Green Baron

Oh, wait, maybe i liked that too early: i understood you were bullied by instinct driven cowards and that gave you thick skin ?

There is a plethora of information about the Los Angeles Basin on the web. It even has a Wikipedia page. The best place to start is surely the USGS. Oil is probably one the lesser "problems". In general wet sediments are difficult to tame, a tunnel network probably needs a lot of steel and concrete. Publications from a mapping project: https://geomaps.wr.usgs.gov/archive/scamp/html/sc_la.html A tunnel network is a very limited enterprise, so the regional charts don't help much. The boring people need actually to know what the local conditions at the places were they dig are like.

Wow. There a sauce for this ? Edit: found, it is apparently correct ! I know we're ot. nevertheless and since there's nothing new from the Boring company; a 250sqm house without any ground e.g. near Stuttgart, Germany, would be worth a million, can be much more if it is new and in a preferred area. The average family there are no millionaires, though there are quite a few of them ;-) 250sqm are ~2,700 square feet, right ? Editedit: and i found that it is apparently half that in Germany, though houses are MUCH more expensive. For the average house price in the US (250,000 funds) you get a two room flat (60-70sqm) in a city situation in southern Germany. And you must commit yourself and pay deposit before it's being built. Bloody central bank money. Sorry ... :-))

No. It is by no means clear and get as well grow to 11billions or more.

I think, but i am not sure, that the calculation in America is different. It includes cellar, patios, balconies, garages(?), walls, etc. while (some countries in) Europe excludes these things, and everything where the headroom is below 2.2m or so. Keeping a house with 400m² clean is a full time job, so i am not jealous :-) Also, i'd be careful with the wish to get a share of their business. This could be expensive ...

Satellites partly prepare pages "in orbit" before they send them to the recipient. That frequently makes for a long wait-time (satellite is gathering and distributing all that google and facebook and ad nonsense the enduser has absolutely no benefit from) when nothing happens. Then they send the package down. Javascripts on the client then send request back based on where you've been before and so on ping pong. Best: disable Javascript and block all the social stuff. That accelerates things a lot, but also some pages don't work any more. You literally communicate 3 Mbyte for a content of maybe 800 Bytes.

Longer waves limit bandwidth. The higher the frequency, the higher the throughput ... Also: atmospheric reflections are as unpredictable as SpaceX timelines ? True. "Not for long !" - Shinzon

I am not an engineer, but i can imagine that a sophisticated software and protocol for the handshake between a fixed groundstation and a buzzing swarm, based on a single license is easier to establish than a uniform grid of masts and corresponding infrastructure. Just think of all the national treaties and licenses one would need, and the competition with indigenous technology and companies, often owned by ... ah politics ... :-) But this is just a guess. It is a space company. (Their boring department sells silly party toys). Navigator's rule of thumb for the distance to a lighthouse: Distance in NM = 2.075 * ( sqrt(height of eye) + sqrt(height of light) ). Objects are closer than one might think ! And that is not only valid for T-rex ;-)

"chaotic orbit", "predictions impossible" .... ... similarities with actual SpaceX timelines are of course incidental ? Edit: Hey, i'm trying to be funny. They did a really good job with the launch i think !

A single (big) satellite can cover half a continent with 100 TV programs and high speed internet for millions. Only problem: it is in GSO, aka far away. One needs a dish in the garden. But they have immense capabilities to buffer content, think pages in advance, etc. It is just, dynamically built pages, like news pages, pub science, etc. take time. A lower flying swarm might actually improve link times, but buffering and broader services are not their thing, too small. At least i can't imagine how ... we must wait & see :-)

:-)

They use Inmarsat as part of the GMDSS. I doubt they'll switch to a different provider if these services are not integrated into that system. I am not sure if Iridium is licensed for the GMDSS too ... Starlink services will probably "just" serve the open public, at least in the beginning.

There is was no infrastructure at all away from the touristic or urban centers and traveling routes (but in the parks actually, funny, a lion with phone ?) when i visited the countries i named above 7 years ago. Many people don't have earnings and live from today to tomorrow, as a white guy hiking alone you better be watchful and don't provoke anything. Leave photo equipment at your place (if it can be locked and isn't just a rigid tent), etc. I heard there was a program to hand out cellphones free of cost to people, like there was the aid from the state when people bought new cars in western Europe several years ago, but if people can't pay a contract then this makes no sense and i don't know how that went. Maybe (hopefully) things have changed in between, in the course of the global boom we are reportedly living in :-) They certainly have changed here, but still no DSL or cable internet out in the green. 2km farther away, in the village, there is DSL, even ADSL at some places. Ok. But i think we all agree that Starlink must have a broad base of customers to make it pay. And it will be in competition with existing satellites that actually work, so in order to be successful it must be better or cheaper or both. I hope it will be :-)

I was there. Edit: you live in Scandinavia, @Nefrums, one of the if not the most egalitarian society in the world. You never see much difference between rich and poor, i daresay you don't have poor people in a sense that they can't afford basic clothing and food. The poor people there drive fried out cars and use the penultimate generation of phones, but they have cars and phones In many parts of the world the differences between rich and poor are much greater. Once away from the city centers you see the gradient. I bet it'll make you feel uncomfortable when you see it. Back on topic: the people Musk wants to reach aren't necessarily wealthy clients with computers, electricity and a necessity of high speed internet access as a primary requirement. And if his company doesn't find enough customers to finance the upkeep of such a network it'll be gone soon(tm). I mean, we already have celestial internet at reasonable speeds, this isn't new what he plans, but it is imo a good step towards competition. I have satellite internet. He must do better than that ! Let's see if his "yet another funny company" Starlink - thanks @sh1pman who mentioned that below - can ;-)

