this post was submitted on 01 Jul 2026
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(page 2) 50 comments
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[–] Regrettable_incident@lemmy.world 13 points 3 weeks ago (4 children)

Seems to me that maintenance would be significant.

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[–] hunnybubny@discuss.tchncs.de 12 points 3 weeks ago

SpaceX IPO happened to keep xAi afloat.

Servers in space topic exist because of this very reason.

It is a non subject

[–] mlg@lemmy.world 12 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

I skimmed the title for a sec and thought "what's wrong with orbital stations?" before realizing the utter stupidity that graced my vision.

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[–] e461h@sh.itjust.works 10 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

Just billionaire psychosis like where ai got to where it is to begin with. Obviously they’re all visionaries leading the world to a better place…

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[–] Kolanaki@pawb.social 10 points 3 weeks ago

Or they are just ignorant of how heat dissipation and vacuums work.

[–] ShredderFeeder@shredderfood.net 10 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Sadly the latency involved in transmitting and receiving from orbit makes many terrestrial applications fail... The speed of light is a fixed constant.

When gaming, we can always see the idiots running on starlink...the lag is visible and makes them sitting ducks.. ;-)

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[–] akilou@sh.itjust.works 9 points 3 weeks ago (8 children)

Ignoring all of the disadvantages of datacenters in space, what are any of the advantages?

[–] BradleyUffner@lemmy.world 9 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

Shit-tons of profit, if you happen to own a company that specializes in rocket launches.

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[–] SocialMediaRefugee@lemmy.world 8 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (8 children)

At medium earth orbit the minimum delay will be about 67ms (250 ms to 600+ ms for geostationary orbits) for LEO it is 25-50 ms. The average ground network ping on a good day is 1ms-20ms.

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[–] Twongo@lemmy.ml 8 points 3 weeks ago (6 children)

don't need to think much about this crackpot idea.

where would the heat dissipate? that just ends this topic.

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[–] ramenshaman@lemmy.world 8 points 3 weeks ago

If they build a data center on land and an identical one floating on the ocean, what is the difference in how much heat they emit when I throw thermite grenades at them?

[–] Jaysyn@lemmy.world 8 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

A data center in space would be damn near impossible to cool.

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[–] SeductiveTortoise@piefed.social 8 points 3 weeks ago (4 children)

At least their water consumption would do down. Let's do it, shoot the tech bros up there with them. Let's even overshoot the orbit and make them disappear in the darkness.

[–] yesman@lemmy.world 7 points 3 weeks ago (4 children)

Water consumption has been way overblown. Sure if you're in the Colorado River basin, water is absolutely an issue. But if your concerned with wasted water usage, all data centers combined would be a rounding error compared to what we throw away on turf grass.

Kyle Hill and Hank Green have both made videos about this I'm not crazy.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wx7ToT0G0qo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_c6MWk7PQc

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[–] RememberTheApollo_@lemmy.world 7 points 3 weeks ago (4 children)

I’m far more concerned with the suggested floating datacenters. Just dumping more waste heat into the ocean. WCGW.

[–] wuffwuffwuff@sh.itjust.works 7 points 3 weeks ago (10 children)

You wildly underestimate the size of the oceans. If they're going to be built anyway, and if they can have a long lifespan even in salt water, this would be far better for the environment than the currently popular method of using rivers for cooling - rivers can be warmed by perceptible and significant amounts until they carry that extra heat into the oceans, plus fresh water is more rare, precious, and in need of protection than salt water.

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[–] Eh_I@lemmy.world 7 points 3 weeks ago (5 children)

Do we have a way to transfer heat into rock, because I'm thinking lunar data centers.

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[–] beep@piefed.world 7 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

The article you posted from Futurism(Via Yahoo News) reference a YouTube video as it's source which is in itself is a follow up to IEEE Spectrum article.

I believe watching the original video or reading the actual article will provide a better value.

[–] chewypoops@lemmy.world 7 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Imagine launching that scale of infrastructure, loaded full of Nvidia chips that'll be outdated in like 2 years.

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[–] 01189998819991197253@infosec.pub 7 points 3 weeks ago (4 children)

I think they're a great idea. They don't use land, don't continuously use water, and don't pollute our land and waterways. And, as an added bonus, they're extremely expensive and a money-pit.

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