ViT (Vision Transformer) fine-tuned on a Starcloud satellite in space (using the Flower framework) -- to the best of our knowledge, this is a world first: https://flower.ai/blog/2026-02-02-flower-labs-and-starcloud-...
Data centers in space makes no sense
701–710 of 1001 posts
Re: Data centers in space makes no sense
#702Data centers in space make perfect sense, in exactly the same way as a jetpack made perfect sense. It is an excellent vehicle to ride out some juicy government contracts for as long as you can keep the grift going.
https://pluralistic.net/2024/05/17/fake-it-until-you-dont-ma...
Re: Data centers in space makes no sense
#703Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's exiting the 5th best social network and the 10th (or worse) best AI company and selling them to a decent company. It probably increases Elon's share of the combined entity. It delivers on a promise to investors that he will make money for them, even as the underlying businesses are lousy.
I'm confused about the level of conversation here. Can we actually run the math on heat dissipation and feasibility? A Starlink satellite uses about 5K Watts of solar power. It needs to dissipate around that amount (+ the sun power on it) just to operate. There are around 10K starlink satellites already in orbit, which means that the Starlink constellation is already effectively equivalent to a 50 Mega-watt (in a rou…
> A Starlink satellite uses about 5K Watts of solar power
Is that 5kW of electrical power input at the terminals, or 5kW irradiation onto the panels?
Because that sounds like kind of a lot, for something the size of a fridge.
Re: Data centers in space makes no sense
#704Earlier quoted context omitted.
It’s a distraction as they suck out as much value from Tesla as possible before the music stops and they go bust. There are a few really big IPOs this year including SpaceX, which will likely trigger significant market volatility.
yes, tesla, famously the worst performing car manufacturer with the worst profit margins, is definitely going bust any day now
Keep up.
Re: Data centers in space makes no sense
#705Earlier quoted context omitted.
My guess is it’s just another example of his habit of trying to use one of his companies to manufacture demand for another of his companies’ products. Specifically: Starship makes no economic sense. There simply isn’t any pre-existing demand for the kind of heavy lift capacity and cadence that Starship is designed to deliver. Nor is there anyone who isn’t currently launching heavy payloads to LEO but the only thing h…
>Specifically: Starship makes no economic sense. Starship can replace Falcon 9 and probably be cheaper, if fully reusable, so more profitable. So at least some economic sense is there already.
No, that's not how any of this works. Try to think for a moment why we still overwhelmingly use non-jumbo jets for aviation in a world where jumbo jets exist.
Re: Data centers in space makes no sense
#706[deleted]
Re: Data centers in space makes no sense
#707I would not assume cooling has been worked out. Space is a vacuum. i.e. The lack-of-a-thing that makes a thermos great at keeping your drink hot. A satellite is, if nothing else, a fantastic thermos. A data center in space would necessarily rely completely on cooling by radiation, unlike a terrestrial data center that can make use of convection and conduction. You can't just pipe heat out into the atmosphere or build…
It's exiting the 5th best social network and the 10th (or worse) best AI company and selling them to a decent company. It probably increases Elon's share of the combined entity. It delivers on a promise to investors that he will make money for them, even as the underlying businesses are lousy.
Sounds like Elon hurt someone’s feelings
Re: Data centers in space makes no sense
#708Heat energy shedding is often talked about as an Achilles Heal of orbital computation.
But heat radiation rates are proportional to temperature to the 4th power!!!!
That is a magical law. The quality of heat pumps used to concentrate heat, will drive the economics and structure of heat dissipation.
Seldom do we get constraints that favorable to work with.
Re: Data centers in space makes no sense
#709Feels like this is about as unserious as flamethrowers, the Boring Company, and Hyperloop.
We're living in the Age of Distraction… amusing ourselves to death (as usual).
Re: Data centers in space makes no sense
#710Two reasons why it makes sense (really really good reasons): 1) Water scarcity and energy scarcity here on earth 2) It will drive down launch costs and promotes investment in orbital facilities and launch capabilities. those two reasons alone are enough.
What does water scarcity have to do with anything? Data centers don't use water. They slightly heat it, and then it flows back out to whatever it would have done anyway.
They need fresh water which is scarce unlike salt water, once they use it, it can't be used for anything else. They're competing with water supplies of municipalities these days. Not a big deal if you're near the great lakes or the missisipi, but a big deal in california, arizona, utah,etc.. and that's just the US. There are places that are becoming unlivable because of water supply issues, and datacenters are needing to be built near them.