Space & Technology Copywriter

Today I launched some upgrades on my website to reflect a new focus for my work: high-tech copywriting.

I've been engaged in marketing and public relations writing in one form or another since 1995, when I became a freelance technical writer for companies like Northwest Airlines and Target. I moved next into public relations writing, still with an emphasis on technology.

When SpaceShipOne left the planet in 2004 with the first commercial astronaut on board, I jumped at the opportunity to cover the story and others like it as a freelance journalist for media outlets like Reuters, Popular Science, Popular Mechanics, New Scientist, Financial Times, and many others. Along the way, I've written two books on advanced technology development for HarperCollins.

At the same time, I kept my hand in PR writing through the partnership I run with my wife, fellow writer Wendy Kagan.

Now I'm combining the two threads of my work as a writer by offering copywriting services to organizations engaged in advanced technology development.

This is an exciting direction for me. It means I get to get to spend more time with some of the most exciting business ventures on (and off!) the planet. At the same time I won't always be tied to the dictates of magazine and news publishing.

Visit the new Copywriting Services page on my website, or read the free white paper I've just posted about Selling Breakthrough Technology to learn more.

License to Thrill

The article I wrote on what it takes to be a commercial spaceship pilot for the March issue of Air & Space is now available online.

The piece was a ball to write--I got to try out the centrifuge at the National Aerospace Training and Research Training, or NASTAR, Center, an experience I highly recommend--especially if you can get someone else to foot the bill!

You can read the whole text of my article at the Air & Space site, but unless you pick up the printed magazine, you'll miss out on one of the best features--gorgeous portraits of spaceship pilots Brian Binnie, Mike Melvill, Pete Siebold, Rick Searfoss, and a few of the new Virgin Galactic pilots by Chad Slattery. The one shot of Searfoss that's on the site doesn't do the spread justice.

Oh, and there are a couple of shots by yours truly in there too.

Now on Twitter

At the instigation of my friend Ben Zackheim, I've started a Twitter feed that will keep you up-to-date on my progress as I finish my DARPA book as well as other projects I'm working on.

See the widget that appears to the right of this post to for the latest.

In case you're not familiar with Twitter...it's a blog-like service for publishing snippets of information--no more than 140 characters at a time. Which makes it ideal for updates about ongoing projects. "Tweets" are easy to write, easy to read, and easy to publish.

Tony Tether Staying on as DARPA Chief

I learned this week from DARPA public relations officer Jan Walker that Tony Tether, the agency's director, will remain in charge when Obama takes office as President. "Dr. Tether will be here after Jan. 20, and there's no formal date on which he plans to leave," Walker told me in an email.

In my past conversations with Tether, he's made it clear that he didn't expect his directorship to survive the changing of the presidential administration, no matter what party the new president belonged to (Tether's a G. W. Bush appointee and a Republican).

A new president generally boots everyone from the old administration, but Obama's doing things his own way, also keeping Bush's Secretary of Defense, Robert Gates, on the job, along with a lot of other top Pentagon officials.

Tether is DARPA's longest-serving director, in office since 2001. Most DARPA directors have stayed in only two or three years, and the agency's program managers typically serve terms of three to six years, a trend Tether cites as one of the agency's strengths. The people running the agency's programs get in to get their pet projects done, and then get kicked out before they have a chance to get entrenched in the bureaucracy and start worrying more about their jobs than the groundbreaking research and development they manage.

“You know,” Tether told me, “I used to always say that the greatest thing about DARPA is that no one's been there long enough to screw up up. Unfortunately, I've been here so long there are people who have said to me, 'Hey, you remember when you said that, Tether? Well, you know, aren't you getting close to that time?'”

It also might be a case of "if it ain't broke, don't fix it."