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Episode 17: Datacenters In Space
The hosts, Danny Gershman and Dustin Hilgaertner, open by celebrating the official release of their book, Before The Commit. Dustin shares his excitement about receiving the physical proof, describing the book as a "playbook" for CISOs and engineering leaders. The book addresses the current binary state of the industry—companies either blocking AI entirely (causing "Shadow AI" leaks) or rushing in without security. Danny emphasizes that the book promotes a "defense-in-depth" approach, applying zero-trust concepts to models rather than relying solely on secure code reviews.
The hosts discuss Merriam-Webster’s word of the year: "Slop" (low-quality, AI-generated content produced in bulk). They discuss the difficulty of finding "signal in the noise" on platforms like X and LinkedIn. Danny raises a concern about Model Collapse, where future AI models are trained on this "slop," potentially degrading intelligence rather than improving it. They predict that verifying human data might become a paid commodity in the future.
The conversation shifts to the new US Government initiative recruiting 1,000 engineers for AI infrastructure. Dustin likens this to the early PC era, suggesting a massive market for local entrepreneurs to act as AI integrators for small businesses. Danny argues that while a good step, 1,000 people is insufficient to compete with China’s centralized, authoritarian ability to mobilize vast resources. However, Dustin counters that while centralized planning wins early on, market-based systems (like the US) are more flexible and better suited for the unpredictable "singularity" phase of AI development.
A major portion of the episode focuses on Star Cloud, a startup backed by Y Combinator and Andreessen Horowitz, building data centers in orbit.
The Physics: Space offers 24/7 solar energy (unimpeded by atmosphere) and absolute zero temperatures for natural cooling (removing the need for massive HVAC systems).
Connectivity: They discuss "coherent cabling" via laser links. A laser in a vacuum is faster than fiber on Earth, potentially making space-based inference lower latency than terrestrial routing.
Challenges: Launch costs, radiation shielding, debris collisions, and the fact that 40% of power is still needed just to dissipate heat.
The hosts speculate on the "death of the search engine." They propose a "Generative Web" where browsers and URLs become obsolete. Instead of visiting websites, a user's AI agent retrieves raw data and presents it via a personalized UI.
The Risk: This leads to AI-to-AI Exploitation. As user agents negotiate with service agents (e.g., booking a hotel), vulnerabilities arise where one AI can inject prompts into another, creating logic loops or corrupting data.
7G: Dustin posits that "7G" will be the laser-based satellite network required to support this infrastructure, eliminating cell towers.
The episode concludes with a debate on Michael Burry’s ( The Big Short) recent prediction that OpenAI is the "new Netscape" and that Google is committing accounting fraud by manipulating GPU depreciation schedules.
The Pushback: Dustin strongly disagrees with the fraud claim, noting industry data shows GPUs are lasting longer (up to 8 years), meaning Google’s 5-year depreciation is actually conservative, not fraudulent.
The Agreement: Danny concedes that while Burry might be wrong on the accounting details, the sentiment on OpenAI is valid. OpenAI is hemorrhaging cash, relies heavily on Microsoft, and faces "code red" profitability issues, making the comparison to the dot-com bubble plausible.
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By Danny Gershman, Dustin HilgaertnerThe hosts, Danny Gershman and Dustin Hilgaertner, open by celebrating the official release of their book, Before The Commit. Dustin shares his excitement about receiving the physical proof, describing the book as a "playbook" for CISOs and engineering leaders. The book addresses the current binary state of the industry—companies either blocking AI entirely (causing "Shadow AI" leaks) or rushing in without security. Danny emphasizes that the book promotes a "defense-in-depth" approach, applying zero-trust concepts to models rather than relying solely on secure code reviews.
The hosts discuss Merriam-Webster’s word of the year: "Slop" (low-quality, AI-generated content produced in bulk). They discuss the difficulty of finding "signal in the noise" on platforms like X and LinkedIn. Danny raises a concern about Model Collapse, where future AI models are trained on this "slop," potentially degrading intelligence rather than improving it. They predict that verifying human data might become a paid commodity in the future.
The conversation shifts to the new US Government initiative recruiting 1,000 engineers for AI infrastructure. Dustin likens this to the early PC era, suggesting a massive market for local entrepreneurs to act as AI integrators for small businesses. Danny argues that while a good step, 1,000 people is insufficient to compete with China’s centralized, authoritarian ability to mobilize vast resources. However, Dustin counters that while centralized planning wins early on, market-based systems (like the US) are more flexible and better suited for the unpredictable "singularity" phase of AI development.
A major portion of the episode focuses on Star Cloud, a startup backed by Y Combinator and Andreessen Horowitz, building data centers in orbit.
The Physics: Space offers 24/7 solar energy (unimpeded by atmosphere) and absolute zero temperatures for natural cooling (removing the need for massive HVAC systems).
Connectivity: They discuss "coherent cabling" via laser links. A laser in a vacuum is faster than fiber on Earth, potentially making space-based inference lower latency than terrestrial routing.
Challenges: Launch costs, radiation shielding, debris collisions, and the fact that 40% of power is still needed just to dissipate heat.
The hosts speculate on the "death of the search engine." They propose a "Generative Web" where browsers and URLs become obsolete. Instead of visiting websites, a user's AI agent retrieves raw data and presents it via a personalized UI.
The Risk: This leads to AI-to-AI Exploitation. As user agents negotiate with service agents (e.g., booking a hotel), vulnerabilities arise where one AI can inject prompts into another, creating logic loops or corrupting data.
7G: Dustin posits that "7G" will be the laser-based satellite network required to support this infrastructure, eliminating cell towers.
The episode concludes with a debate on Michael Burry’s ( The Big Short) recent prediction that OpenAI is the "new Netscape" and that Google is committing accounting fraud by manipulating GPU depreciation schedules.
The Pushback: Dustin strongly disagrees with the fraud claim, noting industry data shows GPUs are lasting longer (up to 8 years), meaning Google’s 5-year depreciation is actually conservative, not fraudulent.
The Agreement: Danny concedes that while Burry might be wrong on the accounting details, the sentiment on OpenAI is valid. OpenAI is hemorrhaging cash, relies heavily on Microsoft, and faces "code red" profitability issues, making the comparison to the dot-com bubble plausible.