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Few days ago I watched 'Debunking Starlink' video [0] (posted by @qsdf38100 in another thread [1] on Starlink) and it got me thinking. I am just a lay person, b

by gala8y 5y ago

Few days ago I watched 'Debunking Starlink' video [0] (posted by @qsdf38100 in another thread [1] on Starlink) and it got me thinking. I am just a lay person, but, after watching it, am not so sure if Starlink is such a good idea. [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2vuMzGhc1cg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2vuMzGhc1cg [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29975352 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29975352

ricardobeat 5y ago
Might not want to take that at face value. I skipped through most of the video but it seems like a series of thoughtless jabs. The cost estimates are way off, ignores the fact commercial launch prices are a large multiple of the actual cost, ignores economics with Starship. It handwaves the fact that Starlink orbits are so low that the satellites naturally decay in 5 years, so no permanent space trash. Comparing the addressable market (telecom alone is already 2T) to average income per capita is pointless.. I stopped there. Too much of the "i am very smart" vibe.
- schiffern 5y ago
  De-debunk: https://old.reddit.com/r/Starlink/comments/rppkb5/very_well_written_post_about_how_wrong_common/ https://old.reddit.com/r/Starlink/comments/rppkb5/very_well_... You just described all of CommonSenseSkeptic's 'debunking' content (along with his predecessor Thunderfoot, who should've stuck with creationists and Kickscammers). Lately I find the word "debunking"/"debunked" in a title is a high-reliability signal of low-quality content.
  - WithinReason 5y ago
    > De-debunk Rebunk? Anyway, Musk-hate seems to be becoming its own religion.
    - schiffern 5y ago
      Linguistically it's an awkward case. Currently, "debunked" (see also: "busted") is just the latest version of the phrase "scientists say X." The literal semantics and how it's actually used in practice are polar opposites. But "re-bunked" still sound like false information. Right now the words are mainly used as a cheap way to sound like Carl Sagan or Mythbusters without any of the deep knowledge and research. "De-debunked" IMO gets the message across, but also highlights the absurdity.
    - qsdf38100 5y ago
      How can people not hate him though? He is so full of shit and all his projects are a joke. He stole Tesla from its true founders and made it about self driving hype. He keeps making non sense claims about it and how it’s 1 year ahead. He generally can’t help coming up with more and more stupid ideas. I could just ignore him, but now everyone believes his bullshit even supposedly smart people on HN, and we keep hearing about futuristic revolution non sense such as hyper loop, underground taxi services, mars colonisation, rocket mass transportation, and now that star link is going to be a 12 in 1 techno marvel, best telescope, best gps, best internet provider, best weather instrument, a supercomputer, etc. Have no one heard about the fact that things that are to good to be true probably are? Elon seem to have achieved global alienation with his pseudo scientific scams and humanity is walking on its head supporting mars colonies and throwing 40000 satellites every 5 years, because we can. Meanwhile the earth is warming up and inequalities in the world is at its worst. But spoiled fans of grandiose science fiction (seemingly everyone) want moar of this giga star hyper AI sexy non sens. He is the Donald trump of the silicone valley, he represents everything that is wrong with the modern world. The car he sent to space was the car that was promised to Tesla true founder after he kicked him out. It was just a multi million dollar middle finger to the guy he stole from. Give me a break. Hope you enjoyed that nuanced take on the Elon situation.
      - mlindner 5y ago
        > How can people not hate him though? He is so full of shit and all his projects are a joke. I stopped here in reading your post but you're in a reality distortion field if you actually think this. Tesla and SpaceX have turned two industries on their head. And Tesla was actually in practice formed by him as the two founders were running it into the ground (Musk was there from day one as well, as chairman of the board). If you think Tesla would have succeeded without Musk, why did none of the other electrical vehicle startups then or since succeed?
        qsdf38100 5y ago
        That’s my point, other didn’t succeed because Elon alienated people with his promises of bringing the Hollywood blockbuster style future the masses dream of. It’s about time, where are the flying cars and hover boards. Why would one buy an boring car when one could have the car from the future from the man from the future. But it’s just a scam, teslas won’t drive themselves as it was promised, à la "driver is there only for legal reasons". It’s too late, the very people that got scammed are trusting his bullshit even more. No amount of facts will change their minds. Same as trump followers. He will achieve full self driving in 1 year with no lidar. He can do more with less. He can do everything with nothing. Now how will other business compete? Will they need to go full bullshit to survive? Because in the end if lots of people buy, it’s a success, right? It’s just about money, who cares about truth and facts? I think he is a terrible role model, and his "success" only proves that there’s a growing amount of people participating in a collective delusion. I’m sincerely worried.
- shaklee3 5y ago
  every credible source I've seen has shown it's not going to make financial sense. so far the returns are extremely poor, and their user adds are far from where they wanted blame the supply shortage or whatever you want, but they're paying thousands of engineers during this time, and it's not making money. I can send more links if you're interested.
  - viczsaszbo 5y ago
    Right now nobody claims it's making money. Musk himself said gen 1 is "financially weak". They have 600k+ preorders and geo satellite people are very happy with it, which is a couple million users mostly in the US just from that. With 400 satellites per launch using Starship, Starlink looks much better financially. They plan on starting to launch Starship with Starlink this year. This reasonable analysis says about 3mil subscribers are needed without factoring in Starship. https://littlebluena.substack.com/p/common-sense-skeptic-debunking-starlink-0d5 https://littlebluena.substack.com/p/common-sense-skeptic-deb...
    - shaklee3 5y ago
      starship is nowhere near ready to launch, and their Boca chica facility is now halted due to epa regulations
      - viczsaszbo 5y ago
        Actually, it is. It's expected to launch around Q2 2022. The NEPA FAA PEA is going to be decided upon on February 28th then if they get the greenlight a launch attempt will happen a couple months after that. For commercial launches, they are targeting 2023. Even if Starship gets delayed to 2023-24 it will still play a big roll in getting Starlink satellites up since they haven't started launching the gen 2 constellation yet.

