I like coilguns. I especially like the idea of a coilgun in Ecuador, running up the Andes. It's not an ideal 45 degrees, but it'll do. 100 km coilgun with 3G acceleration, gets you to around 2500m/s (5600 mph) IIRC, which is about 1/3 orbital velocity and essentially replaces the entire first stage of a rocket stack. Exit altitude is a bit low for that speed though.
You do trigger an important thought - the terminus at geostationary orbit should be quite massive (eventually) compared to the mass of the ribbon and the counterweight. This would help prevent the system from dragging itself off into space (or a higher orbit) too quickly if the lower section got cut off, and vice versa if the upper section got cut off. If that terminus had enough thrust (and fuel), it could maintain station until repairs could be made.
Yep, all designs I'm aware of are tapered, the fattest point is in the 'middle' (where the middle is depends on the counterweight mass.)
I'll just add that the Liftport folks are now focusing on a lunar elevator, which doesn't require exotic materials. It doesn't use the Moon's rotation (since it only rotates once each revolution), but runs through one of the LaGrange points, either L1 or L2. This means a much longer ribbon (60,000 km IIRC) but much less required strength. It would be anchored to a triangle of points on the Moon.
Kenya has a space program. I think Ecuador also. I'd love to see someone build a magnetic launcher up the slope of the Andes. A 100 km launcher could provide about 1/2 the necessary velocity to orbit at around 3G, essentially replacing the entire first stage, and cost a few dollars in electricity. This could cut the cost of space launches by 70% to 90%, for all equatorial launches.
Fear not, do not despair. Instead check out SpaceTechExpo, NewSpace2014, Space Frontier Foundation, International Space Development Conference, and others. Go to some of the conferences. There are a lot more people working to make commercial space happen that you could imagine, but they don't get much press. My associates are working on financial tools to support companies that are building space-related stuff. Check out Nanosatisfi, making cubesats for educational research; look up cubesats, several of which are now getting launched from the ISS with almost every supply mission, doing interesting experiments. Zero Gravity Solutions is a biotech company using microgravity to help develop new biologicals, and has run six experiments on the ISS (disclosure: I have a small position in ZGSI).
The ISS is now a designated National Laboratory, just like NIST, Los Alamos, Lawrence Livermore, etc. and has designated an independent organization (CASIS as the gatekeeper for ISS-based research. If you have a reasonable proposal and can build an experiment (and jump through the necessary hoops), NASA will fly your experiment to the ISS and will run the experiment, free. (It will still cost about $100K to build your experiment, qualify it, etc.) With the advent of private ISS delivery vehicles, the turnaround time for experiments has dropped from three years to a few months, allowing much faster and more productive research. Numerous companies are beginning to take advantage of this opportunity, and I will be surprised if this does not result in a huge number of new products and technologies. I have some hope that it will be as productive as the R&D tax credit of the early 1980s, which was instrumental in creating Silicon Valley.
In the longer term, economists have done the research and concluded that commercial space development has the potential to improve the standard of living of everyone on Earth by a factor of 10. Others are less optimistic, but few deny the potential is there. Two somewhat belabored examples: space solar power (which I myself am somewhat skeptical of for various reasons) could replace every power plant on Earth; and (a bit more interesting) Planetary Resources hopes to reduce the cost of platinum group metals by a factor of 100, from the $1000+ per ounce level to $10+ per ounce. These metals have a huge array of industrial uses that are presently impractical due to cost. There are many other examples, these are just two.
Bottom line: There are perhaps 30,000 people around the world presently working full time or nearly so on making space development happen. Another, larger group are working in general space and most of them are advocates in one form or another. Several million at least are 'fans' and subscribe to space-related activities, magazines, etc. And not least are the huge numbers around the world - I'll guess at least 500 million - who are inspired and encouraged every time they see a news story about a space success. My associates are working hard to provide a way for these folks to participate in making it happen, through financial vehicles. Would you invest $1000 in space, and let it ride for 10 years or more? We hope to make that a possibility. That 10 year thing is one of the biggest roadblocks - most space startups have timeframes to first profits (or even revenues!) of 10 or more years, while few VC funds are willing to wait that long for an exit.
True story. A coworker bought a scissors and couldn't get it open without a scissors, but there wasn't a scissors in the office which is why he bought one.
Scissors is an interesting word. Apparently derived from the latin word for chisel => a pair of chisels.
