3 ms·

Once fully deployed, you'll have the same connectivity in the remotest wilderness as you do from your living room. Apple already has the Emergency SOS [1] feat

Once fully deployed, you'll have the same connectivity in the remotest wilderness as you do from your living room. Apple already has the Emergency SOS [1] feature for sending texts from remote locations in emergencies. This SpaceX service will start with something similar and grow to indistinguishable phone service. Coverage might be a little slow so maybe your youtube playlist will have a bit of buffering while you wait for your rescuers. https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT213426 https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT213426

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
marssaxman 3y ago
> Once fully deployed, you'll have the same connectivity in the remotest wilderness as you do from your living room. What a dismal prospect that would be. Why bother going at all? Might as well plug ourselves into those bio-pods from the Matrix and be done with it.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- andrewmunsell 3y ago
  There's always the option to turn off your phone entirely, leave it at home, or simply buy a dumb phone incapable of using these new satellite features. There's always going to be that one person blasting music in the wilderness, just because some people want to be disconnected doesn't mean we should eschew progress towards tech that can save peoples' lives.
  - marssaxman 3y ago
    > turn off your phone entirely, leave it at home, or simply buy a dumb phone It's not the same; that's just play-acting, and one will not be able to pretend one doesn't know that.
- grecy 3y ago
  > Why bother going at all? I've been exploring the most remote corners of the planet for over a decade now, and while I understand what you're saying, constant connectivity is not a problem if you don't want it to be. I personally don't have a phone, and I prefer not to have "comms" when I go out. I want to be in the wilderness, not connected. So what I do is carry a turned off sat communicator tucked away safely in my "go bag". If something ever goes badly wrong (worse than it has so far), it will save my life. Totally worth it.
ianburrell 3y ago
Starlink Direct-to-cell will not have the bandwidth for "indistinguishable phone service" unless you are still using a 2G dumb phone. The bandwidth is 7 Mbps per cell and each cell cover thousands to millions of people. Which means that each phone will have 20-100 kbps, enough for voice and some data. But not enough to even load the Youtube page.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

marssaxman 3y ago

> Once fully deployed, you'll have the same connectivity in the remotest wilderness as you do from your living room. What a dismal prospect that would be. Why bother going at all? Might as well plug ourselves into those bio-pods from the Matrix and be done with it.

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
andrewmunsell 3y ago
There's always the option to turn off your phone entirely, leave it at home, or simply buy a dumb phone incapable of using these new satellite features. There's always going to be that one person blasting music in the wilderness, just because some people want to be disconnected doesn't mean we should eschew progress towards tech that can save peoples' lives.
- marssaxman 3y ago
  > turn off your phone entirely, leave it at home, or simply buy a dumb phone It's not the same; that's just play-acting, and one will not be able to pretend one doesn't know that.
grecy 3y ago
> Why bother going at all? I've been exploring the most remote corners of the planet for over a decade now, and while I understand what you're saying, constant connectivity is not a problem if you don't want it to be. I personally don't have a phone, and I prefer not to have "comms" when I go out. I want to be in the wilderness, not connected. So what I do is carry a turned off sat communicator tucked away safely in my "go bag". If something ever goes badly wrong (worse than it has so far), it will save my life. Totally worth it.

ianburrell 3y ago

Starlink Direct-to-cell will not have the bandwidth for "indistinguishable phone service" unless you are still using a 2G dumb phone. The bandwidth is 7 Mbps per cell and each cell cover thousands to millions of people. Which means that each phone will have 20-100 kbps, enough for voice and some data. But not enough to even load the Youtube page.