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Orbital Data Centers: Why the Hype Outpaces Reality

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Re: Orbital Data Centers: Why the Hype Outpaces Reality

#61

Post by rbanffy »

toss1 wrote: post #31
aeternum wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good thing Elon's companies have a history of moving engineering impossibilities from impossible to slightly late. Remember when globally competitive electric cars, re-usable boosters, catching a rocket with chopsticks, playing a fps game via a brain implant, and maintaining a satellite constellation at 480km LEO were also impossible?

I used to make similar arguments. But I also now look at actual results, and they are not merely late, they are far less than promised. Globally competitive EV? Not against the Chinese competitors (Hint: it's why he plans to merge Tesla into SpaceX). Self-driving so good cars would be assets you could run your own self-driving Uber-like service (and customers paid a $10K upcharge for the ticket to do it next year)? N…

> you will do well for a while as there are many fools around.

Ideally, you pass your meme stocks to greater fools before they collapse. You then move to the next meme, rinse and repeat. You can do well for a surprisingly long time.

Not being a misanthropist has been expensive to me.

Re: Orbital Data Centers: Why the Hype Outpaces Reality

#63

Post by toss1 »

rbanffy wrote: post #61
toss1 wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I used to make similar arguments. But I also now look at actual results, and they are not merely late, they are far less than promised. Globally competitive EV? Not against the Chinese competitors (Hint: it's why he plans to merge Tesla into SpaceX). Self-driving so good cars would be assets you could run your own self-driving Uber-like service (and customers paid a $10K upcharge for the ticket to do it next year)? N…

> you will do well for a while as there are many fools around. Ideally, you pass your meme stocks to greater fools before they collapse. You then move to the next meme, rinse and repeat. You can do well for a surprisingly long time. Not being a misanthropist has been expensive to me.

Same here; it's expensive to not be a crook at heart (at least short-run expensive. I think it is far better long-run) .

Re: Orbital Data Centers: Why the Hype Outpaces Reality

#64

Post by rbanffy »

toss1 wrote: post #63
rbanffy wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> you will do well for a while as there are many fools around. Ideally, you pass your meme stocks to greater fools before they collapse. You then move to the next meme, rinse and repeat. You can do well for a surprisingly long time. Not being a misanthropist has been expensive to me.

Same here; it's expensive to not be a crook at heart (at least short-run expensive. I think it is far better long-run) .

I understand the point of being able to sleep at night, but lacking a yacht and a business jet of my own, alongside several holiday residences on different tax jurisdictions, is certainly an inconvenience.

Re: Orbital Data Centers: Why the Hype Outpaces Reality

#65

Post by NishanStepak »

root-parent wrote: post #4
NishanStepak wrote: post #2

The advantage is solar power in space. They will never stop getting sunlight.

https://youtu.be/-w6G7VEwNq0?t=340

This has little to do with rationality. It is the classic Move And Fast Break Things combined with the off base idea of building a Kardashev scale civilization. This part of Elon Musk's philosophy as well as many of the tech bros who believe in Abundance. https://x.com/teslaownersSV/status/2068178062030803390

Re: Orbital Data Centers: Why the Hype Outpaces Reality

#66

Post by advisedwang »

ck2 wrote: post #47
advisedwang wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The hotter you are, the less radiators you need for the same heat dissipation. The ISS needs to run at human-comfort temperatures, but a datacenter can run much hotter than that (note the "at 60 °C" in the article). I forget the scaling parameter, but it's like T^2 or T^4 or something like that, so running hotter makes a huge difference. Of course, that's offset by the enormous heat output of a datacenter. I'm not sa…

I am curious to see if this causes an improvement in radiators though, that would be interesting or perhaps a whole new technology invented to vent the heat will be interesting to see what they come up with hmm, how do they radiate the heat from the capsule with humans going to the moon, now I am really curious, I've never seen panels like that on the lunar module past or future

> how do they radiate the heat from the capsule with humans going to the moon

https://blogs.esa.int/orion/2018/01/18/keeping-cool-while-st... https://ttu-ir.tdl.org/server/api/core/bitstreams/a51a54b9-9...

Looks like the regular exterior of the service module provides enough area for heat exchange.

Re: Orbital Data Centers: Why the Hype Outpaces Reality

#67

Post by fnord77 »

dialogbox wrote: post #52
fnord77 wrote: post #10

I think everyone misses the real point - they're completely outside the jurisdiction of any government. Short of launching an ASAT and the risk of space debris, nobody will be able to shut them down.

> nobody will be able to shut them down. ASAT can completely destroy it very easily. Then isn't that everyone who can send orbital object can shut them down?

The only countries that can shoot down a satellite are United States, Russia, China, and India.

Is the US going to launch a multimillion dollar multistage aegis missile to blow up a server that is serving illegal gambling?

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