[analog31]

Indeed, and the benefit of traveling at 0.995 c is that a container of information doesn't suffer from degradation by the inverse square law as it travels over a large distance. It might actually cost less energy to transport information to far flung destinations that way, interstellar snail mail if you will. Some amount of information has to accompany the robot anyway, at the very least, its initial operating instructions.

Of course whoever can get there at 0.996 c can take advantage of a market arbitrage. ;-)

[titanomachy]

> a container of information doesn't suffer from degradation by the inverse square law

Neither does a well-focused laser?

EDIT: apparently it does, unless you manage to focus your laser very far away. Not sure how practical that is.