...to the moon!

so NASA is apparently going to build a moonbase. yes, a base on the moon. hopefully, this will be a little more successful than the problem-plagued international space station. combined with the winning of the Ansari X Prize two years ago could mean some very interesting collaborations between the government and private sector. also, since this seems to be a NASA operation and not international, it will be interesting to see how things play out.

on the amusing side, it's interesting to note that "the permanent base will be built near one of the two poles," even though "we don't know as much about the polar regions." lovely.

20061205 - Update

it turns out that, according to the LA Times, "Australia, Canada, China, Europe, Japan, India, and Russia have extpressed interest in participating" in the moonbase project. why "Europe" is listed next to other countries, I'm not sure, unelss perhaps Europe has a unified, international space program, and each of the other countries has their own.