Arthur C. Clarke will join a panel of prominent scientists to discuss the potential of exploration of Europa. The icy moon has remarkable similarities to Earth, and Clarke has suggested in his novels "2010: Odyssey Two" and "3001: The Final Odyssey" that life could be supported there. JPL launched the probe Galileo to Jupiter in 1989, and it has been orbiting the planet since late 1995, returning to Earth revealing pictures of Europa. Clarke has often referred to Europa as "the lifeboat of the human race," suggesting that if the Earth became inhospitable, mankind could potentially relocate to Europa. The moon could potentially be an ideal space station for further exploration of the galaxy, Clarke says.
Clarke will broadcast his message to the lecture and take questions from the audience via an internet "livecam" near his home in Colombo, Sri Lanka. The livecam is provided by Sri Lanka Telecom. The livecam broadcasts a constant video stream, technically known as a "jpeg push," out to the internet. The livecam is maintained by Los Angeles based Hazardous Media (http://hazardous.com), who has successfully produced a series of cybercasts with Clarke, including birthday wishes to the HAL 9000 computer in March 1997, and the 30th anniversary of "2001: A Space Odyssey" in April 1998. Rebroadcasts of these past Clarke cybercasts are available at http:/hazardous.com/2001.
The jpeg push technology was developed by internet guru John Sokol of Livecam.com (http://www.livecam.com). The livecam is the only one in existence on the island of Sri Lanka, south of India, and Clarke enjoys using it to communicate with the rest of the world.
Says Clarke in a upcoming documentary produced by Hazardous Media: "The internet is a communication network which is making the global family I've been talking about for decades. At the moment, it's true that only a few people in developed countries can afford this sort of thing. But more and more, people in countries like Sri Lanka are getting it. And every village will have a communications device of some kind in the next few decades. So the whole world will be wired up."
This is the third time that Hazardous Media and Livecam.com have teamed to cybercast Arthur C. Clarke to the internet.
Says documentary filmmaker A.J. Catoline, co-founder of Hazardous Media: "Cybercasting Arthur C. Clarke from Sri Lanka to Los Angeles is like traveling from Earth to Europa as far as the internet is concerned. Cybercasting is fast emerging as a new medium like radio and television once were state-of-the art technologies." Catoline says the livecam currently produces an image of about 6 frames per second, however as internet speeds increase worldwide, we will soon see full-motion video.
Adds cybercast technician John Sokol: "Will the telephone, television and internet become one? Absolutely, I think they are converging."
Hazardous Media's website earns its name by embracing the internet as a growing digital revolution, where new mediums are emerging in the uncharted and hazardous frontier of cyberspace. The company's slogan is "daring internet adventures," and Hazardous Media and Livecam.com have taken digital cameras into the world's more "analog" locations, including Sri Lanka, Korea, the Nepali Himalayas, and Eastern Europe. Both companies are based in Los Angeles, however their home is wherever the internet takes them.
Hazardous Media is producing a documentary film called "1010: An Internet Odyssey with Arthur C. Clarke" about the history and the future of the digital revolution and the internet. Scenes from the cybercast will appear in the film.
The lecture will be broadcast to the internet via the websites of Hazardous Media and JPL. Real Audio/Video and CUSeeMe technology will be used. Please stay tuned to the hazardous.com URL listed above. JPL's website may be accessed at: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/galileo/europaday.
The NASA satellite network will also broadcast the entire conference live to viewers in North America. The conference may be received on GE satellite # 1, Ku band, transponder 24, vertical polarity, downlink frequency 12.180, 103 degrees west longitude.
The panel of scientists joining in the lecture with Clarke will be Dr. Ron Greeley of Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ, a Galileo project imaging team member; Dr. John Delaney, a submarine volcano researcher with the University of Washington, Seattle; and Joan Horvath of JPL, the Europa/Lake Vostok Initiative manager. Lake Vostok, a frozen lake underneath the ice in Antarctica, may have features similar to Europa. Dr. Richard Terrile of JPL will moderate the panel and JPL Director Dr. Edward Stone will give the welcome address.
The event is free, but tickets must be obtained from the Caltech Ticket Office, with information available by calling (626) 395-4652 or at the following Internet website: http://www.caltech.edu/~tickets/to.htm.
