Bitcoin Nodes in Space?

[Thekool1s]

If we are just worrying about a "catastrophic event" then under ocean nodes make more sense. Believe it or not, our oceans can survive pretty "harsh" stuff and will outlast us. Just like @Artemis3 mentioned we don't have a fix for the physical latency just yet. Till we figure that out, Having nodes in International waters can be a potential solution to "true censorship-resistance and reliability".

[Abiky]

what kind of catastrophic event are we talking about here that could lead to annihilation of all nodes on earth worldwide that we need a space node?!! and what would we need that if the human race is extinct, or is it just extinction of computers on earth

I'm talking about a meteor or asteroid hitting the Earth in the future, as many scientists have already predicted. If this happens indeed, then expect to see the Bitcoin network weaken in its entirety like never before. Even Stephen Hawking predicted the extinction of the human race within 100 years in the future. We should be prepared for any catastrophic event, by preserving breakthrough technologies (like Bitcoin + Blockchain tech) as much as we can. With nodes on several planets within the solar system, the Bitcoin blockchain will live forever.

That's a good thought, although like what was mentioned already, the Blockstream satellite is already operational. Also, one does not simply send out a satellite into space without having a special permission as it might interfere with aviation in general, and could be dangerous if left unattended. For deeper launches, it will require tons of money, careful planning and again, coordination with aviation authorities as this might hinder explorations and missions on space. Fascinating as it may all seem but it's tedious to the one who's gonna launch a satellite up there which will serve as a node.

The satellite works as intended but it's not the perfect solution for maintaining redundancy of Blockchain data. Currently, it's transmitting signals to Earth. But I'm not sure, if it can do the same to other planets as well. This may sound like a crazy idea for sure. Still, it's better to be prepared for the worse as no one knows what will happen in the future. As long as Bitcoin is able to live for centuries, then we should have nothing to worry about.

[Artemis3]

what kind of catastrophic event are we talking about here that could lead to annihilation of all nodes on earth worldwide that we need a space node?!! and what would we need that if the human race is extinct, or is it just extinction of computers on earth

I'm talking about a meteor or asteroid hitting the Earth in the future, as many scientists have already predicted. If this happens indeed, then expect to see the Bitcoin network weaken in its entirety like never before. Even Stephen Hawking predicted the extinction of the human race within 100 years in the future. We should be prepared for any catastrophic event, by preserving breakthrough technologies (like Bitcoin + Blockchain tech) as much as we can. With nodes on several planets within the solar system, the Bitcoin blockchain will live forever.

That's a good thought, although like what was mentioned already, the Blockstream satellite is already operational. Also, one does not simply send out a satellite into space without having a special permission as it might interfere with aviation in general, and could be dangerous if left unattended. For deeper launches, it will require tons of money, careful planning and again, coordination with aviation authorities as this might hinder explorations and missions on space. Fascinating as it may all seem but it's tedious to the one who's gonna launch a satellite up there which will serve as a node.

The satellite works as intended but it's not the perfect solution for maintaining redundancy of Blockchain data. Currently, it's transmitting signals to Earth. But I'm not sure, if it can do the same to other planets as well. This may sound like a crazy idea for sure. Still, it's better to be prepared for the worse as no one knows what will happen in the future. As long as Bitcoin is able to live for centuries, then we should have nothing to worry about.

There seems to be some misconceptions here. Communication satellites are launched and operated by different companies/organizations, they let you rent "space" in them. The people running the Bitcoin thing, are simply paying for use of a small bandwidth data stream in various satellites. No one is launching anything here, unless you are Elon Musk...

And as i said earlier, if a catastrophic event occurs, keeping the Bitcoin network alive would be the lesser problem. So what if the "meteor" misses the satellite?, who will remain down to receive the signal?, and, who will keep sending signals to it? No, the satellite is not a running node, the actual node is on Earth beaming it up. You can in theory make a true node inside a satellite, but such thing doesn't exist, and it would need to be fed nonetheless with data from other nodes, meaning, an Earth uplink.

The moon is actually a (natural) satellite, but its not geostationary, like Sputnik was or the imaging satellites that keep doing circles instead of staying parked in a position in sync with Earth surface. It is actually cheaper to put a satellite in orbit than anything on the moon, and much much less laggy (closer).

The distance from ground to orbit is actually much smaller than from surface to the planet's core, i know it was a joke, but not a good one. There is such thing as ultra low frequency communications meant to do exactly that, and its not very quick. I believe submarines still use that. There is also the much simpler and old fashioned "short wave" band, signals that simply bounce of the ionosphere. It lets you pick up radio signals from the opposite side of the planet, without satellites.

[The3max]

I don't think your idea will work at this point, when science and technology haven't developed yet, we can't live outside the universe. Besides, the distance is too far, the signals can not connect with each other.

