How's the Society doing right now?

Rxke · 2011-11-23 12:44:13

I'm a bit concerned, the site is only half-functional, some pages direct to placeholders or worse...

Won't that have very detrimental effects on membership-numbers?

For instance, the member pages seem to be offline, I finally splurged on a 3 years membership to celebrate the return of the forums (yes I was *that* happy )

But... after paying, I didn't even get redirected to a valid page... So for all I know, that money might now be somewhere bouncing around in the intertubes...

Grypd · 2011-11-23 16:35:49

Hi Rxke.

To be honest im not sure that the Mars Society is all that healthy. Lets hope that New Mars gets some more support now its back.

James Burk · 2011-11-23 17:04:04

Hi guys,

Rxke, I am sorry to hear about your membership renewal issue. Please send me a screenshot of the error if you can. I can also confirm that your membership was credited for the 3 years. Soon we will have a members area where you will be able to see that yourself.

I can speak for whether the Mars Society is healthy or not, it definitely is. Membership is already up from last year. We are working towards the new field season of MDRS and will have some announcements soon on the 2012 convention activities.

When I joined as Webmaster in July, there was a huge backlog of work which we are still getting through. Restoring the New Mars Forums was one of those items that I am happy to be able to check off the list.

Thanks,
-James

Rxke · 2011-11-24 01:09:22

jburk wrote:

Membership is already up from last year.....

......there was a huge backlog of work which we are still getting through. Restoring the New Mars Forums was one of those items that I am happy to be able to check off the list.
Thanks,
-James

Now *that* is good news There's a lot of Mars talk in the media, of course, people might be looking around.

I fully understand there was/is a huuge load of work to be done, and kudos for doing it 8)

re: screenshot: it was on another computer than the one I'm using now, I'll see if I can resurrect that page through the history when I'm back. The only problem with it was one doesn't get something that explicitly says the transfer went all right. Pretty robust redirect system, though.

Trevor · 2016-01-11 10:42:09

Is there an update on this? I just paid my membership dues and haven't gotten anything in return. Is there a time delay or something further to do after paying? I was expecting at least a welcome email.

Cosmin Panaete · 2017-07-07 04:16:24

Trevor wrote:

Is there an update on this? I just paid my membership dues and haven't gotten anything in return. Is there a time delay or something further to do after paying? I was expecting at least a welcome email.

Same question here. I just paid for lifetime membership and have not received even a confirmation email.

jburk · 2017-07-07 09:17:38

Please contact our Membership Department. Carie Fay (cfay@marssociety.org) is the main contact.

Cosmin Panaete · 2017-07-09 10:34:14

Thank you very much for your swift reply. I have written Ms. Fay .

jburk · 2017-07-11 00:50:30

Two thumbs up.

tahanson43206 · 2020-01-19 09:14:42

This is for SpaceNut primarily ...

The Mars Society has a chapter in the state where I live, and a member listed affiliation in his LinkedIn profile.

He responded recently that he had not been aware of this forum.

This feedback of one data point is insufficient to suggest anything, of course, but it IS a reminder that the existence of the forum is not necessarily known to Mars Society members.

In addition, Mr. Burk has been working on building a new forum for Mars Society members, so the natural direction would be for them to go there.

(th)

SpaceNut · 2020-01-19 12:21:46

I am sure that the data point was missed more than once all over the world as there are lots of other websites which do advocate as being for and with the society.
Some chapters are doing there own web locations to keep data on for there membership and many were using the yahoo groups that are no more.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_Society
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_Society_Australia