California Institute of Technology
May 18, 1998
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/galileo/europaday/index2.html
http://www.hazardous.com/europa
http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/ltc/special/europa.html
137.78.102.199
137.78.206.121
137.78.102.200
The CuSeeMe player runs on either a Macintosh or IBM PC. It is recommended you have the player installed ahead of time. For more information, see this web page:
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/galileo/europaday/cuseemee.html
Here is the satellite information:
Satellite: GE#1, Ku Band
Transponder (or channel) 24
Vertical Polarity
Downlink Frequency: 12.180
103 Degrees W. Longitude
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/galileo/europaday/remote.html
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
May 12, 1998
"A Day on Europa" will take place Wednesday, May 20 and Thursday, May 21, since daylight on Europa lasts about two Earth days. Scheduled activities in numerous American cities will be transformed into global village events via the Internet. Highlights will include new imagery of Europa taken by the Galileo spacecraft and a free panel discussion entitled "Europa-- Another Water World?" on May 21 at Caltech's Beckman Auditorium.
The presentation, to be broadcast live on the Internet, will feature science fiction writer Arthur C. Clarke, author of "2001: A Space Odyssey" and "2010: Odyssey Two," via live telephone hookup from Sri Lanka. Other panelists include Dr. Ron Greeley of Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ, a Galileo project imaging team member; Dr. John Delaney, a submarine volcano researcher with the University of Washington, Seattle; and Joan Horvath of JPL, the Europa/Lake Vostok Initiative manager. Lake Vostok, a frozen lake underneath the ice in Antarctica, may have features similar to Europa. Dr. Richard Terrile of JPL will moderate the panel and JPL Director Dr. Edward Stone will give the welcome address.
The event is free, but tickets must be obtained from the Caltech Ticket Office, with information available by calling (626) 395-4652 or at the following Internet website: http://www.caltech.edu/~tickets/to.htm. The panel discussion may be viewed live on the Internet at the following website, which also contains information on other A Day on Europa activities: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/galileo/europaday. Questions for the panelists may be submitted in advance by email to:
The panel will also be broadcast on GE satellite # 1, Ku band, transponder 24, vertical polarity, downlink frequency 12.180, 103 degrees west longitude.
For those attending the May 21 panel discussion, a special "history walk" will take visitors through the past, present and future of our knowledge of Jupiter and Europa. Special booths with period costumes and displays will depict the Roman Empire, the era of astronomer Galileo Galilei, the Space Age featuring Voyagers 1 and 2, the Galileo spacecraft, and future Europa missions. Vendors will offer related memorabilia and Nikki Stone, a 1998 Winter Olympics Gold Medal-winning skier, will speculate on what it would be like to ski on Europa. The panel discussion is scheduled from 7 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. PDT, with vendors and entertainment from 6 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. Door prizes will be given away during the panel discussion.
Many other activities for "A Day on Europa" are planned around the nation by some of the 84 Galileo ambassadors, who bring the spacecraft's findings to their communities. Free public events on May 21 include the Arizona Science Center, Phoenix, AZ; Flandrau Planetarium, Tucson, AZ; University of Arkansas, Little Rock Planetarium, Little Rock, AR; Century Norwich cable Channel 7 live broadcast, Mystic, CT; The Children's Museum of Indianapolis, IN; Shawnee Heights School Planetarium, Topeka, KS; Mary Hurd Elementary, North Berwick, ME; Norwood Science Center, Norwood, MA; KBSD-TV live broadcast, Brownsville, TX; Vern Burton Center, Port Angeles, WA; and Discovery World Museum, Milwaukee, WI.
Among the school events planned are those at Muncie Community Schools Planetarium, Muncie, IN; Elm Street School, East Machias, ME; Halifax Elementary School, Halifax, MA (on May 22); Lyme School, Lyme, NH; Rankin School for Technology, Akron, OH; Fort Vannoy Elementary School, Grants Pass, OR; and Charleston County Public Schools, Charleston, SC (on May 22).
Educational events will include a May 20 "electronic field trip," a satellite video broadcast with a curriculum targeted for grades 5 through 8. The goal is to reach 2 million students nationwide with the theme "Outside the Envelope: Exploring Beyond Earth's Boundaries." Teachers can sign up by calling (703) 503- 7492 or at the following website: http://www.challenger.org/ote.html. The Los Angeles Unified School District will carry the event live on its cable station, KLCS.
The series represents a major activity of Space Day, which is being observed nationally on May 21. Space Day information is available at: http://www.spaceday.com.
"A Day on Europa" is sponsored by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA, which manages the Galileo mission for NASA. JPL is a division of the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA.