> the fossil record in this area comprises both extant and extinct deep-diving beaked whales. Isotopic dating shows that whale falls in this region have occurred since at least 5.3 million years ago
So this look less like an organized cemetery, and more like Mt Everest, also littered by bones of the less fortunate adventurers.
From the abstract it's possible that whale falls happen roughly evenly across the ocean and that the location is actually the one place without sediment burial occuring.
SpaceX serves a large market that was underserved, via Starlink, and via satellite launches.
There's nothing comparably easy (for some values of "easy") to monetize underwater, except in shallow places like the continental shelves, and these areas are already being heavily developed (oil, wind).
There are many, many wonders deep underwater, but they are mostly not commercially interesting, alas.
I’ve always wanted to start a company that builds automated underwater swarms of “probes” that just search and return info and carry out small exploration tasks but over long amounts of time and space.
Do it right and you can send the first underwater explorers to Europa.
Hard to find the right way to monetize in the early stages though. SpaceX had a variety of options.
AUVs are a thing, but it's a very expensive area to be in, and there's a lot of challenges, especially the extremely high degree of autonomy you need in a much less predictable environment. Maybe recent advances in AI could move the needle there.
> Hard to find the right way to monetize in the early stages though.
Fugro got a tonne of money for sidescan surveys of large areas north of this Diamantina fracture zone up to the equator .. looking for traces of the lost Malaysia Airlines Flight 370.
The search for the missing aircraft became the most expensive search in the history of aviation. It focused initially on the South China Sea and Andaman Sea, before a novel analysis of the aircraft's automated communications with an Inmarsat satellite indicated that the plane had travelled far southward over the southern Indian Ocean.
After a three-year search across 120,000 km2 (46,000 sq mi) of ocean failed to locate the aircraft, the Joint Agency Coordination Centre heading the operation suspended its activities in January 2017. A second search launched in January 2018 by private contractor Ocean Infinity also ended without success after six months.
Make several modular probes and give them fancy names.
Have various support classes like signal relay, charge stations, camera cleaning, resque etc
Sell rent lease the vehicles to customers who get to pilot them in vr.
Create a simulator where one can explore some already explored areas with the probes projected in real time. Create a market for map chunks.
I think it will make one hell of a game.
Roberts Space Industries Legatus bundle costs $48,000 USD and you only get pixels.
If you can have your own exploration submarine without having to deal with all the boring logistcs yourself people will gladly pay many times that and hire other players to do ingame jobs like keeping the signal alive.
If you can build the mothership with investors and crowdsourcing then maintain it with subscription fees and insurance policies it would be hilarious even before anyone finds anything interesting.
Well if you ever find a monetization path this is what I wanted to do for years. I don't know where Schmidt landed in the court of public opinion but I appreciate that the Schmidt Ocean Institute is a thing. I just wish these things didn't reek of billionaire vanity.
I actually work in this space. The difficulties of long-running underwater probes should not be discounted. Comms bandwidth without a tether is… quite slow. Dealing with even the tiniest drops of water inside the system is… a real problem. Salt water is also quite a problem. Deploy and retrieve is a real problem.
I won’t say I think outer space is easier, but the problem space is very different.
>I feel like maybe we've needed an "OceanX" before a "SpaceX"
SpaceX is based on the idea that our planet will someday be uninhabitable, so we need to be ready to colonize other planets. The sooner we start, the sooner we get there.
OceanX might be fun science, but it's not going to save us.
No, spaceX is based on the idea that Elon Musk likes rockets but loves money. The IPO proves that - the company pivoted to renting server capacity through xAI and pushing a ridiculous plan to put server farms in space via their constantly exploding starship as a means to inflate stock and make him a trillionaire.
The implication that SpaceX will "save us" is quite funny. If that was something the world truly worried about, our hopes cannot be on an american private company that might or might not save someone depending on their preferences or their political views.
The whole idea that we can simply pop off earth and colonize another planet is literally insane. There is a reason why no governement across the world is treating colonizing mars as a serious mission.
It is the same marketing technique as "AI WILL DESTROY THE WORLD so we must make it" fear-mongering based marketing. Of course a rocket company wants people to colonize mars, doesn't mean its going to "save" humanity.
> the fossil record in this area comprises both extant and extinct deep-diving beaked whales. Isotopic dating shows that whale falls in this region have occurred since at least 5.3 million years ago
So this look less like an organized cemetery, and more like Mt Everest, also littered by bones of the less fortunate adventurers.
> Isotopic dating shows that whale falls in this region have occurred since at least 5.3 million years ago
Anyone know why these wouldn't be covered under a thick layer of sediment?
