Footnotes for the International Space Station Alpha is a Building in Space

1. We know that "Alpha" is not the official name of the International Space Station and elsewhere in the site we have tried to avoid its use. We use it here because one of us (Tumlinson) has spent years advocating for a concept called AlphaTown and he really likes the fact that much of the press, especially in Europe and the US, has adopted the Alpha name.

2. The owner of a property holds title to the asset and may or may not actually use, administer, or lease out the facility.

3. A landlord leases all or part of the property to one or more tenants, who gain temporary exclusive use of that property. The owner may function as the landlord in which case he is often referred to as an owner/landlord or may lease the entire facility to someone else who serves this function.

4. A broker is an agent who for a fee acts on behalf of the landlord.

5. A contractor may work for either the landlord or a tenant to provide services.

6. A supplier provides product(s) to either the landlord or a tenant.

7. A customer is normally a person or entity that does business with any of the tenants at the property in question.

8. It is important to note that a person or entity may be involved with any number of these various functions.

9. Others have pointed to Intelsat and Inmarsat as models that straddle the public/private divide. While there may be elements of Intelsat and Inmarsat that are useful the unusual nature of the two organizations limit the usefulness of the analogy.

10. NASA, for example, is already considering setting up what they are calling a non-governmental organization (NGO) that would effectively outsource the US portion of science and commercial activity on the ISS.