A quick google
http://chapters.marssociety.org/ Chapters of the Mars Society
http://ohio.marssociety.org/ Mars Society Ohio Chapter
https://purdue.marssociety.org/ Purdue Mars Activities and Research Society
https://marssociety.org.au/ Australia Mars Society
https://marssocietyuk.org/ Mars Society UK.
https://www.marssocietylondon.com/ Mars Society London
http://nextgen4.marssociety.org/
http://colorado.marssociety.org/ Rocky Mountain Mars Society
http://peru.marssociety.org/?page_id=594 THE MARS SOCIETY – PERU …

http://mars160.marssociety.org/ UTAH Desert research website
http://mdrs2016.marssociety.org/ Mars Desert Research Station
http://fmars.marssociety.org/ FMARS – Flashline Mars Arctic Research Station
http://urc.marssociety.org/ University Rover Challenge
https://southasia.marssociety.org/irc/ Indian Rover Challenge (IRC) | Mars Society South Asia
http://education.marssociety.org/ Mars Society’s Education Task Force

http://radio.marssociety.org/ Red Planet Radio

Grypd · 2020-02-13 09:13:59

Great to hear that the MS is getting more organised

tahanson43206 · 2020-12-29 14:58:19

NewMars forum is special in many ways ... among those ways is that while it is sponsored by the Mars Society, it has many members from around the world who are NOT members of the Mars Society itself.

This message went out to those who subscribed to the recent convention:

Dear Friend,
As many of you know, the theme of the 2020 International Mars Society Convention, held virtually over the course of four days in October, was “Rising Together.” We felt that “Rising Together” was a very poignant call to action as we navigate this global pandemic. We believe that humanity can work together on issues of great importance, especially those that impact our long-term future and survival.
The Mars Society strongly believes that becoming multiplanetary is a critically important goal for our civilization, beginning with the human exploration and settlement of Mars, the most Earth-like planet in our solar system.
For more than twenty years, the Mars Society has focused on helping to educate the public, the media and the government on the importance of humans-to-Mars and the establishment of a long-term human presence there.
The Mars Society also helps prepare humanity for the exploration of the Red Planet by operating our Mars Desert Research Station in Utah, hosting crews on a biweekly basis, which allows them to conduct analog work and research to better understand the challenges that will face future human explorers to Mars. (MDRS is currently on hiatus due to COVID but will resume crew simulations in February 2021.)
Our organization, together with SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, has been studying and promoting the viability of establishing a new branch of human civilization on the Red Planet in the coming decades via our Mars City State Design Competition, an international student contest that focused on designing a one million person, self-supporting human urban settlement on Mars. One hundred seventy-five teams participated in this historic competition, with the winner – Nexus Aurora – representing not one but a group of countries, reinforcing the ideal that international cooperation is an important part of exploring space.
This year’s International Mars Society Convention was by far the largest event ever held by our organization, with over ten thousand people registering for the virtual conference around the world. In total, one hundred fifty speakers joined the convention to discuss new ideas and educate the global public about exploration plans for the Red Planet and other important space-related programs and initiatives.
Some of the leading names in space exploration and the commercial aerospace industry joined us to discuss the latest news about Mars and plans for the future, including NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, MEPAG Chair Dr. R. Aileen Yingst, Virgin Galactic Chief Space Officer George Whitesides and former NASA astronaut & Chief Scientist Dr. John Grunsfeld, to name just a few.
Worldwide viewership of our international convention was well over one hundred thousand people, primarily via our organization’s YouTube and Facebook pages. The YouTube channel had seventy-five thousand views during the event, breaking the previous record by tenfold, with over a million on-line views of some of the talks since. In addition, our Zoom audience was also very large compared to in-person events, with most of our track talks having at least three times the number of people who would typically attend face-to-face.
We believe that the overwhelming success of our virtual convention demonstrates the growing worldwide interest in exploring Mars and the need to establish a second home for humanity in our solar system.
To continue with this tremendous momentum, the Mars Society needs your financial support to ensure that we move forward with our work on behalf of humans-to-Mars. We ask you to please consider making a one-time or recurring contribution ($50, $100, $250 or more) to the Mars Society today (tax-deductible if made in the U.S.) by visiting our website.
Thank you in advance for your kind support, and we wish you a very happy and healthy New Year.
Sincerely,
Dr. Robert Zubrin
President & Founder
The Mars Society

