring korvidt denne draumen verkeleg kan oppfyllast."
(my translation(may need aditional translation to become english
"the prize is a trip to space, but it's still some uncertianties if this dream will comew true"
ie. the tv network made the show before making resrvations on the ISS, how clver.
ISS-spotting (Score:2, Interesting)
2 shows in one (Score:2)
A little about the new crazy Russia (Score:4, Informative)
For the last years, there is a rising taste for "adventure contests". It started with some tasteless copies of similar programs in the West, but things went somehow "wrong". Right now Russian major channels are producing or trying to produce programs more near to reality. So they drop a bunch of people in a lost Caribbean island for a few weeks, play "treasure hunts" with real tigers roaming next to you, or make a huge show by closing a few people in an apartment and showing how they live there together for a few days. Part of it is pure showbiz with special effects, but a good part is real and that's what is driving people to it, as in Russia there is a crazy taste for adventure.
But as far as I see things are now going to the extreme. The real extreme. There is a show on "extreme sports", something completely crazy as many tricks ain't showbiz but real dangerous things.
So this new show is nothing special with the exception of sending someone to Cosmos...
On what concerns the practical aspects... Well what's special in Cosmos so that people can't go there? I frankly don't see the problem except for the money one has to pay. On what concerns the idea that ISS is being detoured from a "true scientific expedition". That started while Freedom and Mir2 were still on the paper and politicians were more worried more about superpower politics rather than Science. ISS is flawed and it is questionable from a technical and scientific point of view as it was cut, crunched and thinned every way possible. And here both Russians and Americans have their part on the blame. Russia did delay a LOT the main stage and some other components, due to its financial problems. But US is till now failing to fulfill its promises as it froze down a good part of the project. Presently ISS is mostly a show making a very little part of what was supposed to. And instead of making money, it is eating it up.
So if the agencies are able to save some money by sending turists there, let be it. The standups that some of you people are playing here are flawed from start. No money? No Science, no ISS... And that concerns not only Russia but also the US with its stubborn, count-to-the-very-cent Congress.
Re:Actually... (Score:3, Insightful)
90% of what Hollywood makes about any country (including USA) is pure crap.
People who read this are probably familiar with computers to the degree that they can see how much nonsense the Hollywood depiction of, for example, a hacker is. As a matter of fact, any area in which I have special interests are treated with the same massive flood of factual incorrectness. Given this record, do we have any reason to believe that any of the subjects we know less about are treated with any accuracy?
Re:A little about the new crazy Russia (Score:2)
Bargain for the locals (Score:4, Funny)
Previous attempts by U.S. companies to organize a TV reality show and send the winner to space on board of a Russian Soyuz capsule failed due to the lack of funding. However, Rosaviakosmos traditionally charges domestic customers a smaller fee than that paid by foreign clients.
"Traditionally?" A couple of years ago there was no such thing as space tourism. Now we're told there's even a tradition of targeted price structures!
Re:Bargain for the locals (Score:1)
A little irony here (Score:1)
other contest ideas. (Score:1)
Who wants to be an astronaut?
Survivor: The ISS edition.
American Astronaut
Please do not link to VOA... (Score:1, Offtopic)
- VOA stories often read like federal government press releases because (guess what?) it's owned and operated by the federal government.
- VOA's reporting is generally just garbage. Reading their stories reminds me of those people who flunked out of JOUR 101 because they didn't show up.
The reporter who wrote this story did no work work of his own... he wrote the story based on a press release and stories written by other news organizations.First he quotes Russia's Interfax news agency, which quotes the television station's press release. He couldn't even bother to read the press release himself, which means he has no insight into this story, which explains why it is only six sentences long! Then at the end, the article notes, "Some information for this report provided by AFP."
We would have been better off reading the press release itself, or an AP story. Diversity of news sources is a good thing that should be encouraged on slashdot, but not at the expense of quality.
This is not a troll. All I'm saying is link to primary or knowledgeable impartial secondary sources -- not clueless, biased quaternary sources.
Dilbert about space tourism (Score:1)
Last Post! (Score:1)
In order to allay fears about the continuity of the Linux project, Linus
Torvalds together with his manager Tove Monni have released "Linus
v2.0", affectionately known as "Kernel Hacker - The Next Generation".
Linux stock prices on Wall Street rose sharply after the announcement;
as one well-known analyst who wishes to remain anonymous says - "It
shows a long-term commitment, and while we expect a short-term decrease
in productivity, we feel that this solidifies the development in the
long run".
Other analysts downplay the importance of the event, and claim that just
about anybody could have done it. "I'm glad somebody finally told them
about the birds and the bees" one sceptic comments cryptically. But
even the skeptics agree that it is an interesting turn of events.
Others bring up other issues with the new version - "I'm especially
intrigued by the fact that the new version is female, and look forward
to seeing what the impact of that will be on future development. Will
"Red Hat Linux" change to "Pink Hat Linux", for example?"
-- Linus Torvalds announcing that he became father of a girl
- this post brought to you by the Automated Last Post Generator...