Mention satellites and you invoke memories of the dawn of popular science, with Sputnik and Telstar, and the beginnings of the space race. Indeed, early satellites helped proliferate their own popularity, as their first commercial uses were in communications, linking one side of the globe to the other. And though, since the 1950s, myriad satellites have been launched, with most dedicated to recording the many facets of the Earth's surface, a more enduring image of them and their airborne relatives is of secret surveillance and spy planes.
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