(th)

tahanson43206 · 2021-03-25 18:00:40

From today's member email:

MARS SOCIETY ANNOUNCEMENT
View this email in your browser
President Biden Should Push for the Human Exploration of Mars
By Dr. Robert Zubrin, Mars Society President
Scientific American, 03.25.21

The triumphant landing of the Perseverance rover has inspired all Americans, and indeed much of the world. President Biden should follow it up by launching a program to send humans to Mars.
While robotic rovers are wonderful, they cannot resolve the fundamental scientific question that Mars poses to humanity, which relate to the potential prevalence and diversity of life in the universe. The early Mars was very much like the early Earth; a rocky, warm and wet planet with a carbon dioxide–dominated atmosphere. Life appeared on Earth virtually as soon as our planet was cool enough for liquid water. Did it appear on Mars too? If so, did it use the same DNA-RNA information system underlying all life on Earth, or something else? We now know that billions of stars have planets. Is life likely to found everywhere? Is life as we know it on Earth what life is, or is it just a particular example drawn for a vast tapestry of possibilities?
These are questions that thinking men and women have wondered about for thousands of years. They can only be resolved by sending humans.
Finding evidence of past life requires fossil hunting. Perseverance will make a stab at that, but human rock hounds, capable of traveling far over difficult terrain, climbing, digging, doing delicate work and intuitively following up clues, can do that job vastly better. Finding extant life to determine its nature will require drilling down hundreds of meters to reach underground water where life might still thrive, bringing up samples, culturing them and subjecting them to analysis. That is light-years beyond the ability of robotic rovers.
If we don’t go, we won’t know.
Some say that sending humans to Mars is a task for the far future, far beyond our abilities. In fact, the means to do such a mission are close at hand.
Sending humans to Mars does not require building gigantic nuclear-powered ion-drive science-fiction spaceships in a futuristic world of orbital spaceports. It requires sending a payload of 10 tons or more capable of supporting a small group of people from Earth to Mars, landing it and then sending that or a comparable payload back.
The currently operational SpaceX Falcon Heavy could throw a 10-ton class lander to Mars. The soon to be operational NASA SLS and SpaceX Starship booster will be able to send a 20-ton lander. So, we have that part covered. The next thing we need is the lander.
The Perseverance landing system can deliver one ton to the surface of Mars. To get started with human exploration, we need a 10-ton class lander. There are a number of ways to create such a system. For example, we could use aeroshells, parachutes and landing jets, or perhaps a miniature version of Starship. I won’t go into the details. But the bottom line is if we can land one ton on Mars, we can land 10. It requires no scientific breakthroughs, just engineering.
Once we have a 10-ton lander, we can use it send large robotic expeditions to Mars. Instead of landing one rover, we land a platoon of robots. These could include science explorers like Perseverance, and much bigger versions of the Ingenuity helicopter capable of broad-ranging reconnaissance. A team of smaller rovers armed with high resolution cameras could create a high-definition map of the area and transmit it to Earth, allowing millions of people here to walk the landscape with virtual-reality gear, directly assisting the robots in exploration by calling their attention to features of interest.
But the expedition would also include construction robots, possibly humanoid in form with arms and legs, capable of building a Mars base. These would set up a power system and put in operation units for converting Martian carbon dioxide and water ice into methane and oxygen rocket propellant, which would be stored in tanks. With such a base set up and fully equipped with housing, power, a lab, a workshop and supplies in advance, all astronauts will need to do is show up with a credit card, and check in. Everything they need to live and work on Mars, and return from Mars, will be there waiting for them.
The is nothing in this plan that is beyond our capability, either technically or financially. Joe Biden could take the key step that would allow America to once again to astonish with world with what free people can do. The COVID-19 pandemic has shown the importance of science to our lives. Science comes from scientists, who come from children who want to become scientists. Youth loves adventure. As during the Apollo days, a bold space program would make science the great adventure, inspiring millions of young people to want to become scientists, engineers, inventors, medical researchers and technological entrepreneurs—the ultimate resource we will need to meet whatever challenges the future may bring.
Seize the moment, Joe.

