8 ms·

Funny people think Starlink is mainly a commercial enterprise. Since Teledesic in the 90s, these low earth orbit constellation projects have always been about

by kidme5 4y ago

Funny people think Starlink is mainly a commercial enterprise. Since Teledesic in the 90s, these low earth orbit constellation projects have always been about stepping towards the real goal, which started with Strategic Defense Initiative and now embodied in the Space Development Agency

tra3 4y ago
I’m not in the know…can you ELI5?
- kidme5 4y ago
  https://youtu.be/KsPLmb6gAdw?t=55m47s https://youtu.be/KsPLmb6gAdw?t=55m47s But a historical prerequisite is understanding https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_Defense_Initiative https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_Defense_Initiative unless you're old enough to remember. Then carefully read Mike Griffin's career history: https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_D._Griffin#Career https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_D._Griffin#Career
  - xwolfi 4y ago
    You're unable to summarize ? How d you explain to a child who cannot yet google ?
  - diimdeep 4y ago
    This is eye-opener, OMFG
  - irthomasthomas 4y ago
    That whole spacex origin myth is ridiculous. Musk goes to Russia to buy an ICBM? Right. Then, having never touched a rocket, Musk is given $400M to start spacex? Ok.
    - adastra22 4y ago
      Musk wasn’t given $400M to start SpaceX. What are you talking about? He self-funded with money from PayPal until the first successful Falcon 1 launch.
      - irthomasthomas 4y ago
        Read the links. "In 2002, Griffin was President and COO of In-Q-Tel, a private enterprise funded by the CIA to identify and invest in companies developing cutting-edge technologies that serve national security interests. During this time, he met entrepreneur Elon Musk and accompanied him on a trip to Russia where they attempted to purchase ICBMs. The unsuccessful trip is credited as directly leading to the formation of SpaceX.[11] Griffin was an early advocate for Musk calling him a potential “Henry Ford for the rocket industry".[12] After In-Q-Tel, Griffin served as Chief Engineer and Associate Administrator for Space Exploration at NASA Headquarters. In 2005, he was appointed NASA Administrator where he conceived and introduced Commercial Resupply Services and crew transportation services for the International Space Station.[13] Twenty aerospace companies applied to the Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) program, but only SpaceX was selected and given $396 million--a surprising bet given the new company had never flown a rocket.[14] In December 2008, with SpaceX again on the verge of bankruptcy, Griffin awarded SpaceX along with his own Orbital Sciences company each contracts with a combined value of $3.5 billion.[15] Elon Musk credited the NASA contract as saving his company.[16]" If Musk can be said to have founded Tesla because he was an early investor, then the same logic must apply here. Musk was given $400m by the government before ever flying a rocket.
        Retric 4y ago
        That’s mangling the timeline a little. SpaceX was founded in 2002 and started launching rockets in 2006, it also received the NASA contract in 2006. SpaceX didn’t have a successful launch at the time let alone a proven system, but they had plenty to show. Further they where one of 2 winners splitting the initial 800M budget for COTS with Rocketplane Kistler. They are remembered because Rocketplane Kistler failed. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocketplane_Kistler https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocketplane_Kistler
  - AgentME 4y ago
    Starlink satellites are going to be missile defense satellites? I'm really not following.
    - Retric 4y ago
      Don’t worry you tried to look too closely at a conspiracy theory and it fell apart. A clasic conspiracy theory is basically conformation bias run wild. So someone thinks “thousands of satellites must be useful for X” but never really look into just how tiny each individual satellite is and how much of that must be used to fulfill it’s cover story.
