\n<\/p>\n
I<\/span> realise that, at this point, there are already far too many shows. Every channel, every streaming service is teeming with content demanding your attention, and there are simply too few hours in the day to watch them all. However, with that in mind, may I recommend a new show called Space Live? There\u2019s only one episode. The only potential downside is that the episode literally lasts for ever.<\/p>\n Actually, that\u2019s inaccurate. Space Live isn\u2019t a show, it\u2019s a channel. It launched on Wednesday morning, tucked away on ITVX, and consists only of live footage of Earth broadcast from the International Space Station. It\u2019s beguiling to watch, especially for anyone who didn\u2019t realise that a person can be awestruck and bored simultaneously.<\/p>\n It\u2019s billed as a world first. ITV has partnered with British space media company Sen to use live 4K footage from its proprietary SpaceTV-1 video camera system, mounted on the International Space Station, giving us three camera views: one of the station\u2019s docking ports, a horizon view able to show sunrises and storms, and a camera pointing straight down as the ISS passes across the planet. A tracker in the corner of the screen shows the live location of the ISS, while a real-time AI information feed provides facts about our geography and weather systems.<\/p>\n <\/span>Space Live\u2019s footage is a significant improvement on Nasa\u2019s. <\/span> Photograph: ITV<\/p>\n Of course, if you wanted to be picky, you could argue it isn\u2019t exactly new. Nasa\u2019s YouTube channel has been streaming live footage from the ISS for years, and uniformly draws an audience of a few thousand. But Space Live is, if nothing else, slightly snazzier. The footage is certainly nicer: at 8.30am on Wednesday, Space Live showed gorgeous images of the sun\u2019s glare bouncing off the sea around the Bay of Biscay, while all Nasa could offer was a piece of cloth with the word \u201cFlap\u201d written on it. There\u2019s even a soundtrack, a constant, soothing kind of hold music that loops and loops without ever becoming fully annoying. It\u2019s an improvement, in other words.<\/p>\n And, at least for the first orbit, it is absolutely spellbinding. While not quite offering the overview effect \u2013 the cognitive shift felt by those who see Earth from space, leading to new perspectives about humanity and its place in the universe \u2013 it is still extremely humbling to see just how small the planet is. The time it took for the ISS to pass from south-east England (where I am) to war-ravaged Ukraine could be counted in seconds. And then on, over Asia towards Australia. There really is very little separating us at all.<\/p>\n Inevitably, as the station crosses the Earth, drifting endlessly between sunrise and sunset, your thoughts shift towards people you know from wherever it happens to be. There\u2019s something palpably comforting about that.<\/p>\n However, God knows you can\u2019t be awestruck for ever. And so it is with Space Live. Eventually the magic of the technology and the perspective and the beauty of our planet starts to wear off, and the experience becomes something akin to the map you end up staring at on a flight when you\u2019ve run out of films to watch. Your attention starts to stray, and you realise that ITVX has other live channels to watch. One of them just shows Love Island. Another just shows Christmas films. And then you realise, with a slump, that the majesty of the only home we\u2019ll ever know spinning silently in space has become just another content option, along with whichever ITV channel shows American Ninja Warrior Junior.<\/p>\n <\/span>The views are simultaneously awe-inspiring and comforting.<\/span> Photograph: ITV<\/p>\n But even though you won\u2019t watch it all the time, it\u2019s nice to know that Space Live is there. It isn\u2019t the sort of thing you\u2019d imagine they\u2019d stick on the big screen in pubs \u2013 not unless people really start getting into going \u201cWeeeeeey\u201d every time they see the Ural River \u2013 but as something to have on in the background, it\u2019s undeniably soothing. My guess is, for a dedicated few, the channel will be something they\u2019ll keep on silently as they go about their day.<\/p>\n And, sure, that might not be why humanity first chose to embark upon the miraculous achievement of escaping the surly bonds of Earth \u2013 you\u2019ll remember that Neil Armstrong pointedly did not say, \u201cThat\u2019s one small step for man, one giant leap for the screensaver industry\u201d \u2013 but, as an idea, Space Live can\u2019t be faulted. I might not have it on all the time but, whenever I need to be reminded of who we are and how little separates us, I guarantee it will be my first port of call.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I realise that, at this point, there are already far too many shows. Every channel, every streaming service is teeming with content demanding your attention, and there are simply too few hours in the day to watch them all. However, with that in mind, may I recommend a new show called Space Live? There\u2019s only<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":28204,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[58],"tags":[4383,4431,589,5845,132,1101,16776,2781,1779],"class_list":{"0":"post-28203","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-science","8":"tag-absolutely","9":"tag-channel","10":"tag-earth","11":"tag-footage","12":"tag-live","13":"tag-space","14":"tag-spellbinding","15":"tag-streaming","16":"tag-television"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28203","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=28203"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28203\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/28204"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=28203"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=28203"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=28203"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}