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That's strange. All of those points are wrong. Starlink isn't designed to offer lower latency or lower prices than existing terrestrial wired or wireless ISPs

That's strange. All of those points are wrong. Starlink isn't designed to offer lower latency or lower prices than existing terrestrial wired or wireless ISPs (at least, decent ones). Instead it's designed to offer a low latency wireless service in places where that has never been available at all. Which is most of the land area of the Earth, and all of the ocean. It may also be cheaper and/or faster than some very bad terrestrial ISPs, because there are a lot of those out there, but that's not what it's designed for. Impact on earth-based telescopes has been discussed endlessly, to the point where it seems like there's a law that you can't mention Starlink on the Internet without talking about it. And SpaceX responded by talking to the astronomers most affected by Starlink and adding a sunshade that should prevent the satellites from ruining their images. Which is more than any other satellite operator has ever done, AFAIK, and there are many satellites much brighter than Starlink in the sky today. The Pentagon is certainly interested in Starlink, but commercial service has much higher revenue potential. There are several competitors planning to do roughly the same thing as Starlink, so the business plan is at least plausible.

bryanlarsen 6y ago
Starlink will has promised better latency, bandwidth and prices compared to existing satellite internet. Perhaps that's where the confusion on the first point came from.
- arcticfox 6y ago
  I'm really confused what is going on here. It's really baffling how someone motivated and talented enough to make such a tracking site would have such an odd opinion section. Obviously, Starlink is not the best choice in all situations, but it is so compelling on some dimensions that such a flatly negative opinion is bizarre for anyone with even a cursory understanding of what's going on.
  - shaklee3 6y ago
    What dimension? It's not competitive for anyone who can get high-speed internet right now, and it's not clear if it will complete with traditional satellite in cost.
    - 2StepsOutOfLine 6y ago
      https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1272363466288820224 https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1272363466288820224
      - shaklee3 6y ago
        This is demonstrably false. Look at the YouTube video posted this week that simulated delayed. The best delay, with only hops between satellites, was 40ms or so. That didn't account for any of the higher later delays or transport network.
        bryanlarsen 6y ago
        Good thing then that SpaceX has enough ground stations that no hops are required in the continental US.
        shaklee3 6y ago
        I'm referring to the satellite to gateway hops. There absolutely are many of those just to cross the continental US. The satellite altitude is such that it only covers a small part of CONUS before it has to have off to another satellite.
        bryanlarsen 6y ago
        Why would they use satellite hops for those? They'll just put your packet onto an internet backbone fiber. Starlink is last mile service, not backbone.
        modeless 6y ago
- ehsankia 6y ago
  I don't see why it couldn't. Maybe people here are used to the top of top internet, but I've lived in many places where the best I could get was ~5mbps, with 60ms latency and 60$+. Those are very easy numbers to beat. Yes it might not beat prices and latencies for a super competitive city with true competition, but those are honestly rare and few between. The majority of north american cities have shitty internet at high prices and high latency. Also, slap this router on a Tesla car, allowing it to have connection anywhere it drives, and you're golden.
watersb 6y ago
Radio Astronomy has to deal with this, never mind the sun shades. Pervasive radio everywhere has been a growing problem in general at least since GPS.
- rlt 6y ago
  Since they use phased array antennas they may be able to create fairly small exclusion zones around observatories.
- cryptonector 6y ago
  Time to move the observatories to space. If only there was a launch platform for those.
  - denkmoon 6y ago
    The only problem there is cost, upfront and ongoing. JSW is super expensive. We were very lucky Hubble wasn't a complete write off and even then the fix was very expensive. All that vs. laying down some concrete and a telescope in a remote location.
    - godelski 6y ago
      > The only problem there is cost If only there were launch platforms that could put up smaller telescopes (optical and radio). I mean you can do a lot with telescopes that are much smaller than Hubble Class or JSW. A lot of people are doing work with telescopes that are much smaller. Also, as long as frequencies and locations are published, much of this noise (not all!) can be removed. Sure, the VLA is going to have a major headache, but LIGO wouldn't exist if we didn't know how to remove noise (LIGO had to deal with noise from cars many miles away and all kinds of vibrations because it is ridiculously sensitive).
      - ISL 6y ago
        LIGO can isolate itself from seismic backgrounds, but it has no artificial gravitational-wave foregrounds. (Yes, Newtonian Noise is a concern for future generations, but it is expected to be modeled and subtracted well-enough.) Arrays like Starlink are a persistent foreground for the big radio telescopes. SKA and the like are in the Outback for a reason, but for this there is no escape.
jbuzbee 6y ago
Vey interesting analysis of Starlink coverage and latency: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m05abdGSOxY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m05abdGSOxY
sneak 6y ago
> Starlink isn't designed to offer lower latency or lower prices than existing terrestrial wired or wireless ISPs (at least, decent ones). Instead it's designed to offer a low latency wireless service in places where that has never been available at all. Which is most of the land area of the Earth, and all of the ocean. It is widely believed that a huge chunk of Starlink’s revenue, if not ~all of it, will come from leasing faster-than-currently-available low latency links to HFT companies for nyc-lon and such. This is why their first orbital planes being launched are for the north atlantic and CONUS. Providing internet to the underserved areas is secondary; the cash will come from beating terrestrial fiber links (even idealized great circle ones) between markets that are already extremely well connected. One such private low latency link between Seacaucus and LSEG will probably pay 2-5x what everyone else on the planet combined pays for internet access in underserved areas.
- hooper 6y ago
  The data on this map makes it look like they're going for pretty uniform coverage already. Is there a source for the early orbital planes having a specific purpose? The earth rotates underneath each plane, and the times of day it will be available to any given ground path change over the course of a year. It does seem pretty convenient that the inclination they've chosen lines the satellites up nearly in a straight path from New York to London, but I imagine this would be relevant to many transatlantic communications.
  - Alain-lf 6y ago
    There is a purpose, but it's not HFT... It's orbital mechanics. You can't have efficient coverage of the whole planet without launching all of your satellites at fairly high inclination (>45°). There will be more satellites per area near the poles and so that's why Starlink will be available at very high (and very low) latitude before it's available at the equator.
- tuatoru 6y ago
  > It is widely believed that a huge chunk of Starlink’s revenue, if not ~all of it, will come from leasing faster-than-currently-available low latency links to HFT companies for nyc-lon and such. This is why their first orbital planes being launched are for the north atlantic and CONUS. True? I'd heard that the initial target market was passenger planes over the ocean, cruise ships, and similar maritime and aerial activity that has to use geosynchronous satellites at present. Covid-19 has thrown a spanner into the works of that plan, for a while. I'm sure people with money won't be turned away. Longer term, remembering that Musk hails from South Africa, I thought the plan was to bring internet to failed states or barely functional areas in Africa (outback Namibia/Zimbabwe/Tanzania etc) and possibly also the Americas and the Middle East).

