No Video Games for the Space Station

I read an interesting article at the website io9 about how the International Space Station has internet capability but when a visitor wanted to play a multiplayer video game and bring his ipod, he was not allowed.


Richard Garriott, the first video game designer to ride a rocket to outer space wanted to play a massively multiplayer video game from the International Space Station. And he wanted to bring his iPod. Neither happened.Garriott's gaming plan was to play his then-still-active computer game Tabula Rasa from the International Space Station, logging onto a computer and playing with people down on Earth. He traveled to the space station in 2008 as one of the world's only self-funded space tourists."I looked into taking Tabula Rasa into space," he told Kotaku during an interview at the DICE gaming summit just outside of Las Vegas last week. "There's Internet on the space station. We actually originally were pursuing trying to play live, from space, but it turns out that even though there is an IP (Internet protocol) pathway, they were so worried about people tunneling backwards to the ISS and wreaking havoc that it became a non-starter."That's right, gamers. According to Garriott, the powers that be in some space agency thought that you would try to cheat your way into taking control of the space station. We all know you'd never do that.

Oh well, maybe in the future the private companies that will begin space travel will work on problem hackers and allow more freedom for the people who travel in space, only if governments get their beaks out of the picture.

Here is the story.