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SpaceX launches 60 more Starlink satellites

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Re: SpaceX launches 60 more Starlink satellites

#81

Post by modeless »

ktrl wrote: post #54

There has been a lot of discussion about light pollution from the 1500+ planned Starlink satellites. However much of the discussion is based on the assumption that the world will collectively let Starlink operate as monopoly. How much will light pollution increase when the next competitor launches 1500+ satellites? How much will light pollution increase when a Chinese competitor launches yet another 1500+ satellites?

"Light pollution" for naked eye viewing of the sky is not a big concern for Starlink anymore. SpaceX has designed a sunshade which should make the satellites completely invisible to the naked eye in their service orbits. The sunshade has been designed in collaboration with astronomers to ensure that even the most sensitive telescopes will not have problems with it either.

Will the Chinese do the same? We'll see. But it's definitely possible to mitigate these concerns. There's not much to discuss until a credible competitor to Starlink emerges.

Re: SpaceX launches 60 more Starlink satellites

#82

Post by thekyle »

modeless wrote: post #79
thekyle wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm more concerned about the space junk aspect of it. My understanding is that as satellites collide they produce millions of tiny deadly particles. If we have enough of those in orbit then it will effectively trap us on earth. I'm all for faster internet, but not at the cost of making space travel impossible.

SpaceX moved the satellites to lower orbits, so any broken satellites or debris will fall out of the sky within a few years due to atmospheric drag. And they are specifically designed to burn up completely in reentry. The real concern is in higher orbits where debris would persist for millennia. This is not a concern for Starlink.

That's good to hear.

Re: SpaceX launches 60 more Starlink satellites

#83

Post by londons_explore »

rootusrootus wrote: post #76

Even for those of us living in a suburban area, it will be great having another option to use as a bludgeon against Comcast. Right now they can just laugh if you say you're going to cancel due to a rate hike, because they know the next-fastest provider is 4 Mbps.

Whats wrong with 4G? Cellular isn't the fastest, but I still get 70 Mbps and 20 millisecond pings on a pretty regular basis.

I'd say it's certainly good enough to use if your cable company wants to charge too much.

Re: SpaceX launches 60 more Starlink satellites

#85

Post by flexvision »

pier25 wrote: post #57
sontek wrote: post #25

As someone who lives in the mountains of Puerto Rico and has to rely on "unlimited" cell phone coverage that data caps me and satellite internet that also has data caps.... I can't wait until starlink is up and running and we may have an option for high speed, low latency, internet for us who hate cities and love nature :)

We lived for a year in some mountains in Mexico in an off-the-grid cabin. We became accustomed to everything (energy starvation, driving 30 mins to the nearest village, 2 hours to the nearest city, etc) except the lack of connectivity. I bought one of those huge Wifi antenna to connect to an open Wifi of a rural school a couple of kilometers away. It was empty after 2pm so we had 4Mbps just for ourselves all afternoo…

> huge Wifi antenna to connect to an open Wifi of a rural school a couple of kilometers away

That's impressive, but how did this work from the school's side? Wouldn't they need a huge wifi antenna too?

Re: SpaceX launches 60 more Starlink satellites

#86

Post by elif »

sunseb wrote: post #16

Just a question. Will we actually see those things in the nightsky? I hope not...

In November I was tramping remote mountains in New Zealand, staring into the sky, then there was an extra bright satellite, then another, then another.

I just laid there in awe. After about a dozen in the train, it occured to me that it must be starlink or aliens due to the number of coorbital satellites.

I actually teared up, not because the sky was "ruined" but because humanity had become part of the stars, and more than just a blip. My imagination ran forward to Gibson's detuned TV skies.

Re: SpaceX launches 60 more Starlink satellites

#87

Post by YinglingLight »

Reedx wrote: post #68
sontek wrote: post #25

As someone who lives in the mountains of Puerto Rico and has to rely on "unlimited" cell phone coverage that data caps me and satellite internet that also has data caps.... I can't wait until starlink is up and running and we may have an option for high speed, low latency, internet for us who hate cities and love nature :)

Yeah, if it really does deliver ~25ms latency and up to 1GBPS, work from anywhere becomes much more literal. Currently a lot of remote work and things like multiplayer games are limited to areas with reliable broadband. But if you can get that anywhere... it'll be amazing and have a profound effect.

Cites are done - Scott Adams

Re: SpaceX launches 60 more Starlink satellites

#88

Post by gdubs »

sontek wrote: post #25

As someone who lives in the mountains of Puerto Rico and has to rely on "unlimited" cell phone coverage that data caps me and satellite internet that also has data caps.... I can't wait until starlink is up and running and we may have an option for high speed, low latency, internet for us who hate cities and love nature :)

Sadly, you don't even need to go very far out of some major metro areas in the United States to find ZERO options besides either, as you say, 'unlimited' cellular data with intermittent service, or capped satellite with latency too great for anything like video conferencing. When I say zero, I mean not even DSL is available. Even options like "Fixed WiFi" don't reach a lot of properties due to hills and forest cover, and even if they did they'd also be capped similar to satellite.

Re: SpaceX launches 60 more Starlink satellites

#89

Post by gonehome »

gpm wrote: post #65
gonehome wrote: post #56

I don't know how Loon [0] (graduated Google X project) can look at this and justify their continued existence. Low earth orbit satellites with global coverage seem like such a better approach than balloons that you have to handle in the air assuming the following is true: - Latency difference between the two is negligible - Satellites are not uniquely affected by weather - Balloons are not better in some other unknow…

Balloons don't cost a million dollars to launch. Balloons can be concentrated in the areas where they are needed most. The nature of non-geosynchronous orbital planes is you end up having to distribute satellites roughly uniformly around the earth (you get non-uniform effects with latitude but in very limited ways). Balloons can be brought down and be serviced, satellites are basically throw it up there and replace i…

SpaceX is developing the launch capability so this is even more concerning for Loon since they can't really compete on that reduced cost. Launch is also mostly an up front cost, balloon launch, tracking, and recovery is recurring.

I think you're right on balloon concentration and there's a narrow use case here for things like congested events, but it's pretty niche. I think Starlink is trying to get uniform satellite distribution? Global coverage in the common case seems a lot more important than concentration as long as you can meet the minimum bandwidth required (which they probably can).

I think servicing is a good point, maybe the balloons can improve faster as a result, but it's also a negative (having to service/track them all of the time). It's also not global coverage - has Loon given up on this goal entirely?

Global coverage for Starlink means access to a global customer market which can help cover their increased costs (since I'd guess margins after launch are low). Without a global market even if Loon has lower costs it'll be harder for them to get the revenue to cover them.

> "Google already has experience with being an ISP with fiber and fi."

They abandoned Fiber and I hear Fi kind of sucks, but you're right that this is a point in their favor.

These feel like rationalizations of a losing position to me.

If I worked at Loon I would be worried.

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