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I'm keen to see Starlink deals with government censorship requests. Can a country even effectively enforce their requests? How will China enforce the Great Firewall for instance?
Basically: dear SpaceX, please switch off your sats over our territory, or we will do it for you.
I'm keen to see Starlink deals with government censorship requests. Can a country even effectively enforce their requests? How will China enforce the Great Firewall for instance?
By pressuring Tesla. One thing making me nervous with Tesla's China business is that it will become too big for Tesla to let it fail, at which point Tesla (and every other Musk company) will be beholden to the CCP.
am i the only person thinking that there should be laws to prevent rich individuals to increase the mass in LEO by a factor 10 in less than 10 years? i understand the enthusiasm but shouldn't these decisions let to the people, countries, for instance an intergouvernemental agency. also: is the dark coating working? without it those are quite visible, and make radio and optical astronomy much harder (especially large…
Would it apply only to the rich or to everyone? If everyone, then why bring out the richness? Do you want to prevent satellites existing completely or just keep it at some threshold that has been crossed? Most importantly, what's the actual problem here? You haven't pointed out any downsides of having increased mass in LEO.
there are a lot of useful satellites: for instance for Earth monitoring, it happens we are on a climate transient, those are very relevant. not saying that ppl in rural areas do not deserve internet, but Musk was clear that Starlink was more to finance his mars dream first and foremost.
the problem is pollution and deregulation. and kessler syndrome that might knock out essential satellites in the long run.
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I think the "if Amazon/Google/FB don't comply, someone else will take their place" argument is weaker when replacement requires a constellation of thousands of satellites.
I wonder if the USG would consider the shooting down of Starlink Satellites as an act of war after SpaceX refuses to comply with chinese regulations. It's probably all moot as China would probably simply halt Tesla Sales, as they are not bound by the logics of legality.
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I don't think anyone has the ability to shoot down enough Starlink satellites to make a difference. Musk's biggest risk in China is the CCP confiscating the Tesla factory in Shanghai.
Turning one satellite into a cloud of debris would suffice, Kessler syndrome would do the rest.
am i the only person thinking that there should be laws to prevent rich individuals to increase the mass in LEO by a factor 10 in less than 10 years? i understand the enthusiasm but shouldn't these decisions let to the people, countries, for instance an intergouvernemental agency. also: is the dark coating working? without it those are quite visible, and make radio and optical astronomy much harder (especially large…
The dark coating isn’t used anymore, they have a visor/sunshade instead. The satellites people can see with the naked eye have not reached their service orbit yet, and they are not aligned to use the sunshade (they are instead configured to raise orbit as quickly as possible). As for the rules about polluting space, the simple fact is that none of the rules makers expected that some agency would want to launch thousa…
i fear however no one wants to rule on that, at least for now.
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"at our expense"? You clearly don't have to deal with rural internet if you think this is a net loss for society.
It could have been a non-profit operation no? I would expect rural internet to be cheaper than what SpaceX is charging. $100 per month is very expensive, especially for people in rural areas which generally are poorer. Example, I believe over 90% of rural china has high speed internet and they pay less than $10 a month. Edit. Anyone have a good argument why we can't get $10 per month high speed internet in rural area…
Also, if you think $100/month is expensive, you don't go shopping for rural internet very often. There isn't an ISP on the planet that offers the speeds or latency that Starlink has right now, and believe me, I've tried to find one. $500 for installation and $100/month is reasonably appropriate for the services they're providing, especially if they're taking a $1000-2000 loss on each dish they ship to customers.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
It’s not space junk. When they’re ready to be decommissioned or they fail, the thrusters turn off and the whole thing descends into the atmosphere and burns up.
I wonder how much rare earth material will get incinerated over the next few decades with thousands of these things burning up annually. Hope we figure out space mining quick.
am i the only person thinking that there should be laws to prevent rich individuals to increase the mass in LEO by a factor 10 in less than 10 years? i understand the enthusiasm but shouldn't these decisions let to the people, countries, for instance an intergouvernemental agency. also: is the dark coating working? without it those are quite visible, and make radio and optical astronomy much harder (especially large…
The people elected the leadership which oversees the government agency which approved this project, so ultimately the people allowed this project to happen. This isn't a case of one person doing something alone.
On my early morning walk I can see the satellites as very bright (much brighter than the stars) line across the sky. It's clear they didn't do enough about the reflectivity issue. Edit: Already downvoted for stating a fact. Amazing. Edit: Changed 'did nothing' to 'didn't do enough' Edit: Looks like experts still believe reflectivity is still a problem: https://physicsworld.com/a/dark-coated-starlink-satellites-a...
If you saw a tight line of satellites, those have just been launched and are not in their final (higher) orbit.