Apparently they got sold (accidentally?) as part of a surplus lot to a NASA intern named Gary George back in 1976. George's father found them in among everything else, and he's kept them safe all these years -- and apparently tried to sell them back to NASA for more money than they were willing to pay ten years ago when the active search for them was still ongoing. Now that the 50th anniversary of the moon landing is coming up Real Soon Now, he's put them up for auction with
Sotheby's, who have verified that they are in fact the genuine article. (The tapes have been played once for verification, and once more for the purpose of digitizing their contents.)
The tapes go up for auction on the 21st (of course), with a minimum bid of US$700,000. Follow the link above to see the Sotheby's catalog page for them. And go
here for the
Gizmodo article on the tapes.
Hopefully whomever buys them will be willing to donate them to a museum or something. Thankfully the data has already been digitized, so loss of the data is less likely.
It may have been digitized, but where is the data now? The Gizmodo article explains...
Quote:In December 2008, Mr. George’s tapes were played for the second time since he bought them in 1976, and were digitized directly to 10-bit uncompressed files, retaining their original 525 SD4/3 specifications and downloaded onto a one terabyte hard drive (which is included as a part of the sale of these three reels of videotape).
In other words, the asshole is sitting on that as well as the tapes. I fucking despise people like this. These tapes could have been archived with the rest of the Apollo 11 records - "Hey! I don't think you guys intended to sell this!" - but this fucking dickhead wanted to make a buck at the expense of
American World History.
I hope that someone torches his fucking car the moment the tapes
and the data are safely in trustworthy hands.
Just checked the Sotheby's page a few minutes ago. They now list an expected auction price of $1-2 million for the tapes.
We'll see what happens in three days. Hopefully the winning bidder will, as we hope, hand the tapes and hard drive over to NASA.
Well, the tapes sold for 1.5 million USD.
God knows who the hell the buyer is right now.
Hopefully it's someone like the Dutch guy who bought a flag carried by one of the landing boats during the invasion of Normandy specifically to donate it back to the USA... but I'm not holding my breath until it happens. For some beings, the historical significance is all the more reason to keep it to themselves, and that kind of behaviour does tend to select toward gathering the resources necessary to drop a cool mil or two on things with no practical use just because you want them.
Nah, fuck no. The rich sack of crap that bought these will fucking keep it to themselves.
Still no word on who bought the tapes. Kiss 'em goodbye, folks. If they were ever going to come back into the public we would have heard about it by now.
Speaking of Apollo, SciShow made a video asking the question, “Was the Apollo program a bad idea?”
IMO, no, it wasn’t.
People who think Apollo was a bad Idea only look at the cost of the program in taxpayer dollars, and completely overlook all the other benefits these programs have brought to the people as a result, over and above the knowledge gained.
I strongly suspect that people that make documentaries like this are in secret supporting that weird movement calling for the extinction of humanity, because apparently we shouldn't be allowed to exist.
(Seriously, how is the human race ever going to make it if we don't start figuring out how to live in places other than Earth?)
(08-01-2019, 06:07 PM)SilverFang01 Wrote: [ -> ]Speaking of Apollo, SciShow made a video asking the question, “Was the Apollo program a bad idea?”
IMO, no, it wasn’t.
No, it wasn't. Fuck You SciShow.
Did... Did any of you watch the video all the way through? They say that it WAS a good idea, due to a multiple of things.
(08-05-2019, 03:00 AM)Niteflier Wrote: [ -> ]Did... Did any of you watch the video all the way through? They say that it WAS a good idea, due to a multiple of things.
Have to admit I did not watch it at all; since the OP seemed to make it clear these folk seemed to think it was NOT a good idea. I guess this makes me guilty of judging a video by its thumbnail shot? Though to be blunt, there are so many one can't help but doing so...
(08-05-2019, 03:36 AM)Star Ranger4 Wrote: [ -> ] (08-05-2019, 03:00 AM)Niteflier Wrote: [ -> ]Did... Did any of you watch the video all the way through? They say that it WAS a good idea, due to a multiple of things.
Have to admit I did not watch it at all; since the OP seemed to make it clear these folk seemed to think it was NOT a good idea. I guess this makes me guilty of judging a video by its thumbnail shot? Though to be blunt, there are so many one can't help but doing so...
I wrote that in my opinion it wasn’t, but I wanted to see others opinions after watching it.
(08-05-2019, 05:02 AM)SilverFang01 Wrote: [ -> ] (08-05-2019, 03:36 AM)Star Ranger4 Wrote: [ -> ] (08-05-2019, 03:00 AM)Niteflier Wrote: [ -> ]Did... Did any of you watch the video all the way through? They say that it WAS a good idea, due to a multiple of things.
Have to admit I did not watch it at all; since the OP seemed to make it clear these folk seemed to think it was NOT a good idea. I guess this makes me guilty of judging a video by its thumbnail shot? Though to be blunt, there are so many one can't help but doing so...
I wrote that in my opinion it wasn’t, but I wanted to see others opinions after watching it.
so ka... Means I need to scroll up and watch it to give you an honest opinion then Silver Fang.
and, after having watched it all, my thoughts are best inscribed in the attached file, Silver.
I tend to ignore Clickbait titles on Youtube these days.
...
No offense Bob, but I don't think the newbies understand what Assembly language really IS.
Hell, I came in back in the Cobol age, and I STILL dreaded the possiblity of working at the ASL level.