Futurism

“Project Suncatcher”: Google’s Bold Leap to Space‑Based AI

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Every day, we hear about the massive energy demands of AI models: towering racks of accelerators, huge data‑centres sweltering under cooling systems, and power bills climbing as the compute hunger grows. What if the next frontier for AI infrastructure wasn’t on Earth at all, but in space? That’s the provocative vision behind Project Suncatcher, a new research initiative announced by Google to explore a space‑based, solar‑powered AI infrastructure using satellite constellations.

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What is Project Suncatcher?

In a nutshell: Google’s researchers have proposed a system in which instead of sprawling Earth‑based data centres, AI compute is shifted to a network (constellation) of satellites in low Earth orbit (LEO), powered by sunlight, linked via optical (laser) inter‑satellite communications, and designed for the compute‑intensive workloads of modern machine‑learning.

  • The orbit: A dawn–dusk sun‑synchronous LEO to maintain continuous sunlight exposure.
  • Solar productivity: Up to 8x more effective than Earth-based panels due to absence of atmosphere and constant sunlight.
  • Compute units: Specialized hardware like Google’s TPUs, tested for space conditions and radiation.
  • Inter-satellite links: Optical links at tens of terabits per second, operating over short distances in tight orbital clusters.
  • Prototyping: First satellite tests planned for 2027 in collaboration with Planet.

Why is Google Doing This?

1. Power & Cooling Bottlenecks

Terrestrial data centres are increasingly constrained by power, cooling, and environmental impact. Space offers an abundant solar supply and reduces many of these bottlenecks.

2. Efficiency Advantage

Solar panels in orbit are drastically more efficient, yielding higher power per square meter than ground systems.

3. Strategic Bet

This is a moonshot—an early move in what could become a key infrastructure play if space-based compute proves viable.

4. Economic Viability

Launch costs dropping to $200/kg to LEO would make orbital AI compute cost-competitive with Earth-based data centres on a power basis.

Major Technical & Operational Challenges

  • Formation flying & optical links: High-precision orbital positioning and reliable laser communications are technically complex.
  • Radiation tolerance: Space radiation threatens hardware longevity; early tests show promise but long-term viability is uncertain.
  • Thermal management: Heat dissipation without convection is a core engineering challenge.
  • Ground links & latency: High-bandwidth optical Earth links are essential but still developing.
  • Debris & regulatory risks: Space congestion and environmental impact from satellites remain hot-button issues.
  • Economic timing: Launch cost reductions are necessary to reach competitive viability.

Implications & Why It Matters

  • Shifts in compute geography: Expands infrastructure beyond Earth, introducing new attack and failure surfaces.
  • Cybersecurity challenges: Optical link interception, satellite jamming, and AI misuse must be considered.
  • Environmental tradeoffs: Reduces land and power use on Earth but may increase orbital debris and launch emissions.
  • Access disparity: Could create gaps between those who control orbital compute and those who don’t.
  • AI model architecture: Suggests future models may rely on hybrid Earth-space compute paradigms.

My Reflections

I’ve followed large-scale compute for years, and the idea of AI infrastructure in orbit feels like sci-fi—but is inching toward reality. Google’s candid technical paper acknowledges hurdles, but finds no physics-based showstoppers. Key takeaway? As AI pushes physical boundaries, security and architecture need to scale beyond the stratosphere.

Conclusion

Project Suncatcher hints at a future where data centres orbit Earth, soaking up sunlight, and coordinating massive ML workloads across space. The prototype is still years off, but the signal is clear: the age of terrestrial-only infrastructure is ending. We must begin securing and architecting for a space-based AI future now—before the satellites go live.

What to Watch

  • Google’s 2027 prototype satellite launch
  • Performance of space-grade optical interconnects
  • Launch cost trends (< $200/kg)
  • Regulatory and environmental responses
  • Moves by competitors like SpaceX, NVIDIA, or governments

References

  1. https://blog.google/technology/research/google-project-suncatcher/
  2. https://research.google/blog/exploring-a-space-based-scalable-ai-infrastructure-system-design/
  3. https://services.google.com/fh/files/misc/suncatcher_paper.pdf
  4. https://9to5google.com/2025/11/04/google-project-suncatcher/
  5. https://tomshardware.com/tech-industry/artificial-intelligence/google-exploring-putting-ai-data-centers-in-space-project-suncatcher
  6. https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/nov/04/google-plans-to-put-datacentres-in-space-to-meet-demand-for-ai

When Your Blender Joins the Blockchain

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It might sound like science fiction today, but the next ten years could make it ordinary: your blender might mix your perfect cocktail, then—while you sleep—lend its spare compute cycles to a local bar’s supply-chain optimizer. In exchange, you’d get rewarded for the electricity and resources your device contributed. Scale this across millions of homes and suddenly the world looks very different. Every house becomes a miniature data center, woven into a global fabric of computing power.

