Well, everyone, you can now submit a comment to let the FCC know what you think about SpaceX asking for 1 million satellites for "AI datacenters" whatever the fuck that means.
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Why would they even want AI datacenters in space? We haven't solved how to cool them without massive amounts of water down here on earth, how are they going to cool them up there? Some months back I read of someone else wanting to create the same datacenters in international waters. Is this just a new way for them to try to avoid legal liability? If that's the case, I wonder what kind of content they will generate up there.
I believe, they have the idea that space is really cold, and their machines will need no cooling there.
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Well, everyone, you can now submit a comment to let the FCC know what you think about SpaceX asking for 1 million satellites for "AI datacenters" whatever the fuck that means.
https://docs.fcc.gov/public/attachments/DA-26-113A1.pdf
Comments due March 6.
I am having a very hard time believing this is really happening. Fuck you, SpaceX, and fuck you, FCC. This is not regulation, this is a fucking joke, that will destroy our ability to use satellites for centuries.
@sundogplanets Many thanks for sharing the link - I wasn't aware of his at all. Absolutely disgusting! I shall be submitting some 'developmental feedback' to the FCC!
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Well, everyone, you can now submit a comment to let the FCC know what you think about SpaceX asking for 1 million satellites for "AI datacenters" whatever the fuck that means.
https://docs.fcc.gov/public/attachments/DA-26-113A1.pdf
Comments due March 6.
I am having a very hard time believing this is really happening. Fuck you, SpaceX, and fuck you, FCC. This is not regulation, this is a fucking joke, that will destroy our ability to use satellites for centuries.
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I believe, they have the idea that space is really cold, and their machines will need no cooling there.
I read an article about this, and there was a discussion section, and someone there was making this very argument that space is cold so cooling won't be required, which I thought at the time made total sense. But then someone else brought up the fact the ISS actually has trouble cooling itself, because while yes space is cold, there is so little matter around, it remains very difficult to dissipate heat. So now I'm not so sure.
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I appreciate any Americans that submit a complaint, but who exactly gave an American regulatory body authority over the whole of low Earth orbit and beyond?
Colonial theft.
@sundogplanets @PhoenixSerenity @EricLawton I think we - non US people - have to turn to our governments to tell them to stop this insanity.
Not that I have much confidence in the swiss gov, tough...
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I read an article about this, and there was a discussion section, and someone there was making this very argument that space is cold so cooling won't be required, which I thought at the time made total sense. But then someone else brought up the fact the ISS actually has trouble cooling itself, because while yes space is cold, there is so little matter around, it remains very difficult to dissipate heat. So now I'm not so sure.
That's the point.
The only way to lose heat in space is through radiation.
I guess, tech bros learn their physics from chatboxes.
I also wonder, how they plan to protect their data centres from cosmic radiation.
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That's the point.
The only way to lose heat in space is through radiation.
I guess, tech bros learn their physics from chatboxes.
I also wonder, how they plan to protect their data centres from cosmic radiation.
They might not have learned anything and know nothing of physics.
They might have asked ChatGPT.
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That's the point.
The only way to lose heat in space is through radiation.
I guess, tech bros learn their physics from chatboxes.
I also wonder, how they plan to protect their data centres from cosmic radiation.
@bit @sundogplanets @mina I heard the 486 CPU generations were way more robust against radiation 'cause of there larger structures. Maybe they get popular again. 🫣
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I read an article about this, and there was a discussion section, and someone there was making this very argument that space is cold so cooling won't be required, which I thought at the time made total sense. But then someone else brought up the fact the ISS actually has trouble cooling itself, because while yes space is cold, there is so little matter around, it remains very difficult to dissipate heat. So now I'm not so sure.
Space is not cold.
Temperature is a property of matter. In space there is no¹ matter, so no temperature.__________
¹ There is matter in space, but as it is a ultra-high vacuum, the density is so low that you can completely ignore it in this context. -
@Doomed_Daniel @mmcknett @kiri @sundogplanets The voice of reason was noted in the comments to this very clarifying article. I am an artist/painter and not engineer, (my father and partner are), I am fascinated by engineering and science though. Thank you for this super perspective on the subject I watched last night on 3Sat "Nano", which chilled me to the bone.
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Well, everyone, you can now submit a comment to let the FCC know what you think about SpaceX asking for 1 million satellites for "AI datacenters" whatever the fuck that means.
https://docs.fcc.gov/public/attachments/DA-26-113A1.pdf
Comments due March 6.
I am having a very hard time believing this is really happening. Fuck you, SpaceX, and fuck you, FCC. This is not regulation, this is a fucking joke, that will destroy our ability to use satellites for centuries.
@sundogplanets This is more about the upcoming ipo than reality. It's to make dumb investors wet themselves with excitement. At that level, it'll probably work...
But still, needs a big NO from the FCC, who should not be the arbiter anyway, it's an international issue.
I wonder what the Chinese think about it?!! -
@sundogplanets This is more about the upcoming ipo than reality. It's to make dumb investors wet themselves with excitement. At that level, it'll probably work...
But still, needs a big NO from the FCC, who should not be the arbiter anyway, it's an international issue.
