Stories
Slash Boxes
Comments

SoylentNews is people

posted by Fnord666 on Tuesday July 16 2019, @05:38AM   Printer-friendly
from the strapped-for-cash dept.

Now You Can Buy NASA's Own Original Apollo 11 Moon Landing Footage:

Got a player for 2-inch Quadruplex videotapes sitting around? You could view original NASA recordings of the Apollo 11 moon landing in your living room.

Sotheby's is auctioning off three first-generation tapes of the historic touchdown as part of its July 20 auction of space exploration artifacts set to coincide with the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 landing.

The tapes run a total of 2 hours and 24 minutes and capture moments including Neil Armstrong declaring, "That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind." Also on the tapes are the "long-distance phone call" with President Richard Nixon and the planting of the American flag on the lunar surface.

[...] Gary George, an engineering student and NASA intern, purchased the tapes for $217.77 at a government surplus auction in 1976. It's estimated they'll sell for at least a $1 million at the Sotheby's event.

I was under the impression that the original tapes had been lost or recorded over. Does anyone else remember hearing that? Either way, this is a irreplaceable national treasure and I am astonished at seeing these up for auction. I am hopeful some philanthropist steps up, buys them, perhaps makes a personal copy, and then donates them to the Library of Congress.


Original Submission

This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.
Display Options Threshold/Breakthrough Mark All as Read Mark All as Unread
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
(1)
  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by driverless on Tuesday July 16 2019, @05:57AM (17 children)

    by driverless (4770) on Tuesday July 16 2019, @05:57AM (#867436)

    auction of space exploration artifacts set to coincide with the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 landing.

    Half a century ago we put a man on the moon (women weren't invented until the 1970s, apparently). Today, not only are we in no position to put another person on the moon, but we have to use Russian rockets just to get people to the ISS.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @06:10AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @06:10AM (#867439)

      Some bean counter looked at the numbers and found it more cost effective that way.

    • (Score: 4, Disagree) by bradley13 on Tuesday July 16 2019, @07:09AM (14 children)

      by bradley13 (3053) on Tuesday July 16 2019, @07:09AM (#867447) Homepage Journal

      Pournelle's Iron Law has long since destroyed NASA. Granted, they have a few small probes out there, but for large missions? They're building launchpad after launchpad for the SLS, but they don't have (and likely never will have) the SLS itself. NASA has become a jobs program, plus a Congressional pork barrel.

      This shows one of the huge advantages of capitalism. When a company is eaten by Pournelle's Iron Law: they either clean house, or they go out of business. Government agencies never get cleaned up; they just get more and more inefficient.

      --
      Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
      • (Score: 5, Insightful) by c0lo on Tuesday July 16 2019, @08:03AM (13 children)

        by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday July 16 2019, @08:03AM (#867459) Journal

        This shows one of the huge advantages of capitalism. When a company is eaten by Pournelle's Iron Law: they either clean house, or they go out of business. Government agencies never get cleaned up; they just get more and more inefficient.

        Check your assumptions before applying a rule, it's safer.
        For instance:
        - in monopoly/oligopoly cases, 'capitalistic bureaucracy' is indistinguishable from 'governmental bureaucracy' - remember that 'we don't have to care we're the phone company'?
        - in high competitive condition, 'capitalistic bureaucracy' is actually the entire 'governmental bureaucracy' the survivor(s) of the race-to-the-bottom manage to buy. Case at point, see Ajit Pai defending big business interest not the public's one.

        I hope you aren't tempted by 'true capitalism' type of arguments.

        --
        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @10:20AM (2 children)

          by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @10:20AM (#867485)

          Who even uses house phones anymore? The only calls are telemarketers now.

          • (Score: 2) by janrinok on Tuesday July 16 2019, @01:25PM (1 child)

            by janrinok (52) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday July 16 2019, @01:25PM (#867539) Journal

            I still use a house phone. There are numerous cases where a smart phone is either useless or unnecessary. There are still many areas where no usable signal can be obtained, yet telephone lines already exist. There are people who cannot use a smart phone; some people with disabilities cannot hold or operate a smart phone. They want a solid phone with large push buttons with very positive feedback and that can sit on a surface in front of them without moving during use.

