Google’s Balloon Internet Experiment, One Year Later
wired.com
wired.com
We should look at every endeavor in this manner to improve quality. Look up W. Edwards Deming, wonderful stuff on quality control that can be applied to software just as well as manufacturing.
Many of his ideas stand the test of time. He just doesn't fit neatly into any academic curriculum.
Quality in Deming's point of view requires a deep multidisciplinary understanding: statistics, psychology, engineering, business, economics, and more.
The true irony is that now, more than ever, coming out of a recession and having a corporate and manufacturing issue in the US, we need the manufacturing and quality prowess that Japan exhibited post-WWII. We need Deming.
I believe his main problem was that he was a horrible writer. We need someone to take his ideas and clarify them much better than he could.
I think a lot of the issues he explains go way beyond manufacturing. When I think about the problems with performance reviews, I go back to him. Same with training and leadership.
Who are you and how did you learn about Deming?
Who am I? That's a much deeper question. :-) Someone who has drifted between data, technology and finance over a 20some year professional career.
It would be interesting if, as a side-effect of Project Loom, Google ended up becoming the world's leading weather forecaster.
Furthermore, using data collected by the balloons, in conjunction with model forecasts generated by NOAA, could lead to some interesting/challenging/fun new algorithm development - using wind data from some subset of balloons to predict the trajectory of some other subset of balloons. Sound like fun!
There must be a reasonable cost for each balloons electronics, as well as the risk of this equipment hitting someone with balloon/time increases if left to random descent.
http://www.cnet.com/news/google-buys-solar-powered-drone-com...
http://motherboard.vice.com/read/google-will-beam-gigabit-in...
Let a thousand flowers bloom.
Furthermore, does every developing country want high bandwidth surveillance by developed countries? Because that's what a digitally unsophisticated populace and a crap-ton of smartphones with social networks, high resolution CCDs and IP telephony with dot gov access holes (eg. Skype) does...
Personally I think the China model (limit international bandwidth extensively, block or muck with traffic on larger foreign surveillance systems slash free web based services with invite buttons and 20-second polling apps with GPS requirements) actually has some decent properties in terms of decentralizing global power when viewed in this light: "ZOMG, furry foreign kittens!" They're like, exactly the same in China.
With modern transportation and communication infrastructure, I do not see a future for a decentralized government. In this light I strongly prefer America's stewardship compared China. I feel Chinese culture brings up people with integrity problems, the cheating I saw at the university translates directly to products that fall below expectation, and problems with intellectual property that encourage copying rather then innovating. Not to mention human rights and Democracy.
We both understand that China's model is motivated by the Chinese government trying to protect itself from the Chinese people.
In China, people know where they stand, even if that's not a great place to be. Similarly, their standard of living has raised materially across all sectors of the population to degrees historically unprecedented over the last hundred years, which has to be recognized. In the US, where people are dying of obesity and alcoholism and fighting over access to shitty habit-forming stimulants, the following quote by - I believe - one of your founding fathers most certainly applies: There are no people so hopelessly enslaved as those who believe they are free.
I'm not condoning China's excesses, which are many and despicable, but for the average individual in much of the country it's arguably a better deal than the US.
Both countries are quite similar in my view: converging on a highly dynastically corrupt militarized police state with lip service to democratic principles and human rights.
What can I not do in the USA?
>>it's arguably a better deal than the US
Probably not true, given the unidirectional flow of immigration. Also the average household income is 8x less.
>>Both countries are quite similar in my view
I can't do business with Chinese companies, while I can with members of the civilized world. I see a strong difference in culture.
>>converging on a highly dynastically corrupt militarized police state
Having lived in Russia for 10 years I can tell you the USA isn't corrupt. You can get stuff done without paying bribes and your competitors doesn't go to the local politicians to shut you down, you aren't asked to do underhanded favors.
Good question. How about these: Rely on any real form of social security. Become meaningfully involved in politics without first becoming so indebted to corporate / special interest parties that your independence is essentially compromised. Start a financial services business of any real capacity without massive outside investment. Start most forms of large scale business without paying out millions of dollars to lawyers. Get a decent education without becoming stupendously in debt. Find ten people at the local pub that are able to meaningfully discuss politics, history, geography or philosophies beyond their borders. Eat much in the way of authentically decent food from other countries outside of a few extremely wealthy enclaves. Live easily and comfortably without a car. Live easily and comfortably without a cellphone. Live, work and pay taxes as a citizen of another country, without fear of being extradited with mere days to get out and go through the whole hassle again if you have to change jobs, if you don't want to commit to a green card scenario. Avoid, for more than a town or so, people that subscribe to religious conservative radio and watch fox news. Receive well deserved state protection when distributing truths about organizations like Scientology. Avoid draconian punishments like the death penalty and effective long-term incarceration without trial for whistleblowing or opposing established media/publishing congolomerate interests? Hell, this should be a twitter hash tag.
unidirectional flow of immigration
All developed countries have this. Fact: almost nobody from other developed countries has an interest in moving long term to the United States... look up the statistics on the green card lottery if you wish.
I can't do business with Chinese companies, while I can with members of the civilized world. I see a strong difference in culture.
That's abusive and false. China successfully exports more products in more categories to more destinations than any other country, last time I checked. Maybe the problem is you.
Russia
No idea about Russia. From what I read, they basically skipped the development of a facade pretend-representational government and went straight to a mafia state. I guess you have to give them points for efficiency!
Makes great sense for app updates, etc. though.
See PDF @ https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=945047 for my plea to FirefoxOS along these lines.
Also the bandwidth/latency needs are initially going to be quite a bit lower, which eases capacity planning.
That said we have satellite phones now. Given the lower altitude of balloons getting a signal back should be realistic over future developments.
> Google made a different kind of advance with Loon when it added the capability to send data using the LTE spectrum—making it possible for people to connect directly to the Internet with their mobile phones. (Loon’s original Wi-Fi connection required a base station and a special antenna.)
Possible if you have a giant antenna and a large power source attached to your phone. I'll believe it when I see it. Getting LTE over that distance is very unlikely to work with standard hardware. Also consider that the Balloons power is very limited compared to a base station on the ground.
IIRC, the protagonist wanted a internet-connected TV product with a small antenna. The only way to do it was to create a satellite network where the satellites were so close they would re-enter after a short timespan. It was countered by a continuous stream of launching satellites.
Replace "TV" with "LTE Phone", it's basically the same idea / value add.
> a full ring of between 300 to 400 balloons circling the globe
I don't want Google looking back at me whenever I look up into the sky.
Could you then create a continual service over a grid like network of these balloons? Or are the balloons too expensive to do this?