FCC Authorizes SpaceX to Provide Broadband Satellite Services • Hacker News Board

Re: FCC Authorizes SpaceX to Provide Broadband Satellite Services

#211

Post by grecy » Fri, Mar 30, 2018, 5:20 AM UTC

bpd1069 wrote: post #4

This is monumental - I claim every major advance in communication technology immediately precedes a major progress for society. This will make the 'Internet' truly global and ubiquitous. So excited for the developing world.

I've just driven through 21 countries in West Africa. [1]

Every single country has 3G, a few have 4G. Often the speeds were faster than what I get in Canada.

A pre-paid SIM costs $1, data is anything from $1-$10/GB in a pre-paid bundle. So I think the biggest difference the SpaceX Constellation can make is price.

A huge percentage of the population in virtually every dirt street town has a smartphone with facebook and whatsapp.

[1] theroadchoseme.com

Re: FCC Authorizes SpaceX to Provide Broadband Satellite Services

#212

Post by walrus01 » Fri, Mar 30, 2018, 5:20 AM UTC

Retric wrote: post #192

walrus01 wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A) all radome materials have some degree of loss. Ideally you want no loss at all. The path loss in higher than 10GHz frequencies to LEO is already extreme. B) not just up but to the sides and toward the horizon as well. This will be a non moving phased array antenna that can talk to two LEO satellites moving across the sky at the same time. I predict that any reasonable amount of blockage to the sides will not be a…

A) 1% signal attenuation is not going to kill this and that's plenty to work with. B) Depends on how many satellites are in the constellation. Ideally you want a lot of them as there is vastly more atmosphere the lower your angle to the horizon. C) detectable at say 50 feet sure, but a signal you can detect from 10+ miles in a van doing 60mph without a lot of false positives is another story.

the threat model for hiding from spectrum analyzers is not 10+ miles in a van doing 60 mph. With the resources of a nation-state at the disposal of the spectrum analyzer operators (Iran, China, Ethiopia) it will look more like a person walking around a neighborhood with a portable spectrum analyzer and horn antenna. Multiply by however many people are needed to canvass a metro area in a reasonable amount of time.

With the resources of China, spending $15,000 per spectrum analyzer kit x 8 kits, plus training, is a tiny drop in the bucket compared to the amount of money and effort they are currently spending on IP cameras that feed into facial recognition systems, etc.

Re: FCC Authorizes SpaceX to Provide Broadband Satellite Services

#213

Post by iamdave » Fri, Mar 30, 2018, 5:21 AM UTC

hinkley wrote: post #207

IAmGraydon wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A few examples?

Something one of my history teachers used to go on about. I’m not sure I can do him justice now that I’m thinking about it. Big military upsets due to superior intel. Sometimes by new means. I’m wondering now if he was paraphrasing Napoleon (the secret of war lies in the communications). Roman roads, pigeons, semaphore, radio, all used to project military power in profound and overwhelming ways. Radar, sonar (if you’…

Your earlier post seems to intimate that technological leaps like this precede the start of wars, but your follow up comment intimates that technological leaps like this help win wars, and now I'm not sure I'm exactly following which one is supposed to be your central point to this.

Could you clarify this and help me understand your viewpoint a bit better?

Re: FCC Authorizes SpaceX to Provide Broadband Satellite Services

#214

Post by cossray » Fri, Mar 30, 2018, 5:34 AM UTC

walrus01 wrote: post #176

fwgwgwgch wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you. You're the only "hacker" here among evangelicals and dreamers. Thanks for your informative comments on "hacker" news.

Without evangelicals and dreamers major new ISP infrastructure wouldn't get built. But it has to run into practical realities of what a network will look at all the way down the OSI model stack. People want gigabit FTTH to every home in the USA but the construction costs could be $5,000 per house on average.

I followed this closely and thank you for pointing out the cost implications per house connection. While that's a significant amount in the USA,it's far monstrous in the developing countries/rural areas;which from this forum are touted as the major targets of the SpaceX system. Do you see a way of reducing this cost that can practically serve a rural town in, for example, Africa? (I'm from East Africa and trying to make sense of what this new development means for local ISPs)

Re: FCC Authorizes SpaceX to Provide Broadband Satellite Services

#215

Post by tbabb » Fri, Mar 30, 2018, 5:34 AM UTC

Here's one way I could see this killing Comcast, even in major cities:

As a homeowner, you by a small box which lives under the eave of your roof. The box has high-bandwidth, low-latency satellite uplink to SpaceX which gives you your internet.

The same box also has a terrestrial wireless repeater which serves the local neighborhood. Internet is available through your "tower" to neighbors and passers-by. You and SpaceX split the revenue from the traffic.

Basically, it's like a solar roof, but for internet. Photons/bits rain down from space onto your roof, and you sell the energy/bandwidth back to the local area for a price that amortizes your investment.

In areas very poorly served by internet, or with very poor broadband choices, there could be an especially strong financial incentive to be the guy on your block with a SpaceX repeater.

It would certainly scale a lot better than every house having an uplink-- customer connections are instead concentrated into micro-regional nodes. If there's a node in your area, you buy internet from them. If there's no node around, you invest in becoming one.