      - kidme5 4y ago
        > how tiny each satellite is That's true for v1 satellites, but the v2 (to be launched with Starship) are huge. > it's just a conspiracy theory Its open knowledge that SpaceX is building these custom military satellites for the military (Space Development Agency). Not a secret at all. https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Starlink#Military_capabilities https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Starlink#Military_capabilities
        deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
        Retric 4y ago
        I can see why you would get confused, this is using elements from Starlink satellites the so called “Starlink bus” not the constellation. -The Space Development Agency awarded $193.5 million to L3Harris and $149 million to SpaceX to build four satellites each to detect and track ballistic and hypersonic missiles.“ -“We want to show that we can take commoditized commercial components and perform a DoD mission,” said Tournear. https://spacenews.com/spacex-l3harris-win-space-development-agency-contracts-to-build-missile-warning-satellites/ https://spacenews.com/spacex-l3harris-win-space-development-... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satellite_bus https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satellite_bus
        4y ago
- elephant81 4y ago
  Look at Brilliant Pebbles. Starlink is just V.20 under the cover of Musk.
medion 4y ago
Why do they need Elon part of it and why also commercialize it?
- tsimionescu 4y ago
  Because ballistic missile defense is an aggressive nuclear action, potentially allowing the country that has deployed such a system to launch a nuclear first strike without fear of retaliation. It would entirely destroy the "mutually-assured destruction" balance of power system, and would almost certainly be seen as an act of aggression by all other (non-allied) nuclear powers. Also, why not also commercialize it, if it's simple? Just because you're being subsidized by tax payers doesn't mean you can't turn some extra profit.
wmf 4y ago
If it's not really commercial, why go to the trouble of supporting a million customers for a mere ~billion per year of revenue?
- bitcharmer 4y ago
  There might be something to it. I work for a fortune 500 company and we've been trying to get in contact with them about a project we're working on for the last 12 months. Firstly getting any contact details like a phone number or email is close to impossible. Then you just don't get any response from them anyway. It just looks strange.
- seydor 4y ago
  Judging by the valuation of Elon's companies, crowdfunding
  - mlindner 4y ago
    Crowdfunding a non-public company how exactly?
    - kidme5 4y ago
      Elons wealth is liquid and he leverages SpaceX's image to drive public Tesla investment. When you invest, you invest in "Elon".
      - AtlasBarfed 4y ago
        This is a hilarious characterization given his companies actually manufacture physical goods and capabilities, revolutionary ones at that, while most of the people here work at funny money companies moving bits around to achieve unicorn valuation via hype and "exit". And even more hilarious that this comment is a garden variety take from armies of anti-Elon posters that are astroturfers. The word "Elon" is an internet lobbying battleground (and there are likely armies of pro-Elon roboposters). Armies driven by, at least initially, by funny money hedge fund bets. Bets that would have come true about 5 years ago if Tesla/SpaceX were pure hype/bullshit. SpaceX/Tesla are tremendously high valued because they still have an order of magnitude or two of readily apparent growth. And a CEO's job of growth companies is to hype that growth, to drive investment/stock price, which drives the scaling and R&D. Uber: well. they do provide a physical service. It's just a taxi company at an app with google maps, but, I guess it is a physical service. Meta: once a monopoly, only exists due to ad fraud, and turnkey Big Brother infrastructure Google: still a monopoly, but also only exists due to ad fraud, and also provides turkey Big Brother infrastructre

