What the actual fuck.

[weezmgk@mastodon.social]

@sundogplanets KESSLER NOW

[zgryphon@gweep.cat]

@sundogplanets ... what the fuck does that even mean? I know I could search for it, but I'm not sure I want that in my search history.

[sahak@xn--69aa8bzb.xn--y9a3aq]

@sundogplanets Starlink is going to launch a satellite cell phone service, also most airlines are switching to Starlink internet service, so I think it is natural that they will need a lot more satellites. Starship is going to be able to deliver them into orbit.

[gbargoud@masto.nyc]

@sundogplanets

It's not April fools but it is the day after he appeared in the Epstein files in the most embarrassing way possible

[samloonie@mstdn.ca]

@sundogplanets I thought the Dyson sphere was supposed to go around the Sun, not around the Earth ...

[drangnon@hachyderm.io]

@sundogplanets did someone just finish reading @cstross 's _accelerando_ and decide it wasn't featuring future earth as a dystopia?

[bthalpin@mastodon.social]

@PalmAndNeedle @deborahh @sundogplanets I was a big fan but 7 Eves turned me off: dopey biological determinism leading to sexism & racism...

[waitingforthesign@mstdn.ca]

@sundogplanets@mastodon.social

If I'm lucky I'll be gone before they start advertising.

[tony@toot.hoyle.me.uk]

@sundogplanets That's something like 17,000 falcon 9 launches... they did 606 last year.

[pleaseclap@techhub.social]

@sundogplanets Imagine being familiar with the Kardashev scale but unfamiliar with Kessler syndrome

[patrick@retro.social]

@jakebrake There's a German comic "Elon & Jeff on Mars" that goes like this (https://www.carlsen.de/hardcover/elon-jeff-mars/978-3-551-80572-0)

[betterifyouneil@mastodon.social]

Elmo is too mouthy... They had to cut him loose.

[javierg@mstdn.social]

@sundogplanets
Seems they're (intentionally?) confusing Kardashiev and Kessler

[desperadoduck@digitalcourage.social]

@sundogplanets if they speak of datacenters - I imagine them to be much larger than starlink satellites and they would need a lot of energy. I guess they will have huge solar panels.

This is bat-shit crazy if true.

[seconduniverse@autistics.life]

@Chancerubbage @sundogplanets @Barbramon1 Most importantly, there are far too many of them already.

[zakalwe@plasmatrap.com]

@sundogplanets@mastodon.social It's utterly batshit insane.

[zakalwe@plasmatrap.com]

@ppulfer@mastodon.ie @sundogplanets@mastodon.social Um, no. Not really.

Granted, in an orbit with the right inclination, you can get continuous sunlight, and that sunlight is several times more intense than at ground level. So power can be relatively abundant.

However, a ground-based datacenter can use conductive and convective cooling, both of which can be highly efficient at removing heat even at only moderate temperatures. In space the only mechanism you have, in the end, is radiative cooling... and the physics of black-body radiation are such that a datacenter satellite that hasn't yet fried every semiconductor within it simply isn't hot enough to efficiently radiate as much heat as it's going to generate.

Relatively low-power communications satellites are one thing. We've proven that works. We've proven we can cool astronomical instruments to their optimal working temperatures, though it sometimes takes some very clever solutions. But datacenters in satellites? That's madness.

[weezmgk@mastodon.social]

@sahak do you know what happens when there's too many satellites in orbit? Short answer: much fewer satellites in orbit. Gewgle Kessler Syndrome @sundogplanets

[zakalwe@plasmatrap.com]

@GhostOnTheHalfShell@masto.ai @sundogplanets@mastodon.social Hint: Ask yourself why datacenters use massive bundles of wired or fiber connections internally rather than WiFi.

[weezmgk@mastodon.social]

@ppulfer #cough Kessler Syndrome @sundogplanets