India's Successful Commercial Satellite Launch 168
An anonymous reader writes "Yesterday India successfully launched an Italian astronomical satellite. A BBC article (view video clip) notes that the launch grants India membership in the exclusive group of nations that can sustain commercial satellite launches. India's launch vehicle has less overall capacity than the competition — up to 1,500 kg to orbit — but the country plans to sweep the low end of the market by offering the lowest cost per launched kilogram for smaller payloads."
Next superpowers... (Score:1)
Re:Next superpowers... (Score:5, Interesting)
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Re:Next superpowers... (Score:4, Funny)
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The smiley negated nothing, and here is a raspberry just for you
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Re:Next superpowers... (Score:4, Insightful)
I didn't mentioned the current top dogs because then can't go higher, they are already at the top. But Brasil, India, China, Australia, South Africa, all these countries still have an unfulfilled potential, and I hope that in the next decades they will get their act straight and rise to the place they are supposed to be.
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The coming ice age should take care of them. Along with those pesky EU socialists, and nutjob USians. Viva la Mexico!
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Even if indiscriminately nuking these countries (all of them reportedly with nuclear capabilities) would not ensure Mutual Assured Destruction, the aftermath of this unlikely event would be disastrous for U.S. and worldwide economy in general, and the curr
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Also, If you scroll down, my link [wikipedia.org] lists Brazil under "States formerly possessing nuclear programs".
Sure, you could say "What idiotic country would dismantle its entire nuclear arsenal", and you're probably right, but thats assuming they actually had nukes in the first place, at which point both of will us run out of evidence to back either of our claims and this c
Re:Next superpowers... (Score:4, Informative)
Compare that with 50.4 million votes for Bush on his first term, and 62 million votes on his second term, to measure the strength of Brazilian democracy, taking in account that, differently from U.S.A, not only there are more than 2 effective parties in Brazil but any candidate from any party appears equally on the ballots in the whole federal territory.
Add that to a nationwide deployed electronic voting system (even in the middle of the amazon forest there is electronic voting) that really works, and you can understand how much Brazilian people trust the electoral process there, unlike U.S.A.
I cannot speak for India (that happen to be a democracy too, afaik), but at least Brazil needs no help from U.S. Actually, the more far away U.S. gets from Latin America democracies, the better (go lookup "Operation Condor" and "Escuela de las americas" to understand how U.S. undermine Latin American democracies in the past).
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W00T! (Score:1, Insightful)
Or, for ICBMs... (Score:2, Insightful)
Or, at least use the rockets for ICBMs to mess up the lives of the average Chinese/Pakistani citizen. Remember, one of the goals of the original space race was to show the enemy that anything could be dropped on them at any time.
I wonder if the U.S. will turn a blind eye to such things (like we did with our recent fissionable materials agreements) because India is currently our friend...
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Only PolySci and SocialWork use "betterment" (Score:4, Funny)
Only political science and social work majors use "betterment" when the rest of the English-speaking world would use "improvement".
Re:Only PolySci and SocialWork use "betterment" (Score:4, Funny)
Why? It's a perfectly cromulent word.
Re:Only PolySci and SocialWork use "betterment" (Score:4, Funny)
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For example, Soylent Red and Yellow are an improvement over algae soup (or whatever preceded it); Soylent Green is a "betterment" over the "tasteless, odourless crud" that is Soylent Red.
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India does not really have many known spy satellites. What it does have many of is: Weather and Remote sensing satellites to help farmers through rainfall prediction, actual land usage and study etc.
India also has launched the INSAT series of satellites for communications, telephone lines, Television broadcasting. Some transponders on these satellites have been reserved for distance education programs so that universities l
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India is the only country in the world to use satellites for agricultural research. (National Geographic, June/July 1997, if you'd like a reference)
Re:W00T! (Score:5, Interesting)
The somewhat betterment of the conditions (And I do not turn a blind eye to the fact that these betterments are still only on the surface) in India is largely because of it's new-found IT power, opening of market to the west and getting more exposure to the outside world. Not because India was employing more people in the Sanitation department. Continuing in the same direction will have a good enough trickle-down effect to eventually help sanitation too (I know that you used sanitation only as an example. I am also using it only as an example).
Moreover, unlike most other space agencies, the Indian program still focuses a lot on educational broadcasting and remote sensing. Better than launching those "Spy" satellite, IMHO.
Centre of solar system (Score:1)
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Not to mention that the top orbital mechanics professor in my department is an Italian, and the Italian grad students I've gotten to work with have been wonderful. Plus of course Galileo himself was Italian as well, even if his government and church weren't the
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I can hear it now (Score:2, Funny)
New Delhi: Hello, please spell your name and give me your complete customer ID.
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Hello! My name is Marry-Beth, how may I help you!? :)
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"Do you have your Emergency Repair CD?"
