Hmmm...no trouble ponying up $35 million, but couldn't cough up part of $20 million to put Bass into space.

Reading between the lines of the article, I get the uncomfortable impression that Pepsi was originally working with Bass, and double-crossed him to run off with the marketing idea. Anybody else read it this way, or is it just me?

The estimated $35 million program represents about one-third of Pepsi-Cola Co.'s 2003 promotional budget, according to people with knowledge of PepsiCo's plans. While that's not spare change, it's less than the company spends on mega-promotions such as Pepsi Stuff, according to another Pepsi insider. "It's a lot of money, but it's not unheard of," he said.

See, this kind of money is all over the place in advertising. I don't know why space projects have such a hard time getting a piece of it.