A Space Lawyer Explains Why You can’t own the Sun

While this woman's claim to own the sun seems quite dubious, I do think it's a shame that we haven't yet come up for a system for private entities to claim private property on the moon and other rocky bodies. If the first company to launch and maintain a private moon base were entitled to, say, all the land (and subsurface minerals) within a 500 km radius of their landing site, we might see some more action in private space exploration.

This is just like any other claim to own some particular piece of real estate: it will have abundant "standing", "merit" and "legitimacy" as soon as she is able to back her claim up by force.<p>It's been that way since the beginning of time; and (if you follow eminent domain disputes, and the handling of most aboriginal land claims carefully enough), after all is said and done, that's pretty much the way things work nowadays, also.

The conversation in space is going to be much different when private enterprises get their rockets (and laser canons) up there more efficiently than 99% of soverign nations. The 97 other countries without a space program could kiss my ass with their feelings about my claim of lunar rock.<p>Im partly being facetious but serious all at once. This is going to become a major issue in the coming decades.

I had no idea that there was 'Space Law' and that there is even a Journal... <a href="http://www.spacelaw.olemiss.edu/JSL.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.spacelaw.olemiss.edu/JSL.html</a>