The noun "scissors" is treated as a plural noun, and therefore takes a plural verb ("these scissors are"). Alternatively, it is also referred to as "a pair of scissors". In American English, "a pair" is singular and therefore takes a singular verb ("this pair of scissors is"). In British English, "a pair" does not take the singular ("this pair of scissors are"). The word shears is used to describe similar instruments that are larger in size and for heavier cutting. Opinions vary geographically as to the size at which 'scissors' become 'shears', but this is often at between six to eight inches (about 15 to 20 cm) in length.
(countable, plural in form, usually with a plural verb) A tool used for cutting thin material, consisting of two crossing blades attached at a pivot point in such a way that the blades slide across each other when the handles are closed. Those scissors are sharp. (indicating singular or plural scissors) That scissors is sharp. (less commonly to indicate singular scissors) Scissors are used to cut the flowers. Use a scissors to cut them if you don't have proper shears.
Considering all the atmospheric forces on the cable, plus the length, having the anchor point even 100 miles from the equator probably wouldn't make a significant difference. That 100 miles is the short side of a very long triangle. In fact I could see having two (or more) cables anchored a hundred or two hundred miles apart, converging above the atmosphere somewhere. If each is strong enough to hold the thing together in an emergency, then even if one is damaged by something the other(s) can take up the slack, prevent the entire thing from falling down/apart, and provide continued service to allow repair machinery and materials to continue to be transported. In normal times the multiple cables would provide additional capacity.
One side effect of GPS - we know less (nothing) about where we are or where we are going. We just follow the GPS and pretty much ignore the scenery, the route, etc.
FTFY: Some CEOs of all nations are some of the worst people on the planet, they do whatever they can to give themselves stellar salaries while crashing the company to give them even more gains.
Just as in all fields of endeavor, that type of person is a small minority. It's a bit larger in big companies - about 1 in 25 instead of 1 in 100. Those are real numbers - approximate incidence of sociopathy/psychopathy. Numerous studies have shown that companies that are run by those types are pretty well doomed to crash within three to five years. A good book to see how this goes is "Good to Great" by Jim Collins.
If you think American companies are worse in this regard, you're not paying attention.
Indeed. I recall watching an American Chopper episode, where they built a chopper to be given away by Ford on stage at the annual Ford dealer convention, by a Ford VP. This would have been in the late 1990s? I don't recall when. I was amazed to see that the VP was a clone of Matt Foley's "Van down by the river" character - he appeared to be a big, fat, dumb, idiot, who I surmised had gotten where he is by saying "yes" to various bosses and schmoozing and boozing the dealers. To me, management of this caliber was the problem with Ford (which was not doing well at the time). I said at the time that if I ran the place I'd fire almost everyone in management and start over. That, of course, happened to be probably about the time that Ford was cutting a deal to have Microsoft software in the car.
Add to that the fact that the cost of management is part of that value - as I recall a majority of "American" content in a 1999 Buick was management, not actual manufacturing. IDK what it is now. But new technology (advanced robotics) and a gradually rebalancing world economy (mean pay scales in China have increased by a factor of five or more in the last decade or so) have, as expected, made manufacturing here much more viable. The cost reductions of manufacturing using advanced robotics have completely changed the relationship between cost of manufacture and the cost of shipping.
That doesn't necessarily mean a lot more jobs - plants with advanced robotics may be producing a billion dollars of goods per year with a staff of less than 100. And other factors, notably taxes, safety & environment, and litigation, will still tend to encourage manufacturing in Mexico vs. the US.
From my perspective, essentially everything from south of San Jose to somewhere north of Sausalito and east of I680 is 'city'. Thinking of Mountain View as a suburb is an example of how myopic these folks are. I recall over 20 years ago when 400 square foot condos (that's 20x20 feet or 6x6 meters, including everything) in god-forsaken Fremont sold out before they were built. (In fairness, I don't know what Fremont is like now - it may be yuppie heaven these days.) If that isn't 'city' I don't know what is.
From what the head of Ford said recently, that "we know when you're speeding or breaking the law", I suspect that onstar or the equivalent is always installed and always on, whether you pay for it or not.
The head of Ford recently said that Ford knows everything about your car all the time, including whether you are speeding - he said "we know when you're breaking the law." The implication was that the data was 'live', but I don't have solid facts, maybe it was all just saved in the computer and uploaded when you go to get service. I know OnStar and the other 'optional' car help services use built-in cellular data connections. I would not be surprised if all newer cars (for some brands) had the cellular system installed, just not enabled unless you pay for it.
