TL;DW:

Does It Make Sense To Put Data Centers In Space?

At some point in the future, yes.

Can They Really Cost Less To Operate?

In theory, yes.

Scott expresses concerns that current startups have not adequately addressed some of the practical challenges, such as cooling.

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[–] tquid@sh.itjust.works 45 points 1 year ago (11 children)

Getting rid of heat in space is actually a serious challenge. You can only radiate it away, since there is no gas to allow convection.

[–] Enkers@sh.itjust.works 9 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (9 children)

This always makes me wonder: When they say space is a frozen vacuum, it wouldn't actually feel nearly as cold as it is, right? Because there's no matter to actually take that heat away from you.

The big issue is the pressure, and you'd balloon up like a blob fish out of its depth. But would it feel cold for the few instants you'd have?

[–] Deebster@programming.dev 17 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (5 children)

The first thing to happen is that any liquids (saliva, tears, blood) will start to boil in the very low pressure, but your body won't explode like in some films. This boiling will pull heat from your body causing your nose and mouth to nearly freeze.

Another film trope is that you freeze over, but you'll often overheat first since you can't radiate your heat away quickly enough (depending on if you're in sunlight or not).

[–] 0x0@programming.dev 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I think Mr Musk lost a good opportunity to find out by sending a dummy instead.

[–] CarbonatedPastaSauce@lemmy.world 3 points 1 year ago

Yeah but he didn’t want to be gone from spewing bullshit on twitter that long.

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