Comment by jazzyjackson
1 month ago
This idea that space is a way to get out of the reach of NIMBYs is so dumb.
a: now you’re in everyone’s back yard, since satellites in orbit can be seen by the naked eye at twilight zipping across the sky, so now the whole earth hates you
b: you are still launching from earth, which is a pretty significant target if you’re worried about ecoterrorism.
Have you considered that the 'NIMBY' problem here might be about permits and local resource usage rather than terrorism, which makes about no sense?
Launch requires permits too, you just don't get to jurisdiction shop...
When I looked it up earlier, it seemed to me that to scale this up we would require larger rockets than Starship if we cannot launch hundreds of times per day.
Admittedly I know very little about spaceships
Permits are not costing as much as a space launch and all the extra costs associated with that environment.
If it's too expensive to outsource to another country, it's definitely too expensive to put in space instead.
Cost is one thing, the other is whether it will be permitted at all.
Then there's the power grid problem.
I understand expanding the grid takes a long time, thus the gas turbines. Which I understand are also supply-constrained, and environmentalists are not happy either.
I'm no scientist or financial analyst, but I could imagine that the space thing would be viable especially in a scenario where AI capabilities continue to grow.
If AI really does replace not only most knowledge work but also other labor via robotics, and this requires enormous compute, we are going to want to scale this up at a much faster rate.
Preferably without covering a tenth of the planet with gas generators.
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I'm curious why a space data center has to orbit Earth. Why not a solar orbit? Batched work can be done anywhere if you can tolerate the latency.
It can go further if you want it to be even more expensive, sure.
If you’re putting it in space you don’t care about the cost
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> b: you are still launching from earth, which is a pretty significant target if you’re worried about ecoterrorism.
This so much. Good luck destroying a DC on earth without a very strong force. On the other hand, destroying a rocket on its launchpad just take one FPV drone.
> Good luck destroying a DC on earth without a very strong force.
Leaving aside the DCs already destroyed in the Iran totally not a War by an enemy that can be easily crushed at any moment ...
DCs in mainland US aren't well defended - a pattern of shrapnel heads landed by a mobile mortar or two with a 2 km radius would render most in need of some upkeep.
Sure, but in my view any organized actor with military hardware in their hands count as a “very strong force” when compared to the average Joe with a Molotov cocktail. And Iran, as a state actor with ballistic capabilities is obviously one as well.
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