bryanlarsen 6y ago

Starlink will has promised better latency, bandwidth and prices compared to existing satellite internet. Perhaps that's where the confusion on the first point came from.

arcticfox 6y ago
I'm really confused what is going on here. It's really baffling how someone motivated and talented enough to make such a tracking site would have such an odd opinion section. Obviously, Starlink is not the best choice in all situations, but it is so compelling on some dimensions that such a flatly negative opinion is bizarre for anyone with even a cursory understanding of what's going on.
- shaklee3 6y ago
  What dimension? It's not competitive for anyone who can get high-speed internet right now, and it's not clear if it will complete with traditional satellite in cost.
  - 2StepsOutOfLine 6y ago
    https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1272363466288820224 https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1272363466288820224
    - shaklee3 6y ago
      This is demonstrably false. Look at the YouTube video posted this week that simulated delayed. The best delay, with only hops between satellites, was 40ms or so. That didn't account for any of the higher later delays or transport network.
      - bryanlarsen 6y ago
        Good thing then that SpaceX has enough ground stations that no hops are required in the continental US.
        shaklee3 6y ago
        I'm referring to the satellite to gateway hops. There absolutely are many of those just to cross the continental US. The satellite altitude is such that it only covers a small part of CONUS before it has to have off to another satellite.
        bryanlarsen 6y ago
        Why would they use satellite hops for those? They'll just put your packet onto an internet backbone fiber. Starlink is last mile service, not backbone.
      - modeless 6y ago
ehsankia 6y ago
I don't see why it couldn't. Maybe people here are used to the top of top internet, but I've lived in many places where the best I could get was ~5mbps, with 60ms latency and 60$+. Those are very easy numbers to beat. Yes it might not beat prices and latencies for a super competitive city with true competition, but those are honestly rare and few between. The majority of north american cities have shitty internet at high prices and high latency. Also, slap this router on a Tesla car, allowing it to have connection anywhere it drives, and you're golden.

