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CNES may have given up training astronauts, but that doesn't mean the French government space agency isn't still providing value to taxpayers. The agency teamed up with a French-German arts station to beam a show into space targeted toward an exterrestrial audience:
"Despite the English language title, the programme, Cosmic Connexion, as conceived by the channel Arte, assumes the aliens will have a working knowledge of German and French - the station's two working languages.
"The TV show has been conceived as an idiot's guide to humankind, or close encounters of the nude kind. The hosts will explain how the human body is created - thus justifying their own nakedness - and will tell about the main elements of daily human life.
"The station has a clear message for viewing aliens: 'We have seen your crop circles. Stop by and say hello.' Arte has also asked viewers to submit messages they would like to be broadcast into space as part of the programme. The few halfway intelligible messages on the website yesterday were rather political. 'Maxmax' from Germany wrote: 'Dear friends of the sun (or whatever) . . . George W. Bush: bullshit3 Us - music = rather not.'
"The broadcast signal will reach the star Errai in the year 2051. Arte producers say they are looking forward to receiving alien viewer feedback to their programme - in 2096."