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Privacy First

One of the most immediate wins of pushing AI inference to the edge is privacy. By processing data locally, devices avoid shipping raw information back to centralized servers where it becomes a high-value target. Dense data lakes are magnets for attackers because a single compromise yields massive returns. Edge AI reduces that density, scattering risk across countless smaller nodes. It’s harder to attack everyone’s devices than it is to breach a single hyperscale database.

This isn’t just theory—it’s a fundamental shift. Edge computing changes the economics of data theft. Attacks that once had high return on investment may no longer be worth the effort.

Consensus as a Truth Filter

Consensus networks add another dimension. We already know them as the backbone of blockchain, but in the context of distributed AI, they become something else: a truth filter. Imagine multiple edge nodes each running inference on the same prompt. Instead of trusting a single output, the network votes and distills multiple responses into an accepted answer. The extra cost in latency is justified when accuracy matters—medical diagnostics, financial decisions, safety-critical automation.

For lower-stakes tasks—summaries, jokes, quick recommendations—the system can scale back, trading consensus depth for speed. Over time, AI itself will learn to decide how much verification is required for each task.

Incentives and Resource Markets

The second wave of opportunity is in incentives. Idle devices represent untapped capacity. Consensus networks paired with smart contracts can manage marketplaces for these resources, rewarding participants when their devices contribute compute cycles or model updates. The beauty is that markets—not committees—decide what form those rewards take. Tokens, credits, discounts, or even service-level benefits can evolve naturally.

The result is a world where your blender, your TV, your thermostat—all ASIC-equipped and AI-capable—become not just appliances, but contributors to your digital economy.

Governance Inside the Network

Who sets the rules in such a system? Traditional standards bodies may not keep up. Here, governance itself can become part of the consensus. Users and communities establish rules through smart contracts and incentive structures, punishing malicious behavior and rewarding cooperation. This is governance baked directly into the infrastructure rather than layered on top of it.

Risks and Controls

The risks are obvious. Energy consumption, gaming the incentive systems, malicious actors poisoning updates, and threats we can’t even perceive yet. But here is where distributed control matters most. Huston’s Postulate tells us that controls grow stronger the closer they are—logically or physically—to the assets they protect. Embedding controls across a mesh of devices, coordinated by consensus and smart contracts, creates resilience that a single central gatekeeper can never achieve.

The Punchline

One day, your blender may make the perfect cocktail, make money for you when it’s idle, and contribute to a global wealth of computing resources. Beginning to see our devices as investments—tools that not only serve us directly but also join collective systems that benefit others—may be the real step forward. Not a disruption, but an evolution, shaping how intelligence, value, and trust flow through everyday life.

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* AI tools were used as a research assistant for this content, but human moderation and writing are also included. The included images are AI-generated.

From Tomorrow to Today: Making Futurism Tangible in Your Daily Routine

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Futurism often feels like an ethereal daydream—grand, inspiring, but distant. Bold predictions about 2040 stir our imaginations, yet they rarely map into our Monday mornings. Here at notquiterandom.com, I’m proposing a subtle shift: what if we harness those futuristic visions and anchor them in our 2025 daily habits? This is practical futurism in action—turning forecasts into small, meaningful steps we can take now.

Idea

The Disconnect: Why Futurism Feels Abstract

  • Futurism often lives in abstraction: TED talks and futurology books project us forward—yet too often, they’re unmoored from our present experiences.

  • Technology predictions feel lofty, not livable: We talk AI, distributed computing, or extended reality—but rarely consider how they’ll shape our morning routines, grocery runs, or mid-day breaks in the near term.

  • Audience craving near-term relevance: Tech-savvy professionals, committed yet pragmatic, want today’sutility—not just speculation about 2040.

What’s Missing: Bridging Forecast with Habit

The gap lies in translation—how do we take big-picture forecasts and convert them into rational, actionable daily practices? It’s not enough to know that “AI will transform everything”—we need to know how it can help us, say, stop overthinking, streamline our routines, or fuel better decision-making today.

Learning from Others: What Works, and Why It’s Still Too Vague

  • Future-self mentoring: A Medium article suggests asking your “future self” for advice—pragmatic, reflective, and personal.

  • Habit stacking for incremental change: Insert new habits into existing ones—an early morning walk after brushing your teeth, for instance.

  • AI as daily assistant: From summarizing Zoom calls to smart recipe creation, these are mini-futures we can live now.

But even these are one-offs rather than a cohesive method. What if there were a structured approach for individuals to act on futurism—not tomorrow, but today?

