
Sir Richard Branson: Virgin Orbit rocket fails on debut flight - ZeljkoS
https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-52802520
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ge96
> Take just the example of server farms. We know we could put them in space to
> harness solar power.

That's kind of an interesting thought, cool... but what about maintenance. I
guess if you can build something for 40+ years(Voyager probes) then it should
be possible. You could use those remote drones to perform maintenance, that
would be a neat potential business(those drones/interface). Yeah it doesn't
seem logical the distance.

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seanhunter
Surely the key issue that makes this untenable is network latency. That's a
hard physical limit no matter how far our technology evolves to work around
the myriad other problems with having servers in such an inconvenient
location.

Maintenance is not a small problem though. Even if you were able to design
servers to be robust for 40+ years, your users would have to be content with
using 40+ year-old server tech as opposed to the latest and greatest. That's
going to be ok for some use-cases but relatively few.

~~~
ge96
> network latency

I realize that's one of the first things that comes to mind. Either you beam
power down or you beam compute down/"real time" communication... but I thought
you could do something like "ML training" or anything else where the compute
process does not need to be shared until it's done.

On a side note, are the underwater servers better? I suppose that's easier to
get to than space. The communication is there(transatlantic cables perhaps).

Another side note, what if we could embed "servers" in an asteroid to hitch a
ride... nvm the logistics of doing that. But another way to extend our
existence/influence. RTG/solar for power.

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redis_mlc
> "Orbit is chasing the growing interest in small spacecraft that are being
> designed for telecommunications and Earth observation."

Kinda skeptical on the business models for SpaceX and Orbit.

If SpaceX had enough paying launch clients, they wouldn't be polluting the sky
with their own Internet satellites.

Oya, almost forgot: time to deorbit the ISS. Take a chain saw on the next
trip.

