SpaceX Starlink satellites as seen from the Netherlands

[Dowly]

[ikalugin]

Yea, congratulations to Space-X.

[Jimbuna]

Coolio

[Rockstar]

You have no idea, this is just a sign of things to come. There is going to be 12,000 more launched into the night sky. And that's just ol' elon musk's property. There are others who want to send their own satellite networks. Sad as its already hard enough to find a dark sky without this crap ton of technological wizardry getting in the way.

How much more energy will be required and consumed, how much more ore, rare earth and precious metals will be excavated, how much more by-product will be produced from these launches? Just so people with no life can facebook. I guess the environment can take a back seat to this so long as everyone has internet access to rant about it.

[ikalugin]

The core market that Elon is targetting is actually the financial institutions. And the financial institutions are interested because shaving microseconds of latency on their internet connections (as Elon's space network is going to be faster than the classical trans ocean fiber cables) would earn them billions via automatic, algorithm powered trading.

So it is not even about providing cheap access to the internet for the poor nations so they could develop faster through the use of new technological means.

And to be honest I am not sure how costly those networks are in the grand scheme of things, after all modern space craft tend to serve for 5-10-15 years and we all know how long people use their gadgets before buying new ones.

[bstanko6]

Time to pull out the aluminum hats! They’re after me again!

[Rockstar]

Originally Posted by ikalugin

The core market that Elon is targetting is actually the financial institutions. And the financial institutions are interested because shaving microseconds of latency on their internet connections (as Elon's space network is going to be faster than the classical trans ocean fiber cables) would earn them billions via automatic, algorithm powered trading.

So it is not even about providing cheap access to the internet for the poor nations so they could develop faster through the use of new technological means.

And to be honest I am not sure how costly those networks are in the grand scheme of things, after all modern space craft tend to serve for 5-10-15 years and we all know how long people use their gadgets before buying new ones.

I'll tell ya this, they try to make it appear to be a kumbya moment for global internet access. But I doubt it has much to do with providing for the poor and children of the world. Hope these global warming fanboys will put their money where their mouth is and help put a stop too this. Elon simply provides what the public wants, remaining quite is no different than granting permission. I have absolutely no objection to space exploration in fact I say we need to dedicate ourselves too it. But consuming resources for 12,000 plus LEO satellites and polluting the night sky by 2027? Oh hell no.

[ikalugin]

To be honest I do not see why this is a big deal. We make 1,5b smartphones a year, this means that over the lifespan of such a system we would make over 15b or around one million smart phones per sattelite. This is ~20t of smartphones without chargers, packaging etc per satelite and it's related launch. Packaging is the core cause of waste polution in the world, smartphones include toxic components, etc while sats when decay get disposed in a nice fiery death. What is more wasteful?



But then I support the RKS's idea of creating such constelation of their own.

[Rockstar]

From the perspective of a novice astrophotographer it's big deal. Some of my most cherished memories are laying on the flightdeck at night mezmorized by the heavens above and the amount of light it produced. These days with the amount of light pollution and now the prospect of 12,000 plus satellites cluttering the sky we are missing out on a lot.

[ikalugin]

Originally Posted by Rockstar

From the perspective of a novice astrophotographer it's big deal. Some of my most cherished memories are laying on the flightdeck at night mezmorized by the heavens above and the amount of light it produced. These days with the amount of light pollution and now the prospect of 12,000 plus satellites cluttering the sky we are missing out on a lot.

Well then you have a special interest in this matter


Plus if you live in the city light pollution is probably a more important factor than dusk/dawn effects of moving sats.

[Platapus]

Originally Posted by Rockstar

How much more energy will be required and consumed, how much more ore, rare earth and precious metals will be excavated, how much more by-product will be produced from these launches? Just so people with no life can facebook. I guess the environment can take a back seat to this so long as everyone has internet access to rant about it.

Posted on an Internets Forum...


jus sayin