The Mars Society
11111 West 8th Avenue, unit A
Lakewood, CO 80215 U.S.A.
www.marssociety.org
https://www.facebook.com/TheMarsSociety
@TheMarsSociety
Copyright (c) 2021 The Mars Society
All rights reserved.

(th)

tahanson43206 · 2021-05-01 12:29:28

From today's member email:

Participate in the 2021 Mars Society Poster Contest

The Mars Society <info@marssociety.org>

Sat, May 1 at 1:29 PM
MARS SOCIETY ANNOUNCEMENT
View this email in your browser
Support Mars Advocacy & Show Your Creativity
Participate in the 2021 Mars Society Poster Contest
The Mars Society, the world’s largest space advocacy group dedicated to the human exploration and settlement of the Red Planet, invites members, friends, students, space advocates, and the general public to submit a creative poster for consideration as part of its annual design competition.
As always, the winning poster design will be used as the primary promotional graphic for the organization’s main event of the year - the 24th Annual International Mars Society Convention - to be held virtually Thursday-Sunday, October 14-17, 2021.
With NASA’s Ingenuity helicopter having recently made its historic aerial flight over the surface of Mars as part of the Perseverance mission and the continuing development of SpaceX’s Starship flight system, which will help open Mars and the solar system to exploration, convention organizers have decided that the theme of this year’s international conference will be “Taking Flight”. Those making submissions will need to incorporate this theme into their planned layout.
The deadline for submitting a poster design is Wednesday, June 30th, 5:00 pm MST. All artwork submissions should be sent via email to: postercontest@marssociety.org. Please also use this address for any questions related to the contest and/or the submission process.
Technical requirements for the contest are as follows: 1) The poster size should be 11″ x 17″, 2) There are no restrictions with regard to use of color, 3) If your poster is selected, the designer will need to submit a full color poster as well as a gray-scale copy, and 4) Poster designs can be submitted in Photoshop or as a .pdf file (the former is preferred).
The winning poster design will be announced by the Mars Society during the week of July 12th. Thank you for your involvement and good luck!
Use of Image: Artist gives permission to The Mars Society to use digital images(s) of art work in online and print media. Poster Contest Disclaimer: The Poster Contest Artist, by submitting an application, agrees to defend, indemnify and hold harmless The Mars Society from and against any and all claims, demands or expenses (including attorney’s fees) for libel, slander, invasion of privacy, infringement of copyright, personal injury, damages, or any other claims, demand or expenses resulting from performance in connection with this agreement.

2020 Poster Contest Winner
The Mars Society
11111 West 8th Avenue, unit A
Lakewood, CO 80215 U.S.A.
www.marssociety.org
https://www.facebook.com/TheMarsSociety
@TheMarsSociety
Copyright (c) 2021 The Mars Society
All rights reserved.

tahanson43206 · 2021-05-03 13:41:09

Book announcement:

The Mars Society <info@marssociety.org>
Mon, May 3 at 12:57 PM
MARS SOCIETY ANNOUNCEMENT
View this email in your browser
Mars City State Designs Book Published!
The Mars Society is proud to announce that its book, “Mars City States: New Societies for a New World”, has now been published. Edited by Frank Crossman, the new publication contains the twenty top designs for a one million person Mars city state and is now on sale in both paperback and kindle formats.
People will soon be able to go to the Red Planet. But that very possibility opens a still more interesting – indeed truly grand – question: What will we create on Mars?
It was to answer this question that the Mars Society sponsored its Mars City State Design Competition in early 2020. The challenge: Design a city state for 1 million people on Mars. The prizes: $10,000 and a grand trophy for the best design, with lesser prizes and trophies on down to Fifth. The designs had to take into account all aspects of the city: its technical basis, its economic foundation, its social and political system, and its architectural aesthetics. If a city is to succeed and grow, it will need to be a place that people will want to move to. How can we create such cities on Mars?
The response to the challenge was fantastic, with 176 teams from all over the world entering the fray. All twenty of the semi-finalist, finalist, and top five winning designs are presented in this volume.
The range of creative ideas is extraordinary, collectively representing an intellectual banquet, a feast for thought, that will be of enduring value for all those who will help initiate human civilization on Mars, and innumerable new worlds beyond.
Get your copy today!
The Mars Society
11111 West 8th Avenue, unit A
Lakewood, CO 80215 U.S.A.
www.marssociety.org
https://www.facebook.com/TheMarsSociety
@TheMarsSociety
Copyright (c) 2021 The Mars Society
All rights reserved.