watersb 6y ago

Radio Astronomy has to deal with this, never mind the sun shades. Pervasive radio everywhere has been a growing problem in general at least since GPS.

rlt 6y ago
Since they use phased array antennas they may be able to create fairly small exclusion zones around observatories.
cryptonector 6y ago
Time to move the observatories to space. If only there was a launch platform for those.
- denkmoon 6y ago
  The only problem there is cost, upfront and ongoing. JSW is super expensive. We were very lucky Hubble wasn't a complete write off and even then the fix was very expensive. All that vs. laying down some concrete and a telescope in a remote location.
  - godelski 6y ago
    > The only problem there is cost If only there were launch platforms that could put up smaller telescopes (optical and radio). I mean you can do a lot with telescopes that are much smaller than Hubble Class or JSW. A lot of people are doing work with telescopes that are much smaller. Also, as long as frequencies and locations are published, much of this noise (not all!) can be removed. Sure, the VLA is going to have a major headache, but LIGO wouldn't exist if we didn't know how to remove noise (LIGO had to deal with noise from cars many miles away and all kinds of vibrations because it is ridiculously sensitive).
    - ISL 6y ago
      LIGO can isolate itself from seismic backgrounds, but it has no artificial gravitational-wave foregrounds. (Yes, Newtonian Noise is a concern for future generations, but it is expected to be modeled and subtracted well-enough.) Arrays like Starlink are a persistent foreground for the big radio telescopes. SKA and the like are in the Outback for a reason, but for this there is no escape.

jbuzbee 6y ago

Vey interesting analysis of Starlink coverage and latency: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m05abdGSOxY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m05abdGSOxY

sneak 6y ago

> Starlink isn't designed to offer lower latency or lower prices than existing terrestrial wired or wireless ISPs (at least, decent ones). Instead it's designed to offer a low latency wireless service in places where that has never been available at all. Which is most of the land area of the Earth, and all of the ocean. It is widely believed that a huge chunk of Starlink’s revenue, if not ~all of it, will come from leasing faster-than-currently-available low latency links to HFT companies for nyc-lon and such. This is why their first orbital planes being launched are for the north atlantic and CONUS. Providing internet to the underserved areas is secondary; the cash will come from beating terrestrial fiber links (even idealized great circle ones) between markets that are already extremely well connected. One such private low latency link between Seacaucus and LSEG will probably pay 2-5x what everyone else on the planet combined pays for internet access in underserved areas.

hooper 6y ago
The data on this map makes it look like they're going for pretty uniform coverage already. Is there a source for the early orbital planes having a specific purpose? The earth rotates underneath each plane, and the times of day it will be available to any given ground path change over the course of a year. It does seem pretty convenient that the inclination they've chosen lines the satellites up nearly in a straight path from New York to London, but I imagine this would be relevant to many transatlantic communications.
- Alain-lf 6y ago
  There is a purpose, but it's not HFT... It's orbital mechanics. You can't have efficient coverage of the whole planet without launching all of your satellites at fairly high inclination (>45°). There will be more satellites per area near the poles and so that's why Starlink will be available at very high (and very low) latitude before it's available at the equator.
tuatoru 6y ago
> It is widely believed that a huge chunk of Starlink’s revenue, if not ~all of it, will come from leasing faster-than-currently-available low latency links to HFT companies for nyc-lon and such. This is why their first orbital planes being launched are for the north atlantic and CONUS. True? I'd heard that the initial target market was passenger planes over the ocean, cruise ships, and similar maritime and aerial activity that has to use geosynchronous satellites at present. Covid-19 has thrown a spanner into the works of that plan, for a while. I'm sure people with money won't be turned away. Longer term, remembering that Musk hails from South Africa, I thought the plan was to bring internet to failed states or barely functional areas in Africa (outback Namibia/Zimbabwe/Tanzania etc) and possibly also the Americas and the Middle East).