this is violence

While doing some research about play and design at signtific.org, which I fully plan on talking about soon, my attention was drawn to talk there of something I had never heard of before, something called a “CubeSat.” If you’re not familiar with the CubeSat, it’s defined, according to wikipedia, as “a type of miniaturized satellite for space research that usually has a volume of exactly one litre, weighs no more than one kilogram, and typically uses commercial off-the-shelf electronics components.” Basically: as close to DIY satellites as we’ve got. While they seem to currently be the purview of universities and corporations, so accessible is this technology, middle schoolers are launching Lego based cubesats via weather balloons.

What’s got me sort of fascinated with these is the notion that they really represent the democratization of space, and what that means for all of us. In the last Small Things post, I linked out to Undercurrents’ great little post on how the internet makes everyone small. Thinking about these tiny satellites though, it makes me wonder: is it that the internet makes big brands small, or that technology makes us all increasingly the same size? If a university can launch essentially a throwaway satellite, can Nike? Can Botswana? Al-Qaeda? Me? In the way that we can all have a piece of the web, will we someday soon all have a space program of our very own? If we’re all flying around observing and transmitting away, what does that mean for the relationship between large, rich countries and small, poor ones; between countries and corporations; individuals and the rest of the world?

At the beginning of The World is Flat, Thomas Friedman says “…I was also excited personally, because what the flattening of the world means is that we are now connecting all knowledge centers on the planet together into a single global network, which – if politics and terrorism do not get in the way – could usher in an amazing era of prosperity, innovation and collaboration, by companies, communities, and individuals.” Though the current state of technology and the still non-trivial (though rapidly dropping) cost of launch means that wealthy governments will maintain their position in space for years, I’m not sure how many years. And with technology continuing to become more accessible while becoming more powerful, it makes me wonder how long governments or terrorists will be relevant to the equation.

Ultimately, what I love about these tiny satellites, more than their practical application right now, is their symbolic importance. If what the web provides is cheap, accessible, standardized, distributable software; then the cubesat, to me, symbolizes the height of cheap, accessible, standardized hardware integration to this software. It is, to me, the ultimate manifestation of our desire to go forward and our unwillingness to wait for permission.