NASA's new frontier: Selling space
NASA's new frontier: Selling space
A draft document issued by NASA is circulating among space-exploration advocacy groups and industry insiders. Titled "Enhanced Strategy for the Development of Space Commerce," the report proposes what would have been anathema to many within the agency before California businessman Dennis Tito became the world's first paying space tourist, thanks to the Russians. Among the ideas put forth in the document, which NASA says is a work-in-progress: Allow limited tourism on the space station, but with transportation from the Russians or future commercial spaceships (probably not the U.S. shuttle); seek family friendly corporate sponsors that could plaster their emblems and logos alongside NASA's; and permit merchandising that promotes the so-called NASA brand.