[pooya87]

what kind of catastrophic event are we talking about here that could lead to annihilation of all nodes on earth worldwide that we need a space node?!! and what would we need that if the human race is extinct, or is it just extinction of computers on earth

I'm talking about a meteor or asteroid hitting the Earth in the future, as many scientists have already predicted. If this happens indeed, then expect to see the Bitcoin network weaken in its entirety like never before. Even Stephen Hawking predicted the extinction of the human race within 100 years in the future. We should be prepared for any catastrophic event, by preserving breakthrough technologies (like Bitcoin + Blockchain tech) as much as we can. With nodes on several planets within the solar system, the Bitcoin blockchain will live forever.

but in case of an extinction, who is left to even want bitcoin and technologies like blockchain! even if a catastrophe happens that wipes 80% of the planet, the remaining 20% aren't going to even care about "money" (that is bitcoin). they will need food and shelter, basically the very basic needs for survival.

[lumierre]

Anything is possible, but your question will pose challenges on synchronization. You know, time varies from Earth to Mars and other places in the solar system.
We are progressing well as distances have become shorter and travel farther away so when humans have managed to find networking with the planet. It is possible to send transactions.
Note that even when a global problem occurs, cryptocurrencies can still be used. Unlike banking systems that are connected to central platforms, "out of service means downtime."

The sun is a gigantic source of absolutely free energy. Nothing prevents us from collecting the energy of our star around the clock and seven days a week. It would be possible to place solar panels in orbit, but so far there is no reliable way to transfer the collected energy to the surface of the Earth. On the other hand, we can easily transfer data, so it seems more logical to place mining farms directly in space, and it can become a reality soon.

[thirdprize]

There is sssooooo much infrastructure needed to make a transaction possible (electricity, working phones/computers, broadband, internet, miners, etc) i'll stick to trading grain and animal skins.

[AicecreaME]

As of now, Bitcoin is the cryptocurrency with the most nodes available worldwide. It's been doing well with only 10 years since its inception. However, I believe that in order for Bitcoin to reach true censorship-resistance and reliability, it needs to expand in areas far beyond reach. It would be nice to have Bitcoin nodes distributed across space in order to be prepared for any catastrophic event on Earth. Imagine having Bitcoin nodes on the Moon, as well as, planets like Mars and Venus. This would allow Bitcoin to stand the test of time for generations.

However, it's yet to be proven if this solution is viable after all. What are your thoughts?

Putting it up on the space is interesting. The maximum nodes that we have is 10,000 and now we only have 9,200-9400 nodes all over the network, and these nodes helps the bitcoin network to be more faster and secured, especially if we all have fully nodes in the Bitcoin network, that is why I've heard this project in the internet about putting fully functioning nodes in the space in order to have that fast and secure bitcoin network, however there's no specific date where it is going to happen.

I'm looking forward on it.

[Dabs]

You can have bitcoin nodes in space, probably in low earth orbit, just like GPS, Iridium or other satellites.

There won't be nodes (at least not bitcoin full nodes) in other planets. They will forever remain out of sync and will be behind by a few blocks. At the closest, it will take at least 30 minutes for any signal to reach Mars from Earth, so that means they're already 3 blocks behind on average. At the farthest, it might take an hour.

Someone wrote something called "The Center of Hash"... Bitcoin will be the dominant crypto currency of Earth because of the 10 minute block times. Anything more than 5 minutes away at the speed of light is too far from Earth for any miners to reliably exist, and arguably anything more than 1 or 2 minutes away is already too far.

When humans colonize Mars, there will be a MarsCoin, while Earth keeps Bitcoin. Any space stations that have large groups of people, as long as they are within seconds or minutes away by speed of light from Earth will continue to be able to use Bitcoin and maybe even have miners stationed in space.

Most likely, miners will still be on the Earth's surface.

[stealth 1776]

As of now, Bitcoin is the cryptocurrency with the most nodes available worldwide. It's been doing well with only 10 years since its inception. However, I believe that in order for Bitcoin to reach true censorship-resistance and reliability, it needs to expand in areas far beyond reach. It would be nice to have Bitcoin nodes distributed across space in order to be prepared for any catastrophic event on Earth. Imagine having Bitcoin nodes on the Moon, as well as, planets like Mars and Venus. This would allow Bitcoin to stand the test of time for generations.

However, it's yet to be proven if this solution is viable after all. What are your thoughts?

There's already the Blockstream Satellite, which perpetually broadcasts the blockchain to most of the world from space. It's not Mars or Venus but it's getting there, and it helps reduce the network's dependency on internet access.

You need a satellite connection, right? that would be the only wall to claim

[StayFly]

SpaceX is planning to start taking people from Earth to Mars by 2025. they started building a colony on Mars already with the support of the U.S government. so it is about time we will start hearing bitcoin nodes are going to be installed on either space station or Mars colonies. 

[Abiky]

There seems to be some misconceptions here. Communication satellites are launched and operated by different companies/organizations, they let you rent "space" in them. The people running the Bitcoin thing, are simply paying for use of a small bandwidth data stream in various satellites. No one is launching anything here, unless you are Elon Musk...

And as i said earlier, if a catastrophic event occurs, keeping the Bitcoin network alive would be the lesser problem. So what if the "meteor" misses the satellite?, who will remain down to receive the signal?, and, who will keep sending signals to it? No, the satellite is not a running node, the actual node is on Earth beaming it up. You can in theory make a true node inside a satellite, but such thing doesn't exist, and it would need to be fed nonetheless with data from other nodes, meaning, an Earth uplink.

