Issue #19 - May 17, 2024

Welcome to Issue #19!

Happy World Telecommunications and Information Society Day!

World Telecommunication and Information Society Day 2024 offers the chance to explore how digital innovation can help connect everyone and unlock sustainable prosperity for all.?

With 2.6 billion people?still unconnected, glaring digital gaps hinder innovation across much of the world. Many countries – lacking key policies, investments, and digital skills – are struggling to keep up in today’s fast-changing digital landscape.?

WTISD 2024 reminds the world of the progress yet to be made to ensure that everyone can benefit from digital technologies.

In this issue:

??♂? Digital Twins. Identical, or Fraternal?

??? Space Explained - Lesson #6 - An inclination to elevate your azimuth

???? A community WiFi story, Bill C70, the digital divide of capacity, and stuff

??? Starlink's 50 mission cap, Back to the Moon, and a bunch of other news

?? GTP-4o and an addictive no-code automation tool

?? Autonomous animal brains and stick-shift security

?? And, of course, two podcast suggestions, one movie review, and opinions. All for free ;)

Remember to repost, share, like, and comment (good and bad).

Enjoy Issue #19!

IMHO

Digital Twin this, Digital Twin That..

I've been hearing and seeing a lot about digital twins lately. It's not a new concept by any means. In the networking space, "virtual instances" have been around for some time. Many of you will recall the Juniper Olive, which was (much) later commercialized and legitimized as vMX as part of the "VNFize-everything" years.

(Actually, it was the SDN/NFV-everything era)

Anyway, I've heard many people question what Digital Twins are, so I thought I would use this space to explain them.

Digital Twinning is more than just a virtual representation of something. A digital twin is a virtual representation of a real-world entity or system. It is a digital counterpart that is continuously updated with data from its physical twin, allowing for real-time monitoring, analysis, and simulation. Digital twins integrate data from multiple sources, including sensors, historical data, and other relevant information, to create a comprehensive virtual model.

Real-time data is essential for creating accurate and up-to-date virtual models that reflect the current state of the physical system. For instance, sensors on wind turbines can provide data on weather conditions and turbine performance, which is then used by the digital twin to predict future power output and identify potential issues.

Digital twins enable scenario analysis and what-if and modelling simulations, allowing stakeholders to explore the impact of different decisions and actions on the system. This helps understand the potential consequences of various strategies towards making informed decisions. For example, urban planners can use digital twins to simulate the impact of new infrastructure projects on traffic flow and energy consumption, helping to optimize urban development plans or, in manufacturing, they can be used to simulate production processes to optimize settings and predict maintenance needs, thereby improving efficiency and reducing downtime.

One of the key benefits of digital twins is their ability to perform predictive analytics. By analyzing historical and real-time data, digital twins can identify patterns and trends that indicate potential future states of the system. Predictive models within digital twins can forecast outcomes such as equipment failures, performance degradation, and optimal maintenance schedules. This capability is particularly valuable in industries like energy, where predicting the performance of power grids or renewable energy sources can lead to better resource management and reduced operational costs.

The concept of digital twins has its roots in the aerospace industry, where NASA used physical replicas of spacecraft for simulations as early as the 1960s. However, the term "digital twin" was first introduced in 2002 by Michael Grieves, a professor at the University of Michigan, in the context of product lifecycle management (PLM). The idea gained traction in 2010 when NASA officially adopted the term in its technology roadmap. Since then, the concept has evolved and expanded to various industries, driven by technological advancements such as the Internet of Things (IoT), artificial intelligence (AI), and cloud computing.

