I want to dedicate this blog post to all of the volunteers, participants, supporters and sponsors of SpaceUP Houston.  All of you have helped our organization grow and receive international PR and recognition because of your hard work and enthusiasm for space exploration.  Thank you for your support!

About TEDx Events

I had the privilege of presenting a TEDx Talk on SpaceUP Houston and Spacepoints at this year’s first TEDx Sugarland event in August. If you haven’t attended or heard of TEDx events, I encourage you to look for the next one in your region and apply to attend.

TED is a nonprofit organization that began 25 years ago in California and invites the world’s leading thought leaders to speak on topics related the Technology, Entertainment, and Design.   TEDx events began as a way to bring the same innovation and inspiration to local communities and are independently organized and run.

TEDx Houston has been bringing us a local TED event annually since 2009 and in 2011, TEDx Woodlands became the second Greater Houston Metro TED event.  TEDx Sugarland joined the list this year in August bringing us “The Age of Wonderment“.   and brought a diverse group of thought leaders and doers including artists, educators, nonprofit organizations and scientists.

The list of speakers included:

• Dr. Jacob Cohen, Chief Scientist at NASA Ames Research Center aerospace scientist,
• Dr. Bobo Richards, Co-founder of the the International Space University, Singularity University and Google Lunar X Prize, and
• Nicole Stott, aerospace engineer and NASA astronaut.

Just like SpaceUP Houston, TEDxSugarLand is not-for-profit event, organized entirely by local, unpaid volunteers.

SpaceUP Houston was invited to introduce our organization and our vision to the audience and inspire them to do something.  This was a tall order and our team worked very hard on a presentation that best communicated our enthusiasm and passion for space exploration.

Here’s the video and presentation deck from the event, plus the photos and links to all of the TEDx Sugarland presentations.  Please share these with your network of space enthusiasts, family and friends and join us at our next SpaceUP Houston unconference in February 2013.

I Dream of Space – TEDx Talk Video

Find all the TEDx Sugarland Videos on the event YouTube Playlist.

I Dream of Space Presentation

TEDx Sugarland Event Photos

Find all the photos from TEDx Sugarland online at http://www.flickr.com/photos/tedxsugarland/

We are looking for volunteers and sponsors to help us with SpaceUP Houston events in 2013.  Contact us for more information.

Yesterday at South by Southwest Interactive we released the beta version of Spacepoints.

What is Spacepoints?

The idea is that every time you share the excitement of space exploration to someone outside of the space community you earn points in a virtual database.   The true motivation behind spacepoints is that we want people to become more active in promoting space exploration whether it be robotic, planetary science, human spaceflight, etc.  Spacepoints (to us) seemed like a fun way to offer a platform for engaging and promoting space exploration.

People listen more to their friends and colleagues, so why not share your passion with others outside the space community and maybe in the process ignite a passion for space within them.  Maybe they will take action by learning more about NASA, commercial spaceflight, astronomy, etc.  Perhaps they will write Congress to increase funding for technology and space.  Just remember, it started with you sharing and that’s why you earned Spacepoints!

Let’s get people excited about space!  Here are the activity categories to select from:

• I did – Plan an event, Volunteer, Shared ISS pass, Took people along, presentation at a local school
• I wrote – Tweetup Blog/pictures, Conference presentation, Wrote to congressman, A song, newspaper article
• I gave – Money, Space Souvenirs, NASA stickers
• I Went – launch, tweetup, conference, Yuri’s Night
• I Made – Hardware, Software, founded a space organization

Create your Spacepoints account today and start earning points!

We know we still have a long way to go to implement the requirements.  Want to help?  Contact us!

Schipul’s Sarah Worthy to Discuss Online Community Outreach at SXSW Interactive 2012

Will Examine Developing an Online Community Application for Space Outreach Using Crowdsourcing and Open Source Tools

HOUSTON, March 1, 2012 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Schipul – The Web Marketing Company (www.schipul.com), a leading Web marketing and software development company, announced today that Sarah M. Worthy will lead a Core Conversation about developing a social outreach application using crowdsourcing at the SXSW Interactive Festival. Worthy will lead the session, “SpacePoints: Space Outreach at Ludicrous Speed,” alongside Jon Verville, a collaboration architect at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center.