I wonder what the Chinese think about it?!!@pa27 @sundogplanets
Definitely. Investors already start asking when they are going to see revenue from the investments they made so our beloved tech-bros need a new flashy thing to distract from the fact that they are playing the Theranos-game all over again, raking in nonsensical amounts of money with the added bonus of destructing societies and the world.But maybe everything is just a ploy to get the Chinese and Russians to die from laughter about the stupidity of the west?
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That's the point.
The only way to lose heat in space is through radiation.
I guess, tech bros learn their physics from chatboxes.
I also wonder, how they plan to protect their data centres from cosmic radiation.
Deutschlandfunk had an interview with Prof. Dr.-Ing. Felix Huber (director of GSOC - German Space Operations Center) about this topic yesterday - and they discussed all the points. To me he sounded increasingly annoyed ;D
- mass
- size
- space debris
- heat
- radiation
- tech ageing
- maintenance
- replacement
- de-orbiting
- atmospheric pollution
- communication
- CO2 emissionsConclusion:

German, 5 min:
https://www.deutschlandfunk.de/ki-aus-dem-all-wie-realistisch-sind-weltraumgestuetzte-rechenzentren-100.html -
Deutschlandfunk had an interview with Prof. Dr.-Ing. Felix Huber (director of GSOC - German Space Operations Center) about this topic yesterday - and they discussed all the points. To me he sounded increasingly annoyed ;D
- mass
- size
- space debris
- heat
- radiation
- tech ageing
- maintenance
- replacement
- de-orbiting
- atmospheric pollution
- communication
- CO2 emissionsConclusion:

German, 5 min:
https://www.deutschlandfunk.de/ki-aus-dem-all-wie-realistisch-sind-weltraumgestuetzte-rechenzentren-100.html -
Well, everyone, you can now submit a comment to let the FCC know what you think about SpaceX asking for 1 million satellites for "AI datacenters" whatever the fuck that means.
https://docs.fcc.gov/public/attachments/DA-26-113A1.pdf
Comments due March 6.
I am having a very hard time believing this is really happening. Fuck you, SpaceX, and fuck you, FCC. This is not regulation, this is a fucking joke, that will destroy our ability to use satellites for centuries.
@sundogplanets the environment agency should have their word to say. Because all these millions of datacenters are going to be disposed off... And they won't be recycled. Just burned up. In the open. No filters. No catalysators. Just burned in the atmosphere.
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@kiri @sundogplanets you’re not missing anything; this is absolutely the problem with data centers, structures famously constrained by their ability to reject heat, in space, a place famous for its insulative properties. It’s stupid.
Not to mention that data centers require maintenance and equipment replacement. This aspect of data centers is why companies decided not to put them in the ocean (where heat would be easier to reject). How do they think they’ll do maintenance? Or do the satellites just become trash after a few years?
@mmcknett @kiri @sundogplanets
I suspect Musk knows this won't work. He doesn't care so long as more naive investors throw money at him.
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@sundogplanets the environment agency should have their word to say. Because all these millions of datacenters are going to be disposed off... And they won't be recycled. Just burned up. In the open. No filters. No catalysators. Just burned in the atmosphere.
TBH as someone with direct experience of existing "AI datacenters" I feel like there should be a literal sanity check involved somewhere. At this point you might as well ask for 1 million satellites for isolating the voice of Azathoth the Nuclear Chaos: at least that would be something you might conceivably need to be in space to do.
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Well, everyone, you can now submit a comment to let the FCC know what you think about SpaceX asking for 1 million satellites for "AI datacenters" whatever the fuck that means.
https://docs.fcc.gov/public/attachments/DA-26-113A1.pdf
Comments due March 6.
I am having a very hard time believing this is really happening. Fuck you, SpaceX, and fuck you, FCC. This is not regulation, this is a fucking joke, that will destroy our ability to use satellites for centuries.
@sundogplanets Why would Trump want sophisticated communication systems to be available to just anyone?
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If anyone has time and energy to set up instructions for how to submit a comment to the FCC (it's really fucking complicated, on purpose, I'm sure), I would very much appreciate it! Otherwise I'll do it in the coming days.
If somebody wants to venture into this, please test all steps.
The first one involves sending an email to ecfs@fcc.gov with "get form" and your email address in the message body.
The reply I got was trying to strangely gaslight me:
"Delivery has failed to these recipients or groups:
ecfs@fcc.gov
Your message couldn't be delivered. The Domain Name System (DNS) reported that the recipient's domain does not exist."There seems to be a strange subdomain falstaff.fcc.gov involved. The attached error log says:
Diagnostic information for administrators:
Generating server: SJ0PR09MB11735.namprd09.prod.outlook.com
ecfs@fcc.gov
Remote server returned '550 5.4.310 DNS domain falstaff.fcc.gov does not exist [Message=InfoDomainNonexistent] [LastAttemptedServerName=falstaff.fcc.gov] [SA2PEPF00003023.namprd09.prod.outlook.com 2026-02-05T12:30:46.776Z 08DE6078A5284768]' -
Well, everyone, you can now submit a comment to let the FCC know what you think about SpaceX asking for 1 million satellites for "AI datacenters" whatever the fuck that means.
https://docs.fcc.gov/public/attachments/DA-26-113A1.pdf
Comments due March 6.
I am having a very hard time believing this is really happening. Fuck you, SpaceX, and fuck you, FCC. This is not regulation, this is a fucking joke, that will destroy our ability to use satellites for centuries.
@sundogplanets wtaf??? That's crazy