            It is true that coverage is getting better all the time, but I live in a place that is in a steep valley on the coast. At many places in this valley there is no usable signal. However, the telephone line provides not only voice communications but also my internet access (ADSL). Fiber is still a far-off dream for many of us, current estimates are still 4-5 years away although many of the surrounding towns have had it for years. So I have to have a local wifi router which is fed by my ADSL connection. If I have to have a line for ADSL why would I rush to purchase a cell phone that cannot be guaranteed to receive a signal?

            My land line connection is Red Book, which means I do not receive any telemarketing calls or anything else that I do not actually ask for. Its rental cost is a fraction of that for a smart phone, the cost per call is free for all local calls (and 'local' covers a very generous distance of several 100s miles) and very low for anywhere else in Europe, USA, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.

            I do own a smart phone for when I travel or for the occasional text message, but I don't carry it unless I am going to need it. It is for my benefit and not for the convenience of others.

        • (Score: 3, Insightful) by bradley13 on Tuesday July 16 2019, @10:44AM (6 children)

          by bradley13 (3053) on Tuesday July 16 2019, @10:44AM (#867487) Homepage Journal

          Well, actually, yes: I am tempted by "true capitalism". However, the interactions with the government are critical:

          - First, the government must be prevented from playing favorites. Otherwise, you get "Corporate Cronyism" instead of Capitalism.

          - Second, the government must play a regulatory role, to prevent companies from abusing monopoly positions. There's nothing fundamentally wrong with a company having a monopoly, as long as it does not abuse that position to squash potential competition.

          But back to governmental organizations: The government is by definition a monopoly. Cronyism is a given, because who's going to stop it? Empire building becomes all important, because that's how you justify your position and your promotion. Your boss is doing the same thing, so interests align: better to have more people and more bloat. Accomplishing your actual mission in any sort of efficient manner? No one measures you on that.

          --
          Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
          • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @11:46AM (3 children)

            by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @11:46AM (#867501)

            Cronyism is a given, because who's going to stop it?

            In a democracy or democratic republic ultimately that's the job of the voters. But often their priorities are things like whether gay people can marry or not...

            Trump has proven that US voters can make a difference. Trump's America is noticeably different from Obama's. ;)

            The government is by definition a monopoly.

            Yes, and it's a matter of
            1) whether the government prioritizes the interests of the normal citizens or the corporations or others.
            2) whether the government is strong enough to actually do 1)

            Unregulated capitalism with a weak government will just mean the stronger corporations are effectively in power and most won't prioritize the interests of the normal citizens.

            One way or another you're going to get a Government, but if the effective government ends up being a Corporation, the votes and the voices of the non-shareholders matter even less.

            • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @12:41PM (1 child)

              by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @12:41PM (#867519)

              Unregulated capitalism with a weak government will just mean the stronger corporations are effectively in power...

              How will the corporations form if there is not a government regulation to charter them?

              • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @12:51PM

                by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @12:51PM (#867524)

                By arms power. Granted, they'd be called gangs or mobs, but the behavior won't be much different from a multinational corporation.

            • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Gaaark on Tuesday July 16 2019, @05:39PM

              by Gaaark (41) on Tuesday July 16 2019, @05:39PM (#867625) Journal

              "Unregulated capitalism with a weak government will just mean the stronger corporations are effectively in power and most won't prioritize the interests of the normal citizens."

              Which is what we all seem to have today.

              --
              --- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
          • (Score: 2) by c0lo on Tuesday July 16 2019, @12:45PM

            by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday July 16 2019, @12:45PM (#867521) Journal

            Well, actually, yes: I am tempted by "true capitalism".

            You yourself admit that this is as utopia not different than any other "reduction to principles" type of social organization.

            You won't find "true" capitalism, communism or even socialism today in a society that balances itself over time without tearing itself apart.
            In all "success cases" you will find a mixture in various (and varying) proportions between private wealth ownership and redistribution of wealth; with various degree of governance control over absolute private interests.
            You have various social-democracies [wikipedia.org] in Europe and welfare states [wikipedia.org] around the globe.

            You have Switzerland - with almost a pure bureaucratic government (not much more powerful than a bunch of public servants) and direct democracy with a strong role in governance.
            You have Norway, in which the state runs a big business [wikipedia.org] and manages an $1 trillion pension fund [theguardian.com].
            You have Australia, with a liberal system of welfare - called "a fair go" around here - (with an efficiency that quickly decays - too little control from government over time, leading to skyrocketing energy prices, failing aged care, financial institution abuses, etc).

