Nameing A Star
 

I've been asked to look into nameing a star for someone this Christmas. I've done some searches including the International Star Registry and more specifically the Canadian International Star Registry and wondered if anyone here has looked into this/done this and to what results/satisfaction?

djp-
Your $50 or so would be better spent on anything else. These "services" choose a "star" coordinates and then put the info in a book and then submit to a copyright office. The only true way of "naming" a star is to discover one. Please don't encourage scammers!
Spend the money on an astronomy book and a telescope.

Um, I haven't done it, but just by looking at the site it seems to be along the lines of paying to have yourself listed in a "Who's Who" and the like. It doesn't say anything about the star's name being recognized by anyone except the people who see your certificate or who read the book the company sells. If international astronomy organizations recognized the star names, then sure, I'd do it. As it is, it simply looks like it's a pretty certificate and a placeholder in a book full of the names of other people who've bought the pretty certificate.

That said, if you have money to blow or it sounds cool to you, why not? You can always pretend someone else recognizes the fact that it's your star. ;)

you can get the same effect by printing up a nice certificate on your own with a color printer :) and look you saved $$$.

it's sadly not as romantic as it sounds...not even like you can find one that you've purchased in prior years (we bought one for the science teacher in 1986...can't find it at all again. LAME)

there was a whole thread about this a little while ago.

just as cyn said... its a thorough waste of money.

i bought an ex a star through the International Star Registry - and we got a nice certificate... and not much else.

nice, romantic idea... but also a waste of money.

i dunno...its an easy 50 bucks...but ya wander where its going after ya get a 5 cent piece of paper in the mail...

I've checked around a little bit more, and it looks like it is just a fancy peice of paper and such. Thanks for the input :)

I think all the posts prior sum it up. This is a scam. There is nothing official about 'naming' this star. Heck, I have doubts that they actually bother to pick different stars per each person, as no idiot would actually fall for this twice, let alone once.