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NASA Just Can't Stop Doing Web Stuff Twice UPDATE: Three Times

By Keith Cowing
NASA Watch
October 7, 2019
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NASA Just Can't Stop Doing Web Stuff Twice UPDATE: Three Times

Keith’s 7 October update: Today NASA JPL issued a press release “NASA’s Curiosity Rover Finds an Ancient Oasis on Mars” It includes the text: “For more about NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover mission, visit: https://mars.nasa.gov/msl/ https://nasa.gov/msl
JPL has the release posted here with the same text and imagery as is used by NASA HQ’s version here. But if you go to https://mars.nasa.gov/msl/ and dig a little bit to “news and events” you find a link to the same story here which uses the exact same text as the other two versions but is formatted differently than the JPL PAO and NASA HQ versions and uses different graphics. So this time NASA and JPL posted the same thing not twice, but three different ways – in three different places.
Oh yes: the main point of this release is more evidence of habitable periods and locations on Mars i.e. : “We went to Gale Crater because it preserves this unique record of a changing Mars,” said lead author William Rapin of Caltech. “Understanding when and how the planet’s climate started evolving is a piece of another puzzle: When and how long was Mars capable of supporting microbial life at the surface?”. And of course NASA makes zero mention of (or link to) its Astrobiology program which is chartered to do the whole search for life in the universe thing.
Keith’s 3 October note: NASA issued this press release today: NASA’s Push to Save the Mars InSight Lander’s Heat Probe. If you go to the end of this press release you will see links to two InSight websites
“More about InSight:
https://mars.nasa.gov/insight/
https://www.nasa.gov/insight/

If you go to https://mars.nasa.gov/insight/ you go to the JPL Mars InSight website. If you go to the news link you will see a story “NASA’s Push to Save the Mars InSight Lander’s Heat Probe
If you go to https://www.nasa.gov/insight/ it redirects you to https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/insight/main/index.html which is a NASA HQ website. If you go to “NASA’s Push to Save the Mars InSight Lander’s Heat Probe” you get the exact same story and graphics as you get on the JPL page.
The text is exactly the same on both pages – with links to both InSIght websites at the end. In essence NASA sends you to one page and when you get to the bottom it sends you back on the same dual path to another page that sends you to the same dual path – and so on in an infinite DO loop. In addition, NASA uses one link to a HQ page that then redirects you to another – so why not use the link to which you are redirected to in the release instead?
The real question is: why is NASA constantly doing things like this twice? Someone wrote the original press release, collected the graphics and then formatted it for one website while someone else in another part of NASA took the same text and reformatted it again for another website with the same graphics – but formatted differently. That means NASA is knowingly doing things twice – and paying people to do things twice. Why not just have one website? Why not just have one place where press releases like this are posted? But wait – if you go to the NASA HQ press release page this press release is not even listed. I know NASA is working on fixing this duplication per direction from the Administrator, but this silliness could be fixed now with a simple memo from NASA HQ. Just sayin’
Overhauling NASA’s Tangled Internet Presence, earlier post
Progress Made In Making NASA’s Internet Presence Leaner, earlier post

NASA Watch founder, Explorers Club Fellow, ex-NASA, Away Teams, Journalist, Space & Astrobiology, Lapsed climber.

13 responses to “NASA Just Can't Stop Doing Web Stuff Twice UPDATE: Three Times”

  1. Winner says:
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    They do have a lot of staff to keep busy.

  2. Edward Criscuolo says:
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    The flaw in your logic is in thinking that there is “One NASA”. The reality is that it is composed of a bunch of separate Fiefdoms, each competing and squabbling for resources, funding, and attention.

    (NASA Contractor for 24 years)

    • kcowing says:
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      There is only one NASA. Fiefdoms only exist if NASA management does not take the time to run the agency properly. (NASA civil servant/contractor for 10 years)

      • fcrary says:
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        That’s the theory and the ideal. But if it were true in practice, would we be seeing Marshall and Johnson fighting over who gets to manage lunar lander development?

        As a side note, I was once asked by a Russian colleague about the company I had recently joined. I said the company’s different divisions did things in different ways, so I could only speak for the one I was in. Being someone who liked to deliberately misunderstand English homonyms as a joke, he asked if, since the company was split up into divisions, were the divisions split up into regiments and the regiments into battalions. I told him, no. The divisions were split up into feuds, and the feuds were split up into grudges.

      • tutiger87 says:
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        C’mon Keith, You know better. And the root of it is Congress,who all wants various pieces of any pie in their districts.

        • kcowing says:
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          Actually you are totally wrong. Totally. This stems from the inability of NAS AHQ management to reign in field centers, directorates, and missions around a common coherent coordinated strategy. The website dysfunctions simply mirrors the inefficient and dysfunctional management. Congress could care less about websites.

          • tutiger87 says:
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            “Attitude reflect leadership…”

            Leadership starts at the top. And that’s Congress.

          • kcowing says:
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            You have no idea what you are talking about. Enough trolling for you today,

          • Michael Spencer says:
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            Keith:

            In the manner that human diversity generally produces a superior product – something widely discussed herein, and generally thought true – is it at all possible that differing POVs from the various Centers similarly bring new ideas forward, to the general benefit of NASA?

            (This is a question, not an assertion).

            And the answer appears, at least to this outsider, to be “no,” with no obvious explanation.

  3. mfwright says:
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    For the defense of people doing these sites, regulatory and requirements are very strict with a lot of hoops to jump through. Formatting, layout, font size, security review, etc. etc. In addition there are soooooo many different kinds of NASA (think of it as 100 agencies sharing the same name). But all have to follow the ***same*** format whether they be ISS press site or a esoteric calibration lab.

    • fcrary says:
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      I can sympathize with that. I hosted a NASA programatic meeting in August. You would be surprised at how long it took to get really simple things on the web page for the meeting. I think it took about three weeks to add, “The hotel with the group rate is, unfortunately, just on the wrong side of an highway overpass that just collapsed. Plan on a longer drive from the hotel to the meeting.”

  4. fcrary says:
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    Because NASA’s public outreach and information people do not work for NASA. They work for JPL, NASA Headquarters, etc. Rules and cumbersome requirements for adding content are one reason everyone wants their _own_ web page about any given spacecraft. But it’s also self-promotion and marketing. Someone doing media relations at JPL does not get any professional credit for generating hits on a NASA Headquarters web page, and vice versa. So every NASA center, every university involved and every company involved wants their own web page on the subject. With links to who _they_ are and the other things _they_ are doing.

    That is also why you see somewhat myopic coverage on https://astrobiology.nasa.gov/ and other NASA web sites. Despite the name, it is not about the astrobiology work NASA is doing. It is about the astrobiology _program_ within NASA. That specific box on the org chart. So the web page covers what that _program_ is doing. Not what people outside that program are doing on the subject (even if it’s still something done by other NASA programs.)

  5. MAGA_Ken says:
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    I just want a rocket not to be 3 years behind schedule and billions over budget.