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Is Google building a hulking floating data center in SF Bay?

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Re: Is Google building a hulking floating data center in SF Bay?

#81

How does the data get to/from the platform? Microwaves? Can that work from a slightly moving platform? My wacky guess would have been off-shore offices for employees that can't get H1Bs.

1000 4G dongles could pull down 1 Tbps and the signals run well over several miles of water.

Wireless communication doesn't work that way. Its bandwidth is not proportional to the number of transceivers.

Re: Is Google building a hulking floating data center in SF Bay?

#82
post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Submit it to USPTO and other national or trans-national (e.g. EU) patent registries like any other patent. This one's included in the article: https://www.google.com/patents/US7525207

Satire aside. My point was the ridiculousness of it. What's next, patents covering putting data centers in space, under the sea or under stairs etc..

This is precisely how Feynman got the patents on the nuclear submarine and the nuclear airplane.

Re: Is Google building a hulking floating data center in SF Bay?

#83
post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Submit it to USPTO and other national or trans-national (e.g. EU) patent registries like any other patent. This one's included in the article: https://www.google.com/patents/US7525207

Satire aside. My point was the ridiculousness of it. What's next, patents covering putting data centers in space, under the sea or under stairs etc..

Looks like the patent disclosure refers extensively to challenges and opportunities of the maritime environment - power generation, heating and cooling, etc.

Re: Is Google building a hulking floating data center in SF Bay?

#84

Can somebody explain the point behind the secrecy? What does Google have to gain by taking all these steps to hide they're the ones building it?

The same reason anyone hides trade secrets. For competitive advantage, etc...

Perhaps also for legal reasons. For example larger companies use shell companies for purposes of reduced liability.

Re: Is Google building a hulking floating data center in SF Bay?

#85

So it appears as though Google is looking towards a future where they are an independent country, or at the very least free from regulation, visa-a-vis Seasteading. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seasteading

And interestingly, Patri Friedman used to work at Google...

Re: Is Google building a hulking floating data center in SF Bay?

#87

> putting data centers inside shipping containers is already a well-established practice. Is this true? Does anyone know why? The article seems to assume it without saying why.

I'll try to find the link in a moment, but Microsoft was doing something like this 5+ years back. The premise was similar to Google using commodity hardware in their datacenters. Throw together "compute blocks", set them all up and when performance degrades sufficiently you remove the container and install a new one in its place. EDIT: Also, I'm surprised I got the time right, for some reason 2005-2012 is one big blu…

One of these Microsoft container centers is outside Chicago, near O'Hare Airport in Northlake:

Satellite View: http://goo.gl/maps/2pX5u (Note the transformer farm right across the tollway)

Containers being loaded: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pt5ROTu6ceM

Re: Is Google building a hulking floating data center in SF Bay?

#88
post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FYI, "Buy N Large" was the fictional Costco-like store from Pixar's WALL-E.

I kind of doubt that these two names are related except that they both derive from the same common idiom.

I wouldn't put it past Google to use a tongue-in-cheek name, especially when a good hunk of WALL-E takes place around a massive starship that serves as a floating ark.

The nautical double-entendre that ZeroGravitas mentions only sweetens the deal.

Re: Is Google building a hulking floating data center in SF Bay?

#89

> putting data centers inside shipping containers is already a well-established practice. Is this true? Does anyone know why? The article seems to assume it without saying why.

I'll try to find the link in a moment, but Microsoft was doing something like this 5+ years back. The premise was similar to Google using commodity hardware in their datacenters. Throw together "compute blocks", set them all up and when performance degrades sufficiently you remove the container and install a new one in its place. EDIT: Also, I'm surprised I got the time right, for some reason 2005-2012 is one big blu…

joezydeco: Your reply seems to be dead, I'm not sure why.

I think that's the same one the datacenterknowledge.com article I linked refers to though.

Re: Is Google building a hulking floating data center in SF Bay?

#90
The middle of the ocean could be a a very high margin location for IaaS hosting.

Due to speed-of-light delays, some of the ideal locations for hosting high-speed trading arbitrages are in the middle of the ocean. Being half way between two exchanges would allow you to notice a small difference in price of some commodity in two different exchanges and buy and sell microseconds before your competitors on the mainland know that there's an arbitrage opportunity. See http://www.physicscentral.com/explore/action/stocktrade.cfm

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