At 2:34 PM -0500 3/16/00, Dave Emery wrote:
>On Thu, Mar 16, 2000 at 11:00:54AM -0500, Trei, Peter wrote:
>>
>> It may be bankrupt as a commercial entity, but there are other well-heeled
>> groups who may take it over.
>>
>
>> I suspect those satellites may well be active for a long time to come, even
>> if not available for the non-elite.
>>
>
> There has been talk, perhaps not grounded in reality, of
>actually using the deorbit capability built into the satellites to
>remove the constellation by forcing the birds to reenter and burn up. It
>has been claimed that this might be necessary in order to get maximum
>tax writeoff for the loss. It is certainly in general true that
>companies in the USA seem to need to physically destroy obselete or
>unneeded equipment in order to satisfy the US tax code and get maximum
>writeof, apparently if there is any question of residual value things
>get sticky.
Look, sorry to sound grumpy, but you are just speculating about what
has been widely, widely reported in the news. Read Yahoo or Lycos or
any other such source. It's frustraing watching people just
speculating and reporting what they they have heard as "talk."
The plan to deorbit the 66 satellites will go into effect soon.
Tomorrow night at 11:59 the phone service will be turned off, unless
a buyer is found (or some other last minute funding arrives).
Deorbiting is essentially necessary to get rid of the the junk in
orbit. Keeping the satellites on station requires money (for ground
controllers, etc.), and replacements would have to be launched as
needed to keep the system viable. It is simply _not_ the case that
they can just be left in orbit with no costs and used as needed.
--Tim May
--
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Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money,
ComSec 3DES: 831-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero
W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA | knowledge, reputations, information markets,
"Cyphernomicon" | black markets, collapse of governments.