            You have Germany, with universal access health care, funded by a mixture of subsidies and private insurance [wikipedia.org] and free tertiary education [wikipedia.org].
            Get this - the German welfare state was started [wikipedia.org] by a Prussian conservative in 1880, namely Otto von Bismark. Yeap, the guy that formed the German Empire [wikipedia.org], beat the crap out of neighboring countries in 3 short wars and also the guy who said "Politics is the art of the possible, the attainable - the art of the next best"; he must've recognized that "true capitalism/communism" are not possible.

            --
            https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
          • (Score: 3, Interesting) by Thexalon on Tuesday July 16 2019, @01:56PM

            by Thexalon (636) on Tuesday July 16 2019, @01:56PM (#867550)

            Second, the government must play a regulatory role, to prevent companies from abusing monopoly positions. There's nothing fundamentally wrong with a company having a monopoly, as long as it does not abuse that position to squash potential competition.

            Oh yes, there's something fundamentally wrong with a company having a monopoly, absent government regulation preventing these behaviors:
            1. Monopolies can and do overcharge their customers for their services. For instance, the expense of travelling by air has a lot to do with how many other carriers go to the airports at either end of the flight, which has nothing at all to do with the cost of providing the service.
            2. Monopolies can and do squeeze their vendors, e.g. if you're the only telecom, you not only have control of the telecom market, you also effectively control the market for fiberoptic cables.

            Both of those result in an economic inefficiency, because the cash being spent placating the monopoly and its shareholders could be more effectively spent elsewhere.

            --
            The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
        • (Score: 1) by khallow on Tuesday July 16 2019, @10:52AM (2 children)

          by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday July 16 2019, @10:52AM (#867490) Journal

          - in monopoly/oligopoly cases, 'capitalistic bureaucracy' is indistinguishable from 'governmental bureaucracy' - remember that 'we don't have to care we're the phone company'?

          Remember AT&T was a government enforced monopoly for half a century.

          - in high competitive condition, 'capitalistic bureaucracy' is actually the entire 'governmental bureaucracy' the survivor(s) of the race-to-the-bottom manage to buy. Case at point, see Ajit Pai defending big business interest not the public's one.

          Nothing the FCC oversees is in a highly competition condition. And the FCC is a large part of the reason why.

          I hope you aren't tempted by 'true capitalism' type of arguments.

          And I hope you one day understand what capitalism is. It's not government protecting a business or creating a rigid regulatory environment that favors cartel creation.

          • (Score: 2) by c0lo on Tuesday July 16 2019, @01:14PM (1 child)

            by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday July 16 2019, @01:14PM (#867533) Journal

            Remember AT&T was a government enforced monopoly for half a century.

            And you think a monopoly that wasn't enforced by the government will act less bureacraticky?

            And I hope you one day understand what capitalism is. It's not government protecting a business or creating a rigid regulatory environment that favors cartel creation.

            I get it.
            At least to the point in which I can ask back: do you think capitalism can exist without government?

            --
            https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
            • (Score: 1) by khallow on Tuesday July 16 2019, @01:59PM

              by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday July 16 2019, @01:59PM (#867552) Journal

              And you think a monopoly that wasn't enforced by the government will act less bureacraticky?

              Absolutely. Microsoft and Google are great examples.

              At least to the point in which I can ask back: do you think capitalism can exist without government?

              A lot of its economic activity can be delegated to non-government actors with only a little regulation and law enforcement to ensure they're playing nice.

    • (Score: 3, Interesting) by legont on Wednesday July 17 2019, @01:55AM

      by legont (4179) on Wednesday July 17 2019, @01:55AM (#867800)

      women weren't invented until the 1970s, apparently

      Bullshit. Women were used, for example, to convince man that they could fly modern aircraft at all.

      While many of these women wanted to fly combat missions, to the US Army it was out of the question. In fact, many people across the country didn’t believe women could fly a military airplane at all. The Army used this to their advantage. The male pilots were resistant to learning to fly the newest … and most complicated plane yet: the B29. The solution: have the WASPs show them how it was done. When the male pilots saw two women flying the B29, they stopped complaining and got to work.

      http://www.clarabartonmuseum.org/wasps/ [clarabartonmuseum.org]

      --
      "Wealth is the relentless enemy of understanding" - John Kenneth Galbraith.
  • (Score: 5, Informative) by JNCF on Tuesday July 16 2019, @06:50AM (2 children)

    by JNCF (4317) on Tuesday July 16 2019, @06:50AM (#867443) Journal

    I was under the impression that the original tapes had been lost or recorded over.

