I've been tied up at a two-day Blog Law conference in midtown (well, I needed the CLE credits), so if I'm missing anything critical here, please let me know. Actually, the conference was good, and featured blog heavyweights like Jeff Jarvis of BuzzMachine, and some very hot law bloggers who I do blogroll here on SLP, including the hosts of Patently-O (Dennis Crouch), How Appealing (Howard Bashman), Internet Cases (Evan Brown), as well as Marty Schwimmer and others. It was also cool to meet Google's own copyright guru, Bill Patry. Thanks to the lovable and well-connected Jeff Neuburger of Brown Raysman for the invite.
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Now that, as The Onion notes, politicians have swept the midterm elections -- scoring 'resounding victories in all states, counties, cities, towns' -- the real action begins. Brian Berger looks at how the new leadership in Congress may change oversight of NASA: "While analysts do not foresee the new Congress dismantling the agency's plan to field new manned spacecraft systems and return to the Moon, they do expect Democrats to submit the U.S. space agency's space exploration plans to more scrutiny and use their greater say over federal spending to bolster NASA science and aeronautics programs hard hit in recent budgets." (Space News)
And here is the memo from busy Brian E. Chase, NASA assistant administrator for legislative affairs regarding the FY 2007 budget in the 110th Congress. (SpaceRef)
My apologies to Ed Minchau of robot guy for not noting this sooner but I just caught his thoughtful essay on property rights in space. I owe him a comment there. (As Ed illustrates, arguing that the OST does not preclude private space property is easy. The hard part is convincing folks not to pay anything but donut holes for "deeds" to celestial real estate.)
I may have posted this earlier, but the 27th session of the Inter-Agency Meeting on Outer Space Activities will be held at the UN in Vienna, Austria, Jan. 17-19, 2007.
In response to the Guardian's concerns about Sir Richard Branson's environmentalism, physicist and HobbySpace host Clark Lindsey notes, "With hundreds of millions of cars in daily operation in England, Europe and the rest of the world, it's difficult to see how a relatively small number of rocket flights per week (even under the best scenario of space tourism growth) will make a significant contribution to global warming." Sounds right.
Rocket pollution is one thing, orbital litter is something else.
Speaking of another kind of green altogether -- actually, red -- Scott Hubbard talks about NASA's venture capital firm, Red Planet Capital (SmartMoney via HobbySpace). Remember In-Q-Tel?
In The Space Review, Dwayne Day has an indepth look at the new national space policy.
Also in The Space Review, some items of military interest by James Oberg and Taylor Dinerman.
According to The Space Report: The Guide to Global Space Activity, space companies out perform the S&P 500 and NASDAQ. (The Space Foundation; free executive summary here.)
Congratulations to Blue Origin on its successful test launch this week. (Cosmic Log)
I was caught posting about TV and Sony PS3's, not law, when Professor Reynolds linked here this week. That sort of thing has got to be good for a blawg's reputation ;).
Finally, I don't know if the now notorious couple charged with overt sexual activity on a Southwest Airlines flight called an air lawyer. But they did not call a space lawyer.
KFC, anyone?
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Image credit: Icarus, 1931 - one of L.W. Hine's photographs of the Empire State Building under construction; courtesy of the NY Public Library Digital Gallery.
