Russians take the first lead in extraterrestrial contact - space mail for extraterrestrial civilizations
Pravda.Ru
November 21, 2004

Russian scientists believe that satellites do not use the full range of their capacities during their wandering in open space. Russians will have an opportunity to send messages to extraterrestrial civilizations with the help navigating satellites of new generation, Glonass-M. 
"In addition to the basic purpose of the satellite, we decided to use them as space mail agents," a spokesman for the scientific association for applied mechanics (based in the Krasnoyarsk region of Russia) said. 

Glonass-M satellites orbit the Earth at the height of 20 thousand kilometers, and they can stay there forever. Information in the form of texts and drawings for extraterrestrial beings can be placed on aluminium plates, which make so-called cargo models to balance the satellite's center of mass. Official spokeswoman for the association, Elena Matveeva said that the first six informational plates were placed on the Glonass-M 12L satellite, the launching of which was planned to take place on December 25th. The plates contain the information about the enterprise and its founder, academician Mikhail Reshetnev. 

"We have already started accepting applications for the next Glonass-M spacecraft, which is to be launched in 2005. Anyone can submit their applications free of charge - students, enterprises and so on and so forth," Matveeva specified. First priority will be paid to information about planet Earth, the human civilization, education and modern terrestrial space technologies. The scientific association for applied mechanics does not exclude that extraterrestrial civilizations might be interested in such messages from Earth.