R.I.P. Mars Phoenix

The Mars Phoenix team has just frozen. It's a remarkable thing to feel emotions over the "death" of an inanimate object which I've never seen or touched or otherwise interacted with in any way except the occasional Twitter alert. But it was exciting to get these little updates on a mission that was pushing the boundaries of science and exploring another world. In the end, that's what we associate with the best of what we call the "human spirit." If that is the case, then that frozen slab of metal on Mars that we call Phoenix is more human than a lot of us.

Mars Phoenix Speaks

NASA has been posting first person accounts of the Mars Phoenix lander's mission via Twitter for some time now. It's basically the only reason why I got a Twitter account—in order to follow Phoenix. It's cool and sometimes even poignant to receive these little messages from Mars. Now, nearing the end of its life, the Phoenix Lander saying goodbye as a "guest blogger" on Gizmodo.

Now another NASA mission, New Horizons is jumping on the Twitter bandwagon as it makes its way to Pluto. If nothing else, it seems like a great way to get young people interested in science.

The Text Message From Space!

As part of an attempt to reach out to young people, NASA has put the Phoenix Mars probe on Twitter which makes it possible for cell phone users to get text messages directly from the red planet. Not wanting to be left behind, The European Space Agency has also put its Planck spacecraft on Twitter. Perhaps due to its more esoteric mission, Planck is much less popular on Twitter than Phoenix. I can't help but wonder how this development affects that the recent claims that an SMS message is four times more expensive than the cost of getting data from the Hubble Space telescope.