    Time will tell: [time.com]

    The footage was among 1,150 reels that Gary George, a former NASA intern, purchased at a government surplus auction in 1976 for just $218, or about $975 in today’s dollars. George didn’t know the contents of the tapes for decades, and didn’t think they included anything of value. He had hoped to sell them to TV stations.

    It wasn’t until 2006, when NASA admitted the tapes had been lost, that George realized the value of what he had. His tape has reportedly been viewed only three times since 1976.

    Other, clearer recordings were likely reused or erased at NASA in the early 1980s.

    Probably deepfakes distracting us from the cities on the far side of the moon built by the deepstate secret space program preparing for the oncoming apocalypse when Nibiru returns in 2012.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @05:48PM (1 child)

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @05:48PM (#867628)

      My understanding is that these are broadcast format tapes, not in the original "slow scan" format that the footage was transmitted from the Moon in. Having undergone both frame rate and resolution conversion, these are still not up to the original quality, but they might be the best quality versions surviving, simply due to having been copied fewer times and being well preserved.

      • (Score: 2) by JNCF on Tuesday July 16 2019, @07:04PM

        by JNCF (4317) on Tuesday July 16 2019, @07:04PM (#867662) Journal

        That's at the bottom of the Time quote:

        Other, clearer recordings were likely reused or erased at NASA in the early 1980s.

  • (Score: 2) by krishnoid on Tuesday July 16 2019, @06:53AM (9 children)

    by krishnoid (1156) on Tuesday July 16 2019, @06:53AM (#867444)

    Should we worry less about preserving older recordings in general? If they're *completely* digitized at the highest resolution extractable, isn't such media just an artifact of physical recording technology at the time? I mean, if it was recorded directly to an Exabyte cartridge, what are the reasons to worry about preserving the original cartridge over the data?

    One that I could think of is that you may want to re-digitize it later in case of dispute over the actual audio on the tape.

    • (Score: 3, Interesting) by JNCF on Tuesday July 16 2019, @07:04AM (8 children)

      by JNCF (4317) on Tuesday July 16 2019, @07:04AM (#867446) Journal

      If they're *completely* digitized at the highest resolution extractable,

      What is the highest resolution extractable from analog film, exactly? How many labs have the equipment to extract data at that resolution, and how quickly can they do it?

      • (Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @07:17AM (1 child)

        by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @07:17AM (#867448)

        *Cries in 128kbps MP3*

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @08:10AM

          by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @08:10AM (#867461)

          *Screeches in 64 Kbps Opus*

      • (Score: 4, Insightful) by maxwell demon on Tuesday July 16 2019, @07:43AM (3 children)

        by maxwell demon (1608) on Tuesday July 16 2019, @07:43AM (#867455) Journal

        What is the highest resolution extractable from analog film, exactly?

        It is not analogue film, but analogue tape recording. The maximal resolution is whatever the technology of that time managed to write. I would be shocked if we didn't have the technology to read that at a much higher resolution than originally recorded.

        Maybe not as a ready-made machine, but I'm sure there's a lab that could do it. And I would surely hope NASA has doen that before putting the tapes on auction.

        But having said that, I do think there's value in preserving the original. Unlike any digitalization, the original tapes are hard to tamper with without it being detectable, and moreover their physical age can probably be at least approximately verified. That is, the tapes themselves are evidence that the event really happened, with a credibility that no digital copy can ever gain.

        --
        The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
        • (Score: 2) by JNCF on Tuesday July 16 2019, @07:51AM

          by JNCF (4317) on Tuesday July 16 2019, @07:51AM (#867456) Journal

          It is not analogue film, but analogue tape recording. The maximal resolution is whatever the technology of that time managed to write.

          Fair enough for this specific case, but krishnoid was explicitly making a point about old recordings in general.

          And I would surely hope NASA has doen that before putting the tapes on auction.

          Seeing as they didn't know where the tapes were, and clearer tapes were probably written over (see Time quote in another comment here), I would hope the same but expect otherwise.

        • (Score: 3, Insightful) by krishnoid on Tuesday July 16 2019, @08:17AM (1 child)

          by krishnoid (1156) on Tuesday July 16 2019, @08:17AM (#867462)

          with a credibility that no digital copy can ever gain.

