What's the fairest way to share cosmic views from Hubble and James Webb telescopes?
The managers of the James Webb Space Telescope are considering a big change in how its observations get shared, one that could have a major impact on the science that gets done — and on who gets to do it.
As it stands now, if an astronomer makes a proposal for where to point this $10 billion space telescope, and the proposal gets accepted, that scientist usually has a year of exclusive access to the resulting observations.
Now, though, with the federal government pushing for more taxpayer-funded research to be made public instantly, telescope managers are pondering whether all of the data collected by JWST should be available to everyone right away.
They're considering a similar change for the venerable Hubble Space Telescope. Currently, scientists who get a chance to use that instrument generally enjoy six months of exclusive access
