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xAI joins SpaceX

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Re: xAI joins SpaceX

#551
post #45

> it is possible to put 500 to 1000 TW/year of AI satellites into deep space, meaningfully ascend the Kardashev scale and harness a non-trivial percentage of the Sun’s power We currently make around 1 TW of photovoltaic cells per year, globally. The proposal here is to launch that much to space every 9 hours, complete with attached computers, continuously, from the moon. edit: Also, this would capture a very trivial…

Context missing. This is in reference to a vision the (distant?) future where the satellites are manufactured in factories on the Moon and sent into space with mass drivers. Full paragraph quote comes from: > While launching AI satellites from Earth is the immediate focus, Starship’s capabilities will also enable operations on other worlds. Thanks to advancements like in-space propellant transfer, Starship will be ca…

> This is in reference to a vision the (distant?) future where the satellites are manufactured in factories on the Moon and sent into space with mass drivers.

In the meantime, how about affordable insulin for everybody?

Re: xAI joins SpaceX

#552

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Technically challenging", a nice way to say "impossible"

Just like rockets landing themselves

No, rockets landing themselves is just controlling the mechanism you use to have them take off, and builds on trust vectoring technology from 1970s jet fighters based on sound physics.

Figuring out how to radiate a lot of waste heat into a vacuum is fighting physics. Ordinarily we use a void on earth as a very effective _insulator_ to keep our hot drinks hot.

Re: xAI joins SpaceX

#553
Anyone remember the quote by Russ Hanneman on SV [0] - "No Revenue, means you're potential pure play"

We know datacenters in space - sound plausible enough - yet not practical - hence they're potential pure play - also you can have massive solar in space - unlimited space -- etc -- all true -- but how economical / practical is it ?

yet we know on earth - to power the whole earth with solar - only a fraction of the land is needed. Hell it's even in the Tesla Master Plan v3 docs [1] - current limitation being storage & distribution

so all you - are now witnessing to the greatest scam ever pulled on earth.

[0]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BzAdXyPYKQo [1]: https://www.tesla.com/ns_videos/Tesla-Master-Plan-Part-3.pdf

Re: xAI joins SpaceX

#554

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In fairness, solar cells can be about 5x more efficient in space (irradiance, uptime).

And how much of that power would be spent on high speed communications with Earth that aren't, you know, a megabit or two per second

and, of course and inter-satellite comms and earth base station links to get the data up and down. Starlink is one thing at just above LEO a few hundred km and 20km apart, but spreading these around 10s of thousands of km and thosands of km apart is another thing

Re: xAI joins SpaceX

#555
xAI to cover X investors, SpaceX to cover xAI, us American public investors to cover SpaceX since it cannot go under for strategic reasons. Ultimate grift.

Re: xAI joins SpaceX

#556

From the Big Short (movie) Jared Vennett (narration): "In the years that followed, hundreds of bankers and rating agency's executives went to jail. The SEC was completely overhauled, and Congress had no choice but to break up the big banks and regulate the mortgage and derivatives industries." "Just kidding. Banks took the money the American people gave them, and they used it to pay themselves huge bonuses, and lobby…

Serious question .. are you long on cash or what? What investment class is not overvalued? Gold is but a store of value and doesn't really grow - look at how high it has gone.

Re: xAI joins SpaceX

#557

SpaceX is too big to fail. It's important for national security. I wonder if Elon wants to tangle all his businesses into SpaceX so they are all kept afloat by SpaceX's importance.

How vital is it really to national security? Starlink will have competition from Amazon Leo in the next few months. And while SpaceX is obviously in the lead in launch capability with Starship, there are multiple launch providers capable of providing roughly the same services the Falcon 9 and Heavy provide today.

Re: xAI joins SpaceX

#558
post #486

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is just what I was thinking. Twitter (X) owed $1.3B in debt every year in interest since Musk's takeover. This was before re-financing in a higher interest rate environment. The company was losing $200MM+ per year on ~$5B in revenue before the takeover, and there are reports that revenues have decreased by round 50%. Best case scenario if we accept those numbers is that X makes $3B per year and about half of tha…

> The company was losing $200MM+ per year on ~$5B in revenue before the takeover, and there are reports that revenues have decreased by round 50%. X made a profit last year because they cut costs lower than the drop in ad revenue (which is also slowly recovering). The big question is if they will still be profitable in 2026 year without the US election driving big traffic numbers and ads.

How do you "know" this? They're private and don't need to report anything.

You also have to be careful about who said it and what they meant by "profit," because there is gross profit, EBIT, EBITDA, and others.

Re: xAI joins SpaceX

#560
post #550
post #45

> it is possible to put 500 to 1000 TW/year of AI satellites into deep space, meaningfully ascend the Kardashev scale and harness a non-trivial percentage of the Sun’s power We currently make around 1 TW of photovoltaic cells per year, globally. The proposal here is to launch that much to space every 9 hours, complete with attached computers, continuously, from the moon. edit: Also, this would capture a very trivial…

I couldn't believe that was an actual quote from the article. It is. These people are legit insane.

Not insane at all. They are perfectly sane and know words can be twisted to justify just about anything, when stating the actual goals is unsavory.
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