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A Deep Space Primer
phil reed writes "With the latest Mars missions still in the news, people might be curious about what it takes to actually run a deep space mission: how a spacecraft is designed, how the communications are handled, what kind of project management is in place to make it all work. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory has a primer online that gives broad general coverage of all aspects of putting a satellite into orbit and how to manage it once it's there. Fascinating reading, with lots of links to more detail."
your ping pong ball example is essentially how a electrical wire works. The electrons don't actually travel the length of the wire, they just "push" the ones next to them. Yet this is still limited by the drift velocity of electrons which is slower than the speed of light.
I think the only way to do speed up the conversation would be quantum entaglement but that's not been done outside the laboratory.
Something that works like a very long tube filled with ping pong balls for example. Push one into one end and one pops out the other instantly, no matter how long the tube
why that won't work
Erm, JPL is part of NASA. Caltech manages JPL, and therefore a part of Caltech, but it's also as much a part of NASA as KSC, JSC, or any of the other NASA facilities.