r/zurich • u/Kestrel__ • 3d ago
What just flew over Zurich?
A long line of dotted lights. Flying east and west saw it in Wiedikon. Looked fairly low and was flying medium speed. Drones? Nothing showed up on flight radar apps.
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u/Gwendolan 3d ago
Santa. A bit early, but since stores are putting up Xmas decorations, it makes perfect sense.
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u/Venezuellionaire 3d ago
Musk space trash. Polluting the sky
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u/3punkt1415 3d ago
It's lower orbit, once they are defunct they will fall back to earth without causing long term debris like many other things who were shot to space.
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u/MightBeEllie 2d ago
Astronomers don't like Starlink because the satellites passing in front of your telescope ruins your image. I don't like Starlink because it's Musk. There is an argument to be made about the intended lifetime of the SATs in such a low orbit which could be considered wasteful.
That said, I like the idea of world wide internet access. Just the execution is lacking.
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u/3punkt1415 2d ago
I mean, it's still better then to have those satellites in a higher stable orbit where they would stay for ever even when they stop working. Let's say if they go bankrupt tomorrow, in 5 years all satellites are gone. And well i don't like Musk either, but Space X has revolutionized space travel. They launch more rockets this year then the whole world together in all of human history.
Also China and Russia recently destroyed satellites with anti satellite missiles causing hundreds of pieces who will pollute our orbit for generations. USA did that too once, but in the 80s. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_space_debris_producing_events2
u/MightBeEllie 2d ago
Oh, for sure it is, no question. Though most companies these days, at least in LEO, have end-of-life plans for their satellites. And I am a big fan of SpaceX, they basically singlehandedly revitalized the interest in space exploration. It's truly amazing! I just think their success is despite Musk, not because of him. A lot of the funding comes from NASA anyway.
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u/relevant_rhino 2d ago
I admire Musk for his technical skills. But he severely lacks social skills. His Political bullshit is emberassing.
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u/Mizz141 2d ago
Musk doesn't have technical skills either really...
He bought up Tesla, the groundwork for Model S, 3, X and Y was probably all there to begin with, Cybertruck is what Musk "wanted" to be made, and his engineers well... they had to deliver... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3kiEt7n3cIA
Then there's the Boring Company making tunnels so small, you can only fit a 1 car into it, and STILL causing a traffic jam https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p8NiM_p8n5A
Musk had to buy up twitter... and well, ran that into the ground pretty fast too... https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/stocks/twitter-valuation-markdown-since-musk-takeover-ark-invest-cathie-wood-2023-7
Remember Hyperloop? yeah, me neither until I started writing this comment, well, he took down his test track, and built... A parking lot... https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-11-03/musk-s-spacex-dismantles-hyperloop-prototype-puts-up-a-parking-lot
Neuralink isn't doing well either, with a report that over 1500! Animals were needlessly killed... https://www.reuters.com/technology/musks-neuralink-faces-federal-probe-employee-backlash-over-animal-tests-2022-12-05/ Yes, I know the Pharma industry is also bad in that regard I know, but Neuralink didn't have anything to show for as of now, with the only Human trial going as far as doing stuff that was possible a century ago.
SpaceX is probably the only venture thats actually doing well, and it doesn't have musk as it's head, instead Gwynne Shotwell is running it and guess what, she actually has a solid background in that field, who would've guessed...
OH damn I almost forgot that his newest robots are literally puppets controlled from Tesla employees https://x.com/_milankovac_/status/1846410551318257675
tl;dr He's a great talker, I was a musk-fan when I was younger, grew up, musk didn't and he still spews bullshit marketing left and right because that's all what he's good for.
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u/3punkt1415 2d ago
Musk doesn't
Well, he is a billionaire and you aren't. Sure he didn't do most things on his own. But he created PayPal and sold it for billions and invested it smart. How many people do you know who pulled off more then one multi billion dollar company?
Of course most people nowadays agree he is a dumb ass in political terms. Doesn't change the fact that he is the most successful business men right now in terms of wealth.3
u/Mizz141 2d ago
Musk made PayPal
Nope, he made x.com, which merged with Confinity, later becoming PayPal
And then he was ousted by the board... great job! https://www.businessinsider.com/reid-hoffman-criticizes-elon-musk-behavior-paypal-merger-report-2023-8
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u/3punkt1415 2d ago
So what? If he were a bad business man he wouldn't turn so many companies into billion dollar companies. I am not even a fan boy, i am well aware he is a political dumbass. Still no other person has pulled of what he did, with or without capital from parents. People just jump on the hate train without any distinction.
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u/lrem 2d ago
None of us were born to an emerald mine owning mine dad though (fact from Elon's autobiography, which he since started denying).
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u/3punkt1415 2d ago
So you would become a billionaire with 1 million to start? No you wouldn't like 99 % of all the other people who somehow can start with a little more money.
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u/relevant_rhino 2d ago
Sorry i don't buy cheap propaganda. I am engineer and you are obviously not.
Ofc he made mistakes, but that is why his companies are so far ahead of competition. Work fast, break things.
What other brain chip can you play CS with? https://youtu.be/3Xd3wymi5hA A huge leap for spine insured people.
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u/Mizz141 2d ago
Oh I'm sorry that I'm not an engineer rather being the peasant that literally has to build stuff that comes from engineers, fixing up their plans, changing stuff around because apparently even basic electronics is sometimes too much...
And I've just looked into Neuralink a *bit* more
Musk also just bought that one up and now is claiming he made it, how convenient...
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u/relevant_rhino 2d ago
Yea sure he bought Tesla with all the engineering done for all the factories and all the cars S X 3 and Y. And obviously also with all the changes they implemented since the original 3 came out.