Many people use the credit card and pay off every month (or more often), for convenience and because in the US at least, your maximum liability for someone using your card fraudulently is $50, while there is no such limit on a debit card - you are liable if someone steals your debit card and spends all your money. (Caveat: I'm not positive this is still true.)
I just read a very interesting article, that proposes the thought that BitCoin is not money, it's the internet of money. If the writer is correct, bitcoin's protocol and scripting system has the potential to break every government's (and banking system's) monopoly on the control of financial transactions. It could have a similar effect on financial transactions to the effects HTML and HTTP have had on information 'ownership' and transfer. IOW, their business models may have already been sunk. This has enormous unintended - really unknown - consequences.
For those who have not read the original Sakamoto Bitcoin paper, see Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System. According to my company's head, who _really_ knows this stuff, almost nothing you read about Bitcoin is really correct - this paper lays it all out in very concise, complete detail. And he agrees (at least in principle) with the first article.
As for my particular interest in space development and space commerce, the bitcoin protocol may be one of the enabling technologies for space commerce, as it allows provable transactions and related actions over a remote data link - no need to ship a piece of paper, or a fax, to confirm a contract.
I suspect that NBC doesn't stream it because their contracts with cable and with the local TV stations prevents it, since streaming breaks both of those models.
I think the question is, will the advertising on an internet stream cover the cost with similar profitability as over the air (or cable) broadcast? If so, they might as well stream the OTA content as well. Since they don't do that, there are a few possibilities: they aren't getting as much for the streamed ads as they do over broadcast and cable; or their deal with the cable companies demands that they not stream. I expect the latter. Cable doesn't make nearly as much money from packets as they do from TV channels.
Ummm. Beta was the result of planning by a larger institution. In this case it happens to be a commercial institution. How do you expect a government agency to do better? Like all those government websites are so cool.:P
Slashdot Mirror
I like coilguns. I especially like the idea of a coilgun in Ecuador, running up the Andes. It's not an ideal 45 degrees, but it'll do. 100 km coilgun with 3G acceleration, gets you to around 2500m/s (5600 mph) IIRC, which is about 1/3 orbital velocity and essentially replaces the entire first stage of a rocket stack. Exit altitude is a bit low for that speed though.
You do trigger an important thought - the terminus at geostationary orbit should be quite massive (eventually) compared to the mass of the ribbon and the counterweight. This would help prevent the system from dragging itself off into space (or a higher orbit) too quickly if the lower section got cut off, and vice versa if the upper section got cut off. If that terminus had enough thrust (and fuel), it could maintain station until repairs could be made.
He's also the one who first wrote about geostationary satellites. :)
I forgot to say - their estimated cost is under $1 billion. Also they are running some climber experiments this summer, I believe.
Yep, all designs I'm aware of are tapered, the fattest point is in the 'middle' (where the middle is depends on the counterweight mass.)
I'll just add that the Liftport folks are now focusing on a lunar elevator, which doesn't require exotic materials. It doesn't use the Moon's rotation (since it only rotates once each revolution), but runs through one of the LaGrange points, either L1 or L2. This means a much longer ribbon (60,000 km IIRC) but much less required strength. It would be anchored to a triangle of points on the Moon.
Kenya has a space program. I think Ecuador also. I'd love to see someone build a magnetic launcher up the slope of the Andes. A 100 km launcher could provide about 1/2 the necessary velocity to orbit at around 3G, essentially replacing the entire first stage, and cost a few dollars in electricity. This could cut the cost of space launches by 70% to 90%, for all equatorial launches.
Fear not, do not despair. Instead check out SpaceTechExpo, NewSpace2014, Space Frontier Foundation, International Space Development Conference, and others. Go to some of the conferences. There are a lot more people working to make commercial space happen that you could imagine, but they don't get much press. My associates are working on financial tools to support companies that are building space-related stuff. Check out Nanosatisfi, making cubesats for educational research; look up cubesats, several of which are now getting launched from the ISS with almost every supply mission, doing interesting experiments. Zero Gravity Solutions is a biotech company using microgravity to help develop new biologicals, and has run six experiments on the ISS (disclosure: I have a small position in ZGSI).
