Well first if i go back to paragraph 3 Nasa states that they thought from sending the pictures to the pubic it be a good way to atract public attention to fund mar's missions.

"The face" became very popular when Nasa first sent it to the public. Also on paragraph 7 the author states that when the Mars Global Surveyor flew over Cydonia ,they found out that "the face" was just a regular natural landform. In the year of 2001 the Mars Global Surveyor was able to snap a picture of the landform, as said by Garvin

"the picture actually showed the Martian equivalent of a buttle or mesa- landforms common around the American West". I don't think the landform is an ancient artifact or any alian artifact i just think its a normal landform that happens to look like a human or alian face. Even if Nasa was lying to us the landform benefits Nasa. When they first snapped the photograph and shared it with the public it received alot of public attention. Many people funded the missions to snap more photographs of the landform to get a better look at it. It was basically was a waste of time and money because it ended up being just a regular landform and not an alian artifact as the world believed it was at the time.