ESA Mars Express - Are they hiding Pictures?

Originally posted by Nohup
The pictures sure are pretty. I've always wondered why they were so stingy with them, though. I mean, what kind of value do they have, really? I guess you can license them as screensavers or artwork of some kind, but there are too many great images of Mars for them to really be worth anything, as far as I'm concerned.

Research? What kind of detailed study of the images could they be doing that would require them to be kept away from the public?

It's not like topo maps you're going to sell to hikers anytime soon.

The researchers have the dibbs to any discoveries made in the images, which means they must be given time to write and publish the results of their research (the discoveries) before the images are released, or else other competing researchers may take the opportunity to publish the results first. The same is true with Hubble photographs. In the case of mars images, there may be things like new meteor impacts or outgushings of water/salt in some of the images and the team's researchers have a right to pore over the image data first to be able to claim the rights to any discoveries hidden in them. Those discoveries can be used to leverage for future grant money.