ESA Press Efforts, Moved posts Options

[JonClarke]

I notice you are new to the group.  A lot of the criticism has been due to the fact that ESA's press office has often promoted "discoveries" of long-known information, while ignoring the real discoveries Mars Express is making, which is a spectacular scientific probe.  My comments were due to long frustration with this. This latest round is of much better quality.

I may be new, but I have been reading here for quite some time and active on other sites. I am well aware of this attitude I am critcising here and it is very widespread.

You say this is all in good humour, but I suggest that at times under this humour is a not too well concealed hostility to ESA. I am not pointing the finger here at anyone in particular, but commenting on a general attitude. A joke may well be a joke, but it can also serve as a cover for less savory things.

People are taking these press release statements far too seriously. They are designed for the general media, most of which probably has forgotten that ME still exists. Those of us who have an attention span and an interest that extends between press releases may be frustrated by this, but they aren't designed for us

NASA press releases are often highly misleading also. How many times are we told that evidence has been found for water on Mars? That a new comet or asteroid mission will unlock the orign of the solar system? That a new telescope will reveal the how the universe formed? How every shuttle mission advances exploration of space? If we are going to mock press releases, let's be consistent and mock all of them.

Jon

[JonClarke]

Several us us recently joined this forum from space.com forums.  We have lambasted ESA in our fora too, with a similar sense of humor.  For example, my running joke is that Andy Warhol colorizes their photos they release to the public (I think they used to do a bad job of distinguishing between false color and realisitc colors in the photos they have released to the media).

The ESA is...ESA.  'Nuff said!

I actually don't remember seeing too much ESA bashing there. If I had, I would have roasted it.

Jon

[tedstryk]

I may be new, but I have been reading here for quite some time and active on other sites.  I am well aware of this attitude I am critcising here and it is very widespread.

You say this is all in good humour, but I suggest that at times under this humour is a not too well concealed hostility to ESA.  I am not pointing the finger here at anyone in particular, but commenting on a general attitude.  A joke may well be a joke, but it can also serve as a cover for less savory things.

People are taking these press release statements far too seriously.  They are designed for the general media, most of which probably has forgotten that ME still exists.  Those of us who have an attention span and an interest that extends between press releases may be frustrated by this, but they aren't designed for us

NASA press releases are often highly misleading also.  How many times are we told that evidence has been found for water on Mars?  That a new comet or asteroid mission will unlock the orign of the solar system?  That a new telescope will reveal the how the universe formed?  How every shuttle mission advances exploration of space?  If we are going to mock press releases, let's be consistent and mock all of them.

Jon

Well, I can only speak for myself, but, if you look at my track record of postings considering ESA, I definitely don't harbor any hostility towards it, save perhaps their press office. I agree that NASA, and any other agency, have their shortcomings in this area, but ESA's have been particularly bad, as, if you have been reading this forum long, has been much to the consternation of just about everyone here. I think it press release hype and distortions (of which NASA is guilty too) coupled with unusually slow release of real results.

[JonClarke]

Well, I can only speak for myself, but, if you look at my track record of postings considering ESA, I definitely don't harbor any hostility towards it, save perhaps their press office.  I agree that NASA, and any other agency, have their shortcomings in this area, but ESA's have been particularly bad, as, if you have been reading this forum long, has been much to the consternation of just about everyone here.  I think it press release hype and distortions (of which NASA is guilty too)  coupled with unusually slow release of real results.

They are press officers for goodness sake! What do you expect? The fact this that in this thread (71 posts so far), supposedly about these very significant results, less than half have actually discussed the findings. Almost a third have been snide and silly comments about ESA's press releases.

I find it interesting that you have yet to comment on the findings, and are focusing mainly on attacking the press office. Yet it is the findings that matter, the rest is ephemeral. This does show hostility, IHMO.

So does complaining about the "slow" release of data. This is not the fault of the press office, it is policy. the citicism is unjustified. Since when does raw data releases every 6 months count as slow? Since when does more than 20 major publications and over 100 conference abstracts in two years count as slow?

I suggest we consider the subject closed and focus on science, not trivia. And next time, we should all show some more respect to the hard work that has gone into these and all other missions.

Jon

[RNeuhaus]

So does complaining about the "slow" release of data.  This is not the fault of the press office, it is policy.  the citicism is unjustified.  Since when does raw data releases every 6 months count as slow?  Since when does more than 20 major publications and over 100 conference abstracts in two years count as slow? 

