NASA Technology That Can't Link To Itself
Keith’s note: NASA Office of the Chief Technologist has no link to NASA Tech Briefs. NASA Tech Briefs does not link to NASA OCT. In fact, I did a search of the source HTML code on the NASA Techbriefs home page. There are no links to anything at NASA.gov whatsoever. Yet this page features the NASA logo. Baffling.
This has been discussed before, but maybe not here. Tech Briefs is run by the Tech Briefs Media Group. It is not run by NASA. The site has advertising, which should be conspicuous clue that it isn’t run by NASA.
So how is it that they get to show the NASA logo? I gather that Tech Briefs used to be run by NASA several decades ago, and it was spun off to this private outfit. Part of the spinoff agreement, I believe, allowed them to use the NASA logo. See http://www.techbriefs.com/c….
So what is baffling isn’t that NASA doesn’t link to it, but that the Media Group still gets to use the NASA logo. Not really baffling, just kind of odd.
There are very good reasons why NASA doesn’t link to it, as a private, for-profit media group, and I support that decision.
Instead of guessing, why not check your facts … no one can just use the NASA logo however they wish…. again, do some research.
As I said, it was my understanding (I’m just saying that I heard it somewhere) that these folks have specific legal permission that allowed them to use the logo. If true, they are not just using it as they wish, but as they were specifically allowed to do. That permission is very old, very nonconventional, and probably would not be given today. You’re exactly right that no one can use the NASA logo however they wish … without permission from the agency.
You brought this up in NASAWatch last September, and I guess never got any answers. Given that, and they still do it, one would think that they have some confidence in the legality of it.
But you’re right, some research to investigate this is certainly in order. Also, I’m not “guessing”, I’m just recollecting. That’s what “I believe” meant. As to checking my facts, I never said they were facts, and I’ll leave the investigative journalism to the experts.
I have asked NASA multiple times and they declined to answer formally. Mason Peck recently replied to me that it is “not a NASA website”. But had no reply when I asked why it used the NASA logo.
FYI – NASA Tech Briefs is audited every two years by NASA to ensure compliance is met with NASA’s standards. Therefore this is not an “old” permission. ASSUME
FWIW, here’s the research. If you go to http://bit.ly/ITI681 , you’ll see a 1984 AP report about this. I think it supports my recollection (which is certainly not from 1984!). That’s when NASA and the Tech Briefs Media Group formed a very novel “joint venture” to meet congressional directives to NASA for getting its technology accomplishments circulated. This joint venture was essentially where NASA outsourced that responsibility, saving several million dollars of agency funds. I gather that’s how NASA Tech Briefs gets to use the NASA logo. Because it’s “joint”.
So one might ask why OCT doesn’t link to it. NASA Tech Briefs includes conspicuous advertising, and NASA is probably reluctant to direct people straight to sites with that advertising, and with content it may not really fundamentally control. So why, one might wonder, would NASA set up a joint venture with a group they couldn’t link to? Simple. Because it was 1984, and such link opportunities didn’t exist. Welcome to the future.
So while it would be interesting to see the text of that joint venture agreement, and while such an agreement probably doesn’t make as much sense now as it used to, their use of the logo is probably contractually allowed.
NASA goes after anyone who uses the NASA logo without their permission. So they have NASA’s permission.
there is indeed a link to TBMG on the OCT page: http://www.nasa.gov/offices…