          Or, for that matter, a digital original. If digital recording technology was available back then, and as it becomes the predominant method of recording, it seems like physical evidence would have had/has less credibility as time goes on.

          • (Score: 2) by Bot on Tuesday July 16 2019, @12:24PM

            by Bot (3902) on Tuesday July 16 2019, @12:24PM (#867513) Journal

            I am not sure it's really impossible to fake an analog recording. You can get the old equipment and tapes, feed it a high res fake, fake the passing of time with proper demagnetization/xtalk/noise.

            back to topic, now they can show me whatever, too late. All I remember seeing of the moon mission before CGI fx got gud is material that looks fake. All I hear from the debunkers is stupid fluff. There is a mirror on the moon? So fucking what, russians put stuff too, there. But no living persons appeared in a genuine moon shot till now, for some reason. Frankly, IDC.

            --
            Account abandoned.
      • (Score: 2) by FatPhil on Tuesday July 16 2019, @08:36AM

        by FatPhil (863) <pc-soylentNO@SPAMasdf.fi> on Tuesday July 16 2019, @08:36AM (#867466) Homepage
        > What is the highest resolution extractable from analog film, exactly?

        The tape recording's resolution is almost certainly just grotty old NTSC straight off an Ampex, nothing more.

        Information content? Mix the pixel clock with Shannon's Law if you desperately want a number, but it will be a mostly meaningless overestimate. You could try to work out what the end to end (camera, transmission, recording, and storage losses) noise ratio is, and plug that into Shannon's Law instead, and that would give you a more meaningful number. Which would tell you only one thing - the digital version of it contains all the useful information on the tape already.
        --
        Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
      • (Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Tuesday July 16 2019, @03:33PM

        by hendrikboom (1125) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday July 16 2019, @03:33PM (#867585) Homepage Journal

        The highest resolution on analog film is limited by the graininess of the film.

  • (Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @12:33PM (1 child)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @12:33PM (#867516)

    These are probably the best available for the moon walk, but the signal path is pretty long.
    Sotheby's is selling them as a first generation recording, and they are because they are not a re-recording.
    (Unless there was a tape delay somewhere in the signal chain?)
    But the recording was done after much transmission and conversion.
    Not sure how much better they are than the CBS broadcast tapes.

    Probably transmitting slow scan over a satellite hop works much better than transmitting NTSC over a microwave relay chain, so there is hope that they are much better.
    One would have to see the digitized version to know.

    Also since the original was slow scan, some image processing could likely be done taking this into account to get them closer to the original moon transmission.

    The signal path in detail:
    Slow scan camera on the moon surface.
    Moon to Australia via high gain radio link.
    (Was also recorded in Australia and these tapes lost.)
    Transmitted to Houston via ???
    Converted from Slow scan to NTSC for local viewing and distribution for broadcast
    Recorded locally in NTSC format.
    Sold at auction in the 70's for $217.
    Stored for 40 plus years in unknown conditions.
    (Played and digitized in Ca to verify the quality.)
    (Tested at Sotheby's the verify quality.)
    Now at Sotheby's for sale.

    If they are as claimed, they are certainly an international historical treasure but likely without Copyright protections?

    https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/auction/2019/space-exploration/apollo-11-original-first-generation-nasa-videotape?locale=en [sothebys.com]

    • (Score: 2) by D2 on Tuesday July 16 2019, @09:53PM

      by D2 (5107) on Tuesday July 16 2019, @09:53PM (#867713)

      Copyright protection starts anew the moment that the tape owner does *anything* between original and copy. Digitization. Remastering. Editing. Adding commentary. Adding any footage or titles. Hiring John Madden to draw loops and arrows all over the screen, or the MST3K guys to do their schtick.

      This is the worst of current copyright rules: their absurdity in the face of the above. So *WHAT* that Disney wants to retain and protect Steamboat Willie... they can retain a solid copyright do so by improving from the master and starting the clock again.

  • (Score: 2) by ElizabethGreene on Tuesday July 16 2019, @01:07PM (1 child)

    by ElizabethGreene (6748) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday July 16 2019, @01:07PM (#867531) Journal

    Where does NASA auction their surplus? I'd like to follow that.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @01:24PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 16 2019, @01:24PM (#867538)

      Wild guess, TPB?

(1)