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Loon’s final flight

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Re: Loon’s final flight

#141

Post by supermatt »

timClicks wrote: post #116
supermatt wrote: post #92

IMHO, this is NO different from google closing down any other product. If, however, this news came with a grant of all the patents into the public domain, then it would be another story. Could a startup set up a commercial balloon based mesh network without running into patents now held by google? Probably not. THIS is the problem with these "skunkworks" type projects from megacorps. They suck all the air out of the…

Yes in principle, but probably not for this idea. If a startup was really wanted to take this on, they would be very well funded. At that point, they could easily license/buy any IP monopolies owned by Google.

Well it doesn't need to be a global network of stratospheric balloons - i.e. there are related aspects that could be undertaken with much more limited funding on a local scale.

For example, if you wanted to use a laser link to communicate between two ground-tethered weather balloons, you would need to account for the movements of the balloons to correct the link alignment. Lo and behold, first patent on the list (https://loon.com/legal/patents/) is for that exact thing (https://patents.google.com/patent/US8634974B2/en).

What about control the descent of a balloon by letting out some of the gas? You know, like flight balloons use, but "with a computer". Yep, patent for that too.

LOADS of the patents are basically "mesh network but with ballons"

These are obvious things you would need to do, and yet they are patented.

In short, they took away the ability to do ANY balloon based communications - not just a stratospheric global mesh network of current maneuvering autonomous balloons.

Of course, this shit shouldnt be permitted. The patent system is broken, as we often discuss around here.

IMHO, if these megacorps had ANY honour, they would release all patents to public domain - with revocation clause from another entity if that entity creates a derivative patent without same license. THAT is how to foster innovation - everything else should be a trade secret.

Re: Loon’s final flight

#142

Post by darawk »

Mistri wrote: post #4

People often make fun of Google/Alphabet for their graveyard of failed initiatives/products. While some of it might be warranted, projects like this—that strive to solve a large, global issue through somewhat charitable actions—are generous and have only increased my respect for the Google/Alphabet/X team. I hope they don't get flamed for this, and hopefully some of their research and donation funds can live on and s…

It's depressing that you both have to worry about being flamed for expressing that view, and that those fears appear to be completely justified based on the responses you're getting. It's quite clear that Google's moonshots are largely about doing good for the world, and building exciting technologies to make the world a better place. And we should be commending them for it. Technology has consistently made the world better, and its been mediated by people and companies with an ethos of innovation, and a maybe slightly naive desire to pursue those goals even when they don't completely make financial sense.

Re: Loon’s final flight

#143

Post by AstralStorm »

Judgmentality wrote: post #126
aetherson wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The actual thing that self driving cars get you is "not paying for a taxi driver." If one remote operator can supervise 10 mostly autonomous vehicles, you've gotten 90% of the economic value of full autonomy.

This ignores the cost of sending data wirelessly over cellular networks so remote operators can see the vehicle, the cost of maintaining the software and hardware on the vehicle itself, the cost of maintaining the vehicle fleet, the cost of creating and operating a consumer-facing support system (!!! for Google), the cost of dealing with the enormous amounts of data those vehicles create (even for Google this is not…

Most importantly, their fleet could be made obsolete by personal ownership of assisted driving vehicles. So by any of car manufacturers... (Better version of Tesla autopilot for instance.)

Re: Loon’s final flight

#144

Post by Cthulhu_ »

antupis wrote: post #30
ogre_codes wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the days of Google Moonshots are coming to a close. In general Google hasn't been very good at shooting for the moon. They've lost their leadership and vision and all that's left is a giant advertising behemoth. Did any of their moonshots really hit the mark or even come close?

Brain is doing great and Waymo probably at least hits close.

Waymo may / will earn them some money, either they sell it to a crazy big investor, or they license the technology out to a company backed by a crazy big investor.

Re: Loon’s final flight

#145

Post by sixti60 »

threatofrain wrote: post #139
sixti60 wrote: post #129

Sorry to be this guy, but I am quite happy this will not happen. The sky - our sky - is not a playground for tech companies. Imposing a mesh-grid of thousands of balloons in the sky is an incredible intrusion for people around the world who have not asked for anything. It's the same for mega constellations of satellites (Starlink). Would you be willing to have a company come and put unsolicited electronic equipment i…

Our skies and space shall be the “playground” of military and police though, until the day of international peace.

Yes, and this is a good reason for not adding 100 times more satellites/balloons/whatever again.

NB: currently we don't have "trains" of satellites, i.e. ten white dots one behind the other in the sky. The mega constellation projects would create this.

Re: Loon’s final flight

#147

Post by gundmc »

supermatt wrote: post #92

IMHO, this is NO different from google closing down any other product. If, however, this news came with a grant of all the patents into the public domain, then it would be another story. Could a startup set up a commercial balloon based mesh network without running into patents now held by google? Probably not. THIS is the problem with these "skunkworks" type projects from megacorps. They suck all the air out of the…

> If, however, this news came with a grant of all the patents into the public domain, then it would be another story...THIS is the problem with these "skunkworks" type projects from megacorps. They suck all the air out of the room and prevent others from innovating.

> Loon didn't fail, Google/Alphabet just decided they were going to discontinue funding. Now they hold a pool of patents they don't intend to do anything with. Now they will point that funding elsewhere and do the same.

They did EXACTLY what you are asking for the last X project that was sunset.

From https://x.company/projects/makani/:

> In 2020 Makani’s journey as a company came to an end. To share the lessons and insights the Makani team gained from their 13 year journey developing an entirely new kind of wind energy technology, the team created The Energy Kite Collection, a portfolio of resources including a technical report, Makani’s entire avionics, flight controls and simulation code repositories, flight logs for every crosswind flight of the M600 prototype, technical videos, a new simulation tool called KiteFAST created with the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, and a non-assertion pledge for the free use of Makani’s worldwide patent portfolio.

Re: Loon’s final flight

#149

Post by systemBuilder »

MattGaiser wrote: post #10
deanCommie wrote: post #8

>...the road to commercial viability has proven much longer and riskier than hoped. So we’ve made the difficult decision to close down Loon. I don't really understand - wasn't the whole premise of Google X and their "Other Bets" that "Google has deep pockets. Let's use this to explore radically big ideas, that are ahead of their time, and let the world catch up to them?" Bringing "abundant, affordable Internet access…

I suspect that Starlink will render it unneeded.

You mean starlink's failure will supplant loon's? Think carefully before you respond. I am one of about 5 engineers to help invent both globalstar and iridium.

Re: Loon’s final flight

#150

Post by paxys »

Worth noting that Google invested close to $1B in SpaceX in 2015, and is estimated to own ~10% of the company. Starlink deployment going smoothly and being much closer to commercially viable may have something to do with the decision to finally kill Loon.
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