The session will examine SpacePoints, which was developed by space enthusiasts to use open source Web technologies to incentivize and reward efforts to promote continued space exploration in the wake of NASA’s diminished funding. Participants at the session will learn how SpacePoints successfully brought together like-minded people from across the country to turn an idea into a set of requirements and about the process of managing the development and design of the online community application.

SpacePoints invites Web developers, designers and space enthusiasts to join in the conversation with the goal of integrating new applications and expanding the platform. The online application framework for SpacePoints uses Schipul’s Tendenci^® (www.tendenci.com) content management software (CMS), built on the Django open source framework using the open source Python code.

SpacePoints will officially launch the beta version of the application on the day of the panel, scheduled for 12:30 p.m. Monday, March 12, 2012 at the Hilton Austin.  Interested beta testers are invited to sign-up for a beta invitation at http://spacepts.com.

The festival runs March 9-13, 2012 at the Austin Convention Center. For more information, visit http://sxsw.com/interactive.

The 19^th Annual SXSW Interactive Festival features presentations from the brightest minds in emerging technology, networking events hosted by industry leaders and a line up of special programs showcasing the best new websites, video games and startup ideas the community has to offer. It is widely recognized as the place to preview what is unfolding in cutting edge creative technology.

About Schipul – The Web Marketing Company

Schipul – The Web Marketing Company developed and supports the Tendenci CMS software to provide non-profit organizations an easy and affordable solution for all their online marketing needs. Schipul is headquartered in Houston with an office in Silicon Valley, and provides marketing services on the Internet to more than 300 organizations from a variety of service industries in local, national and international markets. Schipul’s clients include the Houston Zoo, Housing Authority of the City of Los Angeles and  the New York Metropolitan Library Foundation, among many others. Additional information about Schipul is available at www.schipul.com and www.tendenci.com.

The Schipul — The Web Marketing Company logo is available at http://www.globenewswire.com/newsroom/prs/?pkgid=11570

Sarah M. Worthy, project manager for Spacepoints, presented on Saturday February 25th at the 2012 SpaceUp Houston Unconference on the development progress of Spacepoints.

The presentation walked space-enthusiasts and Aerospace industry professionals through the different ways that Spacepoints has implemented the initial requirements determined last year at a SpaceUp Houston Workshop focused on developing Spacepoints.

Spacepoints will be released in Beta at the 2012 SXSW Interactive on March 12th.

Below are the presentation slides and the video of her presentation.

While we are busy planning our yearly unconference to be held February 25-26 we also have volunteers working hard to prepare the Spacepoints platform for beta release at this year’s South by Southwest (SXSW) Interactive in Austin, Texas.  Our panel is scheduled Monday March 12th from 12:30-1:30 pm at the Hilton Austin Downtown in Room 616AB.

We’d love for your help in promoting our Spacepoints Panel on Twitter, Facebook, Google+ etc.

Sample Tweet:  Spacepoints: Space Outreach at Ludicrous Speed Mar 12 at #SXSW (beta to be released) http://bit.ly/yuyZ0A #spacepts

Note that the hashtag for the panel is #spacepts instead of our usual #spacepoints

Thanks for the help in spreading the word and don’t forget to sign up for the Beta Release!

We’ve Been Really Busy Working on Spacepoints

Spacepoints is being developed on Drupal 7.x software and we are looking for experienced Drupal site administrators, developers, and designers who want to be part of the founding team to create this unique social network for Space Outreach.