The ISS is now a designated National Laboratory, just like NIST, Los Alamos, Lawrence Livermore, etc. and has designated an independent organization (CASIS as the gatekeeper for ISS-based research. If you have a reasonable proposal and can build an experiment (and jump through the necessary hoops), NASA will fly your experiment to the ISS and will run the experiment, free. (It will still cost about $100K to build your experiment, qualify it, etc.) With the advent of private ISS delivery vehicles, the turnaround time for experiments has dropped from three years to a few months, allowing much faster and more productive research. Numerous companies are beginning to take advantage of this opportunity, and I will be surprised if this does not result in a huge number of new products and technologies. I have some hope that it will be as productive as the R&D tax credit of the early 1980s, which was instrumental in creating Silicon Valley.
In the longer term, economists have done the research and concluded that commercial space development has the potential to improve the standard of living of everyone on Earth by a factor of 10. Others are less optimistic, but few deny the potential is there. Two somewhat belabored examples: space solar power (which I myself am somewhat skeptical of for various reasons) could replace every power plant on Earth; and (a bit more interesting) Planetary Resources hopes to reduce the cost of platinum group metals by a factor of 100, from the $1000+ per ounce level to $10+ per ounce. These metals have a huge array of industrial uses that are presently impractical due to cost. There are many other examples, these are just two.
Bottom line: There are perhaps 30,000 people around the world presently working full time or nearly so on making space development happen. Another, larger group are working in general space and most of them are advocates in one form or another. Several million at least are 'fans' and subscribe to space-related activities, magazines, etc. And not least are the huge numbers around the world - I'll guess at least 500 million - who are inspired and encouraged every time they see a news story about a space success. My associates are working hard to provide a way for these folks to participate in making it happen, through financial vehicles. Would you invest $1000 in space, and let it ride for 10 years or more? We hope to make that a possibility. That 10 year thing is one of the biggest roadblocks - most space startups have timeframes to first profits (or even revenues!) of 10 or more years, while few VC funds are willing to wait that long for an exit.
True story. A coworker bought a scissors and couldn't get it open without a scissors, but there wasn't a scissors in the office which is why he bought one.
Scissors is an interesting word. Apparently derived from the latin word for chisel => a pair of chisels.
Wikipedia:
The noun "scissors" is treated as a plural noun, and therefore takes a plural verb ("these scissors are"). Alternatively, it is also referred to as "a pair of scissors". In American English, "a pair" is singular and therefore takes a singular verb ("this pair of scissors is"). In British English, "a pair" does not take the singular ("this pair of scissors are"). The word shears is used to describe similar instruments that are larger in size and for heavier cutting. Opinions vary geographically as to the size at which 'scissors' become 'shears', but this is often at between six to eight inches (about 15 to 20 cm) in length.
And yet, Wiktionary says
(countable, plural in form, usually with a plural verb) A tool used for cutting thin material, consisting of two crossing blades attached at a pivot point in such a way that the blades slide across each other when the handles are closed.
Those scissors are sharp. (indicating singular or plural scissors)
That scissors is sharp. (less commonly to indicate singular scissors)
Scissors are used to cut the flowers.
Use a scissors to cut them if you don't have proper shears.
Considering all the atmospheric forces on the cable, plus the length, having the anchor point even 100 miles from the equator probably wouldn't make a significant difference. That 100 miles is the short side of a very long triangle. In fact I could see having two (or more) cables anchored a hundred or two hundred miles apart, converging above the atmosphere somewhere. If each is strong enough to hold the thing together in an emergency, then even if one is damaged by something the other(s) can take up the slack, prevent the entire thing from falling down/apart, and provide continued service to allow repair machinery and materials to continue to be transported. In normal times the multiple cables would provide additional capacity.
Home version:
"It was on sale for 50% off, so I was able to buy it with the money I saved!"
Silicon Valley version:
"We lose $40 on each one but we make it up in volume!"
(see Osborne Computer)
Why is this scary? I haven't kept up, but AFAIK all modern cars use CANBUS.
One side effect of GPS - we know less (nothing) about where we are or where we are going. We just follow the GPS and pretty much ignore the scenery, the route, etc.
FTFY:
Some CEOs of all nations are some of the worst people on the planet, they do whatever they can to give themselves stellar salaries while crashing the company to give them even more gains.
Just as in all fields of endeavor, that type of person is a small minority. It's a bit larger in big companies - about 1 in 25 instead of 1 in 100. Those are real numbers - approximate incidence of sociopathy/psychopathy. Numerous studies have shown that companies that are run by those types are pretty well doomed to crash within three to five years. A good book to see how this goes is "Good to Great" by Jim Collins.