Nope, no infrastructure. Not even high speed GSM or terrestrial DSL. You need the masts, transmitters and the cable or satellite connection to get the data away. Enormous investments that the big companies like Vodaphone, Orange, Movistar etc. don't do. Not even in rural Germany, and guaranteed not on an Atlantic Island. Not for let's say 50 or 100 potential customers per mast. Again: in the villages and towns, yes. Since last year the fibreoptic cable from the mainland via Tenerife goes until Los Llanos de Aridane. ADSL is available too there, but not out in the fields. See above :-) Since last year, but only the town. I have seen people in Africa (East Africa, Tansania, Kenya) run around with black painted cardboxes, playing mobile phone. And many without nothing. In relatively densely populated areas. Away from the centers things are different, people are poor and infrastructure is bad to non-existent. Those who have phones and live in an area with coverage don't care for a satellite network, those who have nothing must care for different and more basal things than celestial internet. That's the sad reality in many places. Direct investments are discouraged and the "official" ones frequently end up ... well i don't want to summon the moderators who are quite strict when it comes to politics :-) Whatever. The company that offers such a service has to demonstrate first that they can deliver and that they don't walk a constant borderline to bankruptcy. Then we'll see. Well, first they actually have to build that Kessler-network :-) 7 :-)

The main thing will be to find enough customers that the whole thing actually pays. They should do a study to find out if there are enough people wanting and willing, if that has not been done already. Not that it goes like Tesla ... Musk's example of Africa is beyond reality (as usual i am tempted to say), few people away from the population centers actually have money and even fewer for something like an internet connection and the necessary power supply.

Nope. This is a good idea from Musk. Nobody will lay cables to the place where i live for example. The towns have cables, but out in the fields you either have a radio connection to a central antenna (i tried out the provider, they are bad) or satellite. Satellite is ok, but if it had competition they'd do much better. Problem: Satellite is in GSO. Which means 0.2 seconds for up and down communication. A dynamically built page that asks many ad servers, google, facebook, youtube and all those so-called social things takes time. I mean TIME, like 20-30 seconds or more. I can block outgoing calls to those annoying services from my network, but that only counts for a half. Downloads of continuous data like updates etc. otoh are relatively fast (the contracted speed actually). So, if spacex would actually provide that service for reasonable conditions (like less than 30funds/month, >3Mbit/s, more than 30GB/month or better unlimited) i'd be a customer.

At 7 o clock. I always wake up at 7 o clock, no matter what ...

Yeah, nice Bauhaus style cage :-) Before you part with other stuff i would suggest to sleep over the decision a few nights. Because i have made the experience that impulsive action can lead to disappointment. Design is short lived, one gets tired of it quickly. And in this case all the flashing LEDs from harddrives, graphics card, IO-devices, or whatever the interior likes to communicate might be so distracting that in the end the box moves below the table and under a blanket. Just saying. Otoh, sometimes a "want to have" reflex is so strong that it becomes vital. In this case .... :-) Edit: just realized that i totally fulfill my assigned role as a boring, reasonable being. xD

The track is Roco. That is 2-line DC. Control of locos is via hand held controller (self driver ;-)), turnouts via DCC (PC). Me ? H0 it is. I haven't yet decided to really model anything. The layout i have a rough plan of will be for playing. At least at the beginning. I mean, it is a question of money as well, all those add-ons like houses, trees, high wire, cars, lights, signals etc. pp. cost. Am still waiting for the wood to come ...

Without anything political as well, i don't like things of war. And this has nothing to do with the people, this thread was a marvelous idea ! What do i have, let's see ... if you want to see a variety of trains under stress, search Youtube for "Geislinger Steige". For example ICE trains, TGVs, gorgeous diesel locomotives like the Maxima It is a step in the landscape where trains make 110m in 5,5 km, smallest curve radius is ~280m. The "Steige" has a history going back to late Roman times as a long distance connection. Europe has the (dis-)advantage of having several different systems and a dense railroad network (except spain). The single locomotives you see have helped pushing a train up the hill and then return empty. Example: That diesel hydraulic locomotive is a Voith Maxima. I'd like to have it on my (future) layout in H0 :-) The white trains (ICE) regular go at 250km/h. The French TGV Thalis even 300. If i am not mistaken it also holds the world record of 570km/h for rail based trains. The Maglevs are of course faster. Or: steam double traction at around 4:00:

Morning :-) But that doesn't involve a centrifuge ? Increasing pressure would be better done with a compressor ... Well, one could feed the CO2 to plants in green houses, probably easier and much more efficient in the long term and when done in large scales. And with beneficial side effects. But that is faaaar away in an uncertain future, probably needs materials and construction techniques we don't have.

Yep, i think it rolled on parallel standard tracks and the inner and outer sets were independent. Nevertheless, it probably fulfills @DDE's criteria for "kerbalness" :-) Nice hint with the tapering !

Cool

Is it possible to separate the O from the CO/CO2 with a centrifuge ? Edit, i mean, maybe one can increase the concentration a little gravitationally ... Also, the O will not be liquid, you'd need to cool it, and that will be difficult with a heat exchanger to cool it to -180°C or so in such a thin atmosphere. You'd probably have to dig. What other methods are there to cool something ?