"I am most sorry that I am unable to help you with your meteorite damage problem."
"Is there anything else I can help you with?"
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ISS: I am having trouble with my 2nd lab computer
SpaceCo: What I need you to do is make sure the power cord is plugged in. I will wait while you check.
ISS: Yes, it is plugged in! The mouse pointer isn't moving when I touch the touch pad.
SpaceCo: Ok, now what I need you to do is to plug the power cord into a different device to confirm that is is working correctly. I will wait whi
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YEIGH! (Score:1, Insightful)
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**Fine, well and good
Does anyone know... (Score:2)
Wonder what Pakistan thinks of this?
Re:Does anyone know... (Score:5, Funny)
pun (Score:2, Funny)
Nice, but not important (Score:2)
Could be very important... (Score:2)
O
Holy Cow... (Score:3, Funny)
And there's a "thank you, come again" joke around here somewhere...
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This summary seems a bit odd (Score:1, Troll)
"Yesterday India successfully launched an Italian astronomical satellite [CC]. A BBC article (view video clip [CC]) notes that the launch grants India membership in the exclusive group of nations that can sustain commercial satellite launches [CC]. India's launch vehicle has less overall capacity than the competition -- up to 1,500 kg to orbit -- but the country plans to sweep the low end of the market by offering the lowest cost per launched kilogram for smaller payloads."
From what I understand, if you would give these guys a license http://www.space-rockets.com/arsa.html [space-rockets.com] they would probably launch satellites for a 12 pack and some bragging rights, especially on that 'low end of the market' sector.
list please? (Score:4, Insightful)
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PSLV- lite (Score:2, Informative)
It is a good job, but launching rockets is not
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Von Braun's body is a moulderin' in the ground and we aint got the moon no more.
If it was easy there would be a more capable US launch vehicle than the Saturn V or the capability to actually build another one in a short time frame. Russia has one that may be as capable as the Saturn V but the proof is actually building it in it's full configuration and launching it - which is still some years away.
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And when you need help... (Score:2, Funny)
In other news.. (Score:1)
thank you thank you i'll be here all night!
Quandry (Score:1)
Old news (Score:1, Informative)
fantastic news (Score:2)
Racism acceptable on /. where India is concerned (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Racism acceptable on /. where India is concerne (Score:3)
Second, the Indian customer service
Re:Racism acceptable on /. where India is concerne (Score:4, Insightful)
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<confused>I thought they already were... </confused>
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Re:can you blame them? (Score:5, Insightful)
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if india wants the freaking jobs, they should start their own companies and create their own job market rather than destroying the american job market.
Re:can you blame them? (Score:5, Insightful)
Here is the news. There's a big bad world out there and it's got COMPETITION for you. If you don't compete, you get eliminated. So you either do it right (i.e. do a better job than the Indians) or get out of the heat of the kitchen and do something else. It's very simple.
And in the meantime, you might also want to think about fixing that little racism problem.
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"free trade" leads to "better distribution of wealth" in the same way "union busting" leads to "better distribution of wealth". The aristocracy gets all the profits, the middle class disappears, and you end up with neo-serfdom. Of course if you actually educated yourself
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how about.. we founded and grew our own economy.. hmm? We didn't pull this crap of draining the wealth of other nations to build our own. We invented and exported the majority of what makes today's world modern.
Err, your American economy was based on the destruction of the Native American economy. Secondly, European expansion and growth was mainly funded on colonial profits. Find out about the enormous amounts of wealth siphoned out of Asia and Africa over the last 500 years.
You guys have had a good time for the past few hundred years. The rest of the world (the 'South') hasn't. Arguments for free-trade have been made and have been accepted both by China and India. And now that BRIC are competing with the Europea
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the US isnt part of europe, it was one of those colonies they were siphoning, it broke away and used its own resources, stop lumping the US in with europe to satisfy your own desire to cloak your hatred of the middle class in reighteousness.
We did "innovate", we grew our own economy from scratch. If you want more wealth make it yourself, you have no right to drai
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Free trade in and of itself is not good.
Isolationism in and of itself is not good.
Capitalism in and of itself is not good.
Communism in an--you get the picture.
All of the above are not intrinsically good. The above terms are definitions for an extreme end of the spectra. When dealing with extremes in economics you have to watch out for diminishing returns. How do you deal with such diminishing returns in all these factors? Going straight to the extremes undercuts total benefit due to the diminishing returns.
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wow what a republican rationale.. apparently selling below margin when it comes to nations is perfectly "ok". pushing wages through the floor and waging war on the middle class is called "competition", and no, just because the individuals directly hired make middle class income doesn't mean they aren't push
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I don't know what you think of america, but the vast majority of americans are very tolerant when theyre not having 80k and years of their lives at a time usurped by people who only have to pay 1/10th that for their living and education exp
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As for insurance on education, there is a very strong centralized cabal of people who propagate the myth of the "welfare leech" and have been not only stonewalled such policies, but rolled them back over the past 15 years.