If you think American companies are worse in this regard, you're not paying attention.
Indeed. I recall watching an American Chopper episode, where they built a chopper to be given away by Ford on stage at the annual Ford dealer convention, by a Ford VP. This would have been in the late 1990s? I don't recall when. I was amazed to see that the VP was a clone of Matt Foley's "Van down by the river" character - he appeared to be a big, fat, dumb, idiot, who I surmised had gotten where he is by saying "yes" to various bosses and schmoozing and boozing the dealers. To me, management of this caliber was the problem with Ford (which was not doing well at the time). I said at the time that if I ran the place I'd fire almost everyone in management and start over. That, of course, happened to be probably about the time that Ford was cutting a deal to have Microsoft software in the car.
Add to that the fact that the cost of management is part of that value - as I recall a majority of "American" content in a 1999 Buick was management, not actual manufacturing. IDK what it is now. But new technology (advanced robotics) and a gradually rebalancing world economy (mean pay scales in China have increased by a factor of five or more in the last decade or so) have, as expected, made manufacturing here much more viable. The cost reductions of manufacturing using advanced robotics have completely changed the relationship between cost of manufacture and the cost of shipping.
That doesn't necessarily mean a lot more jobs - plants with advanced robotics may be producing a billion dollars of goods per year with a staff of less than 100. And other factors, notably taxes, safety & environment, and litigation, will still tend to encourage manufacturing in Mexico vs. the US.
From my perspective, essentially everything from south of San Jose to somewhere north of Sausalito and east of I680 is 'city'. Thinking of Mountain View as a suburb is an example of how myopic these folks are. I recall over 20 years ago when 400 square foot condos (that's 20x20 feet or 6x6 meters, including everything) in god-forsaken Fremont sold out before they were built. (In fairness, I don't know what Fremont is like now - it may be yuppie heaven these days.) If that isn't 'city' I don't know what is.
From what the head of Ford said recently, that "we know when you're speeding or breaking the law", I suspect that onstar or the equivalent is always installed and always on, whether you pay for it or not.
The head of Ford recently said that Ford knows everything about your car all the time, including whether you are speeding - he said "we know when you're breaking the law." The implication was that the data was 'live', but I don't have solid facts, maybe it was all just saved in the computer and uploaded when you go to get service. I know OnStar and the other 'optional' car help services use built-in cellular data connections. I would not be surprised if all newer cars (for some brands) had the cellular system installed, just not enabled unless you pay for it.
Excellent. This is the ideal response to all political opinions and news, and is guaranteed to end every argument instantly.
Many people use the credit card and pay off every month (or more often), for convenience and because in the US at least, your maximum liability for someone using your card fraudulently is $50, while there is no such limit on a debit card - you are liable if someone steals your debit card and spends all your money. (Caveat: I'm not positive this is still true.)
I just read a very interesting article, that proposes the thought that BitCoin is not money, it's the internet of money. If the writer is correct, bitcoin's protocol and scripting system has the potential to break every government's (and banking system's) monopoly on the control of financial transactions. It could have a similar effect on financial transactions to the effects HTML and HTTP have had on information 'ownership' and transfer. IOW, their business models may have already been sunk. This has enormous unintended - really unknown - consequences.
For those who have not read the original Sakamoto Bitcoin paper, see Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System. According to my company's head, who _really_ knows this stuff, almost nothing you read about Bitcoin is really correct - this paper lays it all out in very concise, complete detail. And he agrees (at least in principle) with the first article.
As for my particular interest in space development and space commerce, the bitcoin protocol may be one of the enabling technologies for space commerce, as it allows provable transactions and related actions over a remote data link - no need to ship a piece of paper, or a fax, to confirm a contract.
I suspect that NBC doesn't stream it because their contracts with cable and with the local TV stations prevents it, since streaming breaks both of those models.
I think the question is, will the advertising on an internet stream cover the cost with similar profitability as over the air (or cable) broadcast? If so, they might as well stream the OTA content as well. Since they don't do that, there are a few possibilities: they aren't getting as much for the streamed ads as they do over broadcast and cable; or their deal with the cable companies demands that they not stream. I expect the latter. Cable doesn't make nearly as much money from packets as they do from TV channels.
Words to remember. If you are getting something for free, you are not the customer. You are the product.
Ummm. Beta was the result of planning by a larger institution. In this case it happens to be a commercial institution. How do you expect a government agency to do better? Like all those government websites are so cool. :P