The Space-based Data Center Hype Machine Is Already in Orbit

“ The lowest-cost place to put AI will be in space, and that will be true within two years, maybe three at the latest,” SpaceX founder Elon Musk told the World Economic Forum in Davos this past January, as his company was preparing to go public . Later that month, SpaceX filed an application with the Federal Communications Commission for an orbital data center constellation of up to 1 million satellites in low Earth orbit, 500 to 2,000 kilometers above Earth. And just three days before the IPO,

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ethics.ai (1 July 2026), “The Space-based Data Center Hype Machine Is Already in Orbit,” evidence record 1617, https://ethics.ai/record/1617 (originally published by IEEE Spectrum).

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