The moon is actually a (natural) satellite, but its not geostationary, like Sputnik was or the imaging satellites that keep doing circles instead of staying parked in a position in sync with Earth surface. It is actually cheaper to put a satellite in orbit than anything on the moon, and much much less laggy (closer).

The distance from ground to orbit is actually much smaller than from surface to the planet's core, i know it was a joke, but not a good one. There is such thing as ultra low frequency communications meant to do exactly that, and its not very quick. I believe submarines still use that. There is also the much simpler and old fashioned "short wave" band, signals that simply bounce of the ionosphere. It lets you pick up radio signals from the opposite side of the planet, without satellites.

I guess that there are more important things in life than Bitcoin itself. Food & shelter are primordial things we need to consider for survival. The rest will come later. In an imminent crisis, people won't be looking to use alternative forms of money to conduct their daily transactions. Physical cash is much more accessible to them than anything else. Still, it would be nice to maintain the life cycle of the Bitcoin blockchain no matter what happens in the future. As many have said earlier, we have already have the "Blockstream Satellite" which is more than enough to transmit Bitcoin's blockchain data from space to the Earth.

Establishing an interplanetary ecosystem of Bitcoin nodes, would be something optional than mandatory. Our technology is still not robust enough, to allow the transmission of data from the far reaches of space into other planets of the galaxy. The moon is the only closest planet to Earth, that's highly accessible to us. Maybe sometime in the future, we'll be able to see the idea of Bitcoin nodes in space become a reality. In the meantime, we just have to work with what we have available to help preserve our lives and the longevity of the Bitcoin blockchain.

but in case of an extinction, who is left to even want bitcoin and technologies like blockchain! even if a catastrophe happens that wipes 80% of the planet, the remaining 20% aren't going to even care about "money" (that is bitcoin). they will need food and shelter, basically the very basic needs for survival.

Good point. It wouldn't make sense to preserve a technology that the majority won't be using within a catastrophic event in the future. People will quickly recur to physical cash to buy food, find shelter, and gather supplies. Fiat is much more accessible than Bitcoin in this regard, because of its physical form. With a satellite transmitting the Bitcoin blockchain data from space, we should have nothing to worry about. I think that's more than enough for preserving the longevity of the Bitcoin blockchain for years to come. The idea of Bitcoin nodes in space, is a plus that will become extremely beneficial for Bitcoin if it becomes a reality. But with our current technology, we might not be able to establish nodes on different planets after all.

[Wintersoldier]

technically there is no reason for escalation of the bitcoin nodes outside of our coverage. First, it will be costly as it needs the proper equipments to be launched in space, second, the same function will still be gained from the infrustructures that we had now already, such as the transatlantic cable that transfer data fast enough to secure connectivity and transactions. Lastly, the safety of the nodes isn't the big thing, the cost of maintenance of it inside of our vicinity is much lower compared to the expenses we need to launch it in space.

[bounceback]

it can happen if they do something like that but in my opinion it's just a dream, it's hard to distribute bitcoin to other planets from earth maybe in my opinion they don't think of ideas like you think because it takes longer to distribute bitcoin to planets others, they better think of something definite, such as reducing problems in the bitcoin system that is currently less stable for security.

[Abiky]

technically there is no reason for escalation of the bitcoin nodes outside of our coverage. First, it will be costly as it needs the proper equipments to be launched in space, second, the same function will still be gained from the infrustructures that we had now already, such as the transatlantic cable that transfer data fast enough to secure connectivity and transactions. Lastly, the safety of the nodes isn't the big thing, the cost of maintenance of it inside of our vicinity is much lower compared to the expenses we need to launch it in space.

Yes. It wouldn't be viable to distribute Bitcoin nodes across space right now. Our technology is not robust enough to allow this to happen anytime soon. Not to mention, this will be an extremely expensive task that only a multi-billion dollar company would be able to make it a reality. I think we should worry more about how Bitcoin is performing on Earth, and then we'll think about expanding to other areas as our technology improves over time. We already have thousands of Bitcoin nodes distributed around the world, which is more than enough to preserve the Bitcoin blockchain in any undesired situation. As long as there is 1 node and miner securing the network, Bitcoin's blockchain will continue to be alive within the mainstream world.

The Blockstream satellite is a great effort from the company, in order to help transmit Bitcoin's blockchain data to people who lack Internet access. This is extremely convenient for emergency situations (like a natural disaster) where the Internet becomes unavailable to the public. I believe that's all we need in the moment to help preserve the Bitcoin blockchain for a very long time.

Nonetheless, Bitcoin nodes in space is an interesting idea worth looking at. It's something optional at the moment, that would greatly solidify the Blockchain like never before. Maybe someday a company like SpaceX or even Blockstream will take the effort of making this happen in the future. They could start with the Moon, all the way to other planets of our Solar System. All in all, it's hoped that Bitcoin will survive for many generations. Just my thoughts