[Goober5000]

At the moment, all the information is based on technical analysis and leaked news reports, but the mood surrounding this is cautiously optimistic.  Here's the official part:

The Inspiration Mars Foundation, a newly formed nonprofit organization led by American space traveler and entrepreneur Dennis Tito, invites you to attend a press conference detailing its plans to take advantage of a unique window of opportunity to launch an historic journey to Mars and back in 501 days, starting in January 2018. This “Mission for America” will generate new knowledge, experience and momentum for the next great era of space exploration. It is intended to encourage all Americans to believe again, in doing the hard things that make our nation great, while inspiring youth through Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) education and motivation.

(from http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=31160.0)

Here's what is based on leaks:

This publication obtained a copy of the paper Tito et al. plan to present at the conference, discussing a crewed free-return Mars mission that would fly by Mars, but not go into orbit around the planet or land on it. This 501-day mission would launch in January 2018, using a modified SpaceX Dragon spacecraft launched on a Falcon Heavy rocket. According to the paper, existing environmental control and life support system (ECLSS) technologies would allow such a spacecraft to support two people for the mission, although in Spartan condition. “Crew comfort is limited to survival needs only. For example, sponge baths are acceptable, with no need for showers,” the paper states.

(from http://www.newspacejournal.com/2013/02/21/new-insights-on-that-private-crewed-mars-mission/)

Here's a pretty good opinion piece with summary and speculation:
http://news.discovery.com/space/private-spaceflight/space-tourist-mission-to-mars-in-2018-130221.htm

We'll know more after the press conference on February 27th.

[General Battuta]

By 'actual' we mean 'totally notional right now' ofc

[headdie]

tbh I would rather see this sort of thing pushed back a few years for a 4 person crew basis with an actual mission such as dropping and recovering a probe, droping some equipment in prep for a crewed surface mission or some such, before returning.   A "minimum expendature" proof of concept there and back seems a bit thin for such a huge endeavour, ok the survival data will be necessary for any large scale mission but, I dont know, given that for a little more expenditure a lot more could be gained i would prefer to see something more substantial and perhaps with greater safety margines.

[deathfun]

I wonder if they'll be giving eachother sponge baths...
...and if they're both women

[headdie]

I wonder if they'll be giving eachother sponge baths...
...and if they're both women

web cam 

[guitarfan01]

Interesting.

That sounds like a very unpleasant year and a half for the astronauts, though.

[FreeSpaceFreak]

Hmm... I guess you have to be American to sign up?

[el_magnifico]

Ha! Amerricans so far behind. Soviet Union will bury you!

tbh I would rather see this sort of thing pushed back a few years for a 4 person crew basis with an actual mission such as dropping and recovering a probe, droping some equipment in prep for a crewed surface mission or some such, before returning.   A "minimum expendature" proof of concept there and back seems a bit thin for such a huge endeavour, ok the survival data will be necessary for any large scale mission but, I dont know, given that for a little more expenditure a lot more could be gained i would prefer to see something more substantial and perhaps with greater safety margines.

Excuse me, but isn't that the kind of thinking that's been keeping us in the ground for so many years by now?

I wonder if they'll be giving eachother sponge baths...
...and if they're both women

web cam 

Then think of how that women might look after a year and a half in such conditions, and you will start to reconsider...

[General Battuta]

This mission should be robotic. It would actually really own (and stand a chance of happening) if it were!

[headdie]

I wonder if they'll be giving eachother sponge baths...
...and if they're both women

web cam 

Then think of how that women might look after a year and a half in such conditions, and you will start to reconsider...

we cant smell them, give them a year and a half supply of razors, or perhaps veet hair removed and its all good

[FireSpawn]

As long as they ae provided with an ex-military combat drone-come-science droid, then nothing can go wrong...Providing that they don't encounter some sort of carnivorous mars beetles, giant stone faces emitting strange radio waves or magicalmysticalmumbojumbo mars ghosts.

Hmm...Better send Ice Cube as well, just in case.

Did I forget any other references? Oh!

And make sure they don't send this guy:

[headdie]

:like:

[castor]

Sounds tough. 2018 is like, tomorrow.

[Nuke]

we should sent a pair of crazed lunatics. that way if it ****s up you are not minus two functional members of society.

i would like to volonteer to be one of those crazed lunatics. please make the other one a sex addicted russian chick who doesnt speak any english.

[BloodEagle]

While I understand that this is to (possibly-sorta-maybe) take place five years from now, putting two people in a cramped, hazardous environment for five hundred days is a good way to kill two people.  And on top of that, you have to worry about the actual, external dangers involved in the journey.

[deathfun]

While I understand that this is to (possibly-sorta-maybe) take place five years from now, putting two people in a cramped, hazardous environment for five hundred days is a good way to kill two people.  And on top of that, you have to worry about the actual, external dangers involved in the journey.

External you can compensate for
It's what is inside the human brain that would prove to be the bigger problem. You're being taken away from society for a long period of time cramped in a small space in space, with one other fellow. If you aren't going crazy, I wouldn't trust the other guy to be the same

[headdie]

they need broadband 

* headdie dives for cover

[Dragon]

A signal needs 2 minutes to get from Mars to Earth, and that's in good conditions. So, you'd end up with an unavoidable 4 minute lag on the connection. That'd be very annoying. No real-time chat, constantly getting ninja'ed on forums... If you want to drive a man crazy, that's what you give him. 

[FIZ]

Are the risks of the privatization of the space industry starting to bear fruit?  I'd like to think so. 

"We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win, and the others, too."

[NGTM-1R]

By 'actual' we mean 'totally notional right now' ofc

Yeah, pretty much everything at NASA right now is committed to James Webb. They've staked their existence on that project.