Raw data is released every 6 months. It is relatively very slow. Improve the policy for that. It is one of the most complained of points of ESA's PR. What are the reasons for releasing these data after a so long time?
The rest sounds fine but I am not aware of these new major publications and conference abstracts. Maybe it is of my blame since I didn't search well for these new novelties.

Rodolfo

[The Messenger]

I suggest we consider the subject closed and focus on science, not trivia.  And next time, we should all show some more respect to the hard work that has gone into these and all other missions.

Jon

It is hard to focus on science, when so little that is science or hard engineering, has been released. I'm working on health management packages for future flights, and I would like to know how the instruments preformed: What types of sensors performed as expected, and which ones are suspect?

The batteries clearly out-lived expectations, is this because they outperformed prototypes, or was the probe warmer-than-expected during the descent? Is there lag time in the sensors relative to the clock times? Why are the radar charts so muddled?

When is the report on the channel A screw-up going to be released? Do you have any recommendations we can build into our systems that will prevent these types of events in the future?

Time is money, this was a joint venture: Those of us who built the systems that got Huygens there would like to know what-and-how we can improve on the systems we are designing and proposing today. For months it was evident Huygens teams were not even sharing data with each other. Seesh!

[edstrick]

I think the partly validly, partly invalidly described "ESA Bashing" can mostly be resolved into two things: General Press Office bashing and general bashing of a perceived combination of amateurishness, bureaucratization, and euro-scientific-establishment-elitism.

Press office bashing is nothing new. For two or more decades, I've grumbled that a fair fraction of the people in press offices simply wouldn't be able to hack it outside of (what are perceived to be) protected civil service positions. I have recurring (mostly silent) screaming fits at the terminal incompetence of whoever is in charge of the NASA TV schedule postings. Sometimes events that have been known to be scheduled have had their actual broadcast scheduled the morning of the day of the event. I've suspected sometimes the schedule was posted after it happened. As of yesterday, they have coverage of a February spacewalk posted, but not the prelaunch events for the New Horizons mission launch. Somewhere, somebody MUST know what programs are queued for the overnight Gallery showings on NASA TV, but do they deign to give us that information? Nah...

The other bashing of amateurishness etc, is more specifically pointed at ESA and it's sometimes bumbling and lame public presentation. There was abundant conversation here about the amateurish handling of the Huygens coverage. The same applies to the recent briefing. Even if it had been broadcast in HiDef instead of horribly low-bandwidth webcam video, it was amateurish, even though the science was spectacular.

Bureaucratization: Has anybody here tried to listen to the pompous organizationally-self-congratulating speaches by the program officials at the beginning of these briefings and events? Has anybody here been able to read any of the ESA planning documents that regularly show up on SpaceRef? The levels of high-minded generalities and windy blather are beyond stupefying. When you've finished reading one of those documents, you know what they were talking about, but they've said nothing that contains any information!

Complaints of intellectual elitism are widespread and there are constant reports in Science magazine of calls for reform in the German, French, Italian and other scientific establishments. I cannot vouch for it in person, but you somtimes get a feel for what's there, especially in the way they deal with the public. The ESA bragged and bragged about the revolutionary science to come from the miniaturized new tech instrumets orbiting the Moon on Smart-1, but I think we are decidedly underimpressed with what seems to be coming out of this mission, other than the entirely successful engineering development and testing.

It's not that we're anti-ESA and anti-European.... It's more that we're frustrated at what we see are obvious continuing problems that they seemingly can't recognize in themselves and can't fix. Certainly, in the US, we've got our on different but equivalent problems, and difficulties in seeing then and fixing them, but we bash ourselves plenty, too.

[tedstryk]

They are press officers for goodness sake!  What do you expect?  The fact this that in this thread (71 posts so far), supposedly about these very significant results, less than half have actually discussed the findings.  Almost a third have been snide and silly comments about ESA's press releases. 

I find it interesting that you have yet to comment on the findings, and are focusing mainly on attacking the press office.  Yet it is the findings that matter, the rest is ephemeral.  This does show hostility, IHMO.

So does complaining about the "slow" release of data.  This is not the fault of the press office, it is policy.  the citicism is unjustified.  Since when does raw data releases every 6 months count as slow?  Since when does more than 20 major publications and over 100 conference abstracts in two years count as slow? 