Digital twins have found applications across numerous industries, including:

• Manufacturing: Product design and prototyping, production line optimization, predictive maintenance, and Quality control.
• Aerospace and Automotive: Aircraft and vehicle design, predictive maintenance, and Autonomous Vehicle testing (Y'know, that scenario where there's a baby and an old woman in an intersection, and the AV has to decide which one it will avoid?)
• Healthcare: Personalized medicine, surgical planning and training, and Medical device testing
• Smart Cities: Urban planning and infrastructure management, traffic management, and emergency response simulations
• Energy and Utilities: Power grid optimization, Renewable energy management, and asset monitoring and maintenance
• Construction and Architecture: Building design and simulation, and construction site monitoring
• Networking and Information Technology: System design, predictive failure detection, capacity planning, and release testing

Digital twins leverage various technologies to create and operate virtual representations of physical entities. Some of the key enabling technologies include:

• Internet of Things (IoT): IoT sensors and devices collect real-time data from physical objects, which is used to update and synchronize the digital twin.
• Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML): AI and ML algorithms are used to analyze the data collected from the physical twin, enabling predictive analytics, simulations, and decision-making.
• Augmented Reality (AR) and Virtual Reality (VR): AR and VR technologies are used to visualize and interact with digital twins, enabling immersive experiences and training scenarios.
• 3D Modeling and Simulation: 3D modelling and simulation tools are used to create accurate virtual representations of physical objects and systems, enabling design, testing, and optimization.

Although the benefits of Digital Twins are many, including improved design and development cycles, optimized operational and maintenance cycles, simulation and predictive analytics-driven decision-making, reduced costs, and overall efficiencies, there are some challenges as the adoption of Digital Twins grows.

These include:

• Data integration and interoperability issues
• Cybersecurity and data privacy concerns
• High initial investment and implementation costs
• Lack of standardization and best practices
• Skilled workforce requirements

Despite these challenges, the adoption of digital twins is expected to grow across various industries as the technology matures and its benefits become more widely recognized.

There's a lot of "digital twinning" type of activity going on everywhere, although without the label. As with the buzz around "AI," I'm sure we'll see many Digital Twin labels start appearing everywhere very soon. I can think of a few that I would label to change the narrative.

As the technology continues to evolve, Digital Twins is poised to play an increasingly important role in driving innovation and efficiency across multiple sectors. Says me.

Oddly enough, Digital Twins will be a topic of discussion at the upcoming Canadian Rural and Remote Broadband Community Conference, May 27th-29th in Orillia, Ontario. There's still time to register for golf and the conference.

And, send your marketing folks to attend the latest addition to the conference workshops, "Understanding Brand, Marketing, and the Importance of Customer Experience" with Meg Shephard

Technology

Space Explained - Lesson #6 - An inclination to elevate your azimuth

This week, I wanted to discuss some terms of reference associated with satellite operation and positioning and briefly discuss the Starlink trails that people often see following a satellite launch, and their orbital insertion.

Let's review the different orbits.

Satellites can be placed in different types of orbits depending on their mission:

• Low Earth Orbit (LEO): Altitudes between 160 km and 1,600 km. These orbits are used for Earth observation, scientific research, and, more recently and frequently, communication satellites.
• Medium Earth Orbit (MEO): Altitudes between 10,000 km and 20,000 km. These orbits are often used for navigation satellites like GPS.
• Geostationary Orbit (GEO): Altitude of approximately 35,786 km. Satellites in this orbit appear to be stationary relative to the Earth's surface, making them ideal for communication and weather satellites.

Maintaining Orbit

Satellites in orbit are subject to various forces, including gravitational pull from the Earth, the Moon, and the Sun, as well as atmospheric drag in lower orbits. To maintain their position, satellites use small thrusters for adjustments, a process known as "station keeping".

Starlink satellites, developed by SpaceX, use electric propulsion systems, specifically Hall-effect thrusters. The newer Starlink V2 Mini satellites are equipped with argon-fueled Hall thrusters, which are more cost-effective and efficient compared to the krypton-fueled thrusters used in earlier versions.

Amazon's Project Kuiper satellites use custom-built Hall-effect thrusters. These thrusters are designed to be highly efficient, using krypton as the propellant.

