ben_w

47 ms·

901.
by ben_w 4mo ago
Mars… needs something rather bigger. I don't know what the most cost-effective solution would be, but Mars gets about half the per-area sunlight as Earth so it would need a reflector about the size of Mars to get the same overall insol
902.
by ben_w 4mo ago
At the orbits they're talking about, at best 30 minutes before dawn and after sunset. Earth gets in the way, have to go much much higher to get 24 hour coverage, and if you can focus that well over that distance you've got the opt
903.
by ben_w 4mo ago
> The only non-marginal application for this is military, surely. I think so, but even then it's a heck of a lot of work to make it useful for that. > Farming? Don't plants need night too? Does harvesting need the sun anymor
904.
by ben_w 4mo ago
Here's a ninety thousand lumen floodlight: https://www.kaufland.de/product/500729350/?search_value=stad... And a satellite isn't going to provide "hours" of extra light unless it's a very
905.
by ben_w 4mo ago
Never mind that, they're ignoring light bulbs for the S&R stuff. At least, best I can make out over this UI choice: https://imgur.com/gallery/bad-ui-5t0O0SH (Why, of all the things, would someone use a fire
906.
by ben_w 4mo ago
They seem to be talking about each satellite managing the luminosity of the full moon over a few square kilometres, and getting a few tens of thousands of them. Even if you ignoring how much drag these must have, and hence how much electric
907.
by ben_w 4mo ago
That was some time ago. Musk himself tweeted about getting a volcano lair in 2015.
908.
by ben_w 4mo ago
Much larger. The compute part may be a rack or a cabinet worth of GPUs (though TBH the public designs are currently vague to the point of being artistic impressions), but they also need to come with a PV array big enough to power that, plus
909.
by ben_w 4mo ago
You need an /s or a /jk or people will take you seriously. https://www.google.de/maps/place/Nairobi,+Kenya/@-1.2745409,...
910.
by ben_w 4mo ago
Starlink isn't billed for the cost of launches. https://www.fool.com/investing/2026/06/29/spacex-secret-laun...
911.
by ben_w 4mo ago
All of those three examples are also rather more important than Starlink. Starlink is cool, and has some niches, but this is a fairly limited argument in its favour.
912.
by ben_w 4mo ago
Their IPO made me look up what TAM was, and TBH it looks like the kind of metric where you're allowed to draw the boundaries however you like. To the extent that they're not actually wrong about that TAM: https://en.wik
913.
by ben_w 4mo ago
Indeed. It's something investors should worry about for the data centres and if SpaceX will bankrupt itself instead of giving them a return on their investments, but it's not something where general space enthusiasts should worry
914.
by ben_w 4mo ago
The alternative to Starlink already existed before Starlink. I'm using it right now.
915.
by ben_w 4mo ago
Indeed. Compare https://arxiv.org/pdf/2502.03651 with https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bortle_scale
916.
by ben_w 4mo ago
> 'My kids had to see a power line going through the country side' A lot of people get upset about such things, even those are rather more important than just adding to the world's existing widespread internet access.
917.
by ben_w 4mo ago
Their brightness is a mixture of a lot of things, including the huge PV arrays and the angle they have with the sun when they cross the terminator between night and day. Starlink have already put a lot of effort into their satellites being
918.
by ben_w 4mo ago
Thanks to LLMs being good at writing CVs and cover letters, all job hunting right now is in the snipe-hunt danger-zone.
919.
by ben_w 4mo ago
I broadly agree, though I wouldn't call it a Ponzi scheme. Not just because Musk's a bit litigious*, but because a Ponzi scheme is a very specific thing and I think, decades from now, what Musk is doing today will get its own name
920.
by ben_w 4mo ago
> No, because that’s the point. It’s not intelligent because intelligence is a human characteristic. A rose by any other name, etc. Defining the meaning of the word you use to suit your preferences and then gluing to that other people&#x
921.
by ben_w 4mo ago
It's unlikely Russia has a 3 megawatt laser and the optics to hit a satellite at this time. Anti-drone defence would be much easier with much worse than that. That said, the ongoing improvements to lasers, and price reductions, in a de
922.
by ben_w 4mo ago
From what I've seen, I believe the only possible option is threatening to use the US military against anyone who attacked Starlink. Space is hard place to attack in the first place, but even harder to defend against attacks from those
923.
by ben_w 4mo ago
I've experimented with them, I think current models could replicate (with just a few prompts and on the free tiers) the "interesting mechanic rather than complex levels" kind of content I saw on Kongregate circa 2010. Right n
924.
by ben_w 4mo ago
Extremely obvious they would consider this, to the extent that it's one of the independent arguments against valuing Starlink as if it has a shot at being a global monopoly. Ditto space-based data centres.
925.
by ben_w 4mo ago
You may laugh/cry with the contents of: https://thedailywtf.com As with the sibling comment, I advise you to be skeptical of causation: lots of corporations have weird office politics and you'll need to rule that out b
926.
by ben_w 4mo ago
This is mostly false. > It doesn't design architecture. It can do that. Won't say it's amazing, but it can do it. > It doesn't think. It doesn't reason. Can you define these in ways that aren't tautologic
927.
by ben_w 4mo ago
There's things it can do, so long as you use it as your complement, i.e. all the stuff you know is important you just go "ugh" when faced with. For me, that means unit tests. I can write them, I know why I should write them,
928.
by ben_w 4mo ago
A better question is if the government can. Given that big tech firms keep getting fined for doing stuff like this ("anything 3rd party want with undisclosed criteria"), clearly the answer is "yes, eventually".
929.
by ben_w 4mo ago
We have underfloor heating/cooling; the only mould we see anywhere now is a small amount on the skylight, and previously some in the bathroom that was due to a leaking roof the builders have since made good. Condensation needs humidity
930.
by ben_w 4mo ago
> If Stockfish uses a table base to play endgames, does it play chess? It would be very impressive to watch this, but irrelevant: https://duckduckgo.com/?q=%22table+base%22&t=osx&ia=images&i... > If a CPU

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