Bitcoins in space!

[rme]

Could someone post info about the required equipment to recieve the BitSat broadcast in a average laptop?

If possible post links to amazon for the equipment.

[Dabs]

Is it going to be bootstrapped as high as possible before launch, or will it have to download the entire blockchain while in orbit? LOL

heh, definitely loading the chain prior to launch.  That's part of the pre-flight tests in fact.

Of course! Right?

I mean, the day before launch, copy over all the blocks*.dat and other files needed. Then turn it on while it's still here, keeping it running as long as possible until right before launching to sync up the last possible minute.

Then when it's in space, uh, ... well, I don't know how it works, but I guess it's already turned on while it's flying there.

How many satellites will there be? From the ad, it seems there will be 18 to 24 cubesats? Each one connected to a ground station or each other?

I made this picture in Paint.



Let me know if I understand this or not. The lines are supposed to be, well, line of sight communication between ground stations and each other.

[jgarzik]

With space, you get much higher latencies than on the ground.

To get full coverage over populated areas of Earth, one requires multiple orbital planes, resulting in something like this:

[Newar]

New desktop wallpaper!

[marcus_of_augustus]

With space, you get much higher latencies than on the ground.

To get full coverage over populated areas of Earth, one requires multiple orbital planes, resulting in something like this:

sweet ... got a view that shows southern hemisphere ground stations (e.g. australasian)?

[jgarzik]

How many satellites will there be? From the ad, it seems there will be 18 to 24 cubesats? Each one connected to a ground station or each other?

How many satellites depends on funding:

• 4 - a demo, with coverage gaps, high latencies
• 16 - adequate, with some periods/areas of high latency
• 24 - ideal target
• 32 - super duper

The satellites can communicate with each other (P2P!).  There will be multiple ground stations in multiple countries around the world.

sweet ... got a view that shows southern hemisphere ground stations (e.g. australasian)?

That's all I can release for the moment.  Every landmass except Antarctica should have full coverage.

[Dabs]

New desktop wallpaper!

I'd like an interactive screen saver... click on a satellite and watch it go round and round.

The satellites can communicate with each other (P2P!).  There will be multiple ground stations in multiple countries around the world.

That's the answer I was hoping for. So if the entire planet goes dark, the blockchain is swirling around us and continuing to exist. (mining would be a different issue)

[jgarzik]

FAQs:  How long does a cubesat stay up there?  How long is a single cubesat reachable during an orbit?

With COTS parts, operational life is predicted at 2-3 years, possibly years longer.

[matthewh3]

The three links in the OP are not working for me?

[jgarzik]

The three links in the OP are not working for me?

Fixed.  Thanks for pointing that out.

Some things got moved to BitSat.org.

[matthewh3]

Kryptoradio are broadcasting blockchain data in a 7.5kbps channel on the UHF band using the DVB-T1(or possibly)T2 codec in Finland.  Using the Digital Radio Mondiale codec you could broadcast =>7.1kbps over a 5kHz channel on SW/MW/LW.  Although renting SW transmitter broadcast time costs around $25k per month for 24/7/365 broadcasts.  5kHZ though is about a quarter of the bandwidth that current AM radio broadcast stations use on MW or LW.

Ireland's RTE Long Wave radio station on 252kHz is to close down this January.  That's 18kHz of bandwidth that could cover all of the British Isles and reach all it's 68Million people from a single transmitter.  Plus I'd imagine that Northern France and maybe the low countries could also receive the transmission.  The blockchain plus a Digital Radio Mondiale coded audio station could be broadcast with the 18kHz of bandwidth using the Digital Radio Mondiale codec.  Or more data like alternative blockchains could potentially be transmitted instead.  LW transmissions have good penetration into large buildings.  So an external antenna on the outside of the building would not be needed.

[ElysianBaws]

so how much btc is needed 2 do it?

[jgarzik]

Ireland's RTE Long Wave radio station on 252kHz is to close down this January.  That's 18kHz of bandwidth that could cover all of the British Isles and reach all it's 68Million people from a single transmitter.  Plus I'd imagine that Northern France and maybe the low countries could also receive the transmission.  The blockchain plus a Digital Radio Mondiale coded audio station could be broadcast with the 18kHz of bandwidth using the Digital Radio Mondiale codec.  Or more data like alternative blockchains could potentially be transmitted instead.  LW transmissions have good penetration into large buildings.  So an external antenna on the outside of the building would not be needed.

Yes.  Ideally blockchain data, plus other useful data, can be transmitted if bandwidth is available.  For example, the next probable goal for transmission would be live bitcoin transaction data.  This enables mining (assuming you have an uplink somewhere), by delivering a "full feed" of bitcoin protocol data.

After blocks + TXs, there are plenty of other useful things one can imagine.

[matthewh3]

Ireland's RTE Long Wave radio station on 252kHz is to close down this January.  That's 18kHz of bandwidth that could cover all of the British Isles and reach all it's 68Million people from a single transmitter.  Plus I'd imagine that Northern France and maybe the low countries could also receive the transmission.  The blockchain plus a Digital Radio Mondiale coded audio station could be broadcast with the 18kHz of bandwidth using the Digital Radio Mondiale codec.  Or more data like alternative blockchains could potentially be transmitted instead.  LW transmissions have good penetration into large buildings.  So an external antenna on the outside of the building would not be needed.

Yes.  Ideally blockchain data, plus other useful data, can be transmitted if bandwidth is available.  For example, the next probable goal for transmission would be live bitcoin transaction data.  This enables mining (assuming you have an uplink somewhere), by delivering a "full feed" of bitcoin protocol data.

After blocks + TXs, there are plenty of other useful things one can imagine.

With the full 18kHz of bandwidth at 252kHz LW it looks like you could potentially transmit up to ~25kbps (Mode D) to ~60kbps (Mode A) using the Digital Radio Mondiale codec.  So almost 11MB could be transmitted per hour in Mode D.  Or about 1.8GB per week in Mode D.  Which is about 94GB per year in mode D.

[rme]

Imagine that they are already a couple of BitSats up there, how the average Joe uses them?

Joe has modern a android device (i.e. nexus 5) and a average laptop.

[jgarzik]

Imagine that they are already a couple of BitSats up there, how the average Joe uses them?

Joe has modern a android device (i.e. nexus 5) and a average laptop.

A satellite receiver.

The project specification indicates that the receiver should be made with Common, Off The Shelf (COTS) parts, and may be purchased or built by a skilled hobbyist.

[jgarzik]

KnCminer blog post: https://www.knccloud.com/blog/archive#he-s-going-to-beam-bitcoin-from-space

[silversurfer1958]

What about a system where the Block chain is carved up and stored on people's PCs in smaller chunks, actually, they are probably working on this already, a bit like i2p

https://geti2p.net/en/

[marcus_of_augustus]

Are there any basic specs for the satellites up anywhere ... just would like to know some basics, dimensions, weight?

[matthewh3]

Some new press on the WSJ MONEYBEAT blog BitBeat: Bitcoin Coder Garzik Signs Deal to Deploy ‘BitSats’ In Space