Thrusters are used for the following functions:

• Orbit Raising: After deployment, the satellites use their thrusters to reach their final operational orbits.
• Station Keeping: The thrusters help maintain the satellites' positions within their designated orbits.
• Collision Avoidance: The propulsion system allows the satellites to maneuver and avoid potential collisions with other space debris.
• Deorbiting: At the end of their operational life, the thrusters are used to deorbit the satellites safely

A Hall-effect thruster (HET) is a type of ion thruster used in spacecraft propulsion. It accelerates ions using an electric field to produce thrust. Here are the key details about how it works and its applications:

How a Hall-Effect Thruster Works

• Ionization: The thruster uses a magnetic field to trap electrons, which ionize the propellant gas (commonly xenon or krypton) by colliding with its atoms. This creates a plasma of positively charged ions and free electrons.
• Acceleration: An electric field is applied along the axis of the thruster, accelerating the ions out of the thruster at high speeds (typically between 10 and 80 km/s). The expelled ions generate thrust, propelling the spacecraft in the opposite direction.
• Neutralization: To prevent the spacecraft from becoming charged, a cathode emits electrons to neutralize the ion beam, ensuring the spacecraft remains electrically neutral.

Performance Characteristics

• Specific Impulse: Hall thrusters typically have a specific impulse ranging from 1,200 to 1,800 seconds, which is higher than chemical rockets but lower than some other ion thrusters.
• Thrust: They produce thrust in the range of millinewtons to newtons, depending on the power level. For example, a 1.35 kW thruster can produce about 83 mN of thrust.
• Efficiency: Hall thrusters have efficiencies between 45% and 60%, making them suitable for long-duration missions where fuel efficiency is critical.

Orientation of Satellites

Attitude Control

Satellites must be oriented correctly to perform their functions, such as pointing antennas towards Earth or sensors towards specific targets. This orientation is controlled by an attitude control system, which can include gyroscopes, reaction wheels, and thrusters.

Terms Related to Satellite Orientation

• Azimuth: The horizontal angle measured clockwise from a reference direction (usually true north) to the direction of the satellite. It ranges from 0° to 360°.
• Elevation: The vertical angle between the horizon and the satellite. An elevation of 0° means the satellite is on the horizon, while 90° means it is directly overhead.
• Skew: The angle of rotation of the satellite's antenna to align with the polarization of the signal. This is important for optimizing signal reception and transmission.
• Inclination: The angle between the satellite's orbital plane and the Earth's equatorial plane. It determines the latitude range over which the satellite can pass and the coverage are of the satellite.
• Attitude Control: The system used to control the orientation of the satellite, ensuring it points in the correct direction for its mission

Understanding these concepts and terms is essential for grasping how satellites function and are managed in space.

The Starlink Train

Shortly after deployment from the rocket, the satellites are still clustered together in what's known as the "Starlink train" or "string of pearls" formation. This distinctive line of bright lights moving across the sky is visible from the ground for a day or two after launch.

Each satellite in the train is an individual object reflecting sunlight, appearing as a bright dot in the line. The train formation occurs because the satellites are released in a tight grouping and travel at similar speeds in the same orbital path initially.

Orbit Raising

Over the course of several months, the satellites use their onboard ion thrusters to gradually raise their orbits to an operational altitude of around 550 km (340 miles)1615. This is done to reach the desired orbital plane and spread out the constellation. During this orbit raising phase, the satellites are still visible but appear more dispersed in the night sky rather than in a train.

Final Orbital Insertion

Once at their final operational altitude of around 550 km in low Earth orbit (LEO), the satellites are disbursed into different orbital planes at various inclinations between 53° and 70° to provide global broadband coverage. At this point, the satellites are much harder to see with the naked eye from the ground, though astrophotography can still capture them as faint streaks of light.

This phased orbital insertion allows SpaceX to efficiently deploy the large Starlink constellation.

By the way, if you're looking for more information on last week's topic - ESA's and Phased Array Antennas, check out GSOA's latest webinar, "Next-gen Antennas: Multi-orbit, Multi-network – Defining New Standards".

More next week!

