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