Using balloons to provide Internet access around the world sounds like a joke. But Google seems serious, or at least mostly serious.

And there’s a reason for Google to step up to consider such an effort, which The Wall Street Journal discussed in an article last month.

Google’s plan for changing that is based on launching a fleet of radio-equipped balloons far up in the stratosphere, twice as high as commercial aircraft fly. Instead of trying to keep them one place–which is very difficult because of prevailing winds–Project Loon is based on the notion of riding those winds with groups of balloons in planned ways that keep them close enough to each other to form communications networks, the company says.

 lenta.ru