They had about 350 pictures of Titan. Marty Tomasko - principal investigator for Huygens' Descent Imager/Spectral Radiometer - had three ready to show and comment on. He throws one taken from 16km altitude up on a screen at the ESOC control center. But we in the TV and Web audience don't see it. Instead they show images of the privileged guests in Darmstadt looking at the image we can't see and clapping for what seemed like forever.

Finally they show the image to the public. Tomasko gets maybe 30sec to explain what we are looking at. But before he goes on to the closeup pictures, the announcer goes around the room to various high officials and managers and gets their reaction in their native languages. There is one official for each of the major language blocs paying for the ESA.

Then the picture freezes up. I figured it was my viewer so I restarted it. By the time I'm back on line, NASA TV is showing the usual pap again with no link to ESOC. I don't know if this was ESA's idea, a technical flaw, or maybe someone at NASA just got bored and shut it off. (I can't wait to hear Dick Hoagland's interpretation.)

At a JPL media event, the center director and maybe the NASA Administrator might be there, but they wouldn't be the center of attention. The coverage would center on 1) the images 2) the scientists explaining them 3) the bright young people at the consoles who do the real work on the mission. Nobody would think of making managers and politicos the focus of the coverage, and people would complain bitterly if they did.

The whole thing is a classic example of a major cultural difference between the USA and Europe that nobody talks about. I first ran into it at science conferences in Europe. There was always an 'honorary organizing committee' made up of local political bigwigs that had nothing to do with science. "What's the point of this? What are you scientist guys getting out of it? Aren't you compromising your academic freedom by sucking up to partisan politicians?"

The answer was "We've always done it this way and if we don't stroke the egos of our politicians they will cut the science budget to punish us."

"But what if another party wins the next election and you have new politicians?"

"They'd still be offended that we were not sufficiently respectful of politicians as a class."

I gradually got it through my head that most European nations are still at root pre-Enlightenment, even after 200 years of bloody revolutions. They may call themselves democratic and even socialist, but the common man doesn't count for much even if he has a Ph.D. The people in charge no longer wear plate armour and mostly don't inherit their jobs, but they are still aristocrats at heart.

Jeffrey F. Bell is a retired space scientist and recovering pro-space activist.

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