[Starlink] the website for the end of the world

[Dave Taht]

This is an uplifting story about keeping the network going in the case of a
biological war and disaster. It kind of predates LEO sats, but, in general
the tales of individual sysadmin heroism,
inspires me. A similar tale might be told of the fellas that kept Iridium
going in the dark days of bankruptcy, and buyout.

https://craphound.com/overclocked/Cory_Doctorow_-_Overclocked_-_When_Sysadmins_Ruled_the_Earth.html

On Thu, Sep 21, 2023 at 6:59 AM Alexandre Petrescu via Starlink <
starlink at lists.bufferbloat.net> wrote:

>
> Le 20/09/2023 à 11:13, David Fernández via Starlink a écrit :
> > Wondering what else, besides anycast DNS, could be worth hosting up
> there.
> >
> > There is this study going on too:
> https://cordis.europa.eu/project/id/101082517
> >
> >
> >> Date: Tue, 19 Sep 2023 14:09:13 -0700
> >> From: Dave Taht <dave.taht at gmail.com>
> >> To: Dave Taht via Starlink <starlink at lists.bufferbloat.net>
> >> Subject: [Starlink] the website for the end of the world
> >> Message-ID:
> >>      <
> CAA93jw5L_t4ZdcCv8-ESegBm-o8_2UTWwD_Hw7qpxmUs7D7DrQ at mail.gmail.com>
> >> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"
> >>
> >> John Carmack just kicked off a thoughtful thread over here:
> >>
> >> https://twitter.com/ID_AA_Carmack/status/1704160299845071328
> >>
> >> (Among other things, I would rather like to see DNS services hosted
> native
> >> up there)
> >>
> >> Starting point:
> >> The idea that the internet was created to survive nuclear war is
> >> apocryphal; packet routing does provide some resilience, but you will
> lose
> >> internet in an apocalypse. Space based systems are interesting to
> consider
> >> — they tend to be very reliant on ground systems, but it would be
> >> technically elegant if packets from one ground station to another were
> >> delivered directly, with no other ground interaction. LEO constellations
> >> probably need near constant ground help to update orbital ephemeris, and
> >> the orbits would decay in a few years anyway, but GEO sats could
> continue
> >> operating for decades if their control software didn’t preclude it.
> There
> >> should be off grid (or even in-space) servers connected to the satellite
> >> networks at static IP addresses (so DNS isn’t required). The Website For
> >> The End Of The World. What would a sparsely distributed group of
> apocalypse
> >> survivors want to see there? A Wikipedia mirror and some type of forum
> for
> >> communication, certainly. It seems like a good story element, but a
> little
> >> real world LARPing along those lines would be fun. The tragedy would be
> >> when all the terminals maintaining a fragile network of communication
> among
> >> humanity shut down due to the account billing servers being unavailable.
>
>
> Recent experience about war teaches many things. (if war is what you
> mean by end of world, because there could be other reasons for end of
> world, like viruses, volcanos, metoerites and others).
>
> In an advanced war, the destruction of sats could appear relatively
> early.  At that point, it would make not much sense to put many eggs up
> there on sats.
>
> In a controlled war, the sats might indeed be spared - maintained there
> in agreement, but then we wouldn't talk about 'end of the world'.
> However, it is not known whether there could be such thing as a
> 'controlled war' when people get very upset at each other.
>
> For the contents of an 'end of the world' website, provided it could be
> reached somehow, maybe among some underground shelters, I'd suggest the
> following:
>
> - prayers (I am not a believer right now, but at the end of the world
> one never knows).
>
> - description of a means to measure time when light (Sun, starlight) is
> absent, so no shadows for sticks.
>
> - description of methods to communicate on a longer distance when
> electricity and batteries are unavailable.
>
> - other similar survival's expert advice.
>
> Alex
>
> >>
> >> <https://twitter.com/ID_AA_Carmack/status/1704160299845071328>
> >>
> >>
> >> --
> >> Oct 30:
> https://netdevconf.info/0x17/news/the-maestro-and-the-music-bof.html
> >> Dave Täht CSO, LibreQos
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-- 
Oct 30: https://netdevconf.info/0x17/news/the-maestro-and-the-music-bof.html
Dave Täht CSO, LibreQos
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