by kidme5 4y ago

tra3 4y ago

I’m not in the know…can you ELI5?

kidme5 4y ago
https://youtu.be/KsPLmb6gAdw?t=55m47s https://youtu.be/KsPLmb6gAdw?t=55m47s But a historical prerequisite is understanding https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_Defense_Initiative https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_Defense_Initiative unless you're old enough to remember. Then carefully read Mike Griffin's career history: https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_D._Griffin#Career https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_D._Griffin#Career
- xwolfi 4y ago
  You're unable to summarize ? How d you explain to a child who cannot yet google ?
- diimdeep 4y ago
  This is eye-opener, OMFG
- irthomasthomas 4y ago
  That whole spacex origin myth is ridiculous. Musk goes to Russia to buy an ICBM? Right. Then, having never touched a rocket, Musk is given $400M to start spacex? Ok.
  - adastra22 4y ago
    Musk wasn’t given $400M to start SpaceX. What are you talking about? He self-funded with money from PayPal until the first successful Falcon 1 launch.
    - irthomasthomas 4y ago
      Read the links. "In 2002, Griffin was President and COO of In-Q-Tel, a private enterprise funded by the CIA to identify and invest in companies developing cutting-edge technologies that serve national security interests. During this time, he met entrepreneur Elon Musk and accompanied him on a trip to Russia where they attempted to purchase ICBMs. The unsuccessful trip is credited as directly leading to the formation of SpaceX.[11] Griffin was an early advocate for Musk calling him a potential “Henry Ford for the rocket industry".[12] After In-Q-Tel, Griffin served as Chief Engineer and Associate Administrator for Space Exploration at NASA Headquarters. In 2005, he was appointed NASA Administrator where he conceived and introduced Commercial Resupply Services and crew transportation services for the International Space Station.[13] Twenty aerospace companies applied to the Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) program, but only SpaceX was selected and given $396 million--a surprising bet given the new company had never flown a rocket.[14] In December 2008, with SpaceX again on the verge of bankruptcy, Griffin awarded SpaceX along with his own Orbital Sciences company each contracts with a combined value of $3.5 billion.[15] Elon Musk credited the NASA contract as saving his company.[16]" If Musk can be said to have founded Tesla because he was an early investor, then the same logic must apply here. Musk was given $400m by the government before ever flying a rocket.
      - Retric 4y ago
        That’s mangling the timeline a little. SpaceX was founded in 2002 and started launching rockets in 2006, it also received the NASA contract in 2006. SpaceX didn’t have a successful launch at the time let alone a proven system, but they had plenty to show. Further they where one of 2 winners splitting the initial 800M budget for COTS with Rocketplane Kistler. They are remembered because Rocketplane Kistler failed. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocketplane_Kistler https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocketplane_Kistler
- AgentME 4y ago
  Starlink satellites are going to be missile defense satellites? I'm really not following.
  - Retric 4y ago
    Don’t worry you tried to look too closely at a conspiracy theory and it fell apart. A clasic conspiracy theory is basically conformation bias run wild. So someone thinks “thousands of satellites must be useful for X” but never really look into just how tiny each individual satellite is and how much of that must be used to fulfill it’s cover story.
    - kidme5 4y ago
      > how tiny each satellite is That's true for v1 satellites, but the v2 (to be launched with Starship) are huge. > it's just a conspiracy theory Its open knowledge that SpaceX is building these custom military satellites for the military (Space Development Agency). Not a secret at all. https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Starlink#Military_capabilities https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Starlink#Military_capabilities
      - deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
      - Retric 4y ago
        I can see why you would get confused, this is using elements from Starlink satellites the so called “Starlink bus” not the constellation. -The Space Development Agency awarded $193.5 million to L3Harris and $149 million to SpaceX to build four satellites each to detect and track ballistic and hypersonic missiles.“ -“We want to show that we can take commoditized commercial components and perform a DoD mission,” said Tournear. https://spacenews.com/spacex-l3harris-win-space-development-agency-contracts-to-build-missile-warning-satellites/ https://spacenews.com/spacex-l3harris-win-space-development-... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satellite_bus https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satellite_bus
        4y ago
elephant81 4y ago
Look at Brilliant Pebbles. Starlink is just V.20 under the cover of Musk.

medion 4y ago

Why do they need Elon part of it and why also commercialize it?

tsimionescu 4y ago
Because ballistic missile defense is an aggressive nuclear action, potentially allowing the country that has deployed such a system to launch a nuclear first strike without fear of retaliation. It would entirely destroy the "mutually-assured destruction" balance of power system, and would almost certainly be seen as an act of aggression by all other (non-allied) nuclear powers. Also, why not also commercialize it, if it's simple? Just because you're being subsidized by tax payers doesn't mean you can't turn some extra profit.

wmf 4y ago

If it's not really commercial, why go to the trouble of supporting a million customers for a mere ~billion per year of revenue?

bitcharmer 4y ago
There might be something to it. I work for a fortune 500 company and we've been trying to get in contact with them about a project we're working on for the last 12 months. Firstly getting any contact details like a phone number or email is close to impossible. Then you just don't get any response from them anyway. It just looks strange.
seydor 4y ago
Judging by the valuation of Elon's companies, crowdfunding
- mlindner 4y ago
  Crowdfunding a non-public company how exactly?
  - kidme5 4y ago
    Elons wealth is liquid and he leverages SpaceX's image to drive public Tesla investment. When you invest, you invest in "Elon".
    - AtlasBarfed 4y ago
      This is a hilarious characterization given his companies actually manufacture physical goods and capabilities, revolutionary ones at that, while most of the people here work at funny money companies moving bits around to achieve unicorn valuation via hype and "exit". And even more hilarious that this comment is a garden variety take from armies of anti-Elon posters that are astroturfers. The word "Elon" is an internet lobbying battleground (and there are likely armies of pro-Elon roboposters). Armies driven by, at least initially, by funny money hedge fund bets. Bets that would have come true about 5 years ago if Tesla/SpaceX were pure hype/bullshit. SpaceX/Tesla are tremendously high valued because they still have an order of magnitude or two of readily apparent growth. And a CEO's job of growth companies is to hype that growth, to drive investment/stock price, which drives the scaling and R&D. Uber: well. they do provide a physical service. It's just a taxi company at an app with google maps, but, I guess it is a physical service. Meta: once a monopoly, only exists due to ad fraud, and turnkey Big Brother infrastructure Google: still a monopoly, but also only exists due to ad fraud, and also provides turkey Big Brother infrastructre