from Hacker News

Vint Cerf’s Plan for Building An Internet in Space

by code_scrapping on 10/22/20, 8:00 AM with 42 comments

  • by The_rationalist on 10/22/20, 10:16 AM

    What about neutrino communication? It's the biggest spectrum we haven't analyzed yet and it would perfectly make sense for an advanced civilization because it pass through matter much better than any other alternative.

  • by somesortofsystm on 10/22/20, 11:06 AM

    I've always wondered about the feasibility of using space for temporary/short-term storage needs.

    I remember a time when, as a junior developer, I'd log into operations, and hand the operator my tape reel with my work for the day - and she'd go off, mount the spool, and start the streaming, until my files were available in local storage for a few hours, and then .. when logging out, I'd have the operator re-stream the files, and off we go ..

    So, why not use space as a large tape buffer? Send the satellites off, 20 minutes of light-speed away, and use the big gap as a cache.

    Seems sorta feasible to me, but I guess I'm overlooking some ridiculously obvious factor, such as launch costs, viability, etc. But really, seems like a fleet of satellites spread out around the solar system could function as quite a nice medium ..

  • by CGamesPlay on 10/22/20, 11:18 AM

    The protocols are interesting, but it seems to me that point-to-point is more applicable in the vast emptiness that is outer space. Why send a packet to Mars when Jupiter is 5° to the left and I have a clear line of sight to both?

  • by egberts1 on 10/22/20, 5:28 PM

    We have been experimenting with DTN network since 1996 with different types of delay mechanism based on different environment settings. It’s nice to see them in action now.

  • by Angostura on 10/22/20, 11:24 AM

    I remember talking to him about this in the late 1990s. He might have been talking at Comdex or somewhere.

  • by justicezyx on 10/22/20, 4:52 PM

    DTN once was a fashionable research topic in before 2012, never thought it could actually been implemented.

  • by chris123 on 10/22/20, 12:35 PM

    Next they'll be saying, Bitcoin will be the interplanetary reserve asset. Then the interstellar. Intergalactic. Universal. Not in our lifetimes, is course. But it's coming.