Communicating Astronomy with the Public Journal

Here at the CAPjournal we are always keen to find new ways of disseminating
available astronomy education and public outreach (EPO) resources.

Wearing my International Year of Astronomy 2009 hat, I need to find new ways of re-using
the resources available to our IYA2009 partners and ensure that they are available to other
nations and organisations. We see IYA2009 as a huge opportunity to empower networks
and to exploit all available material.

If we could count the number of astronomy EPO resources available on the web, our
minds would be blown by the enormous number of terabytes out there — many more
than the data from the Hubble Space Telescope.

Unfortunately, these resources are not easy to translate or adapt to different languages
and cultures. Principally because, either the original materials were not developed with
portability in mind, or the source files are simply not available.
Imagine a website where anyone can download, access, reuse, recycle and adapt content
to different languages and cultures. The first steps torwards this have come from
Spain, where a group of aficionados are translating and adapting electronic EPO content
into Spanish using professionally minded volunteers. The network astroseti.org translates
and adapts news, documents, brochures, educational material and presentations,
specifically to promote and disseminate astronomy. This group are setting an example
to follow! The IYA2009 Cornerstone, the Portal to the Universe, hopes to continue their
efforts and is attempting to fill this niche.

CAPjournal is protected by a Creative Commons License, which enables you to copy,
distribute and transmit the content under certain conditions, such as for non-commercial
proposes. So we practise what we preach!

In this issue, Mathew McCool, Professor of Writing at the Southern Polytechnic SU
(Atlanta, USA) provides tips on how to avoid cultural and linguistic tangles in astronomy
communication. Also be sure to check out the articles on achieving high levels of media
coverage, the upcoming Venus-Jupiter conjunction and what journalists really think about
scientists...

Between issues you can stay in touch through our website, www.capjournal.org, where
you will find the current issue in PDF format, a job bank, submission guidelines and back
issues. You can also post anything you have to say on the site or e-mail me at editor@
capjournal.org. I’d like to know what you think!