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SpaceX gets $886M from FCC to subsidize Starlink in 35 states

arstechnica.com

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Re: SpaceX gets $886M from FCC to subsidize Starlink in 35 states

#91

Post by Forge36 »

peey wrote: post #88
juanbyrge wrote: post #9

If there is any corporate entity I'd happy giving public funding, it would be SpaceX. Their end goal is to settle Mars and potentially other bodies in the solar system. Compared with the absurd amounts of money wasted on defense contractors, I am perfectly happy with funding SpaceX in every way possible.

"Mars Terraforming Not Possible Using Present-Day Technology" https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/goddard/2018/mars-terrafo... https://www.nature.com/articles/s41550-018-0529-6

And that's fine in the future maybe it's possible. Parent reply doesn't mention terraforming.

Re: SpaceX gets $886M from FCC to subsidize Starlink in 35 states

#92

Post by chorsestudios »

dcolkitt wrote: post #41
liquidise wrote: post #7

This headline is only part of the story, looks like ~10 ISP's were awarded sizable subsidies. While i am not a fan of subsidies in general, the ISP space is particularly tricky for free-market forces to ensure competition. The capital requirements are overwhelming in many cases for a traditional startups, leaving the only other option as local/municipal votes, which have been successful in some areas. Long-term, i co…

> The capital requirements are overwhelming in many cases for a traditional startups, leaving the only other option as local/municipal votes, which have been successful in some areas. I disagree. Especially today, capital is highly abundant and dirt cheap. The markets are starved for yield on any sort of fixed income product, especially when it's secured by tangible assets with predictable cash flows. Every day the m…

> I disagree. Especially today, capital is highly abundant and dirt cheap. The markets are starved for yield on any sort of fixed income product, especially when it's secured by tangible assets with predictable cash flows.

I disagree here. Capital might be highly abundant and cheap in general but not necessarily in the ISP sector for startups. There are enormous costs associated with laying and maintaining fiber lines or building/launching internet satellites. SpaceX has an advantage by being able to launch their own satellites, it might not be profitable if they had to contract out all of their satellite deployments. I don't think investors will be eager to throw lots of capital at an ISP startup, especially after Google Fiber.

Re: SpaceX gets $886M from FCC to subsidize Starlink in 35 states

#93

Post by StillBored »

ccorda wrote: post #47

This was a reverse auction, where the goal was to minimze cost to government to get high speed internet in rural areas. Starlink bid in the Above Baseline tier, meaning ≥ 100/20 Mbps (with data cap of ≥ 2 TB). According to the FCC [1], 99.7% of locations are at that tier or higher, and 85%+ in the highest Gigabit (1000/500) tier. So it looks like the auction funded gigabit where there was a provider bidding at that t…

In TX, a number of the rural telco providers already have really good service in the towns they cover. Presumably at least partially due to previous handouts of the universal service fund being used for broadband. So I assume the higher tier rollouts are in similar situations.

For example there is a rural co-op that covers a number of the towns just west of where I live. The towns actually have better service than I do (cheaper, and faster) because the entire town is a mile or two along a major highway, and a few rows of residential streets. The density is at least as good as the suburban area I live in for a square mile or so.

Drive a few miles out of town though, and your on some kind of wireless or sat service.

Re: SpaceX gets $886M from FCC to subsidize Starlink in 35 states

#94

Post by mlyle »

sneak wrote: post #82
dkdk8283 wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn’t characterize defense spending as waste. China is a significant threat, for example, and maintaining superiority over them is of national importance IMO.

This view presupposes that nations themselves are important, and that preserving the existence and concept of nations, and their superiority over other nations, isn't wasteful. I doubt very much that the children born on Mars will share your view about the value of Earth nations.

It would be nice if we could get away from nations, but I'm not really ready to cede the game and entrust China with supremacy or even parity and hope that it all works out OK.

Re: SpaceX gets $886M from FCC to subsidize Starlink in 35 states

#95

Post by iptrans »

smithza wrote: post #21
iptrans wrote: post #15

Riddle me this, would SpaceX not have built out Starlink if they didn't get this subsidy? Since they already put Starlink satellites in orbit without any guarantees of subsidies, was this good use of government funds?

I don't think the logic holds up here. It is conceivable that SpaceX could have entered into the market to disrupt the relatively lo-tech GEO options without FCC subsidy options (I think you agree here). Hughes (a GEO provider) themselves received a subsidy despite their being well established in North America. To ask that about SpaceX is to ask the same question about Hughes. In the age of COVID-19, any investment i…

The Hughes grant is highly questionable too. Luckily they only got about a million.