Here’s a little information about what we’ve been up to:

1. Moved the Spacepoints website to a development server in a cloud hosting environment and set-up a way for multiple people to log-in and help set-up and adminster the site as a community.
2. Developed the rules and workflow for how users will join Spacepoints and earn Spacepoints for submitting how they’ve shared something Space-related with others inside the Drupal environment.
3. Compiled a list of Drupal Modules and started laying out the workflow and permissions settings for each of them within the Spacepoints Platform.
4. Identify and begin to implement API and oAuth integration functionality with the Spacepoints Platform to allow users to share across multiple social networking sites and websites.
5. Created initial design and process to promote SpaceUp and Spacepoints Sponsors, Partners, and Paid Advertisers on this gamified social networking platform to repay those who are giving time, money, and resources to Spacepoints development and also so that users can ‘spend’ their spacepoints with interested companies in a space-loyalty program.

That’s just a short list of what we are doing and there is a lot more that we need help with.  We have various tasks that range from Drupal development, Graphic Design, to content creation and site adminstration.

Most of this isn’t that technical either…

If you are familiar with using a web content management system like Drupal, WordPress, or Joomla, then you can be a part of the team that creates Spacepoints.

In return for being one of the founding development team members, you’ll receive:

1. Permanent recognition for you and your organization on the Spacepoints platform, including logo and link to your own website
2. Bragging Rights
3. Mention at the SXSW 2012 Spacepoints Panel in Austin, TX on March 12th when Beta is launched
4. Thank you mention in beta invitation emails as well as at least one email newsletter after beta launch
5. Mentions on the Spacepoints Facebook and Twitter streams

If you are interested in joining the fun, contact us at spacepoints@spaceuphouston.org with a brief summary of your experience with Drupal and tell us why you want to be part of our team.  Include your name, email address, location, and the amount of time each week you will commit to spending on the Spacepoints Project from now until Beta Launch on March 12th, 2012.

We’ll be at SpaceUP Houston’s 2nd Annual Unconference February 25th and 26th with a reveal of the Spacepoints Platform so far and a very limited number of pre-Beta invites. Only attendees at the conference will be eligible to receive the chance to create an account and start earning Spacepoints so make sure you register and attend: https://www.wepay.com/events/2012unconference

The Spacepoints team was honored to learn today that they have been selected to present at the SXSW  Interactive 2012 in Austin Texas March 9-13 at the Downtown Austin Hilton.  A huge thanks goes out to all of our supporters that made this possible by voting for us.

About the Spacepoints Panel:

When NASA’s budget was drastically cut and the commercial aerospace industry found itself in charge of getting man into space, a group of “space geeks” consisting of web developers, aerospace scientists and engineers, and people who have a dream of living in space started meeting up and designed the rules, developed the application, and are sharing Space Points and are increasing awareness publicly about space policy, increasing funding to aerospace-related research (commercial and government), and having fun playing to win!

Congratulations goes out to the SpaceUp family as another panel was selected that has representatives from both SpaceUp Foundation, D.C., and San Diego!

Spacepoints (learn more on our blog, wiki, facebook) is excited to offer our very first contest for sharing your enthusiasm of space exploration with those outside of the space community.

Rules:

• Follow @spacepts on Twitter
• “Like” Spacepoints on Facebook
• Post on Spacepoints Facebook Page what you did to share space exploration with those outside the space community
• Earn points by soliciting Facebook “likes” from those in the space community  (on twitter use hashtag #spacepoints to catch their attention) or by soliciting Facebook “likes” from your friends, family, coworkers, etc.
• Each “like” = 1 point
• As soon as you reach 10, 25, or 50 “likes” let us know via Twitter (@spacepts) – we will ask you to DM or email us your mailing address so we can send you cool space loot! (See below for prizes available)
• Posts already on our Spacepoints Facebook Page are eligible for this contest
• (Added 9/1/11)  Anyone on EARTH can participate as long as you have a valid mailing address
• (Added 9/2/11) All posts must be in English
• Contest runs through 11:59 pm CDT on September 15, 2011.

Prizes

Participants who receive 10 “likes” will receive the following set of 4 stickers (until quantities run out).

Participants who receive 25 “likes” will receive the following set of 4 shuttle mission patches (until quantities run out).

Participants who receive 50 “likes” will receive the following set of of shuttle and station expedition mission stickers (until quantities run out).  Note that these are not complete sets but contain all of the stickers available to SpaceUp Houston for this contest.

