I was forwarded this email today by Mark Reiff:

My name is xxxxxx and I am a journalism student at xxxxxxxxxxx. I am currently writing a story about international collaboration in space exploration, with a focus on newer agencies and their impact on exploration overall. I was hoping you could answer a few questions for me or put me in touch with a policy analyst or expert who could. I couldn't find a number for you, so I'm including my questions at the end of this e-mail. But if you'd rather chat on the phone, you can reach me at xxxxxxxx or on my cell at xxxxxxxxxx. My deadline for this is Friday, March 4, so any help before then would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks so much!

1. What motivates countries to join the space race?
2. How do new entrants impact foreign relations?
3. How do foreign relations impact scientific exploration?
4. How does scientific exploration impact foreign relations?
5. What political impacts does joining the space race have on a country?
6. How does president Bush’s vision for NASA impact other space agencies?
7. What role do you think space tourism will play in foreign relations?
8. What role does defense in space play in foreign relations?
9. What sort of backlash, if any, can a country that starts to get involved in
space exploration expect?
10. What else should I know about the political impact of newer agencies that I
should include in my story?
11. What is your title?

She (on the assumption that it's a she) is asking questions that would take a lengthy essay, if not a book) to answer properly (which would, of course, be doing her work for her).

In fact, any one of them requires a lengthy response. I'm not sure who she thinks will be willing to take the time for this. My response is that there are a lot of hidden (and not necessarily valid) assumptions in the questions. For example, they assume that there is such a thing as a "space race," and that everyone knows what that is. They assume that the only kind of international cooperation in space is between government agencies. Despite the question about space tourism, there's no apparent recognition of private activities in space, in the US or elsewhere. They're twentieth-century questions asked in an era in which they've become an anachronism. I've no idea how to answer them. I think that her questions should be much more fundamental.

I'm suspecting that she already has the "story" basically written, or at least knows what the story line will be, and is simply looking for confirmation from "experts." Thus is a journalist made.

Or perhaps I'm being unfair. In any event, I don't know how to help with that story, and it's not one I find particularly interesting.

If I'm wrong, I have a comment section for her response (and that of others).

I think almost all the questions hinge on the first. China is in the space race because it it racing the US, but it is about 40 years behind. India is sort of in the same race. No other countries are in the race. Both countries are really racing their space programs versus their money.

No foreign relations impact (except as a public gauge of warmth of relations for joint undertakings)

No science impact.

No real NASA impact, but it is nice to send an instrument on an Indian craft or invite the Chinese to do a joint mission once that is feasible.

No space tourism impact. If we are lucky, China going will convince US to adopt permissive regulations allowing individual US billionaires to best China in a mock space race.

Defense in space has not really escalated seriously to foreign relations--we still have utopian no weapons treaties hanging around.

My title is "Columnist".

Rand,

You may want to delete her phone number from your post. She clearly did not intend to post her private contact information for all the web to see and we have no clue if some crazy stalker may get her info and chase her down.

Dave

Good point. I wasn't thinking.

My take: (1) she's a student, this is effectively a homework assignment: learn how to get info from pundits and weave comments into your story. (2) if this were a REAL news story ("Westerners Spurn Third-World Space Efforts", say) the logical people to quote would not be American bloggers but officials from Indian and Indonesian and and Brazilian (etc.) space agencies.

-ms

I received a shorter list of questions from a claimed freelance journalist (not the same person as this posting) at GWU. Not the same topics (they were mainly Moon v Mars tradeoffs), but the questions were phrased similarly.

Interesting.

if this were a REAL news story ("Westerners Spurn Third-World Space Efforts", say) the logical people to quote would not be American bloggers but officials from Indian and Indonesian and and Brazilian (etc.) space agencies.

You forgot to put scare quotes around "REAL". :-)

Getting the U.S. government to adopt tax and regulatory policies to get billionaires to put their money into space is a wonderful idea. It promotes free market development of a new frontier and creates lots and lots of jobs and business opportunities for the rest of us (who aren't billionaires).

I would much rather see the billionaires put their money into space industry rather than these huge mansions that seem to be proliferating all over the place.

Promoting private space development is a no brainer.

Rand the know-all strikes again. Gee Rand, did you ring her up and ask her what story she was writing. Or did you just already have the assumption worked out before you asked the question. Then you go on to abuse her for being shock horror a journalist. And if she wants to defend herself she has to comment in your comments section to be excused for asking a question you didn't like the sound of. But the real kicker is your get out. Followed by your disinterest in the subject at hand. The whole point of your post was simply to abuse this person and wrap your own biases around it. You really are the classic turd in nerd's clothing.

You know, Anonymous Coward, I was much less abusive of her than you are of me. Go heal thyself, physician.

No, the point of my post was not to abuse her. The point of my post was to point out some problems with journalism in general, and space reporting in particular. If she wants to be a journalist, she'd better get used to the fact that the readership has a feedback mechanism now, and if she can learn that while still in school, all the better.

Rand, are you actually responding to her in any way? Like pointing to this comments section?

No. The only way for me to do that is to call her, because the the only contact information I have is her phone number.

First, she is a student. Second, she was asking for help. Your response was to post a private e-mail to your blog and to ridicule her. You could have ignored her or helped her. But instead, you chose to make this whole thing public. And according to your last comment, you do not even know if she is aware of all of this because you have not been in contact with her. Do you have any manners? If anybody sends you an e-mail, is it fair game for your blog?

As for the other comment that her questions were similar to another person's questions from another university, it's not all that odd. I would bet that there are journalism professors using a similar syllabus. It happens all the time.

I am not "ridiculing" her. I am simply pointing out some potential flaws in her potential story, whatever it may turn out to be.

However, you're right, it was bad manners to publish any personal information about her, which I now regret, and I've blanked it out. One of the intents of putting this up on my blog was to see if some of my commenters would be of any help to her.

As for her being a student, as I said, it's better for her to learn these things now than on the job.

"As for her being a student, as I said, it's better for her to learn these things now than on the job."

Which is why a personal response, and not insults on a blog, is the proper response.

And this:

"I'm suspecting that she already has the "story" basically written, or at least knows what the story line will be, and is simply looking for confirmation from "experts." Thus is a journalist made."

was snide, and unnecessary, especially considering that (once again) she was a _student asking for help._ It clearly was ridicule, not help.

It may not have been help, but it wasn't "ridicule," either. It was my assessment of the situation.

If it was me, I would have sent a private response instead of shooting it down in public. But at least Rand removed the personal details after the fact.

Stop bashing on Rand, he was clearly dead on in his asessment of questions and the person writing them. My younger cousin is a journalism major (God help her) attending NYU. I was a political science major, therefore when she has to write papers on politics I inevitably get a call. Not that I mind helping her out, but she doesn't seem to want to do any research for herself, and when she does come to me with questions from her professors they are all extremely biased to the left. I'm sure she has taken flak from some of the answers I have given her in regards to political questions, however if she doesn't learn to be balanced and defend her positions in college she will never learn. I think that is all Rand was pointing out, it's a similar situation.

And, this e-mail wasn't sent personally to Rand. It wasn't a personal matter addressed to him, unless, of course, this student only knows how to get a hold of Rand by going through Mark Reiff... Google Rand's name, and you get enough links to this blog to acquire a contact method.

So, to the whining about airing personal business, this was never personal business between Rand and this student.

I've disagreed with Rand before, but I don't have a problem with this post, except for (now removed) accidentally included personal information. This is a journalism student that has already taken a position, is asking specific details about it and is trying to get others to do her work for her. An open ended request for an interview would be appropriate, this is not. I don't see any "insult" in pointing out the implied assumptions in her statements.