The drawback of democratic politics is "the tyrrany of the majority", especially when that majority is being effectively brainwashed by an increasingly consolidated corporate n
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i really object to the characterization of outsourcing as "fair competition" when its just not the case.
Do we lack the average standard of living in the West? yes.
Is it deliberate? Hell no.
Can the whole world survive if everyone uses the same resources the average American uses? Hell No.
Given that we must use less resources, we will provide cheaper labor/services.
When America exports cheap things due to abundance of cheap power/land it's fine. But when we export cheap labor/services due to abundant people power, somehow it is unfair competition?
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You talk about how the developing world is ending up in serfdom and you talk about 'propaganda?'
Oh please! Pass the sick bag. Do you recite the pledge
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this is because in india and china farmers live below the poverty line, and so do half the population. The people in india live at US comfort levels because they do so on the backs of the im
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if india wants the freaking jobs, they should start their own companies and create their own job market rather than destroying the american job market.
That's exactly what they've done. The companies have names like Wipro, Infosys, Tata, and Satyam. They are Indian companies, employing Indian people, in India. What's the problem?
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If by competitive you mean undercutting first world by living in "developing" conditions, settling for income which wouldn't qualify to pay for a refrigerator box in the middle of highway 1 let alone raise a family, then yeah.. it's competitive. so lets see here.. youre really sensitive to racism but youre perfectly ok with the dispossession of the middle class of an entire nation for the sake of another which should be building its own middle class without draining the wealth of another... im confused as to what political affiliation youre supposed to have.
Yes. They should just refuse these jobs and insist that the American middle class be given a fair break first. That's a yuppie wet dream that obviously doesn't stand up under turnabout.
The income from these jobs is sufficient for a middle class family in India to live quite well, if not in the lap of luxury. Of course, they probably won't be able to afford a big house with a lawn, annual vacations, flying everywhere and maintaining their children in the extravagant lifestyle that American kids are accus
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second, IT requires just as much education as any other sector, and the fact that IT is going overseas should be the canary in the coal mine for people like you. I did not specialize in IT either, but i see the writing on the wall for other skilled professions.
hell, microsoft rece
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"pressure to 'open markets'" comes from multinationals looking to screw americans just as bad
That's hardly a profound truth. My point is that the labor force (of any country) doesn't seem to mind expanding markets via multinationals when they are the ones who gain from it (due to increasing jobs in the parent country). THAT was the point I was trying to make with the India example. The irony was simply a bonus.
Also, considering the selective vision of \. (or /. :P) users, I'm not surprised that you missed my comment that it IS a problem and the solution is economic/political. It is NOT a moral
smaller payloads? (Score:2)
So, more orbital debris. But at least this will be smaller stuff.
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But are they competitive? (Score:3, Interesting)
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http://www.ndtv.com/convergence/ndtv/story.aspx?id =NEWEN20070009135 [ndtv.com]
ISRO was not keen to name figures but indicated they were charging around 30 per cent less than the regular international price of $15,000 to $20,000 per kg of payload to make things commercially attractive to the customer.
''The cost is about Rs 80 crore usually. If you remove the six strapons, it will come down by Rs 12 crore.''
''The cost of launch was negotiated on a commercial basis. We have to keep confidentiality to win a market. We are not losing anything. We are making what we are spending and more,'' said Madhavan Nair, Chairperson, ISRO.
Which makes no sense - Rs 68 Crore = $16 Million.
353kg @ $15K/kg = $ 5.2 Million.
So either the numbers are out of whack, or Madhavan Nair's quote is incorrect or out of context.
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This allows for little to no use of on-board propellant in the satellite - increasing its orbital life-span significantly.
Third, there was another satellite launched with this payload - 185 kg.
Taking the laun
Sounds sort of like IT (Score:1)
And why not? It's been working VERY well for them so far. Replace "launched kilogram" with "line of code" and "palyoads" with "projects" and you have the very foundation of the Indian tech boom.
Cheap Low Orbit (Score:2)
Not so subtle difference (Score:2)
More accurately, "nations that can support the launching of commercial satellites". If a nation's support is required, it's not a commercial launch, it's a government launch. The parent's wording is misleading. That doesn't matter to most people. It does to those interested in commercial space development.
Governments do these things using peoples' money whether or not they want their money used that way. Companies do things with their own money and ma
Outsourced, again! (Score:2)
Oh great. I just switched careers from programming to aerospace because my programming job was outsourced to India.
Porn industry, here I come!
Implications for SpaceX? (Score:1)
Now Gates Has No Excuse Not to Fly PSLV! (Score:2)
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Re:Small payloads? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Small payloads? (Score:4, Interesting)
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