Spacepoints was created at SpaceUp Houston in February 2011 and is a mechanism to promote space related outreach and engagement beyond the space community.

9/5/11 – Changed 25, 50, 100 likes to 10, 25, 50 likes to encourage more participation.

Vote between August 15 and September 2, 2011

We need your help to get exposure at the annual South by Southwest (SXSW) in Austin. This is where mobile apps go to grow up and we want to spread the word about Spacepoints, how you earn them, why you earn them, and how you make a difference in the world of space outreach. Online voting accounts for 30% of the total score.

Want to learn more about Spacepoints? Check out our wiki, our blog, and earn your Spacepoints at Facebook (for now).

Thanks for your vote!

Cross posted by Jon Verville from his blog: Thoughts on NASA Engineering

See also Hackathon Proposal

I have posted a number of times now on how important I feel it is for the historical and future of Space Mission Data to be available on the web in a linked, browsable, and crowdsourced framework. For those not familiar, by Mission Data what I mean is the mission parameters, such as the rocket engine that was used, the date of launch, the mission timeline, and the many other details of the mission.

So, instead of just talking about it, I felt it was very important just to do something about it. So I have! I started working on the wiki that I help run, nasatweet.com. And I found a neat framework, called Semantic MediaWiki (SMW), which is used across the web and is open source, but backed by some serious companies such as Ontoprise and Paul Allen’s Vulcan. They describe the framework as a “powerful and flexible collaborative database.”

I must mention that there are many sites on the internet which have much of this data already very well filled out and indexed. Some of my favorites are Gunther Space Page, Astronautix, and Jonathan’s Space Report*. While many of these sites have a very impressive amount of data on them, as far as I can tell none of these sites are data driven in the sense they you can slice the data any way you want or view the data from different perspectives. For instance, what if I want to see all spacecraft that were launched at Vandenburg in the 1990′s which had an Earth science mission? If this same set of data were entered systematically in some type of structured (MySQL) or semi-structured (NoSQL or Semantic MediaWiki in my case) then queries could be created that could easily show these “views”.

Implementation

So I just started building the structure of the data in the SMW framework and it I was able to do it quite quickly. I basically chose a few fundamental data structures:

1. Space mission
   1. …has a description
   2. …has a launch vehicle, and vehicle details
   3. …has mission events
   4. …has a launch site and a launch pad
   5. …has a launch date & time
   6. …has an image
2. Mission event
   1. …has a start time
   2. …has an end time
   3. …has a description
3. Launch vehicle
   1. …has a description
   2. …has an image
4. Launch site
   1. …has a lat/long
   2. …has a description

Samples

So here are some samples of how I have implemented this already:

1. This is a great example of an actual mission, STS-135. It has all data fields filled out and a couple mission events as well: http://nasatweet.com/wiki/STS-135 Make sure to login and try to edit the page so you get a feeling for what the form looks like. Selecting the Launch vehicle automatically picks from the database of Launch vehicles already entered into the database, so that autopopulates. Notice that you can click on any Property (like Launch date, description, site, etc. and it will allow you to pivot on that Property and see values for all entries in the database).
2. When you view a Launch site, like KSC: http://nasatweet.com/wiki/Kennedy_Space_Center,_Pad_39A You will be shown all the missions in the database which launched here dynamically, so this is very data driven.
3. Viewing a Launch vehicle, like this http://nasatweet.com/wiki/Delta_IV you see the specific launch pad and vehicle configuration for it.
4. Adding a new mission, launch vehicle, or site is very easy. For mission, going to this page http://nasatweet.com/wiki/Category:Missions lets you just add one at the top. Then you will be prompted with a form to enter all the data you saw previously.

Epilogue

But just having this data available does not help us solve the problems themselves, there is another step needed. Our bright innovators across our agency, and across our nation need to synthecize this data and information into knowledge to make key technical decisions that can enable the next generation of scientific discovery.

* In addition to the three pages listed above, I have spent some time building a compilation of all these Space Mission Data sites, please feel free to contribute: http://nasatweet.com/wiki/Mission_Data_-_Sources