back to article ALIEN ARTIFACTS can best be FOUND ON MOON

Space boffins have come up with a plan which strikes a deeply resonant chord with us here on the Register lunar desk. The scientists advocate the settting up of a distributed volunteer effort to trawl for signs of alien visits through the vast databases of lunar imagery being accumulated by NASA's space probe now circling the …

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  1. Alister

    Does LRO also map magnetic anomolies... say, in the Tycho area??

  2. Boris the Cockroach Silver badge
    Alien

    well

    at least it will give those alien conspiracy nuts something to do that will keep them secured locked in their mom's basement, leaving the rest of us to live our lives normally

    AND in blissful ignorance of the real truth thats out there!

    bet that LRO probe has a 'malfunction' within a couple of days......

  3. Neil Barnes Silver badge
    Alien

    Wouldn't it be nice

    if we discovered incontrovertible evidence of alien litter patrols, sweeping up after us and keeping the moon nice and tidy?

  4. horsham_sparky
    WTF?

    Lunar desk?

    How many desks do you guys have at el reg? is it just one desk with lots of titles? or do you have lots of desks that you move around between? or alternatively, are these just hypothetical desks that the reader should furnish with their imagination?

    mmmm moon-cheese desk.. gromit! gromit! we've forgotten the crackers!

    Apologies for the slight tangent there..

    1. ps2os2
      FAIL

      Lunar Desk?

      Is that similar to a cloud desk only really far out (near the mens room)?

  5. Graham Dawson Silver badge
    FAIL

    Great idea?

    Given the conspiracists propensity to see any nearly-straight-edged object as CONCLUSIVE PROOF OF ALIENS (see, for example, the "5 sided pyramid" on Mars that looks almost symmetrical until you actually pay attention) and a constant drone of "it's a city!" every time someone spots a jpeg artefact on a picture, I'm not sure this is going to produce anything particularly useful.

    1. Malmesbury

      Worry

      If you find a strange city of squares without apparent purpose - all burnt and hacked about.

      I'll get my coat. It's the one with the Engines of God in the pocket...

  6. No such thing as an Anonymous Coward
    Black Helicopters

    c3po's head...

    was photographed during the Apollo mission...

    Just do a search for: Hoagland's C-3PO Moon Discovery.

    1. This post has been deleted by its author

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    " this location has the virtue of being close,"

    A lot like the drunk looking for his keys under the street light, because 'the light is better there'.

  8. jai

    where do i sign up

    I'm well up for this. Galaxy Zoo was good fun for a few otherwise dull sunday afternoons. If they can put the data up on a website without the use of flash, then I'll happy contribute from the sofa while the missus is watching her tv programmes

  9. Natalie Gritpants

    About as likely as you finding a spell checker

    Artifact!

    1. sandman

      Artifact

      American English spelling - used to get complaints from some pedantic Americans when I wrote an archaeological website and used the English (English) spelling "artefact".

      1. Steve Evans

        How on earth did "archaeological" manage to get past them?

        Surely it can't be too long before that is "corrected"

        Archylogical?

  10. BuddyLee

    Don't you think that if that LRO finds anything the government deems unworthy to release to the public that it'll just photoshop the images before release to the media like they've done with everything else? Someone mentioned Hoagland, I saw his interview on Camelot forum & it's quite interesting which goes with my theory on what he stated about the government "cleaning" up photos...one of them he mentions domes on the moon that were basically taken out of the picture that the public saw. This article is interesting in the least but again nothing will ever be produced unless the govm't approves it. They may find a Lost City on the Moon & we'll never see it if they don't want us to...all we get is a pixelated image of what might be something.

    1. stpete

      Smudges in old govt lunar pics?

      Governments have been altering photos since for ever, but without Photoshop or computers to digitize lunar pix and smoothly alter photos in the 60's & 70's, lunar photos released back then feature many clumsy (by modern standards) smudges. <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13TmpnWwAJ8&feature=related>

  11. TXITMAN
    Alien

    all this time

    All this time I have had 'get your as to mars' running through my head.

  12. Mike Flugennock
    Alien

    D'ahh... it's old news, man...

    ...didn't the Weekly World News already publish the stolen secret NASA fotos of that WWII bomber about 20 or 30 years ago?

    1. Graham Marsden
      Happy

      @Mike Flubennock

      Ah, but The Sunday Sport went one better, not only did they have "WWII Bomber Found on Moon - Picture!" showing said bomber on the moon, but a bit later they had "WWII Bomber Disappears from Moon" with a picture showing where the bomber *used* to be!

