Data centers on the Moon

[Gingerbread Demon]

https://spacenews.com/lonestar-emerges-from-stealth-with-plans-for-lunar-data-centers/

That's a neat idea but I'm wondering if it is practical in the long term. What happens with breakdowns or things going bung? It's not like you can fix it in a hurry. Would it be fair to call it a gimmick?

 

[Nerys Myk]

Saw this in the recent posts and thought it was about Mister Data. Then I noticed the which section it was in.

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

Google datacenter on The Moon Imagine that. I guess if it's on the light side they get power all the time from the sun but what about things like temperature and again things breaking down?

 

[StarCruiser]

And the first random asteroid strike...poof...no data center.

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

And the first random asteroid strike...poof...no data center.

Yep.......... So this is a gimmick right?

 

[scotpens]

Google datacenter on The Moon Imagine that. I guess if it's on the light side they get power all the time from the sun but what about things like temperature and again things breaking down?

Excuse me? Whichever side of the moon you're on, there's always a two-week "day" and a two-week "night."

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

Excuse me? Whichever side of the moon you're on, there's always a two-week "day" and a two-week "night."

Oh OK I thought the same side of the Moon faces Earth

 

[scotpens]

Oh OK I thought the same side of the Moon faces Earth

That's correct. But the same side doesn't always face the Sun.

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

That's correct. But the same side doesn't always face the Sun.

Ah................ OK forgot about Moon phases

 

[YellowSubmarine]

I presume the Moon settlement with have its own data centre.

 

[rahullak]

It's unlikely that Musk wants to rely on Earth data centres when he can have his own on Mars.

However, dust storms, asteroid/meteor strikes, breakdowns/no parts.

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

I presume the Moon settlement with have its own data centre.

Probably but signals from Earth don't take THAT long to get to the Moon, just needs good antenna setups for long duration data transmission to the Moon

 

[StarCruiser]

Two general issues (not bringing up the obvious cost issues):

The moon is tidally locked to the Earth - that's why there's a "light side" and "dark side" (Dark Side of the Moon....great album...sorry, off subject). There would have to be solar arrays set up at multiple points across the surface to provide consistent power.

Yes - the distance is a possible factor as the normal means of sending/receiving signals for computing requires some form of signal integrity - primarily through various encryption/encoding and those methods all require confirmations. It takes more than one second for light to get to the moon from Earth and vice versa. Round trip time is roughly 3 seconds if I remember correctly.

 

[scotpens]

Two general issues (not bringing up the obvious cost issues):

The moon is tidally locked to the Earth - that's why there's a "light side" and "dark side"

I really, REALLY wish people would stop saying "the dark side of the moon" when they mean the far side. The only time the dark side and the far side are the same is when there's a full moon. (See diagram in my post above.)

When there's a new moon -- meaning the lunar disk is not visible to the unaided eye -- the far side is the light side and the near side is the dark side!

 

[XCV330]

too much latency, even for deep vault storage and what would be the point?

except that the information contained while legally subject to the laws of the country of the spacecraft that got it to the ground by international treaty, would in practicable terms not be enforceable. so if you get a country like Luxembourg that has already made some interesting moves regarding space asset privatiation, to officially own your moon storage spot, you could also declare the bulk of your intellectual property assets to be held on lunar territory and tax free. it's an idea, anyway.

I hope someone attaches a camera to livestream images of Earth.

You can do that, now, basically: https://epic.gsfc.nasa.gov/

 

[Relayer1]

things going bung?

I believe the only other time I've come across that particular expression was from the lovely Paul Hester...

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[Asbo Zaprudder]

Latency and bandwidth limitations would likely make it a non-starter for many decades but I've been wrong before. Other engineering challenges would include power problems during the 14-day lunar night and associated thermal stress not to mention exposure to a potentially harsh radiation environment due to solar coronal mass ejections and flares, abrasive charged lunar dust, and micrometeorite bombardment. To commit one's disaster recovery data to such a solution would seem to imply bad risk assessment.

 

[XCV330]

Are those static, never changing imgs or does it get updated by some intervals?

there's a new photo about every two hours. DISCOVR is at L1, about a million miles from earth on the sunward side, so it is further than the moon, and all pictures of earth are full sunlight. One cool thing is you will get to see the moon transition across when every lunar cycle.

 

[XCV330]

Thank you.

Seeing phases of the Earth is one thing I was looking forward to but oh well, maybe someday....

Gateway station will start getting assembled in the next few years. they may get some interesting photos from lunar orbit.

 

[publiusr]

Dennis Wingo is heading up one effort. He’s pretty well known in the Space community.