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Ethiopia has launched its first satellite into space

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Re: Ethiopia has launched its first satellite into space

#111

Post by true_religion »

beambot wrote: post #78
rburhum wrote: post #42

I am very familiar with the purchasing process of satellites by LATAM countries. Basically the Chinese or the French (i.e. Airbus) come in and offer you a satellite that ranges between 180M-380M USD in price depending on what you want. The price includes a building with a ground station, the launch, and some basic training. If you negotiate correctly, the full telemetry is send only to you and you process it all loca…

It seems like college students can design, build, & launch a microsat for $50k-$1M. Why jump straight to $200M+ for those learnings? It shouldn't take $Billions to start getting your feet wet.

Ghana launched a satellite in 2017, for 500,000 dollars. It was used for environmental monitoring. Since the Ethiopian satellite is to be used for the same thing, it will likely cost the same amount.

Re: Ethiopia has launched its first satellite into space

#112

Post by true_religion »

cambalache wrote: post #108
tristor wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The West will never step aggressively to the plate. We aren’t allowed to by our own domestic politics. One of the major reasons China can become so directly and aggressively involved is they aren’t white. They don’t have a history of African colonialism, Apartheid, or slavery in Africa. They’ve done all these (or similar) and worse, but not in Africa and not in a way which found domestic disapproval. If the West ever…

Let me guess, you are western and white, I ask because only a person of your demographic would dare to say that the Chinese has done even worse than the African slave trade, if you are going to mention the great leap forward I can easily mention WW1 and WW2 so I dont know where your sense of smug superiority comes from. I am not chinese by the way, nor "white".

It’s not worse in totality, as in we are summit up your sins to see who goes to heaven.

It’s worse in brutality for a specific case.

The argument that you are trying to have doesn’t exist here.

Re: Ethiopia has launched its first satellite into space

#113

Post by filleduchaos »

faizshah wrote: post #109
filleduchaos wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Call to the next village? Really? Unless you were having that conversation two decades ago, they 100% were just having you on.

Exaggerating, sure. But, the general point is accurate especially when looking at cost relative to income: https://media.economist.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/o... More recent: https://a4ai.org/extra/mobile_broadband_pricing_heat_map-201...

Your first link is from 2011 and is about cost of devices, and your second is about data plans, not mobile call rates.

I doubt your intention was to prove my point very loudly, but here we are.

Re: Ethiopia has launched its first satellite into space

#114

Post by true_religion »

haditab wrote: post #73
PedroBatista wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's the type of offer they can't refuse even if they wanted to. I get it, but this "help" has a tremendous cost, a cost many future generations of Ethiopians will pay dearly. While the "West" has been a mixed bag between good and bad, there's always been some kind of moral "checks and balances" and pressure from their voters. You get none of that with China.

What are the "moral checks and balances and pressure from the voters" in the west? As a voter in the west I don't recall ever hearing candidates talk about Africa (although I haven't necessarily been looking out for it and may be a bit too young depending on when it happened).

When accepting funds directly from the US government, or a source tied to it (e.g. World Bank, IMF), a country commonly has to undergo some amount of economic reform in order to ensure that the money can be paid back in the future. In order to get money from the US, you typically also have to adhere to similar political values such as democracy.

Exceptions of course are the oil states, due to strategic need.

China on the other hand does not care who you are or what you do so long as you can pay.

In this way they are really similar to private equity markets, but unlike private markets, they do have a navy and can use it to ensure that far away governments pay back their money.

Re: Ethiopia has launched its first satellite into space

#115

Post by [deleted] »

chirau wrote: post #48
rburhum wrote: post #42

I am very familiar with the purchasing process of satellites by LATAM countries. Basically the Chinese or the French (i.e. Airbus) come in and offer you a satellite that ranges between 180M-380M USD in price depending on what you want. The price includes a building with a ground station, the launch, and some basic training. If you negotiate correctly, the full telemetry is send only to you and you process it all loca…

Why do these countries need satellites anyway, what exactly are they using them for?

[deleted]

Re: Ethiopia has launched its first satellite into space

#116

Post by corporate_shi11 »

trianglem wrote: post #80
corporate_shi11 wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately, projects with very long term benefits that require political will to maintain are not sustainable in Democracies.

Is this why countries with democracies in North America, Europe, East Asia, South East Asia and South Asia have see such decades long explosive growth?

Actually most developed Democracies have economies that are relatively decoupled from their governments and their politics. Corporations operate relatively autonomously, and it is corporations which fuel the explosive growth we observe.

On the other hand, developing countries often have bloated bureaucracies and corrupt governments that are heavily involved in the private sector and corporate activity.

The difficulties I mentioned in my original post are those in which the Government is heavily involved. Corporate investment in properly functioning nations are free from (public) political hindrances.

Re: Ethiopia has launched its first satellite into space

#118

Post by yellowapple »

mdszy wrote: post #102
iguy wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But is this true? Sure if you want coverage of Siberia you may need your own, but doesn't every orbit cross the equator? I would have thought plenty of satellites cross Ethiopia every hour, although perhaps not bothering to run all their cameras without a customer?

Geostationary orbits won't necessarily cross the equator.

I'm reasonably sure satellite imaging happens pretty far below geostationary, though. It'd be interesting if we could someday park satellites in geostationary and just stare at a given spot continuously, but lens technology just ain't there yet, last I checked.

Re: Ethiopia has launched its first satellite into space

#119

Post by mdszy »

yellowapple wrote: post #118
mdszy wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Geostationary orbits won't necessarily cross the equator.

I'm reasonably sure satellite imaging happens pretty far below geostationary, though. It'd be interesting if we could someday park satellites in geostationary and just stare at a given spot continuously, but lens technology just ain't there yet, last I checked.

NOAA has a network of geostationary weather satellites.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geostationary_Operational_Envi...

Re: Ethiopia has launched its first satellite into space

#120

Post by faizshah »

filleduchaos wrote: post #113
faizshah wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exaggerating, sure. But, the general point is accurate especially when looking at cost relative to income: https://media.economist.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/o... More recent: https://a4ai.org/extra/mobile_broadband_pricing_heat_map-201...

Your first link is from 2011 and is about cost of devices, and your second is about data plans, not mobile call rates. I doubt your intention was to prove my point very loudly, but here we are.

Actually it's based on this data on mobile services cost: http://www.itu.int/ITU-D/ict/ipb/

I included the data from 2011 because it includes mobile services cost whereas the other is newer but on data costs.

Not sure what your point is at all other than to be pedantic and obfuscate the general point to be honest. The point being that african telecom costs are some of the highest in the world and this would be one use for a satellite...

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