      1. Dave Bell
        Boffin

        I was once at an SF convention where we tried to get a story into the Sunday Sport.

        Unfortunately, we were a bit too subtle: they didn't realise what was odd about fater-than-light neutrinos.

  13. Destroy All Monsters Silver badge
    Alien

    A fire upon the Moon?

    Let ancient evils sleep in peace!

    http://www.webscription.net/chapters/0812515285/0812515285.htm

  14. Anonymous Coward
    Alien

    Seriously?

    I mean; for several reasons already mentioned its hard to pick this up as serious. And to add to the cynicism... Hasn't it been determined that having gas giants in the outer regions of our solar system helps protect the inner planets from impacts from meteors and the likes? All up to a certain point of course, but I clearly recall reading about studies which determined that planets such as Jupiter pick up a lot of "space debris".

    So, pardon my very simple approach here, but wouldn't that aspect make the outer planets more liable sources ?

    1. Peter Mc Aulay

      Even better, gas giants can be mined for hydrogen fuel and electricity so they would make a natural watering hole for interstellar spacecraft to visit. Assuming certain things about their propulsion systems and other workings, of course. I'd say the odds of stuff being left in Jupiter orbit or on its moons (many of which are subject to heavy erosion, though) are about as good as stuff being left on Luna, depending on how long ago they were visited.

      And if you're adapted to space or even just different gravity, pressure or gas mixture, Earth may not be on the to-do list at all.

  15. MrPSB
    FAIL

    Er...

    http://www.moonzoo.org has been going for quite a while now, maybe they should have run a quick search?

  16. Andrew Newstead

    Classic SF

    I seem to remember Arthur C Clarke writing a little know short story around this idea, I think someone made a movie of it...

    1. jon 72
      Alien

      Sci-fi Librarian

      That would be "The Sentinel" one of his earlier works, Clifford D Simak also explored this theme with another short called "Construction Shack" where Pluto was not quite what they thought.. many other examples of alien leftovers can also be found dotted across the genre and the asteroid belt ;)

      1. Dodgy Geezer Silver badge
        Boffin

        "That would be "The Sentinel" one of his earlier works..."

        But the name of the film escapes me....

        Obviously NASA can't remember either. Otherwise they would be looking for MAGNETIC anomalies. And doing it from a ground-based survey robot in Tycho......

        Anyway, we'll soon know. Just as soon as they shut up JET and claim there's an infectious disease going round, and Russians looking like Rigsby who have just spent three months calibrating the new antennae at Tchalinko start asking suspicious questions...

        1. phuzz Silver badge
          Alien

          Although, in The Sentinel, the protagonist doesn't discover the object via a careful examination of satellite footage, he notices a glint whilst aimlessly looking out the window (of the British Lunar Base no less!) while cooking bacon.

          The bacon did unfortunately end up burnt :(

  17. Local Group
    Childcatcher

    Old Chinese Proverb

    Journey in search for extra terrestrial intelligence begins with snapshots of the moon.

  18. This post has been deleted by its author

  19. techfreak
    Terminator

    Trail of debris from BSG-75

    I'm quite positive that when Battlestar Galactica, as bad of a shape as she was, bubbled out of FTL above the moon, she left a long, long trail of debris. It would be proof positive that Moore and Eick are Cylons. And they have a plan.

  20. rimblock
    FAIL

    Nahsa

    The moon is only worth visiting because it is OUR moon. If i was an alien i would probably just shoot a couple of rockets at it as i flew past.

  21. Stoke the atom furnaces
    Happy

    ALIEN ARTIFACTS

    I spent many happy hours trading Alien Items, Artifacts, Weapons, etc as a child in my Cobra Mk III.

    1. Steve Evans

      Yeah yeah, likely story... Narcotics more like and a hacked mining laser.

  22. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    probabilistically speaking

    if we find non human artifacts on the moon they still came from here.

    anonymous 'cause I dig the mask

  23. unitron
    Headmaster

    Well, technically...

    ...wouldn't any of the junk we've left up there count as alien artifacts?

    We aren't actually native to our planet's moon, only to our planet.

  24. Sceptic Tank Silver badge
    Go

    And if the band you're in starts playing different tunes

    I'll see you on the dark side of the moon.

  25. Anonymous Coward
    Coat

    I like the moon...

    I like the moon coz it is close to us. I like the moon, but not as much as a spoon coz that's more use for eating soup, and a fork is pretty useless for that unless you have got many vegetable. In that case, you may be better off with some chopsticks.

    1. John 62
      Unhappy

      I'm sad there are no Quiznos subs near me

      :(

      but I'm very happy about the song.

      We love the moon!

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