Monday, May 18, 2009

Reality Imitates Fiction: China National Space Administration Logo: Half Star Trek, And Other Half ...Star Trek

Professor Susan Scafidi, the authoriy on Fashion Law (Fashion and Intellectual Property Law), author of 'Who Owns Culture?' and Counterfeit Chic sent me a great link: 'China Bootlegs Star Trek for Its Space Program' on Cool Aggregator, a site about pop-culture and strange news maintained by Valerie D'Orazio. 

Reality Imitates Fiction

It is understandable that the people of the China National Space Administration (CNSA) are inspired by science fiction show Star Trek, but the fact that the designers of the logo of CNSA forged two different Star Trek logo's (of Star Trek itself and of the imaginary United Federation of Planets) from this popular series into one, is less then decent. Then again, the creators of Star Trek probably never imagined that their creations would ever fly, in reality, into space. Unless, Star Trek will sue the CNSA for trademark infringement, that is.  Then again, they might see it as a free (interplanetary) advertisment for their science fiction show (which becomes less and less science fiction).  

After the name "Taikonaut" was coined by Chiew Lee Yih from Malaysia and later embraced by Xinhua for people who travelled in space for the Chinese space programme (to distinguish those from astronauts from the US and cosmonauts from the USSR/Russia), IP Dragon is surprised that the CNSA chose for a less than original logo. According to this Wikipedia article: "the terms "yǔhángyuán" (宇航员, "sailing personnel in universe") or "hángtiānyuán" (航天员, "sailing personnel in sky") have long been used for astronauts. The phrase "tàikōng rén" (太空人, "spaceman") is often used in Hong Kong and Taiwan." 


Bill Rich said...

The logo of the CNSA is just a simple revelation of the innermost mysterious way of China: It's all a TV show.

Ryan Petersen said...

Great find! Their homepage also uses the lowest resolution GIF image they could find. Awful...