Golden record
The Golden Record aboard the Voyager that contains sounds and images specifically selected to "portray the diversity of life and culture on Earth" NASA/JPL

Nasa has beamed the winner of #MessageToVoyager vote into interstellar space. The message, chosen from over 30,000 entries, was part of the 40th year observance of Nasa's longest running space mission to date.

The message was beamed by William "Captain Kirk" Shatner from Nasa's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California.

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Based on the short messages placed on the golden record aboard Voyager 1, messages of goodwill were picked from tweets posted with #MessageToVoyager on the Voyager and Nasa Twitter page. Ten of them were then chosen by a team from the Voyager space mission staff, and after an open public vote, one that got the highest number of votes was selected.

The voting came to a close on 29 August and the message was sent out on 5 September. It will reach the "vicinity of Voyager 1" after a day, travelling at the speed of light, according to Nasa.

Here is the message that will reach Voyager 1:

We offer friendship across the stars. You are not alone.

Nasa announced this in a tweet calling out the person who first posted it - Oliver Jenkins.

Jenkins, self-titled "ambassador of Earth", responded to the selection made by Nasa.

Every bit of communication between Voyager 1 and Earth takes close to a day, so at the time of writing this story, the message will still be on its way to the furthest man-made object in the galaxy. The spacecraft is travelling far beyond the solar system and is currently over 20 billion km away. It is constantly moving at a rate of over 61,000 km/h toward the Ophiucus constellation.

According to a Nasa video, the message that was beamed will continue to travel across the galaxy for several light years before eventually decaying. So if there is intelligent life beyond Voyager 1 and if they have the means to receive the signal, it will reach them.