--- title: Naming of Mars Rover Prompts Boaty McBoatface Jokes description: In the post-Boaty McBoatface era, apparently no Internet naming competition is safe from those hoping to recreate the iconic viral prank. canonical: https://time.com/5344247/mars-2020-rover-name-contest/ author: Megan McCluskey article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2018-07-20T17:09:12.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-10-12T09:35:05.467Z og:title: Boaty McBoatface Naming Debacle Haunts the 2020 Mars Rover og:description: No Internet naming competition is safe og:url: https://time.com/5344247/mars-2020-rover-name-contest/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf01da0bd8bf2e4fa/69888fa2196cf4189303b3b0/boaty-mcboatface.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 3493 og:image:height: 1965 og:image:alt: BRITAIN-RESEARCH-SHIP-OFFBEAT og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Boaty McBoatface Naming Debacle Haunts the 2020 Mars Rover twitter:description: No Internet naming competition is safe twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf01da0bd8bf2e4fa/69888fa2196cf4189303b3b0/boaty-mcboatface.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # The Boaty McBoatface Naming Debacle Is Coming Back to Haunt the 2020 Mars Rover > Sponsored content. 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Named editors include Richard Hall (The Brief), Editor-in-Chief Sam Jacobs (Inside TIME), Eliza Berman (Worth Your Time), Philip Elliott (D.C. Brief), Justin Worland (Future Proof) and Harry Booth (In the Loop). Health Matters is written by TIME's health desk. #### How do I sign up for a TIME newsletter? Go to time.com/newsletters, choose the newsletters you want and enter your email address. There is no cost and no subscription requirement. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-network-2026q3/newsletters?i=d9672a8a-76a4-4e19-9d95-09f49d8401b7&cr=time-nl-network-2026q3-v1) ## Video: Space Agency Invites Public to Name Mars Rover [Watch (HLS stream): Space Agency Invites Public to Name Mars Rover](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/moOB8GBU.m3u8) (1:37)  _Published 2018-07-20. It's officially called 'ExoMars,' but scientists nicknamed its prototypes Bruno and Bridget._  by [Megan McCluskey](https://time.com/author/megan-mccluskey/)  ## Megan McCluskey Staff Writer Jul 20, 2018 5:09 PM UTC  by [Megan McCluskey](https://time.com/author/megan-mccluskey/)  ## Megan McCluskey Staff Writer Jul 20, 2018 5:09 PM UTC In the [post-Boaty McBoatface era](http://time.com/4836095/boaty-mcboatface-submarine-voyage-david-attenborough/), apparently no [Internet naming competition](http://time.com/4266219/boaty-mcboatface-naming-vote/) is safe from those hoping to recreate the [iconic viral prank](http://time.com/4265572/nerc-name-our-ship-boaty-mcboatface/). After the U.K. Space Agency opened a contest to name its next Mars rover—which is set to launch in August 2020—Twitter users predictably began chiming in with the Boaty McBoatface-inspired suggestion of Rovy McRoverface. For those unfamiliar with the Boaty McBoatface debacle, the hilarious moniker was the name chosen for a $287 million polar research ship after an online poll created by the U.K.’s National Environment Research Council (NERC) spiraled out of control in 2016. However, the astronaut spearheading the mars rover campaign, Tim Peake, has found a way to ensure the spacecraft gets a bit more appropriate name. Instead of being subject to the Internet’s will, all suggestions entered on [this website](https://events.airbus.com/ereg/index.php?eventid=200179103&) will be presented to an expert panel for consideration. See some of the Boaty McBoatface jokes below. > [](https://twitter.com/steverumsby/status/1020310484917112833) > [](https://twitter.com/A%5FMEdwardz/status/1020281364342628353) > [](https://twitter.com/TheAndyMaturin/status/1020275314520461312) > [](https://twitter.com/BlatentLie/status/1020275776451764224) > [](https://twitter.com/simmo68/status/1020253982000852992) ## Transcript Behind me you can see this rover okay This one is called Bruno it is a prototype for a rover that's going to Mars in about two years time, the summer of 2020. And that's currently called X O Mars. Now we want to give X O Mars a name so the purpose of this morning is to launch a naming competition for the X O Mars rover. The most amazing discovery is to identify signs of either past or even present life on Mars. Now we're talking about organic molecules or compounds or bacteria for example, maybe evidence of single cell life forms. We're not talking about intelligent lifeforms, but even so it would tell us an awful lot. About how life evolved on our own planet here on Earth by studying Mars. So this rover's gonna drill down under the surface of Mars, into the permafrost, and look at water ice where those signs of life may be present. Our rover will be almost fully autonomous, and will be driven that way most of the time. The reason is because the time to light between Earth and Mars can be as much as 20 minutes. So it's either not safe or not particularly efficient to drive it by a remote control. Instead you want the rover to make the decisions about where is safe and where is not. And that's primarily what this prototype is designed for. So it starts with the cameras at the top of the mass. They see in 3- D, in much the same way we do. That allows the rover to identify where the rocks in the slopes are in front of it. And if any are outside it's capability, the rock is too big, the slope is too steep, the rover will identify that and drive round it on it's way to the target it's trying to reach. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/5344247/mars-2020-rover-name-contest/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/5344247/mars-2020-rover-name-contest/"},"headline":"The Boaty McBoatface Naming Debacle Is Coming Back to Haunt the 2020 Mars Rover","datePublished":"2018-07-20T17:09:12.000Z","dateModified":"2026-10-12T09:35:05.467Z","description":"No Internet naming competition is safe","url":"https://time.com/5344247/mars-2020-rover-name-contest/","keywords":["Newsfeed","viral"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf01da0bd8bf2e4fa/69888fa2196cf4189303b3b0/boaty-mcboatface.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Megan McCluskey","jobTitle":"Staff Writer","url":"https://time.com/author/megan-mccluskey/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf01da0bd8bf2e4fa/69888fa2196cf4189303b3b0/boaty-mcboatface.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"BRITAIN-RESEARCH-SHIP-OFFBEAT","caption":"BRITAIN-RESEARCH-SHIP-OFFBEAT","creditText":"AFP/Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/5344247/mars-2020-rover-name-contest/","name":"The Boaty McBoatface Naming Debacle Is Coming Back to Haunt the 2020 Mars Rover"}}]},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"VideoObject","name":"Space Agency Invites Public to Name Mars Rover","description":"It's officially called 'ExoMars,' but scientists nicknamed its prototypes Bruno and Bridget.","thumbnailUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/moOB8GBU/poster.jpg?width=720","uploadDate":"2018-07-20T15:59:16.000Z","contentUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/moOB8GBU.m3u8","embedUrl":"https://time.com/5344247/mars-2020-rover-name-contest/","duration":"PT1M37S","potentialAction":{"@type":"SeekToAction","target":"https://time.com/5344247/mars-2020-rover-name-contest/?jw_start={seek_to_second_number}","startOffset-input":"required name=seek_to_second_number"}}] ```