Video: SpaceUp DC

Thanks for posting this, Keith. I agree with this guy so completely.

Wow, that guy has a lot of energy. Part of what makes space boring is that it is so dangerous and difficult that everything moves slowly and carefully with years of planning.

He's right about the lack of emotion though. Most of the astronauts are fairly robotic. Part of what it takes to be an astronaut probably makes that the more likely personality type though (science education, team player etc). Charlie Bolden shows plenty of emotion (he cries very easily). Mike Massimino is pretty good with the public.

Interesting talk.

I love how you're featuring this video about "NASA making space boring" the same week you're asking over and over why the Kepler scientists haven't been subjected to intensive PR training.

If the media - notably you, Keith - are going to jump down NASA's throat over a tiny, tiny, TINY poor choice of words ("Earth-like" instead of "Earth-sized" in a talk in which it was blindingly obvious that the speaker was referring only to size) in a relatively low profile unmanned mission, then OF COURSE they are going to turn everyone into bureaucratic automatons for the high profile manned missions!

And the audio remix is up on the downloads site of http://www.spacevidcast.com :^) (disclaimer: I did the audio remix!)

A rapt audience for NASA TV is a fantasy--if CBS can't do it we certainly can't. What interests people is drama or things that are new, that's why Hubble images or accidents keep people's interest but the ratings on the later Apollo missions waned. If we want the spotlight we are going to have to do some "firsts" on a regular basis--show people stuff that has not been seen before. Unfortunately, that happens slowly and we live in a face-paced media culture. And face it, more people tune in to American Idol than Discovery and will never care about space.

So what is this guy crying for? He wants ENTERTAINMENT! He wants everyone at NASA to be hyper and EXCITED as they do their routine but dangerous and important jobs. I think some maturity is what he needs! And that info he was looking for - plenty of that is available on the web if he goes looking.

What was the name of the crazy guy jumping, screaming, running out of breath, and about to throw up? Huhm?

The point of the question is no matter how ignited people try to make space to justify its funding by people who never get to go to space, in the end, we still only pay for pretty pictures and space visit recounts of places we have been to over and over. The change currently taking place is the President wants to change who gets to produce the space visit recounts and that’s it.

This is like watching the sun rise and set every day. It gets boring, predictable, and eventually ignored because it happens over and over every day of our lives.

The purpose of NASA is not to be the guiding sun that everybody eventually does not pay any attention to. It is to be a producer of an occasional exciting event that gets people's attention and entertains them for one moment in time that they remember for the rest of their lives or perhaps inspires them to pursue new innovations in space. They are the meteor shower, the eclipse, and the comet. They represent occasional awe inspiring events that never disappoint anyone.

The ignition needed to procure funding from people who never get to go to space could be for a Near Earth Asteroid mission that hauls, like a tug, a huge rock back to Earth and targets it to land on Australia.

Wouldn’t people gullible enough to get ignited by energetic people like this crazy guy and then want to buy a piece of the rock that gets delivered to Earth by NASA? Even if NASA decided not to sell any of it and put in away in their vaults next to the 250 lbs or so of Moon rock, they would undeniably capture people’s attention because space rock, no matter where it’s from or what it is made of represents The Holy Grail of Space.

"NASA needs to explain to us why they need $19 billion dollars...NASA needs to educate us, because space is cool". Get this kid to a violin. He is RIGHT ON. Somebody send this to Lori Garver, for Pete's sake. At least she gets it.

Its great that Lori Garver is a cheerleader.

In her position we need more than that. She has the power, the authority, and the responsibility to make a difference.

I get tired of these cheerleaders who, once given the opportunity, sit back and wait to see if anything is going to happen. That is not leadership.

I think fighter pilots are probably boring to listen to also, and even the baddest combat soldier would be boring also. Lots of roger, 10-4. Calmly calling out procedures. Though I suppose they are known to yell out occasionally.
It reminds me of the adage that describes many things: "hours and hours of boredom punctuated by seconds of sheer terror".
So it is not realistic for NASA people to act like the speaker. But I think his basic point remains, that working in space elicits (or should) wonderful feelings in everyone involved, and they should find ways to communicate this often and fully, thus inspiring all who are not (yet) involved.

This is the first person that I have ever heard say exactly what I feel on this subject, and yet all of the posters so far seem to have completely missed his point. His point was "It's on us". Did anyone hear him say that? Replay the video, it's what he said, and it was his point. His point wasn't that NASA makes space boring. That was a fact that he presented very clearly, of course you can get easy and cheap applause anytime by just saying that. Which is what I thought he was doing at first, but he wasn't. His point was also not what NASA needs to do. That was just another fact that he stated which always gets unanimous amens from the gallery. But then he started to get to his point. First he said that he doesn't expect NASA to change that part of their culture, and he doesn't trust them to do it. He also never says that what NASA does is boring. He makes it clear that he thinks that what NASA is doing is very exciting, he doesn't try and make a point that NASA should do more exciting things. He believes that exciting things are already happening, and his point is - we should tell people! He did state that the media should do a better job, but his audience wasn't the media, it was us. He message was to us, we should make space interesting to other people.

Two weeks ago I told a friend about an upcoming ISS sighting. I knew he would forget (everyone does) so I called him at 9:15 p.m. and I said it will be passing over in five minutes, so he went outside and when he saw it you could hear the excitement in his voice as he ran around to the front of the house so that he could see it go over the horizon.

You know Joe, even sunsets can be exciting. If you are watching a sunset with someone who doesn't know anything about astronomy, and you mention that the sun actually went below the horizon eight minutes ago but the light is just now getting to us, you'll find that you'll spark a very interesting discussion because people really are interested in space but they don't understand it, and if you start to make it real, and put it in terms they can understand without making them feel stupid, then you will be amazed at the wide variety of questions they will ask. Joe maybe you do that already I just used your sunset comment as an example.

At work I tell people whenever the shuttle is about to launch or land, and I find they are interested and will ask me questions. I am careful to not launch into technical babble but I try and answer their questions simply, then I'll bring up a fact I think they may find interesting.

Most people don't even know there is a space station, or that people are up there right now living for months at a time. We can tell them.

It's on us.