NASA Commits $100 Million To Create New All-Inclusive Web Portal-A Hundred Million Bucks Whoosh

Special From SPACE.com September 2002

The Jet Propulsion Laboratory has announced that NASA is looking to create a new all-inclusive website to replace the current www.nasa.gov .

The proposed site, dubbed a "oneNASA portal" on the JPL Acquisitions Department's Request for Proposal (RFP), is meant to reflect agency administrator Sean O'Keefe's "One NASA" philosophy, that is, a website that highlights the diversity of research and work created by NASA's various space centers.

"NASA conducts many different research and development programs in a variety of locations, but these distinct programs ultimately account for the combined efforts of a single Agency with a common vision and mission," says the introduction to the proposal. "Through this activity, we invite you to be our partner in creating the premiere Web presence on the Internet, both in its visual impact and in its intuitive usability. Our goal is for this portal to serve as a pre-eminent example of the President's Management Agenda's e-Gov initiative."

The proposal follows in the wake of the now dormant NASA/Dreamtime partnership. In June, 2000, NASA announced it had signed a seven-year deal with the Internet start-up company Dreamtime Holdings. Under the terms of the deal, Dreamtime Holdings was to produce a wide array of space-related multimedia programming for NASA, including at least 30 hours weekly of high-definition television (HDTV) broadcasts from the International Space Station.

The company had pledged $100 million to the effort, which was to include a space-theme portal on the Internet, digitization of NASA's mammoth archives and documentary and educational programming.