The worlds of Star Trek and real space exploration have been intertwined since the show began in the 1960s during the space race. And the tradition will continue with the release of Star Trek Into Darkness thanks to a privately crowdfunded campaign to air PSAs at screenings of the new Trek movie which will promote more NASA funding.
‘We Are The Explorers’ ads To Air With ‘Into Darkness’
This week the Aerospace Industries Association (AIA) of America successfully ‘crowdfunded’ a campaign via Indigogo to air 30 second spots to promote NASA’ space exploration during selected screenings of Star Trek Into Darkness. The campaign isn’t being run by NASA but the AIA represents over 350 aerospace manufacturing companies and their goal is to demonstrate support for NASA and to inspire a new generation of students (and to inspire peopel to support funding for NASA of course).
The plan is to make a 30 second advertising spot out of the following "We Are the Explorers" video which was recently made by NASA (below). These spots will be shown with selected showings of Into Darkness.
The AIA campaign easily met their target of $30,000, probably helped greatly by support from Star Trek: The Next Generation star Wil Wheaton via Twitter.
For more about the campaign visit the official Indigogo campaign page.
I LOVE NASA! Once I got a personal tour of JPL,a branch of NASA,and it was AWESOME! The guy who gave me the tour,a friend’s hubby,is a rocket scientist….yeah,I KNOW how it sounds,lol….and his baby was Spirit,who got stuck on Mars. I saw the room they had set up to look exactly like the ditch on Mars where Spirit was stuck and how they worked to try and free her. Takes forty minutes to know if it worked or not,signal used twenty minutes to Mars and then twenty minutes back. Rather fascinating,to be honest.
Have fun!
J-R!
I’m so glad they were successful with this.
This is wonderful news! Go NASA & Trek!!
Now the only thing that’s missing, are whales :-)
Yeah- go NASA- back to the moon!!
But sadly, due to you-know-who, we won’t see another moon mission in any of our lifetimes…
Weird, considering that Star Trek has abandoned any premise at all of being scientific. Nothing wrong with fantasy, but all it promotes is junk science.
@5 Maybe not from the USA, but here is hoping China will reach the moon in the next few decades.
@5. Dr. Image
“Yeah- go NASA- back to the moon!!
But sadly, due to you-know-who, we won’t see another moon mission in any of our lifetimes…”
Voldermort?
Is that Peter Cullen narrating that?
This is an awesome and inspiring video!
It is too bad that the present administration is not supportive of nasa, our future in space, exploration, and american exceptionalism. Maybe in few years there will be a change! I am HOPEFUL!
Did some of my posts here get deleted!? Why? Was I….feeding the troll…so to speak!? lol! Oh well,I can mention hoverboards again some other time,like 2015,lol!
It sure sounds like Peter. If you watch this on youtube there’s some funny comments about Optimus saying we have to go to space,lol! I’d go right NOW if I could. Mars looks like fun,as does Saturn.
J-R!
How wonderful! I hope this campaign is very successful in raising funding for NASA!
I’d quite like to see this on the big screen, but I’m assuming this won’t be before screenings in the UK! :-P
Ad astra per aspera, my American brothers and sisters.
I love this! I know Star Trek was an inspiration to myself and many of my colleagues to pursue NASA careers.
NASA needs greater support from the public. We try to get the most out of our $0.0025 per federal dollar (yep a quarter of a penny) but big missions and big science cost big money. And in a recession it is hard to prioritize a manned mission to Mars (probably $100 billion) over food stamps ($75 billion per year)
2 unnecessary wars started by people who were less than visionary has nearly wiped out anything left over for R&D. Exploration for exploration’s sake only goes so far before economics demand a return on the investment.
But trying to explain that every idiot’s smartphone can be directly traced back to NASA R&D falls on deaf ears.
Hear, hear for NASA’s self promotion. But if they’re only showing this during a Star Trek film they’ll be preaching to the choir. I’d rather see this during March Madness or during an NFL game. Its the near beer drinkers that need convincing.
JJ, Bob, et al,
The opening credits of Star Trek IV featured a dedication to the Challenger crew.
A modest suggestion – splice the edited version of this info video into the front of “Into Darkness” before the Paramount / BR credits. For free. It would be very much in the spirit of the teaser trailer for ST that opened with the JFK narration.
NASA and ST have had an interesting and synergistic relationship for 50 years. Would be a real public service to let the audience know that space flight did not end with the conclusion of the shuttle program.
Thanks for your consideration.
This is some cool news. I hope that my theater gets the NASA vid. Star Trek inspired me to get a degree in physics, here’s hoping that it can continue to inspire the next generation of scientists.
That is Peter Cullen. http://www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2012/mar/HQ_12_071_We_Explore_Video.html
It’s too bad NASA couldn’t be convinced to let Star Trek The Exhibition return for a 2nd Sci-Fi Summer at Kennedy in 2012, with the Next Generation bridge, etc., saying NASA is about showing reality not fake. Then they turn around and bring Angry Birds in Space to KSC.