Core Pillars: Building Practical Futures in 2025

1. Flip 2040 Predictions into 2025 Micro-Actions

Take a prediction—say, “AI-enabled personalization everywhere by 2040”—and turn it into steps:

  • Experiment with AI tools that tailor your workout or meal plan (like those that adapt to mood or leftovers).

  • Automate a routine task you dread—like using AI to summarize meetings.
    These are small bets that reflect future trends in digestible chunks for today.

2. Scenario Planning—For You, Not Just Companies

Rather than corporate foresight, create a mini “personal scenario plan”:

  • Optimistic 2025: AI helps you shave hours off your weekday.

  • Constrained 2025: Tight budgets—but you rely on low-cost hacks and habit stacks.

  • Hybrid 2025: A mix—automated routines and soulful analog rituals share your day.
    Plan habits that thrive in each scenario.

3. The “Small Bets” Approach

Reed habit stacking into futurism:

  • Choose one futuristic habit (e.g., AI-curated learning podcast during walks).

  • Run a low-stakes trial—maybe one week.

  • Reflect: Did it help? Discard, tweak, or embed.
    This mimics how entrepreneurs iterate and adapts futurism into a manageable experiment.

Illustrative Mini-Plan: Futurism Meets the Morning Routine

  1. Habit Stack: After brushing teeth, open AI habit tracker that suggests personalized micro-tasks (breathing, brief learning, stand-up stretch).

  2. Try the 2-Minute Trick: Commit to two minutes of something high-tech or future-oriented—like checking that AI tracker—then see if you naturally continue.

  3. Future-Self Check-In: End the day by journaling a quick note: “If I were living in 2040, how would my present behavior differ?”

These micro-actions fuse futurism with routine, making tomorrow’s edge realities feel like tomorrow’s baseline.

Why It Resonates with notquiterandom Readers

Our audience—rooted in tech awareness, skeptical optimism, and personal agency—wants integrity, not hype. This blend of grounded futurism and reflective practice aligns with:

  • Professional curiosity

  • Self-directed experimentation

  • Meaningful progress framed as actionable—no grand leaps, just deliberate stepping stones

Conclusion: Begin Your 2025 Future Habit

The future doesn’t have to be a distant horizon—it can be woven into your habits now. Start small. Let habit stacking, mini-scenarios, and future-self reflection guide you. Over time, these microscale engagements seed long-term adaptability and readiness.

Your Turn

Ready to design your first micro-bet? Whether it’s a futuristic habit stack, an AI tool tryout, or a scenario exercise, share your experiment. Let’s co-create real futures, one habit at a time.

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* AI tools were used as a research assistant for this content, but human moderation and writing are also included. The included images are AI-generated.

The Coming Collision of Quantum, AI, and Blockchain

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I’ve been spending a lot of time lately thinking about what happens when three of the most disruptive technologies on our radar—quantum computing, artificial intelligence, and blockchain—don’t just mature, but collide. Not in isolation, not as separate waves of change, but as a single force of transformation. I’ve come to believe this collision may alter our global systems more profoundly than the Internet ever did, and even more than AI is doing on its own today.

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More Than the Sum of the Parts

Each of these technologies is already disruptive. Quantum promises computational power orders of magnitude beyond anything we can imagine today. AI is rapidly reshaping how we create, work, and decide. Blockchain has redefined ownership, trust, and verification.

But imagine them intertwined. AI powered by quantum computing. Identities and financial transactions rooted in shared blockchains, public and private. Blockchain as the arbiter of identity, of non-repudiation, of who we are and what we’ve agreed to. Smart contracts enhanced by AI that can generate, adjust, and arbitrate terms on the fly. Quantum cryptography woven into blockchains that operate at scales and speeds impossible with today’s systems. AI itself acting as the oracle for contracts, feeding real-time insights into automated agreements.

That’s not incremental progress—that’s tectonic shift.

Systems That Won’t Survive the Collision

Some sectors will feel the tremors first. Finance is obvious, even without the collision. Add in these forces together and you have leverage points that could reset the foundations of how money moves, how markets behave, and how trust is established.

Healthcare, defense, and governance won’t look the same either. Identity frameworks built on quantum-secure blockchains could redefine everything from medical records to voting. Critical infrastructure may evolve to the point where the old approaches don’t make sense anymore—financially, socially, or technologically.

And overlay it all with quantum AI: an intelligence capable of holding vast landscapes of knowledge and spinning out probable solutions to nearly any problem, no matter the complexity. That’s not science fiction—it’s a future horizon. Maybe not tomorrow, maybe not in five years, but possibly in my lifetime.

The Double-Edged Sword

I’m not naive about the risks. All swords cut both ways. Bad actors will find ways to exploit these systems. Tyranny won’t vanish, even in a world of shared prosperity. People are driven by power, and that’s unlikely to change.