by gala8y 5y ago

ricardobeat 5y ago

Might not want to take that at face value. I skipped through most of the video but it seems like a series of thoughtless jabs. The cost estimates are way off, ignores the fact commercial launch prices are a large multiple of the actual cost, ignores economics with Starship. It handwaves the fact that Starlink orbits are so low that the satellites naturally decay in 5 years, so no permanent space trash. Comparing the addressable market (telecom alone is already 2T) to average income per capita is pointless.. I stopped there. Too much of the "i am very smart" vibe.

schiffern 5y ago
De-debunk: https://old.reddit.com/r/Starlink/comments/rppkb5/very_well_written_post_about_how_wrong_common/ https://old.reddit.com/r/Starlink/comments/rppkb5/very_well_... You just described all of CommonSenseSkeptic's 'debunking' content (along with his predecessor Thunderfoot, who should've stuck with creationists and Kickscammers). Lately I find the word "debunking"/"debunked" in a title is a high-reliability signal of low-quality content.
- WithinReason 5y ago
  > De-debunk Rebunk? Anyway, Musk-hate seems to be becoming its own religion.
  - schiffern 5y ago
    Linguistically it's an awkward case. Currently, "debunked" (see also: "busted") is just the latest version of the phrase "scientists say X." The literal semantics and how it's actually used in practice are polar opposites. But "re-bunked" still sound like false information. Right now the words are mainly used as a cheap way to sound like Carl Sagan or Mythbusters without any of the deep knowledge and research. "De-debunked" IMO gets the message across, but also highlights the absurdity.
  - qsdf38100 5y ago
    How can people not hate him though? He is so full of shit and all his projects are a joke. He stole Tesla from its true founders and made it about self driving hype. He keeps making non sense claims about it and how it’s 1 year ahead. He generally can’t help coming up with more and more stupid ideas. I could just ignore him, but now everyone believes his bullshit even supposedly smart people on HN, and we keep hearing about futuristic revolution non sense such as hyper loop, underground taxi services, mars colonisation, rocket mass transportation, and now that star link is going to be a 12 in 1 techno marvel, best telescope, best gps, best internet provider, best weather instrument, a supercomputer, etc. Have no one heard about the fact that things that are to good to be true probably are? Elon seem to have achieved global alienation with his pseudo scientific scams and humanity is walking on its head supporting mars colonies and throwing 40000 satellites every 5 years, because we can. Meanwhile the earth is warming up and inequalities in the world is at its worst. But spoiled fans of grandiose science fiction (seemingly everyone) want moar of this giga star hyper AI sexy non sens. He is the Donald trump of the silicone valley, he represents everything that is wrong with the modern world. The car he sent to space was the car that was promised to Tesla true founder after he kicked him out. It was just a multi million dollar middle finger to the guy he stole from. Give me a break. Hope you enjoyed that nuanced take on the Elon situation.
    - mlindner 5y ago
      > How can people not hate him though? He is so full of shit and all his projects are a joke. I stopped here in reading your post but you're in a reality distortion field if you actually think this. Tesla and SpaceX have turned two industries on their head. And Tesla was actually in practice formed by him as the two founders were running it into the ground (Musk was there from day one as well, as chairman of the board). If you think Tesla would have succeeded without Musk, why did none of the other electrical vehicle startups then or since succeed?
      - qsdf38100 5y ago
        That’s my point, other didn’t succeed because Elon alienated people with his promises of bringing the Hollywood blockbuster style future the masses dream of. It’s about time, where are the flying cars and hover boards. Why would one buy an boring car when one could have the car from the future from the man from the future. But it’s just a scam, teslas won’t drive themselves as it was promised, à la "driver is there only for legal reasons". It’s too late, the very people that got scammed are trusting his bullshit even more. No amount of facts will change their minds. Same as trump followers. He will achieve full self driving in 1 year with no lidar. He can do more with less. He can do everything with nothing. Now how will other business compete? Will they need to go full bullshit to survive? Because in the end if lots of people buy, it’s a success, right? It’s just about money, who cares about truth and facts? I think he is a terrible role model, and his "success" only proves that there’s a growing amount of people participating in a collective delusion. I’m sincerely worried.
shaklee3 5y ago
every credible source I've seen has shown it's not going to make financial sense. so far the returns are extremely poor, and their user adds are far from where they wanted blame the supply shortage or whatever you want, but they're paying thousands of engineers during this time, and it's not making money. I can send more links if you're interested.
- viczsaszbo 5y ago
  Right now nobody claims it's making money. Musk himself said gen 1 is "financially weak". They have 600k+ preorders and geo satellite people are very happy with it, which is a couple million users mostly in the US just from that. With 400 satellites per launch using Starship, Starlink looks much better financially. They plan on starting to launch Starship with Starlink this year. This reasonable analysis says about 3mil subscribers are needed without factoring in Starship. https://littlebluena.substack.com/p/common-sense-skeptic-debunking-starlink-0d5 https://littlebluena.substack.com/p/common-sense-skeptic-deb...
  - shaklee3 5y ago
    starship is nowhere near ready to launch, and their Boca chica facility is now halted due to epa regulations
    - viczsaszbo 5y ago
      Actually, it is. It's expected to launch around Q2 2022. The NEPA FAA PEA is going to be decided upon on February 28th then if they get the greenlight a launch attempt will happen a couple months after that. For commercial launches, they are targeting 2023. Even if Starship gets delayed to 2023-24 it will still play a big roll in getting Starlink satellites up since they haven't started launching the gen 2 constellation yet.