"As you read this, a moustachioed Canadian astronaut named Commander Chris Hadfield is readying himself for a ride from the international space station down to earth, with 800,000 Twitter followers in tow. When he left the planet on Dec. 19, that number stood at roughly 20,000. Neither Hadfield nor the 20-person strong communications team at the Canadian Space Agency set out to grow his count of Twitter followers, let alone try to make him of the the most widely recognized astronauts since Neil Armstrong. In fact, the CSA had a much humbler mission: to tell their countrymen that there is such a thing as the Canadian Space Agency and to interest young Canadian students in science and technology." - × × ×