Canada Broadband and Things

Canadian Telecommunications Association Welcomes Proposed Changes to Criminal Code under new Foreign Interference Legislation, Bill C-70

OTTAWA – May 13, 2024 – The Canadian Telecommunications Association welcomes new legislation that would help safeguard Canada’s communications networks by imposing new offences in the Criminal Code for sabotaging essential infrastructure.

Tabled in the House of Commons on May 6th, Bill C-70, An Act respecting countering foreign interference, addresses a significant gap in our legal framework by explicitly criminalizing acts of sabotage against essential infrastructure, including the telecommunications network equipment that Canadians rely on to stay connected.

Read the full article

My Take: Not my words, but aligns with my thoughts -- “Telecommunications networks are the lifelines connecting communities, businesses, and emergency services. Just as we cannot afford disruptions due to sabotage, Canadians’ safety should not be put at risk because of acts of theft and vandalism,”

21 spaces in Essex, Leamington, Kingsville and Lakeshore now have free Wi-Fi

Feds put up $422K to pay for public Wi-Fi in spaces across 4 Essex County municipalities.

"Creating digital spaces, green spaces, in public spaces is so important. I think we really saw it during COVID when so many people didn't have those connections," said MacDonald, who's also the mayor of Leamington.

Funding was provided through FedDev Ontario's Canada Community Revitalization Fund.

Read the full article

My Take: What a great project. Congratulations, Joanne Soave !

Heed the middle mile for rural broadband, industry leaders caution

Some $100 billion in U.S. broadband investment will be spent in rural areas before the end of the decade to close the digital divide. Yet industry leaders warn that a middle mile gap will remain if we aren’t careful.

Building last fiber mile networks and leaving rural markets lacking the middle mile is akin to having beautiful roads in your rural town without any real connection to the highway, he added. “We will still have a digital divide of capacity in these areas.”

Read the full article

My Take: Ah, the digital divide of capacity. This is a real problem in Canada as well and is being served today, in part, by satellite providers. The other issue will be focused on resiliency, which I believe will require satellite providers remain in place, even when terrestrial services become available.

Comcast does public-private broadband projects across footprint

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen today visited a recently completed Comcast rural broadband project in Stafford County, Virginia, highlighting that this is a public-private project between Comcast and the county. The giant cable company is involved in public-private partnerships across its national footprint, according to a company spokesperson.?

For years cable operators such as Comcast, Charter and Cox have fought hard against municipal broadband projects, always crying that it’s wrong for taxpayer dollars to compete against their private investments.

But now, the competitive landscape is shifting. There’s a lot of taxpayer money available through government programs such as ARPA and most significantly through the Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment (BEAD) program.

Read the full article

My Take: That's one way to keep the competition out, opportunistic as it may seem. Should Municipalities try to be broadband providers on their own? Mmmm.. I think not.

Space

There was so much space news this week that I thought I would just provide some snippets for some of them.

SpaceX launches 20 Starlink satellites on 50th mission of the year (video)

SpaceX launched 20 of its Starlink internet satellites today (May 14), on the company's 50th orbital mission of 2024.

A Falcon 9 rocket carrying the Starlink spacecraft —?13 of which feature direct-to-cell capability — lifted off from California's Vandenberg Space Force Base today at 2:39 p.m. EDT (1839 GMT; 11:39 a.m. local California time).?

Read the full article

My Take: It reminds me of a Tragically Hip Song, but with a different 50 missions, although the while "crush cap" thing may still apply in some odd way.

Anyway, more recoveries of the first stage on Of Course I Still Love You, the drone ship in the Pacific. There's a great trivia question right there..

Huge solar storm impacting Starlink satellites, 'degraded service' reported: Musk

Elon Musk has said that the powerful geomagnetic storm hitting Earth right now is putting Starlink satellites under tremendous strain.

Conditions reached level 5 on the 5-point scale?of geomagnetic activity on Friday evening, according to the Space Weather Prediction Center (SWPC) which says its?satellites observed an "extreme" event -- the first such storm to reach that level since October 2003.?

"Major geomagnetic solar storm happening right now. Biggest in a long time," Musk wrote on X, formerly Twitter early this morning. "Starlink satellites are under a lot of pressure, but holding up so far."