But the upside is massive. For emerging economies especially, these collisions could level the field, bringing access, transparency, and efficiency that the old systems have long denied. If global prosperity rises, maybe some incentives for malicious behavior diminish.

Early Sparks and Long Horizons

We’ll see hints and echoes of this in the next decade. Experiments, prototypes, niche applications that give us glimpses of the possible. But the real shifts, the agricultural-revolution-scale changes, may sit 20 to 30 years out. If that horizon holds true, the world my grandchildren inherit will be unrecognizable in ways both challenging and awe-inspiring.

Looking Ahead

I don’t claim to have the answers. What I have is a sense that the collision of quantum, AI, and blockchain is not just coming—it’s inevitable. And when it hits, it will be bigger than the sum of the parts. Bigger than the Internet. Maybe even bigger than the scientific revolution itself.

For now, the best we can do is pay attention, experiment responsibly, and prepare ourselves for a future where the unimaginable becomes the baseline.

Supporting My Work

If you found this useful and want to help support my ongoing research into the intersection of cybersecurity, automation, and human-centric design, consider buying me a coffee:

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* AI tools were used as a research assistant for this content, but human moderation and writing are also included. The included images are AI-generated.

Advisory in the AI Age: Navigating the “Consulting Crash”

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The Erosion of Traditional Advisory Models

The age‑old consulting model—anchored in billable hours and labor‑intensive analysis—is cracking under the weight of AI. Automation of repetitive tasks isn’t horizon‑bound; it’s here. Major firms are bracing:

  • Big Four upheaval — Up to 50% of advisory, audit, and tax roles could vanish in the next few years as AI reshapes margin models and deliverables.
  • McKinsey’s existential shift — AI now enables data analysis and presentation generation in minutes. The firm has restructured around outcome‑based partnerships, with 25% of work tied to tangible business results.
  • “Consulting crash” looming — AI efficiencies combined with contracting policy changes are straining consulting profitability across the board.

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AI‑Infused Advisory: What Real‑World Looks Like

Consulting is no longer just human‑driven—AI is embedded:

  • AI agent swarms — Internal use of thousands of AI agents allows smaller teams to deliver more with less.
  • Generative intelligence at scale — Firm‑specific assistants (knowledge chatbots, slide generators, code copilots) accelerate research, design, and delivery.

Operational AI beats demo AI. The winners aren’t showing prototypes; they’re wiring models into CI/CD, decision flows, controls, and telemetry.

From Billable Hours to Outcome‑Based Value

As AI commoditizes analysis, control shifts to strategic interpretation and execution. That forces a pricing and packaging rethink:

  • Embed, don’t bolt‑on — Architect AI into core processes and guardrails; avoid one‑off reports that age like produce.
  • Price to outcomes — Tie a clear portion of fees to measurable impact: cycle time reduced, error rate dropped, revenue lift captured.
  • Own runbooks — Codify delivery with reference architectures, safety controls, and playbooks clients can operate post‑engagement.

Practical Playbook: Navigating the AI‑Driven Advisory Landscape

  1. Client triage — Segment work into automate (AI‑first), augment (human‑in‑the‑loop), and advise (judgment‑heavy). Push commoditized tasks toward automation; preserve people for interpretation and change‑management.
  2. Infrastructure & readiness audits — Assess data quality, access controls, lineage, model governance, and observability. If the substrate is weak, modernize before strategy.
  3. Outcome‑based offers — Convert packages into fixed‑fee + success components. Define KPIs, timeboxes, and stop‑loss logic up front.
  4. Forward‑Deployed Engineers (FDEs) — Embed build‑capable consultants inside client teams to ship operational AI, not just recommendations.
  5. Lean Rationalism — Apply Lean IT to advisory delivery: remove handoff waste, shorten feedback loops, productize templates, and use automation to erase bureaucratic overhead.

Why This Matters

This isn’t a passing disruption—it’s a structural inflection. Whether you’re solo or running a boutique, the path is clear: dismantle antiquated billing models, anchor on outcomes, and productize AI‑augmented value creation. Otherwise, the market will do the dismantling for you.

Support My Work

Support the creation of high-impact content and research. Sponsorship opportunities are available for specific topics, whitepapers, tools, or advisory insights. Learn more or contribute here: Buy Me A Coffee

References

  1. AI and Trump put consulting firms under pressure — Axios
  2. As AI Comes for Consulting, McKinsey Faces an “Existential” Shift — Wall Street Journal
  3. AI is coming for the Big Four too — Business Insider
  4. Consulting’s AI Transformation — IBM Institute for Business Value
  5. Closing the AI Impact Gap — BCG
  6. Because of AI, Consultants Are Now Expected to Do More — Inc.
  7. AI Transforming the Consulting Industry — Geeky Gadgets

* AI tools were used as a research assistant for this content, but human moderation and writing are also included. The included images are AI-generated.