This could drastically decentralize and cheapen internet across the globe, if done right. It could be extremely disruptive to telecoms, and profitable for SpaceX.

Re: FCC Authorizes SpaceX to Provide Broadband Satellite Services

#216

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Mar 30, 2018, 5:40 AM UTC

natethinks wrote: post #98

ArlenBales wrote: post #88

As a hiker who likes to spend many nights camping out in the remote wilderness, this will be a blessing but also a curse. I'll be able to stay connected to family and friends, and have emergency services and information available if necessary, but at the same time I'll have Hacker News and Reddit distractions - but inevitably this is the way the future will be, so it's time to get used to it. At least when going on a…

This is where I would love my old Samsung's "ultra power saving" mode. Nothing but calls and texting on a black and white screen. Almost a week of battery life.

[deleted]

Re: FCC Authorizes SpaceX to Provide Broadband Satellite Services

#217

Post by walrus01 » Fri, Mar 30, 2018, 5:47 AM UTC

tbabb wrote: post #215

Here's one way I could see this killing Comcast, even in major cities: As a homeowner, you by a small box which lives under the eave of your roof. The box has high-bandwidth, low-latency satellite uplink to SpaceX which gives you your internet. The same box also has a terrestrial wireless repeater which serves the local neighborhood. Internet is available through your "tower" to neighbors and passers-by. You and Spac…

this model already exists (google "WISP micro pop"). One of the primary problems with doing this at a large scale is that the bandwidth via satellite will not be that great, compared to what's possible with current terrestrial technology. the second is that the micro POP needs some kind of serious battery backup and a way to meet five nines or better reliability. you can't start hanging downstream customers off of the rooftop radio system on some random person's house unless you can be absolutely certain that the main uplink won't be unplugged by somebody's kid messing around with a power-over-ethernet injector underneath a desk.

one of the challenges with a wisp micro POP approach for current last mile FCC part 15 unlicensed band operators is that you need to (a) keep the equipment powered independently of whatever the POP-host customer might be messing around with inside of their house, and (b) provide a good sized UPS for it, and (c) ensure that the POP stays in place and contractually "survives" the original resident moving out, either new tenants or new homeowner. The (c) part requires a fairly long and ironclad commercial lease agreement that becomes attached to the property title, which is not something either ISPs or homeowners take lightly.

Re: FCC Authorizes SpaceX to Provide Broadband Satellite Services

#218

Post by estreeper » Fri, Mar 30, 2018, 5:47 AM UTC

walrus01 wrote: post #63

clay_the_ripper wrote: post #34

Please tell me that this means Comcast will go out of business. Oh man. The excitement I would feel at watching them go down...

Satellite can be amazing tech. But it's still not going to be the best viable option for high bandwidth connections in medium to large sized cities. As companies like centurylink build GPON and 10GPON based FTTH networks (example: Capitol, Hill, Seattle) it's quite possible to do 900 x 900 Mbps symmetric, though slightly oversubscribed, residential connections. DOCSIS3.1 over old copper coax cable, with enough RF cha…

Great points, but...

> This is by no means going to hurt Comcast.

Well, it could, couldn't it? Satellite internet does have the potential to make regional pseudo-monopolies go away, which means Comcast now has price competition. Even if speeds end up being much lower, it will still be plenty fast for lots of people, and the price will be the determining factor.

At the very least, I think this will force Comcast to lower their prices and/or be better.

Re: FCC Authorizes SpaceX to Provide Broadband Satellite Services

#219

Post by walrus01 » Fri, Mar 30, 2018, 5:50 AM UTC

kakarot wrote: post #36

the-pigeon wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would be subject to local wireless spectrum control. So like for your example it would have to sell to Chinese customers illegally if it wasn't going to comply with their censorship regulations. Which the Chinese government could then do a lot to fight. So basically no, satellite internet is unlikely to have any impact on censorship.

It's a pretty easy problem to solve: This is extraterrestrial wireless internet, and geography should have no bearing on your service. Don't require an address, just an account. Problem solved. Others will step in to resell bandwidth if SpaceX doesn't want to involve themselves with this political nightmare.

That's all well and good, i encourage you to move to addis abbaba, ethiopia (an example of a semi-autocratic state that does not allow ANY non-government-owned competition in international telecom links) and build a 2.4 meter c-band Tx/Rx earth station on top of your house. Count how many days elapse before men with guns come to dismantle it.

Re: FCC Authorizes SpaceX to Provide Broadband Satellite Services

#220

Post by walrus01 » Fri, Mar 30, 2018, 5:54 AM UTC

glax wrote: post #198

dsparkman wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just like India does.

Can you elaborate ?

I can, basically anything that transmits needs an indian license from their version of the FCC. No license, it might get taken away by men with guns. You can't even bring a handheld Iridium satellite phone into India without a license. It is not rigorously enforced, because the Indian version of the FCC is certainly not fitted out with Sprinter vans equipped with $60,000 of spectrum analyzers, but it is occasionally enforced. The more traffic you move or the more significant your thing becomes in your local area's telecom infrastructure, the more likely it is to be noticed.