Google announced it will give $30 million to the first private company to safely land robotic spacecrafts on the moon....if Google can have access to all of the company's research materials and make them searchable...
"We're thrilled to be sponsoring the Lunar X-PRIZE, which will award a total of 30 million dollars to teams competing around the world to land privately funded spacecraft on the Moon," said a senior VP at Google.
The spacecraft must:
1. roll for at least a quarter mile (land it on a hill?)
2. beam back a gigabyte of images and video to Earth after its safe landing.
3. do so by 2012
1st place is $20 million
2nd place is $10 million
Google's reasoning for the plan....
1. It's cool. (That's cool.)
2. Space exploration has also produced technological breakthroughs and Google hopes the X-PRIZE will do the same.
3. Google hopes the contest will renew public interest in math, engineering and computer science.
Great plan, Google!
How about a few more giant hi-tech firms teaming up with Google or offering a similar plan?
Meanwhile...Japan, is working feverishly to privatize their government, having just launched a lunar probe.
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