...oh dear , here we go, WW6....

Russia appears to be exercising more muscle of late... but what's the betting the US spit the dummy out over this?

Apparently Russia have already placed an underwater flag on it.

Mart wrote:
Apparently Russia have already placed an underwater flag on it.
Yaaay! Whitie is on the seabed.

The idiots and their precious flags. Same old, same old again.

I'm looking forward to when we all start fighting over who owns the Moon.

Seriously...

I watched a very interesting documentary recently (I think it was a Horizon show) called Moon For Sale.

Fascinating stuff. One of the topics covered was the fact that virtually all of the surface rock on the Moon (and very probably the underground rock as well) is rich in a substance called Helium 3.

Helium 3 is a VERY valuable commodity which is used to power nuclear fusion reactors. It's very rare on this planet but basically, experts reckon that there is enough Helium 3 on the moon to power the Earth for countless generations to come. The only problem is getting it from there to here. One guy said that even if there were gold bars lying all over the surface of the moon, it would be no good to anyone as the cost of transporting them back to earth would make it totally unfeasible. However, as the monetary value of of Helium 3 is currently estimated to be around 4 billion dollars per tonne, this makes it very worthwhile.

Of course, there are all kinds of logistical issues to consider when setting up a mining operation on the moon but it might not be as crazy as it sounds. Already, there are underwater construction projects deep in the oceans, with the objective of learning how to build things in a completely hostile environment (no air, no gravity etc).

Russia, China, The US, India (I could go on) all have rapidly expanding ambitions to lay claim to the moon and this will be something we're going to hear much more about over the next 10 years or so.

Also in the documentary was the guy who runs this site:

www.spaceregistry.org/?source=gmoon

This guy (hats off to him) has been flogging real-estate on the moon for a good few years now and is making SERIOUS money in the process. His website employs four people on a full time basis and he's already apparently made millions of dollars with not one attempt to shut him down. Amongst his clients are high profile entertainment and political figures (including Bill Clinton)....

Who'd have thought it...?

Adios,
Pete

So JK's sixties hit was actually an astounding prediction of the future!

Pete Clarke wrote:
I'm looking forward to when we all start fighting over who owns the Moon.

www.spaceregistry.org/?source=gmoon

This guy (hats off to him) has been flogging real-estate on the moon for a good few years now and is making SERIOUS money in the process. His website employs four people on a full time basis and he's already apparently made millions of dollars with not one attempt to shut him down. Amongst his clients are high profile entertainment and political figures (including Bill Clinton)....

Who'd have thought it...?

Adios,
Pete

The bloke flogging bits of the Moon is novelty only. It/he has no legal standing whatsoever.

The Moon belongs to nobody by International agreement. Although that isn't exactly a cast iron guarantee.