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Weather Balloons as Wireless Telephone Technology

Posted by timothy on from the or-is-that-a-trial-balloon dept.

Under the plan described in this article submitted by reader RoscoHead, "Space Data would use un-tethered weather balloons launched daily by the National Weather Service to carry lightweight wireless communications equipment to an altitude of 100,000 feet. There, at the 'SkySite,' they would relay voice and data signals to remote areas at a fraction of the cost of installing cell towers or launching satellites, company officials say."

17 of 153 comments (clear)

  1. Space Junk by Technician · · Score: 1, Offtopic

    Great, more junk to track as it fails and starts to return. Hope the commercial aircraft can avoid all of it.

    --
    The truth shall set you free!
  2. the ultimate in mobile linux by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    penguins with cell phones

    1. Re:the ultimate in mobile linux by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

      why the mod down? i clicked the link and it is on topic. someone metamod this comment please. check the comments more closely before you mod them.

  3. Here's a printer-friendly version of this article by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    For a text-only page, click:http://sci.newsfactor.com/perl/printer/16358 /

  4. One lump of fresh Horseshit by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    Is better than a decade of Wired magazine. I remember sitting on the toilet, reading the November issue of Wired...They were doing the usual, glamorizing the middle manager, prostelitizing mediocre technology, hyping yesterdays buzzwords.

    As I sat there on the toilet, I had to wonder i they would ever get a grip that the bubble had burst. A few months later they got it. What a bunch of losers.

  5. Re:Ouate de phoque by rosewood · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    Ill prolly get hit with some stupid - mod for this but fyi

    I just rebooted my xp box last week when ATI released new drivers and I wanted to squeeze some more Mhz out of my OC. Uptime? 4 weeks. My Fiance's XP box curently has a 2 month uptime and she does daily DivX encoding. He Parent's XP box has about the same uptime and that has apache running on it doing family picture serving. When new pics go up, it gets about 300 hits pretty quickly. Granted, nothing amazing but its work. Also, their son - my soon to be brother in law - uses that box as his gaming box.

    I used win98 and 95 and still encounter it. Ive used 2k and XP. The whole reliabilty thing was gone with Win2k... at least for user and small serving

    I have no experience in large serving apps so i dont speak of that

    --
    The ultimate network admin tool needs HELP!
  6. W00T! W00T! W00T! W00T! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic



    Ain't life FUCKING GOOD!?

  7. W0000000T! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic



    Ain't life FUCKING GOOD!?

  8. W0000000T! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic



    Ain't life FUCKING GOOD!?

  9. W000T! W00000T! W00000T! FUCKING W000T! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic



    Ain't life FUCKING GOOD!?

  10. Re:I've been thinking of this ... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    It's ideas like this that are mostly responsible for people like you working at places like McDonald's.

    Keep dreaming though; see that bright future? (It's only a dream)

    P.S. I think there's a "Castlebin" needing cleaning if you have a spare minute.

  11. 802.11 by erpbridge · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    Hey Cringely, when are you gonna put some passive repeaters on these babies?

  12. Re:Here's a printer-friendly version of this artic by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    Come on, thats all you goat?...whoops, I meant got. My mind must be elsewhere. Anyway, I wanted a big hard penis staring right at me when I clicked that link. Perhaps a nice cumshot all over the camera and lens. To take that penis that's going soft in my mouth and lick cum off it and the camera... Ohhhh!!! I think that's enough for now. Oh do I hate clean up ;-)

    Posted under the influence of hick.org/goat

  13. Re:The annoying stick in your head song for today by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    Nope.

  14. Re:Practical Concerns by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    magister mundi sum is incorrect. Magister is singular, but sum and mundi are plural. It literally translates to "the teacher are the worlds." Try magistri mundi sum and you might be happier.

  15. Re:Very interesting by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    magister mundi sum means "I am the master of the universe."

  16. No....... by RLiegh · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    Really?