From the abstract it's possible that whale falls happen roughly evenly across the ocean and that the location is actually the one place without sediment burial occuring.
funny that this summary is paywalled but the actual article is open access
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-026-10546-z
Thanks so much.
Warning: the photos are nightmare fuel and not safe for bedtime
I feel like maybe we've needed an "OceanX" before a "SpaceX".
Hey, Gabe Newell might be your man here. But it's not for profit.
https://luxurylaunches.com/transport/gabe-newell-explorer-ve...
https://www.forbes.com/sites/deajusufi/2026/06/13/gabe-newel...
That's what OceanGate of imploding submarine fame was trying to be.
SpaceX serves a large market that was underserved, via Starlink, and via satellite launches.
There's nothing comparably easy (for some values of "easy") to monetize underwater, except in shallow places like the continental shelves, and these areas are already being heavily developed (oil, wind).
There are many, many wonders deep underwater, but they are mostly not commercially interesting, alas.
What about deep sea mining ? What about those poly metallic nodules there ?
We definitively have stuff to fuck up over there. Those ecosystem that do not know noise or light need disruption and market capitalization
https://noduleresearch.com/
1 reply →
I’ve always wanted to start a company that builds automated underwater swarms of “probes” that just search and return info and carry out small exploration tasks but over long amounts of time and space.
Do it right and you can send the first underwater explorers to Europa.
Hard to find the right way to monetize in the early stages though. SpaceX had a variety of options.
AUVs are a thing, but it's a very expensive area to be in, and there's a lot of challenges, especially the extremely high degree of autonomy you need in a much less predictable environment. Maybe recent advances in AI could move the needle there.
> Hard to find the right way to monetize in the early stages though.
Fugro got a tonne of money for sidescan surveys of large areas north of this Diamantina fracture zone up to the equator .. looking for traces of the lost Malaysia Airlines Flight 370.
~ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malaysia_Airlines_Flight_370
3 replies →
Sounds good.
Make several modular probes and give them fancy names.
Have various support classes like signal relay, charge stations, camera cleaning, resque etc
Sell rent lease the vehicles to customers who get to pilot them in vr.
Create a simulator where one can explore some already explored areas with the probes projected in real time. Create a market for map chunks.
I think it will make one hell of a game.
Roberts Space Industries Legatus bundle costs $48,000 USD and you only get pixels.
If you can have your own exploration submarine without having to deal with all the boring logistcs yourself people will gladly pay many times that and hire other players to do ingame jobs like keeping the signal alive.
If you can build the mothership with investors and crowdsourcing then maintain it with subscription fees and insurance policies it would be hilarious even before anyone finds anything interesting.
Well if you ever find a monetization path this is what I wanted to do for years. I don't know where Schmidt landed in the court of public opinion but I appreciate that the Schmidt Ocean Institute is a thing. I just wish these things didn't reek of billionaire vanity.
1 reply →
I actually work in this space. The difficulties of long-running underwater probes should not be discounted. Comms bandwidth without a tether is… quite slow. Dealing with even the tiniest drops of water inside the system is… a real problem. Salt water is also quite a problem. Deploy and retrieve is a real problem.
I won’t say I think outer space is easier, but the problem space is very different.
2 replies →
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Silent_World:_A_Story_of_U...
Capitalism and stock markets would drive them to become Avatar'esque villains.
Given humans' propensity for ruthless exploitation with disastrous side effects on the environment, I'd rather not.
Avatar. In realising stic scenarios they wouldn't win.
>I feel like maybe we've needed an "OceanX" before a "SpaceX"
SpaceX is based on the idea that our planet will someday be uninhabitable, so we need to be ready to colonize other planets. The sooner we start, the sooner we get there.
OceanX might be fun science, but it's not going to save us.
Colonizing another planet will never be easier than our own biosphere. That claim for SpaceX is pure nonsense.
3 replies →
No, spaceX is based on the idea that Elon Musk likes rockets but loves money. The IPO proves that - the company pivoted to renting server capacity through xAI and pushing a ridiculous plan to put server farms in space via their constantly exploding starship as a means to inflate stock and make him a trillionaire.
The implication that SpaceX will "save us" is quite funny. If that was something the world truly worried about, our hopes cannot be on an american private company that might or might not save someone depending on their preferences or their political views.
The whole idea that we can simply pop off earth and colonize another planet is literally insane. There is a reason why no governement across the world is treating colonizing mars as a serious mission.
It is the same marketing technique as "AI WILL DESTROY THE WORLD so we must make it" fear-mongering based marketing. Of course a rocket company wants people to colonize mars, doesn't mean its going to "save" humanity.
1 reply →
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