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Very confused by this plan. Data centers on Earth are struggling with how to get rid of waste heat. It's really, really hard to get rid of waste heat in space. That seems to be about the worst possible place to put a data center.
Very confused by this plan. How about now? https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/ce3ex92557jo
Is there any insight into how Starlink solved cooling? One 'expert' insisted that there is no reason to expect that data center satellites would generate any more heat than starlinks.
I'm convinced that >30% of this comes from ideas leaking out of fiction such as like Neuromancer , and percolating through the minds of wealthy people attracted to some of the concepts. Namely, the dream of being a hyper-wealthy dynasty, above any earthly government, controlling an extraterritorial Las Vegas Fiefdom In Space. (Which in the book, also hosted a powerful AI.) Then they work backwards, trying to figure o…
It possibly makes sense if you're preparing for war, harder to hit, harder to physically break into, beyond the range of nuclear EMP, and accessible from anywhere on earth.
Any country capable of producing nuclear warheads will also be able to toss up enough BBs and other small objects into LEO to wipe out most of Starlink and anything else in LEO. At least on Earth data centers in theory can be hidden and physically hardened. In orbit, even a crude rocket able to reach that plane can become a weapon of mass satellite destruction. Even if those orbits clear out in four or five years, by…
Next up, the Boring Company gets imaginary contract for underground datacenters, is now valued at $500B.
I thought that was actually quite interesting/practical, because if there is a problem, you can just bury the problem.
not like tmi/fukushima/chernobyl
To Steelman the topic, Musk’s whole alleged mission is to make humans a multi-planet species that can survive an earth killing event. To that end, a small data center space isn’t about unit-economics, it’s a bigger mission. So the question we should consider is what can we put into space the further that mission. Can we put a meaningful sum of human knowledge out there for preservation? It sounds like “yes,” even if…
A data center in space is probably toast after some years of space radiation. High performance chips are made for the shielded atmosphere. Imagine the cost launching all the extra shielding that you don't need on earth. It is beyond stupid. Comical levels. I can't believe people are trying to find any justification.
Can you not provide any type of shielding at scale to wrap a (small, not Google tier) data center? To be honest my criticism with TFA is its focus on “you can’t do massive scale” rather than the premise entirely.
Very confused by this plan. Data centers on Earth are struggling with how to get rid of waste heat. It's really, really hard to get rid of waste heat in space. That seems to be about the worst possible place to put a data center.
The average temperature of deep space is approximately -270.45°C or 2.73 Kelvin), which is just above absolute zero. This baseline temperature is set by the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) radiatio...
Which is absolute nonsense, because vacuum has no temperature.
How about we just make a giant heatsink that reaches into space instead. Then we can cool the whole planet. Coming up with crazy ideas is cheap, but the logistics are obviously impractical.
Look into radiative cooling. Basically this, but more practical. Several companies working on it: https://www.skycoolsystems.com/
Is it really better than just using solar panels to run a heat pump?
It possibly makes sense if you're preparing for war, harder to hit, harder to physically break into, beyond the range of nuclear EMP, and accessible from anywhere on earth.