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Look up at the night sky in 2020 and you might see an ad for McDonald's floating among the stars. A startup is planning to use a constellation of tiny satellites to create glowing ads. The satellites would light up different messages for up to six minutes at a time at about 250 miles above Earth.
Also at Futurism.
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Glowing Space Billboards Could Show Ads in the Night Sky
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You are a fluke of the universe; you have no right to be here.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 19 2019, @09:48PM (2 children)
I would not worry too much about it.
Think about this. How big is the international space station? hint: it is NOT small, about the size of an American football field. https://www.nasa.gov/content/international-space-station-length-and-width/ [nasa.gov]
That is state of the art neato in size currently with what we can launch. That is in low earth orbit. To most people IF you can find the thing it is about the size of a pinhead when going over. If you get out binoculars you can sort of see the shape. Now to get something as big as a billboard in a major city would be quite the technical achievement all by itself. http://www.meadowoutdoor.com/billboard-design/good-vs-bad/font-size [meadowoutdoor.com] Think about the moon. When it is out you can hold up your thumb and cover most if not all of it. That thing is about 2200 miles across. Now the closer you are to the earth the smaller you can make the thing. But like I said that will still be HUGE.
Also keep in mind the space station is always falling. They continuously boost it up higher into orbit so it does not crash into the earth. Getting that fuel into orbit costs money, lots of it. Most billboards run on very thin margins. So even if they manage this amazing technical feat of engineering (which would cost a lot), then con someone into paying for it, then find someone crazy enough to orbit this thing, then assuming any of the worlds govs green light it (more money/campaign contributions), then manage to keep it in orbit (more money). Then MAYBE it would be annoying.
I do however have 0 doubt if an advertising exec could manage it they would.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Ethanol-fueled on Sunday January 20 2019, @12:38AM
What about the light-pollution considerations from the perspective of terrestrial observers? Serious ones, not just the casual douchebags with their 2-footers who probably think it would be awesome to see more closely an airborne ad for crap.
The idea would be a lot better if we could do disco-like shit in the skies for tourist attractions, like when you used to use those Playstation 1 and Winamp visualizations while high on pot to enhance your experience. Of course, somebody has to pay for that somehow, and even if such an awesome idea were implemented, there would still be "commercial breaks" on a regular basis.
(Score: 2) by crafoo on Sunday January 20 2019, @03:14AM
Could we unfold enormous reflective mylar sheets with a painted mask? catch the sun with the Pepsi logo?