Mike Mongo | SEDS SpaceVision 2013 | Build A Starship—How Students Will Bring About An...

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Here at the beginning of the 21st century, sending astronauts to space is something most of us accept as extraordinary and ordinary. Yet for most of us today, becoming an astronaut is a career outside of our reach. Space has become both pedestrian and elite. In order to foster a new interest in space and a new commitment to space careers and space explorations, the tedious “business-as-usual” state of modern astronautics and space must be reclaimed and subverted, and imbibed with new creativity and inspiration. BUILD A STARSHIP is a grassroots campaign which uses accessible outreach tools (such as hand-distributed stickers, posters, and wristbands, as well as homemade “undertrend” media content as YouTube vlogs, Kickstarter campaigns, and tumblr GIFs) to foster interest in and support for humankind’s first interstellar accomplishment by a ship or device by the year 2100. Specifically, by applying principles and techniques practiced in modern street art campaigns—such as Fairey’s OBEY* street art campaign—and modern political campaigns—such as Fairey’s HOPE* political campaign for the election of US President Barack Obama)—today’s students are in the position to foment a generational movement to subtly engender a shift in our space priorities from being inaccessible, elite, and unexciting to an interstellar priority which is inclusive, accessible, motivating, and inspiring. In this new context, Mars, asteroids, and the moons of Saturn and Jupiter must all be seen not as simple destinations but as more complex stepping stones leading beyond this solar system to another star system—such as Alpha Centauri B, a mere 4.3 light years away. The time from the OBEY street art campaign kicking off and leading to the HOPE campaign and the election of President Obama was nearly 20 years. Using the same campaign model with an expanded window of time—nearly 90 years—the BUILD A STARSHIP campaign beginning now as a Creative Commons-licensed motif disseminates an apparently innocuous slogan to begin with in order to induce a global pursuit of humankind’s most worthy space goal. * Please note the author is co-founder of the OBEY campaign and organization, contracted to create, produce and distribute the HOPE campaign motif in 2007.

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