Convex.
Think of the “cave” part of concave to keep things straight.
And just to add another “bad idea” comment to the mix: How soon after someone figures out how to display the Pizza Hut logo on the moon is it before someone else figures out how to display “Hello, world!,” “Surrender Dorothy,” or a swastika?
Well, the moral issues are best left to GD. I started the thread here in GQ to address only the technical/engineering issues.
Well, and to joke around a bit.
“Go out into your back garden,” Gersen said. “There’s a great Darsh face hanging over the garden wall.”
Yes, I’ve heard that the albedo (reflectivity) of the moon is about the same as that of an asphalt parking lot. Hard to believe, when you see a big white full moon, but that’s what they say.
And in fact, that may be something of a myth. Interestingly, that link says that the reflectivity is significantly higher than you’d expect when the incoming light is perpendicular to the surface, as tiny natural glass beads in the moondust act as reflectors.
Can I sell these on eBay? (Buyer collection in person only).
Interesting. Many actual projection screens are layered with tiny glass beads to increase the image brightness, so maybe the moon is already as good as it can get.
I’m not sure if it was Asimov or Clarke that wrote this one…
An experiment is being run from an orbiting space station (or maybe moonbase) to release a large cloud of reflective plasma that should be visible from earth. Much discussion is held around the advertising (and amusement) potential. The captain is determined to prevent anyone abusing the experiment, but the gas is released in a “familiar wasp waisted bottle” shape, known to be the captains favourite.
Si
Asimov wrote vthat particular one – it’s Buy Jupiter, and is in his antholofgy of the same name.
But Clarke also wrote a story about advertising on the moon. A soft drink company had arranged for a scientific experiment (that was supposed to, at one point, provide a luminous glow on the moon) to light up in the shape of their product logo. Clarke doesn’t name them, but it’s obvious from his description that the culprit was Coca Cola. The story is in one of his anthologies, but I don’t recall which one (tales from the White Hart?)
And Heinlein describes advertising on the moon, too. In The Man Who Sold the Moon he has his character walk into the offices of a soft drink company (un-named, but pretty obviously a stand-in for Coke again) wearing a lapel button with their competitor’s logo on it – a circle with 6+ on it. That’s pretty obviously supposed to be 7-UP. The character claims the button is the same subjective size as the full moon. IIRC, they never do say if anyone ever puts up a sign for any company on the moon.
Anything’s OKAY with me, as long as it’s not CHA.
or HA with a bite out of it.
Since we’re delving into fiction…
There’s an episode of The Tick where Chairface Chippendale tries to carve his name into the moon with a laser. Not just illuminate it, he actually carves trenches in the face of the moon. IIRC, he gets as far as the “A” before the Tick manages to stop all that evil. In a nice bit of continuity, the moon with “CHA” on it is seen in several following episodes.
In another episode, they try to collapse the trenches with explosives, but stop after the “C” when the Tick is blown into deep space.
ETA: Whoops, didn’t see Cal’s allusion to this when I posted…
I think si_blakely was referring to the story he described when he said he wasn’t sure if Asimov or Clarke wrote it.