> In the age of COVID-19, any investment in ISP infrastructure is beneficial.

Not if you end up having nothing to show for it.

Re: SpaceX gets $886M from FCC to subsidize Starlink in 35 states

#96

Post by octopoc »

sneak wrote: post #82
dkdk8283 wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn’t characterize defense spending as waste. China is a significant threat, for example, and maintaining superiority over them is of national importance IMO.

This view presupposes that nations themselves are important, and that preserving the existence and concept of nations, and their superiority over other nations, isn't wasteful. I doubt very much that the children born on Mars will share your view about the value of Earth nations.

Do you think nations are a bad thing? What's your alternative? City states? Planet-wide government?

Re: SpaceX gets $886M from FCC to subsidize Starlink in 35 states

#97

Post by cromwellian »

peey wrote: post #88
juanbyrge wrote: post #9

If there is any corporate entity I'd happy giving public funding, it would be SpaceX. Their end goal is to settle Mars and potentially other bodies in the solar system. Compared with the absurd amounts of money wasted on defense contractors, I am perfectly happy with funding SpaceX in every way possible.

"Mars Terraforming Not Possible Using Present-Day Technology" https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/goddard/2018/mars-terrafo... https://www.nature.com/articles/s41550-018-0529-6

And? Building bases on the moon, mars, or the asteroid belt doesn't require terraforming, anymore than living on an Antarctic base through winter requires the ability to farm for food, and wear a bikini.

We spent $700 billion a year on the defense budget, and $7 trillion on wars, $1 billion on inspiring stunts like moon landings or mars landings once a generation, are not really a waste, the money is mostly spent on earth, dual use technology comes out of it, and it opens the possibility of space tourism, not to mention just cheaper launch capabilities (driven by the need to send a million tons to Mars) also benefit building a better space-based asteroid/comet defense system too.

Re: SpaceX gets $886M from FCC to subsidize Starlink in 35 states

#98

Post by sneak »

octopoc wrote: post #96
sneak wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This view presupposes that nations themselves are important, and that preserving the existence and concept of nations, and their superiority over other nations, isn't wasteful. I doubt very much that the children born on Mars will share your view about the value of Earth nations.

Do you think nations are a bad thing? What's your alternative? City states? Planet-wide government?

I left it intentionally ambiguous about my own opinions on the topic, as I am not interested in a nationalistic debate about my own views, as they aren't relevant here. (If you'd like to take an easy guess at them and discuss further, my email's in my profile.)

I just wanted to draw attention to the fact that whether something is wasteful or not is a value judgement in a lot of ways, and that there aren't usually one size fits all answers for all members of a society when it comes to value judgments, especially for a potentially multiplanetary society.

Re: SpaceX gets $886M from FCC to subsidize Starlink in 35 states

#99

Post by iptrans »

baq wrote: post #36
iptrans wrote: post #15

Riddle me this, would SpaceX not have built out Starlink if they didn't get this subsidy? Since they already put Starlink satellites in orbit without any guarantees of subsidies, was this good use of government funds?

You can provide high bandwidth low latency access to the internet in places where not even 1.3B fiber subsidy’s won’t reach or you can build few hundred miles more fiber to mostly nowhere for the same price. The fact is, starlink is the absolute best option in quite a few places - sparsely populated, far from dense urban areas. This is actually the best way to spend government money for that purpose even if it ends u…

> The fact is, starlink is the absolute best option in quite a few places - sparsely populated, far from dense urban areas.

If it were only subsidized there. Some of the Starlink areas are next door neighbours to subsidized fiber builds.

Re: SpaceX gets $886M from FCC to subsidize Starlink in 35 states

#100

Post by bumby »

juanbyrge wrote: post #9

If there is any corporate entity I'd happy giving public funding, it would be SpaceX. Their end goal is to settle Mars and potentially other bodies in the solar system. Compared with the absurd amounts of money wasted on defense contractors, I am perfectly happy with funding SpaceX in every way possible.

I don't know if those who would argue against funding SpaceX take the "either traditional defense contractors or SpaceX" bait. I think a major argument is that there are better ways to spend the money here on Earth. I.e., it's nobler and more feasible to protect and improve this planet than settle another one.

As a former space industry worker, I don't know if I subscribe to that, but that's the best steelmanning I can come up with.

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