Read the full article

My Take: I wonder how many Teslas were affected, electromagnetic interference, and all. Didn't he lose about 20 satellites last time there was a significant solar storm?

Again, if you were living under a rock last weekend, you wouldn't have known about the epic coronal mass ejection that treated much of North America to a great light show for a couple of days.

There's a couple of pictures on the Internet, or your favourite social media feed if you missed it.

Why Everyone Is Heading Back to the Moon

More than 50 years after the last human set foot on the moon, the US and China are competing to repeat the achievement. A handful of other countries have their own lunar programs, as does the European Union. Through 2030, governments and private entities have planned more than 100 missions to fly past or circle the moon or to land crewed or uncrewed spacecraft there, according to a count by the European Space Agency. Unlike the last moon race, between the US and what was then the Soviet Union, the objective goes beyond leaving so-called flags and footprints on the lunar surface. The aim this time is to stick around for a while, using the moon as a proving ground and staging base for a much more ambitious project: travel to Mars, which is 200 times farther away.

Read the full really interesting article

My Take: Lots of pretty pictures and cool words ;)

Snippets:

Carnival Corporation Rolls Out SpaceX's Innovative Starlink Across Entire Global Fleet, Rivaling the Best Wi-Fi Experiences Available On Land

(My Take: See, Arjen Kaput , you don't need to take your own panel with you ??)

5G eclipsed by LEO, LTE networks at Gogo

(My Take: Marine, air.. no need for ground-based infrastructure)

Small Satellite Revolution Brings Opportunity & Danger, Warns Aerospace Engineer Uma Shangery Aruldass At?TEDxMMU

(My Take: this one's pretty interesting and focused on space junk)

The satellite industry needs to adapt to Starlink’s aggressive price points

(My Take: Wholesale capacity pricing. They're disrupting that, too)

Navigating Starlink Disruption in the Maritime Connectivity Market

(My Take: The digital revolution at sea is underway, with 99.9% uptime required for cloud applications. Ku- and Ka-band VSAT, Low-Earth Orbit (LEO), and 4G and 5G are all being used in an SD-WAN type of approach to provide redundancy).

AT&T and AST SpaceMobile Announce Definitive Commercial Agreement

(My Take: But not including Canada)

AI

Introducing GPT-4o and more tools to ChatGPT free users

In line with our mission, we are focused on advancing AI technology and ensuring it is accessible and beneficial to everyone. Today we are introducing our newest model, GPT-4o, and will be rolling out more intelligence and advanced tools to ChatGPT for free.

Watch the release and demo video

My Take: Unless you're completely disconnected, it's hard no to have heard about OpenAI's newest release by now. It's pretty cool.

I commented in an earlier newsletter that one of the issues with conversational AI tools is the delay in processing a response. It seems they've taken care of that! The real-time language translation is a pretty handy tool ;)

Watch the video.

Make.Com

From tasks and workflows to apps and systems, build and automate anything in one powerful visual platform.

Traditional no-code iPaaS platforms are linear and non-intuitive. Make allows you to visually create, build, and automate without limits.

Visit the site

My Take: It's pretty powerful, and with all of the pre-built application integrations, your imagination is the only limitation. Of course, there's a bit of "just because you can, doesn't mean you should". In any case, there are two people on TikTok - mason.automate and ageica_automates - with all sorts of tutorials, office-hours, and other automation-related content and tutorials.

And no dancing or singing.

See! TikTok isn't all bad.

And in Other News

Colorado woman tried to steal a pickup, but couldn’t handle the stick shift, police said

BOULDER, Colo. (AP) — A Colorado woman’s attempt to steal a pickup truck — shortly after she was released from jail on a car theft charge — was thwarted not by officers, nor the truck’s owners, but by her inability to drive a stick shift, Boulder Police said.

Read the full story

My Take: Many stories like this. I'm amazed at how many people still buy cars that are meant to be driven with manual transmissions, and they opt for automatic.. because they never learned to drive stick. It's sad. So few cars are even offered with manual transmissions these days thanks to CVTs. You can forget it with any EV, as well.

