TEDxNASA Organizers Did Not Learn Much From Last Year's Event

NASA Opens Registration for TEDxNASA
“One of “Woman’s Day” magazine’s 50 women changing the world, an author who could be the next JK Rowling, and a software developer who has an “app” for that – these are just some of the speakers at TEDxNASA, Nov. 4, at the Ferguson Center for the Arts in Newport News, Va. All are people with big ideas about “What Matters Next,” the theme of TEDxNASA. This year’s event, which is sponsored by NASA’s Langley Research Center and the National Institute of Aerospace in Hampton, Va., will feature more than 20 top speakers who will share inspiring and thought-provoking stories. Presenters already announced include NASA’s Chief Technologist Bobby Braun and Jim Green, director of the Planetary Science Division in the Science Mission Directorate at NASA Headquarters in Washington. Green will speak at the same time NASA’s EPOXI spacecraft is flying by and snapping close-up images of comet Hartley 2, more than 11 million miles away from Earth.”
Keith’s note: This is getting silly. I have sent multiple requests to NASA LaRC PAO requesting the names of the speakers at this event. They simply refuse to release that information. Yet they put out a press release that describes some of the speakers – yet they still refuse to identify them by name. Clearly they know who these people are. So much for being open and transparent. NASA LaRC PAO touts this event as being one whereby the public and NASA can meet to exchange ideas. Curiously, when you go to register for this event, you are asked to pick one of these choices:
“- NASA Langley Civil Servant
– NASA Langley On-Site Contractor
– Other NASA Center – Civil Servant
– Other NASA Center – On-Site Contractor
– Other Government Employee
– Other”
LaRC PAO seems to be concerned (with great specificity) with regard what flavor of NASA/contractor/government employees attend. However, with regard to understanding the backgrounds (interests) of everyone else (teachers, students, doctors, accountants, truck drivers, nurses – i.e. the taxpaying public) LaRC PAO simply lumps everyone into one giant, impenetrable category called “other”. This is typical NASA behavior: the agency simply does not understand how to collect metrics about their events so as to show their value in terms of outreach tools. Instead they ask for information in a way that confuses and ultimately obscures the collection of those metrics.
Previous TedXNASA postings