Wicked Problems. A wicked problem is a social or cultural problem that is difficult or impossible to solve for as many as four reasons: incomplete or contradictory knowledge, the number of people and opinions involved, the large economic burden, and the interconnected nature of these problems with other problems.
Surely you remember Iridium, Motorola Corporationâs $5 billion low-Earth-orbit debacle. Planned in the mid-1980s, the system was archaic by the time it was deployed in 1998, offering global communications from a brick-size, $3,000 phone at charges from $6 to $30 a minute.
1 On May 30, 1974, the first geostationary communications satellite in the world to be three-axis stabilized was launched: the experimental satellite ATS-6 built for NASA. 2  After the launches of the Telstar through Westar 1 satellites, RCA Americom (later GE Americom, now SES) launched Satcom 1 in 1975.