Government has given hundreds of billions in broadband funding to the giant telecoms and cable for ages for absolute nada [EDIT, 1]. The clients I put in Starli

Government has given hundreds of billions in broadband funding to the giant telecoms and cable for ages for absolute nada [EDIT, 1]. The clients I put in Starlink for last year had a 10 meg connection for which they were charged hundreds of dollars per month and were fortunate since a mile away it was 56k modem of HughesNet or nothing. It's really good tech. I've been hearing promises and aspirations about fiber for like 17 fucking years. I can completely believe that in designing and putting into being a brand new network like that SpaceX has misjudged cell density vs satellite density and capabilities in areas and let the average speeds fall. But given what they're doing and the (non)alternatives I'd be a lot happier if there was some leeway to bring that back up and see how v2 comes out. Funding very promising technology that is aggressively trying to ramp hard and has a clear 1-3 year horizon is precisely the sort of thing government should do after all their failures up until now. And there are others less well off within a hundred miles who were hoping to get Starlink if the monthly cost could be brought down by this program. And Starlink aren't assholes like the incumbent players either. No datacaps, zero billing crap with surprise charges or fees, no port blocking, no bullshit in general. Of course more speed would be better, but that should be worth something too vs theoretically faster connections that then punish or restrict. Bottom line: I don't think these $886 million now going elsewhere are going to benefit even a single person up here near the Canadian border in the next few years. Fiber is still not going to appear here. The border is over 3000 miles long. In contrast Starlink can do something now (if you look at the Starlink map [0], there are very few filled cells in northern New England or northern Midwest/Pacific West up near Canada), and has the real promise of doing better. Now that will be harder, and I do not believe anything better is going to come of it for any of us in that time frame. If fiber comes in 2028 wonderful, Starlink could be cancelled then. That's a long time though to still be on 56k/HEOsat. To sibling comments talking crap like "do you work for SpaceX" if you wish to volunteer and come up to lay fiber for us right fucking now by all means. ---- 0: https://www.starlink.com/map https://www.starlink.com/map 1: I'm editing in response to tyrfing below because I suspect I'll hit the HN reply speed cap sometime shortly. This got tons of coverage in the 00s in particular but has fallen away over time as these things tend to. I had a bunch bookmarked at one point from old /. stories and the like and actual paper books but all the sites now seem to be dead. Here's a more recent one though that seems to cover the gist and could be a place to start for more: "The Book Of Broken Promises: $400 Billion Broadband Scandal" https://www.huffpost.com/entry/the-book-of-broken-promis_b_5839394 https://www.huffpost.com/entry/the-book-of-broken-promis_b_5...