Starlink offering free internet access for 30 days for Hurricane Helene victims • Hacker News Board

Re: Starlink offering free internet access for 30 days for Hurricane Helene victims

#111

Post by AdamJacobMuller » Thu, Oct 03, 2024, 8:17 PM UTC

hathawsh wrote: post #7

I hope we can focus on the human kindness that Starlink is showing and ignore the political overtones. Both Trump and the current administration are creating the impression that it was their idea. Maybe Elon or Starlink thought of it first? It doesn't really matter. Let's all just do what we can to help the hurricane victims.

Impossible to know for sure, but, https://x.com/TheShawnHendrix (who has a very interesting story) is one of the people driving starlinks (and other things) to the affected areas and was tagging elon incessantly asking him to do this and was asking his followers to do the same.

I would hazard to guess that's how Elon found out.

Re: Starlink offering free internet access for 30 days for Hurricane Helene victims

#112

Post by EricE » Thu, Oct 03, 2024, 8:18 PM UTC

bena wrote: post #81

This might be good for responders, but not so much the victims. But then responders will have their own networks so won't need this. When you've been hit like this, you aren't going to use your power for this. You have bigger issues. You have to dry out your house, demolition, etc. And that's when you get power. You might not get it for weeks. And honestly, once power reaches residences, power to other services has u…

You do realize people have generators/solar, right? That there are dozens of videos on Youtube of people setting them up and neighbors coming over to share bandwidth so they can communicate with family?

Purely gestural? Can you be any more thoughtless?

Re: Starlink offering free internet access for 30 days for Hurricane Helene victims

#113

Post by vel0city » Thu, Oct 03, 2024, 8:18 PM UTC

nynx wrote: post #65

renewiltord wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the government started this project tomorrow I would stall it in the courts until they could prove that they did the necessary environmental reviews. Besides, privacy is a big concern and we can’t have the government use the opportunity to become Big Brother as the sole Internet provider for so many people. We must protect freedom. Sometimes that costs the lives of children and sometimes that of adults. But freedo…

Environmental review for blimps?

What goes up must come down no?

Re: Starlink offering free internet access for 30 days for Hurricane Helene victims

#114

Post by AdamJacobMuller » Thu, Oct 03, 2024, 8:19 PM UTC

svnt wrote: post #13

How long does it take to rebuild fiber infrastructure? This is not a kindness, it is a promotion. Six months would be a kindness.

It might be extended, it might be extended for select terminals (people who are allowing general public access?), maybe only in areas which are still down in 30 days (once we actually know that).

30 days is just an obvious number to start with and give enough time to make a reasonable assessment for better next steps.

Re: Starlink offering free internet access for 30 days for Hurricane Helene victims

#115

Post by AdamJacobMuller » Thu, Oct 03, 2024, 8:21 PM UTC

silisili wrote: post #27

svnt wrote: post #13

How long does it take to rebuild fiber infrastructure? This is not a kindness, it is a promotion. Six months would be a kindness.

It's a start. This is a national emergency, there are still people unaccounted for and people who don't know if their family is alive or dead. This helps setting up internet at regional centers that weren't devastated, for contact and comms. Not for browsing Reddit, taking Zoom calls, and playing Roblox.

Really considering how little power a mini draws (30 watts) it really doesn't matter how devastated a location is. You can effectively indefinitely power it with a fairly modest battery+solar setup.

I've been solar powering my mini since I got it with some old hardware I had laying around, just to see if I could.

Re: Starlink offering free internet access for 30 days for Hurricane Helene victims

#116

Post by lupusreal » Thu, Oct 03, 2024, 8:22 PM UTC

threeseed wrote: post #107

UberFly wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are coming across as someone with an axe to grind. There are plenty of private people and organizations getting supplies to the areas in need. Starlink hardware is definitely included as it's the best way to get remote communication up and going at the moment.

[flagged]

> But it's simply a lie to imply that everyone is [getting supplies.]

It's a lie to say anybody implied that.

Re: Starlink offering free internet access for 30 days for Hurricane Helene victims

#117

Post by 1970-01-01 » Thu, Oct 03, 2024, 8:23 PM UTC

marlone93 wrote: post #61

Why is this advertising-like stuff worth of hackernews?

It's newsworthy as it shows just how quickly Elon can 'gift his tech' compared to say Apple or Amazon. Elon also did this for superchargers a few years ago. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17990007

Re: Starlink offering free internet access for 30 days for Hurricane Helene victims

#118

Post by duxup » Thu, Oct 03, 2024, 8:23 PM UTC

hammock wrote: post #86

duxup wrote: post #12

You gotta have the hardware right? Isn't this then just ... kinda a normal "free 30 days" offer? This seems not far from handing out free AOL disks, except you also need some added hardware?

The action was taken in response to replies like this: https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1841207137420132549 Wherein good samaritans are bringing hardware into the affected areas and having trouble/ delays using gift cards to get the accounts online and in service

Initial problem was payment processing with gift cards?

Not too surprising, seen that, must be a fraud thing.

Re: Starlink offering free internet access for 30 days for Hurricane Helene victims

#119

Post by threeseed » Thu, Oct 03, 2024, 8:23 PM UTC

huijzer wrote: post #97

AlotOfReading wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The bandwidth is limited on a per-cell basis, somewhere around 700Gbps max per cell. Actual capacity at any time is somewhat less. If everyone is actively using theirs, you might get single digit Mbps or less at cell capacity limits, even if there aren't bottlenecks elsewhere. It's fine , but it's highly dependent on having extremely low customer density. The system doesn't work well if everyone is using it all the t…

Oversubscription is also an issue on wired networks. It might be a problem but usually you shouldn’t notice; on wired at least. What is your extremely low customer density source? In theory they could reduce beam size and throw more satellites in space. How much they can handle is up for speculation, but your “extremely low” claim could use a source.

> Oversubscription is also an issue on wired networks

Wired networks can include fibre optic to the house like we have in Australia where the speeds can reach a consistent 1Gbps even in highly dense areas at peak times. And internal testing is happening on 10Gbps.

If US cares about supporting the internet of tomorrow satellite services like Starlink will never be capable enough.

Re: Starlink offering free internet access for 30 days for Hurricane Helene victims

#120

Post by olouv » Thu, Oct 03, 2024, 8:24 PM UTC

It appears that issues with payment setup were delaying relief efforts, as indicated by this tweet: https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1841207137420132549.