(th)

Rxke · 2021-05-04 00:10:43

tahanson43206 wrote:

paperback and kindle formats.

Aaargh. Why not ePub format? Good thing Calibre can convert that ebil format in a sane one...

edit: oh wait, one has to actually buy it on Amazon.... Never mind then. I don't have a credit card, Jeff.

Last edited by Rxke (2021-05-04 00:14:25)

SpaceNut · 2021-05-04 18:47:25

Well, well, well, glad to see you; "old lurker", from your last post sir from nearly 2 years ago....can you stop by more often...please...

I remember talking about the walkability of your nation and how the US. unless you are in the cities is not so much....and even with a bicycle its not going to do but it helps.

Rxke · 2021-05-05 00:05:10

Heehee. I stopped visiting when I saw you became Administrator! (kidding! Kidding!)

I actually still walk every day to work. We even were able to sell our car... When we need one, there is a parking spot with shared cars say 80 yards from our door. Not having to worry about a car is actually a glorious luxury...

I'm still following the Mars stuff. The screens at work have the blood red sunrise with SN8 as desktop

I still want to go. but Mars doesn't need a manuscript photographer over 50 I'm afraid....

NewMarsMember · 2021-05-05 10:50:34

For Rxke re unable to buy book ...

While I understand not everyone can afford a copy of the new Mars Society book, I am ** surprised ** that anyone can live in a first tier company without a credit card. I went back in your many posts and learned about your (to me enviable) ability to live without a car! I have the option of renting a pickup truck from a nearby rental agency that is just a few blocks away, and I'll have to think about that instead of just automatically jumping into the car. Rental costs on the order of $50 (US) for a day, including refilling the gas tank. How does your local car sharing facility handle rental expenses? How can you rent without a credit card?

I use cash for only one transaction per week these days, and could convert that to credit card if I weren't so set in my ways.

However ... back to the book .... I'd like to make sure that a long term member such as yourself is able to hold a copy of the book in your hands, and (more importantly) to contribute to discussion here on the forum about the various studies, to see which ones might be worth supporting.

It might be possible to raise funds to purchase a copy of the book for you. I have no idea what the response of the forum might be, but there is surely no harm in asking.

I understand that living without a car and without a credit card leads to a different life style than I can imagine, but it must be working for you.

(th)

Rxke · 2021-05-05 12:58:40

oh nonono! I'm not in dire straits!

I'm merely an European without a credit (but debit!) card! I can afford it financially, but not 'technically' because amazon wants payment with creditcard only...

and we don't really hire a car, it's a shared system.... you ave a monthly low subscription and reserve the car online and pay afterwards. It's a way to get cars off the roads. (which only works in dense cities with good public transport of course...)

A lot of people don't use credit cards here (though 'thank's to Amazon that is changing...)

tahanson43206 · 2021-05-05 13:13:41

For Rxke re #21

This discussion seems OK (to me at least) for the topic because we are both members of the Society (although it is true I rejoined recently after a lapse of many years).

Thanks for more comments about how the shared rental system works .. that seems to me to be something that should work here as well, and the generation coming along may decide to make it happen at some point. However (on the other hand) the ubiquitous availability of Uber and Lyft may eliminate the need for an autombile, and the strenuous efforts by Amazon and others to eliminate in-person shopping will reduce the need even more.