Animal brain inspired AI game changer for autonomous robots

A team of researchers has developed a drone that flies autonomously using neuromorphic image processing and control based on the workings of animal brains. Animal brains use less data and energy compared to current deep neural networks running on GPUs (graphic chips).

The results are extraordinary: during flight the drone's deep neural network processes data up to 64 times faster and consumes three times less energy than when running on a GPU.

Read the full article

My Take: LIttle brains, less power, but better than a GPU. Maybe I should teach my dog to drive?

Podcast Recommendations

Listen Here

990: Jonathan Haidt | How Gen Z Became the Anxious Generation

Listen Here

• Social media and smartphones have drastically altered childhood since the early 2010s, leading to increased rates of anxiety, depression, self-harm, and suicide among teens, especially girls.
• Virtual interactions on social media are disembodied, shallow, and can spread mental health issues among susceptible teens. Prestige biased learning causes teens to emulate influencers, even those promoting unhealthy behaviors. Smartphones and social media also enable sexual predators to easily target children online.
• Overprotection in the real world and underprotection online are both mistakes that need to be reversed. Parents have allowed kids too much unsupervised screen time while restricting their independence and free play in the physical world out of exaggerated fears.
• Schools and parents need to set clear boundaries around technology use. No smartphones before high school, no social media until age 16, and phone-free schools from bell to bell are key norms to establish. The longer parents delay introducing these technologies, the better.
• Although the situation is serious, positive change is possible when parents, educators, and lawmakers work together. Parents can start by giving kids more independence and free play time offline, schools can go phone-free, and governments can pass laws to make online spaces safer for kids. With collective action, we can restore a healthier childhood for the next generation. Small steps like “Free Play Fridays” for neighborhood kids can make a difference right away. By coming together to solve this, we can ensure today’s youth have the space to develop into competent, well-adjusted adults.
• And much more…

Movie/Streaming Recommendation

A Man In Full - Netflix

IMDb: 6.6/10

JMDb: 7.5/10

Follows an Atlanta real estate mogul as he faces sudden bankruptcy, and tries to defend his empire from those attempting to capitalize on his fall from grace.

Netflix's "A Man in Full" is a six-episode miniseries that offers a satirical and dramatic look at the life of Charlie Croker, an Atlanta real estate mogul facing sudden bankruptcy. Created by David E. Kelley and directed by Regina King, the series is based on Tom Wolfe's 1998 novel of the same name. With a star-studded cast including Jeff Daniels, Diane Lane, and Lucy Liu, the show promises a mix of humour, drama, and unexpected twists.

"A Man in Full" is a rollercoaster of a series that combines satire, drama, and dark comedy. While it may not be everyone's cup of tea, it offers a unique and entertaining look at the follies of the rich and powerful. With strong performances from its cast and a storyline that keeps you guessing, it's worth a watch for those who enjoy a mix of humour and drama with its social commentary.

Events

The Canadian Rural and Remote Broadband Community Conference

The CRRBC conference series continues into 2024 with two announced dates and locations. Mark your calendars and register early!

"Beyond Connectivity: Building Prosperity in Rural Communities".

"Let's shape the future together through engaging discussions on community economic development, workforce development, regulatory policies and the latest in technologies. Explore the limitless possibilities of broadband access in rural and Indigenous communities—from boosting tourism and advancing remote healthcare to fostering digital literacy, exploring data sovereignty, and laying the groundwork for Smart Communities. Your presence can make a difference! Mark your calendar now for a transformative dialogue that paves the way for a connected and thriving rural future.?"

• May 27-29th, Casino Rama, Orillia, ON
• November 3-5th, Delta Grand Okanagan, Kelowna, BC

Until Next Time

Comments here are my own and do not represent the opinions, views or thoughts of any person, company or organization that I may be associated with.

Feedback, comments and ideas are welcomed. Message me on LinkedIn or contact me at [email protected]