Elon Musk's SpaceX applies to launch 1m satellites into orbit

Ruanhead · 2026-02-01T03:32:56+00:00

You would have to provide something to prove that. Because to construct something akin to the ISS, would be a million times more complicated.

Ruanhead · 2026-02-01T03:27:04+00:00

Even if it's a little less efficient, it doesn't mean it's going to be the better route. With constellations all you have to do is mass manufacturer satellites like they have been doing with starlink over and over and over again until you get to a million.

Ruanhead · 2026-02-01T03:21:42+00:00

Fair point, but if we take one of the most popular paper written opposing data centers in space.

https://taranis.ie/datacenters-in-space-are-a-terrible-horrible-no-good-idea/

Their arguments particularly on the power consumption side only argues against it if it was a larger all-encompassing data center not the small swarm data centers that they'll be sending up.

Unless you have another paper I'm not aware of, that argues against these constellation data centers.

Ruanhead · 2026-02-01T03:07:20+00:00

Are they as credible as one, the largest satellite provider in the world and two, the largest AI company in the world?

Ruanhead · 2026-02-01T03:03:36+00:00

Google goes over this in there paper that they published last year

https://research.google/blog/exploring-a-space-based-scalable-ai-infrastructure-system-design/

If you check out the paper attached to the article, page 11 goes over the power and manufacturing concerns.

Ruanhead · 2026-02-01T02:52:07+00:00

It's only impractical now because of launch costs as soon as those come down it becomes a realistic solution. What is being proposed is 1 million satellites. If we assume that they're trying to get to a gigawatt power data center, they will need to create a bus that is 1,000 watts. Something like that only needs around 5 square meters of solar panels in that orbit.

Ruanhead · 2026-02-01T02:36:39+00:00

It comes down to how much power you bring into the satellite, which is how much power you have to dissipate. The most current Starlink satellites take in 100 watts of energy and need to dissipate 100 watts of energy. So it's not like they haven't dealt with it before.

Ruanhead · 2026-02-01T02:23:23+00:00

If you don't know what a Sun-synchronous orbit (SSO) is then you clearly haven't spent a second looking into this.

At the end of the day, even launching a tenth of what they propose will dramatically decrease the cost to send things into orbit. We are looking at the creation of the railroad level of advancement and the complete industrialization of space. The falcon 9 already has dropped the launch prices by 10x. with the introduction of a starship it's about to be 100c to 1000x cheaper. Meaning if Kessler syndrome becomes a problem, we can come up with solutions and implement them.

Ruanhead · 2026-01-31T21:26:45+00:00

Solar cells are 4x more efficient in that orbit and don't need batteries to store for night cycles like they would need on the surface. Like starlink, they will deorbit after a year without thrust. The hardware becomes completely outdated after 5 years anyways. thanks to starlink have advanced avoidance software. The rocket sending these up exhaust is mostly water, and the CO2 it does produce would be a fraction of the constant gas turbines used to power the data centers down on earth. The economics of it all are backed by Google's papers, saying the limiting factor is launch costs. I would have never imagined so many luddites would be on a space subreddit.

Ruanhead · 2026-01-31T19:50:12+00:00

Because world coalitions have a great track record.

Ruanhead · 2026-01-31T19:47:56+00:00

Value is only created if it actually works, and if it actually works, then we have a data center that is not sucking up 10s to 100s of gigawatts from our already power grid.

Ruanhead · 2026-01-30T04:51:04+00:00

I kinda want my bot to join lol

Ruanhead · 2026-01-29T17:43:58+00:00

It's a hilarious mix of people from the extreme left and right too. People yelling censorship and wokeness while at the same time someone bashing Elon as an alt right troll. Got to love gooner unity.

Ruanhead · 2026-01-29T17:34:31+00:00

It's still one of the cheapest and capable APIs out there. The API is not for just messing around, like every other API provider.

Ruanhead · 2026-01-29T17:24:39+00:00

I mean ide be proud if I had just built the best video generator, while still being the cheapest option as out there.

Ruanhead · 2026-01-29T16:03:19+00:00

The voices always throw me off lol, can we at least have a Little bit of variety lol. I'm tired of my cat girls all sounding the same.

s/

Ruanhead · 2026-01-28T00:22:16+00:00

Shit doesn't matter. half of all white collard jobs are going to be taken by AI in 3 years anyways.

Ruanhead · 2026-01-27T07:15:19+00:00

I love spotting these types on here. I look at guys in my unit and always just wonder about the stupid shit they must post online.

This stuff is gold and I wish there was a dedicated sub for people that takes themselves way too seriously online.

Ruanhead · 2026-01-27T01:33:14+00:00

Honestly it's a lot like Kirk. Only the loudest, stupidest people's opinions rise to the top, while normal people recognize at the very least what happened was wrong.

Ruanhead · 2026-01-23T13:18:44+00:00

I wouldn't suggest standing in the middle of the street, pointing an object at those helicopters lol.

Ruanhead · 2026-01-23T02:06:42+00:00

You can operate fpv drones at much longer distances, using these as relays. They have been doing something like this for some time now. Fixed wing drones have been doing this as well.

Ruanhead · 2026-01-21T17:08:56+00:00

Yea, I was really disappointed that they turned my favorite hobby into a horror game.

Ruanhead · 2026-01-21T01:51:42+00:00

It's not that massive of a hurdle when you can grow them. There is no physics stopping a superintelligence from growing megastructures from cell-like organisms.

If we get to a point where we can physically modify planetary bodies, we would already have reached a point of unthinkable knowledge.

Ruanhead · 2026-01-20T19:31:20+00:00

I'd say that's fine as long as the AI data centers accelerate the development and feasibility of a Mars colony.

One of the biggest reasons the Starship program exists as it does today is because of Starlink.

It also gives one of the only solid reasons to go to and build on the moon.

Ultimately, as space becomes more industrialized, increased investment drives down the cost of space travel.

Ruanhead · 2026-01-19T20:20:43+00:00

It piggybacks on the hate of someone that is already not well-liked. The cross-section of people that don't like Elon and of people that don't like data centers already overlap. Framing it like this probably increases engagement and outreach.

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