I suggest we consider the subject closed and focus on science, not trivia.  And next time, we should all show some more respect to the hard work that has gone into these and all other missions.

Jon

So, in other words, any joke or criticism is hostility. It isn't, but you are not going to be convinced otherwise. We are showing plenty of respect.

[chris]

The is getting way too personal and acrimonious. As a community, we are better than this. Please all take a deep breath and calm down.

Chris

[djellison]

ESA does amazing things. We know that. MEX is great, Huygens was great, Rosetta will be great etc etc etc

BUT

Their press and outreach efforts are a disgrace and data release is not much better. Fact. The Hugyens coverage was terrible, MEX press releases are often missleading, intentionally - remember MEX 'discovering' water at the pole. It was pathetic, missleading, and BANG out of order to over sell the discoveries MEX has made. What's happening to Smart-1 at the moment. Dunno - they dont bother telling us any more - it's been in orbit around the moon for months and months - and what press info have we had? Half a dozen pictures. That's it. It will have taken thousands, if not tens of thousands by now.

Yes - MEX data gets released at the same schedule as MGS data - but have you SEEN it? HRSC data is in one, processed format that's basically unworkable. Where's the MEX version of the workbook, where's the software to use the data, where's the pdf's covering the calibration and processing? Where's the Smart 1 data?

Occasionally - ESA pulls a blinder, such as the Photoshop plugins for FIT's imagery - some of the work people have done using that with that, and DSS2 / HST data etc is just utterly utterly astonishing ( eg http://www.spacetelescope.org/projects/fit...emartin_12.html ) - but they COULD do the same for MEX, for Smart 1 - let us at it, show us the goods in a way that is useable....but they dont.

Let me repeat - the efforts of the scientists and engineers who are doing these missions is superb. I don't lay much of this criticism at their door. The disgrace is the outreach and press efforts of ESA which are often embarrasing. I CRINGE when I see a new Mars Express press release, worrying what they'll claim MEX has 'discovered' this time. It's a culture within ESA that the 'public' are an at-arms-reach body that wouldnt understand what they're doing anyway. It started with the chronic Giotto imagery and it's been the same ever since.

Basically, consider MER. The workbook, the raw JPG's, Steve's blog, the Pancam website, the Director Updates, the route maps, Podcasts, weekly updates, the genuine discoveries being trumpeted, and the context of previous missions into which they fall being credited.

Now consider Smart 1 or MEX. The difference is night and day, black and white, it is the difference between the right way of doing things, and the wrong way.

Criticism of ESA on this point is valid, warrented, justified and appropriate and the discussion is NOT closed until the situation improves.

Doug

(PS - yes - I agree, too much of this particular discussion - I'm going to move it to an appropriate thread elsewhere - we have one on this exact topic)

[djellison]

home for some moved posts from the MEX/Huygens thread

[The Messenger]

home for some moved posts from the MEX/Huygens thread

Good move, but it kinda killed the topic - nice summation.

I have a minor complaint with the Nature articles: The data in many of the charts is smoothed, and sometimes lacks essential axis information. For example, the pressure table is cleansed of dynamics, and lacks a time axis. I was hoping they would provide a better, less ambiguous, representation of the radar altimeter data. Some error bars would be nice - I guess I won't be completely happy until the complete release of the all the raw data.

On the whole though, it is fun, informative, tantalizing reading and demonstrates we need to go back and do it again...soon.

[ljk4-1]

Overview of ESA communication activities in 2006 relevant to the media

Press conferences, exhibitions, launches, and much more. Here is the list of the
main communication activities ESA will be involved in this year. Pencil them in
into your diaries.

More at:

http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEM28P8A9HE_index_0.html

[ljk4-1]

ESA's Director General meets the press

ESA Director General Jean-Jacques Dordain met the Press at ESA Headquarters this
morning to take stock of ESA's 2005 activities and announce the main events for
the upcoming year.

Full story:

http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEM12CMZCIE_index_0.html

[ljk4-1]

NASA and ESA: a parting of ways?
---

NASA and ESA have shared a long, if sometimes rocky, history of
cooperation in space ventures. Taylor Dinerman reports that this
cooperation may be endangered as the two space agencies are pulled in
different directions by their respective governments.

http://www.thespacereview.com/article/539/1