Jason Townsend, NASA deputy social media manager, said his team takes advantage of trending topics, anniversaries, and other connections in the news to draw in new audiences. For instance, it allowed British boy band One Direction to shoot a music video about a space mission to Mars at NASA facilities. NASA’s social media team filmed their own short videos of the band participating in astronaut training, which attracted a lot of new, young followers, particularly girls, he said. “A lot of folks groan, ‘Why are you talking about One Direction?’ … You should talk about space,” Townsend said. “But you know … we’re trying to inspire the next generation of explorers here.”
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