To the subject at hand ... Does Amazon accept Paypal?

If so, and if you are not familiar with Paypal, they most definitely ** do ** accept debit cards.

OK ... I'll admit I've not checked recently, but I have a high level of confidence that they ** did ** at one time.

Besides, Amazon is not the only place the book is sold online. I think the society itself may provide a way.

I have two copies on order. One is for me to mark up as I like to do, and the other is for my family physician who surprised me with a level of interest in the Mars undertaking that I was most definitely NOT expecting.

My guess is that as an intelligent person with kids, she may have absorbed a small part of the constant news about NASA and others at Mars, to the extent she was interested enough to ask reasonable questions.

I'm planning to gift the book, in hopes she will pass it along to someone who might be interested in building a career around exploration of Mars, as Noah has a chance of doing.

(th)

Last edited by tahanson43206 (2021-05-05 13:15:24)

Rxke · 2021-05-05 14:32:14

last I checked they did not accept PayPal.

(we're getting off-topic, sorry about that. )

I'll check other avenues.

SpaceNut · 2021-05-05 17:24:48

Mwahahah evil laugh... check the local gift card rack as thats where we find the amazon cards at the local markets....

tahanson43206 · 2021-05-05 17:43:45

For SpaceNut re #24

That's a suggestion I can definitely endorse ... I've used gift shop cards like that to make purchases from Internet shops I do not trust. A couple of bucks fee is a price well worth paying to keep my credit card information secure.

That's why I use Paypal for any online transaction where there's any doubt ... Paypal has proven itself trustworthy, and it extracts it's fee from the vendor.

***
For Rxke ... your acquisition of a copy of this (to me important) book seems an appropriate subtopic within "How's the Society doing right now?"

I trust/hope you've taken advantage of the (totally free) video recordings of the 2020 Convention, where a number of the Million Person City contestants recorded their talks.

(th)

New Mars Forums

Announcement

#1 2011-11-23 12:44:13

How's the Society doing right now?

#2 2011-11-23 16:35:49

Re: How's the Society doing right now?

#3 2011-11-23 17:04:04

Re: How's the Society doing right now?

#4 2011-11-24 01:09:22

Re: How's the Society doing right now?

#5 2016-01-11 10:42:09

Re: How's the Society doing right now?

#6 2017-07-07 04:16:24

Re: How's the Society doing right now?

#7 2017-07-07 09:17:38

Re: How's the Society doing right now?

#8 2017-07-09 10:34:14

Re: How's the Society doing right now?

#9 2017-07-11 00:50:30

Re: How's the Society doing right now?

#10 2020-01-19 09:14:42

Re: How's the Society doing right now?

#11 2020-01-19 12:21:46

Re: How's the Society doing right now?

#12 2020-02-13 09:13:59

Re: How's the Society doing right now?

#13 2020-12-29 14:58:19

Re: How's the Society doing right now?

#14 2021-03-25 18:00:40

Re: How's the Society doing right now?

#15 2021-05-01 12:29:28

Re: How's the Society doing right now?

#16 2021-05-03 13:41:09

Re: How's the Society doing right now?

#17 2021-05-04 00:10:43

Re: How's the Society doing right now?

#18 2021-05-04 18:47:25

Re: How's the Society doing right now?

#19 2021-05-05 00:05:10

Re: How's the Society doing right now?

#20 2021-05-05 10:50:34

Re: How's the Society doing right now?

#21 2021-05-05 12:58:40

Re: How's the Society doing right now?

#22 2021-05-05 13:13:41

Re: How's the Society doing right now?

#23 2021-05-05 14:32:14

Re: How's the Society doing right now?

#24 2021-05-05 17:24:48

Re: How's the Society doing right now?

#25 2021-05-05 17:43:45

Re: How's the Society doing right now?

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