Today saw the launch of A Message from Earth, a “ground-breaking digital time capsule that will be created entirely by the Bebo community this summer and beamed into deep space on a 120 trillion-mile journey.”

The Bebo page has a video introduction by someone called Venetia, who tells us that there’s a planet 20.5 light years away that is very similar to Earth, “and could, in fact, hold life”. In fact we have no idea, but don’t let that stop you.

Bebo users can submit text messages, photographs and drawings to be beamed into space. So what should we send? The press release helps out: “From our natural planet, the achievements of mankind or the worst traits of humanity to a best friend or a favourite celebrity, nothing is too big or small to be included.”

Celebrities are also being asked to participate. So far the list includes: Gillian Anderson of The X Files, Chris Carter (creator of The X Files), Buzz Aldrin (second man on the moon) and broadcaster-astronomer Patrick Moore, which is hardly “the broad spectrum of leading figures in the world of music, sport, fashion, film, politics” promised by the project.

But more worryingly, the last few messages left by commenters on the Bebo page don’t exactly augur well for the content to be sent. So far we have: “What Is This?” and “you phoned me up about this job and i wasnt in and you said u were going to phone back but you didnt”.

A nice idea, but is this really the best way of communicating with aliens? I agree that it’s time we moved on from sending pictures of Vitruvian man or strange golden records (see picture above) into space, but I fear that if any other life forms do intercept the messages, they might deem us not worthy of a reply.