I want it.
spoiled consumer.
SpaceX says Starlink internet has ‘extraordinary demand,’
31–40 of 102 posts
Re: SpaceX says Starlink internet has ‘extraordinary demand,’
#32> In addition to getting the satellites in orbit, SpaceX will need to build a vast system of ground stations and affordable user terminals if it is going to connect consumers directly to its network. Why are ground stations required? I thought you were connecting from your dish to the satellite and therefore could be anywhere with a view of the sky.
There is currently no satellite to satellite communication with the first iteration of the technology. This means you need ground stations to receive the traffic coming from the user terminals. This can either hooked up directly to the internet backbone (ideal), or bounce to another satellite closer to the backbone connection. Basically, user computer user wifi or router user terminal satellite ground station fiber p…
Thank you!
Re: SpaceX says Starlink internet has ‘extraordinary demand,’
#33> In addition to getting the satellites in orbit, SpaceX will need to build a vast system of ground stations and affordable user terminals if it is going to connect consumers directly to its network. Why are ground stations required? I thought you were connecting from your dish to the satellite and therefore could be anywhere with a view of the sky.
You might find Mark Handley's visualization illuminating: https://youtu.be/m05abdGSOxY
Thank you!
Re: SpaceX says Starlink internet has ‘extraordinary demand,’
#34I have a house on a farm. I only have relatively high speed internet (25mb/s) b/c someone set up a line of sight system pointing at a mountain as a co-op. My neighbors' house about half a kilometer away is blocked by a hill so they can't use it. When it's cloudy, I have to use my phone as a mobile hotspot. Coming from San Francisco, I didn't realize how many people face this reality of poor connectivity. I don't care…
My parents still live in the house I grew up in. It's about 30 miles from the nearest big city, a top-10 U.S. city.
- They had dial-up until the early 2000s.
- Then they had that terrible asymmetric satellite service where the upstream service was also dial-up. That lasted a couple of years.
- Then they got some kind of two-way sat service. Still terrible latency, but tolerable for the time.
- Finally, sometime in the early 2010s cable television service made its way to their neighborhood. Television, not internet.
- About 2015 they were finally able to get cable internet, which they have today. It's an amazing 5mb/sec up/down.
When I go there I just tether to my phone because its faster. They never got DSL. I bet they'll never get fiber. Starlink could be a serious improvement to them even at 2x the price they pay now.
Re: SpaceX says Starlink internet has ‘extraordinary demand,’
#35I have a house on a farm. I only have relatively high speed internet (25mb/s) b/c someone set up a line of sight system pointing at a mountain as a co-op. My neighbors' house about half a kilometer away is blocked by a hill so they can't use it. When it's cloudy, I have to use my phone as a mobile hotspot. Coming from San Francisco, I didn't realize how many people face this reality of poor connectivity. I don't care…
I moved from Sunnyvale to Los Altos Hills and lost access to broadband. Comcast even told me they offered service at the address, then reneged when I moved in and asked to set it up.
More options would be great, and underserved areas aren't as far out as people often think they are. You can be five miles from Google's headquarters and unable to get decent internet.
Re: SpaceX says Starlink internet has ‘extraordinary demand,’
#36As far as Internet numbers go, 700K signing up to receive updates isn't that amazing.
SpaceX/Starlink have done effectively no marketing spend to get those leads into their funnel. Subscriber acquisition costs (SAC) for home broadband and TV are very high, and due to churn doesn't necessarily even translate into net subscriber adds. Those numbers are good by any measure. One representative example, Subscriber acquisition costs for Dish network: "DISH TV SAC was $822 during the year ended December 31,…
Elon’s Twitter is very much marketing. He not only has over 30M followers, but also each of his statements and companies get disproportional media coverage. Marketing isn’t only buying ads.
Re: SpaceX says Starlink internet has ‘extraordinary demand,’
#37I'm in a busy city so I don't think I will have a Starlink option, but I'd gladly pay twice as much to fund this than keep paying money to our evil overlord Comcast.
That would be selfish, sort of like buying the hot Christmas toy when you don't even have kids. The amount of available bandwidth at any given time is fixed. If everyone does that then SpaceX would either need to raise prices (so the people with no other option will have to pay more) or implement some other kind of throttling.
It's good if Starlink has enough demand to make the service a success, so SpaceX will want to expand it. Beyond that, you're just pricing other people out, until they grow to the point that they can actually serve everyone.
Re: SpaceX says Starlink internet has ‘extraordinary demand,’
#38I know Wyoming law enforcement rely on apps that can function in a disconnected environment since I heard network coverage through out many parts of the state is really poor. This would also help a lot of park rangers.
Re: SpaceX says Starlink internet has ‘extraordinary demand,’
#39Earlier quoted context omitted.
SpaceX/Starlink have done effectively no marketing spend to get those leads into their funnel. Subscriber acquisition costs (SAC) for home broadband and TV are very high, and due to churn doesn't necessarily even translate into net subscriber adds. Those numbers are good by any measure. One representative example, Subscriber acquisition costs for Dish network: "DISH TV SAC was $822 during the year ended December 31,…
Elon’s Twitter is very much marketing. He not only has over 30M followers, but also each of his statements and companies get disproportional media coverage. Marketing isn’t only buying ads.
jlaporte said marketing spend. Elon tweeting from his personal account is free.
Re: SpaceX says Starlink internet has ‘extraordinary demand,’
#40I have a house on a farm. I only have relatively high speed internet (25mb/s) b/c someone set up a line of sight system pointing at a mountain as a co-op. My neighbors' house about half a kilometer away is blocked by a hill so they can't use it. When it's cloudy, I have to use my phone as a mobile hotspot. Coming from San Francisco, I didn't realize how many people face this reality of poor connectivity. I don't care…
I was, long ago, a microwave radio tech. It's cool to me that line of sight issues still create issues. For the most part, my old line of work is dead because tech marches on. My immediate reaction is that your neighbor should be able to use a troposcatter shot[1] to fix his issues, but I suppose the provider has bigger fish to fry. I'm a bit sad about it, because tech advances have technically made this sort of thin…
It's alive and well in San Francisco! Monkeybrains is an independent ISP that does internet via wireless microwave in SF and Oakland.