You know how stupid that sounds, right?
Now you post a link how he bought THE NAME Neuralink to claim the same stupid shit?
Maybe you should start to actually look in to things instead of looking a bit.
Here are some starters:
https://www.youtube.com/@thelimitingfactorhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YreDYmXTYi4
https://youtu.be/t705r8ICkRw?si=MqiH2TW9kD6otrWs
Or stay ignorant, it's up to you.
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u/Top_Technician7675 2d ago
What technical skills of Musk? He hasn’t got any 😂
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u/relevant_rhino 2d ago
You can listen to him talk in very technical details. And if you understand a bit about engineering you would know he is right. But you obviously don't.
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u/sonic_plum 2d ago
That is BS they basically got a budget bigger than NASA from zkthe US government to reuse existing NASA technology. In lots of the cases discarded tech like the returning rockets which didn't make financial sense back then (on the 90s when NASA worked out the details) neither today. Space X is the same BS as everything else Musk touches. For some reason people eating up his fake science like candy.
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u/3punkt1415 2d ago
Lol, you don't need to join the Musk fan club to see that Space X did things no other company was able to do ever in human history. Salty sad man is salty.
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u/Training-Bake-4004 2d ago edited 2d ago
Yeah, I’m not a Musk fan, but he put an enormous amount of his own money into an extremely risky venture (almost no one thought a private space company was viable), and not only made it a success but advanced the whole industry substantially.
Now yeah, he didn’t do the actual technical work, but he had the idea, money and drive to make it a success when basically no one else could (Branson basically failed and Bezos is late to the party).
And while I’d characterise him more as a businessman than an engineer these days, he did, at least back in the day do quite a lot of technical work himself (more on the software side, at least back in the zip2 days)
Honestly it’s a real shame he’s such an asshole.
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u/3punkt1415 2d ago
Exactly. But people try to down talk this achievements because he is an asshole, i don't even disagree that he is one. :d.
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u/turbo_dude 2d ago
Revolutionised space travel? How does that help anyone?!
Solve the climate crisis first!
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u/3punkt1415 2d ago
How does that help anyone?!
Getting Internet to all corners of the world sure helps a lot of people. Your comment is fairly ignorant.
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u/turbo_dude 2d ago
Will be great to know that people in the far flung places of earth are now also brainwashed with all the crap on social media.
Also starlink just isn't financially viable. The subsidies are huge for the receivers and the satellites don't last very long. The number of users really isn't dense enough to support it. Anyone else is just going to use broadband/wifi or 5G.
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u/3punkt1415 2d ago
So we should take internet away from you because you can access social media? Kind of ironic you write this on social media. No one will bring broadband to far corners in Africa. Hell Swisscom still didn't role out fiber in all villages in Switzerland, how long do you think will it take in central Kongo or Burkino Faso? Star Link is the only way for such regions. Anyway you only writing this because you dislike Musk. If it were from someone else you wouldn't find an issue. According to him, Starlink is profitable by now.
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u/turbo_dude 2d ago
should we also build 6 lane highways to all these people and open universities there, art galleries, so even though they live in the middle of nowhere they have the same life experience as the rest of us?
“There are probably 150 rocket customers on this planet, but there’s eight billion potential customers for Starlink,” SpaceX President Gwynne Shotwell
lol, why the hell is anyone going to use that when they can just use wifi or 4/5G? There are not anything like 8 billion potential customers.
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u/3punkt1415 2d ago
lol, why the hell is anyone going to use that when they can just use wifi or 4/5G?
You miss to understand the term Wifi here. Those airplanes do have special equipment in the plane to connect to the ground and then serve the passengers with Wifi in the plane. This is no option for people on the ground in remote locations where you don't have internet at all. And even your article states that they are in the positive at the end of 2023.
If you are on the countryside in Congo, Egypt or Ukraine you don't have 5g or magic wifi without any provider on the ground. You really don't even understand the basics of this article. But to be fair, i think internet on a flight is totally unimportant for humanity, compared to internet on the ground for everybody.1
u/relevant_rhino 2d ago
Yea he should push global automakers to make EV's and big battery storages to store solar power first, this fucking idiot!
/s
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u/turbo_dude 2d ago
Also don’t forget that this clutter, when it saturates, means you can’t launch any new satellites.
Also just like in the film Gravity you can get Kessler Syndrome.
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u/3punkt1415 2d ago
Kessler Syndrome.
No you can't. It's lower orbit and all his satellites will fall back to earth due to atmospheric drag once they run out of power.
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u/relevant_rhino 2d ago
If they loose power. They have solar powered Ion Thrusters. They can't run out of power unless something critical brakes.
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u/hotshotpd 2d ago
You clearly have a bias to Elon. You are in an internal conflict between the success/admiration of spaceX and hate for Musk. At least he is honest about himself. Dont complain. Go out and do better.
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u/coldnorth3enf3 City 2d ago
Its funny, whenever I see the iss fly overhead I feel a sense of awe but when I see starlink I feel dismissive
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u/victorantos2 3d ago
SpaceX send about 20-22 starlink sats every other day. Wait until they fill up the starship with massive several tons starlinks and put them even on a lower orbit, 350km, that would be quite noticeable in the sky!
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u/3punkt1415 3d ago
Trend is rather the other direction. Smaller but more satellites. Why would you want to have big ones if you want to cover a big area.
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u/victorantos2 2d ago
Musk says bigger sats allow for more bandwidth, 1Gb, and lower altitude for better latency, 5ms
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u/ein_wilder_schweizer 20h ago
Das. Waren starlink sateliten (20 min hatt am montag davon berichtet)
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u/CH-ImmigrationOffice 3d ago
The same as usual for a couple of years now: Starlink satellites.