X-Prize

Presumably none of you have been watching, but the X-Prize cup was this weekend.

It's really only cool to giant space geeks, I suppose. As I write this, John Carmack has already flown his earth-version lunar lander once, and they've just started a second attempt. They go into some fun details on the nature of the contests and the vehicles, and so forth.

There was apparently an impressive beam-climb that I missed, and some other contests featuring huge pieces of equipment doing loud, dangerous things.

The funny thing about the broadcast is that it feels a lot like some small-town coverage of a local festival. Their geek commentary is very good. I'm not sure why they decided they needed a squad of wannabe-stereotyped-anchorpeople, though. Doesn't really fit the mood.

Starting small. I expect that every year, they'll have more flights, more contests, more contestants. I just hope they keep a really high geek-to-anchor ratio, because the more the reporting turns into a generic wannabe-news-report, the less useful stuff gets said.