Mastodawn

Any journalists want to write an article about all the environmental costs of the more than 10,000 Starlinks that are now in orbit? All I'm seeing are breathless articles mindlessly worshiping That Awful Billionaire for crossing the 10,000 satellite mark.

Every single one of those will come down in an uncontrolled reentry. That's a lot of metal in the atmosphere, and a lot of dice-rolling to see if any more pieces will make it to the ground.

SpaceX is truly awful.

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Drew 🇵🇭 ♾️1d ago

@sundogplanets SpaceX - or rather #Starlink - is my lifeline, and the lifeline of many thousands of others living in a rural location with no proper broadband service. #Spacex may be "awful" but it has improved my quality of life immeasurably.

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Joe Vinegar

@drewtowler @sundogplanets I'm sympathetic with you. Makes sense from your personal viewpoint. I've two doubts.
Bad take: does it make sense to pollute the atmosphere at global scale to bring connectivity in rural areas, if we balance the improved quality of life of the few benefiting against literally the rest of mankind (to be specist)? An utilitarian and an individualist would have no doubts. I have a preference too but I don't think it's ok to abandon rural areas and minority conditions in general.
So, the second doubt:
how much would it cost to bring 5G equivalent connectivity even to remote places? Is it really more expensive than the satellite system? Even without accounting for the negative externalities? And accounting for them? and even if it were, wouldn't it be the only ethical choice (albeit expensive)?

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Drew 🇵🇭 ♾️1d ago

@joe_vinegar @sundogplanets First point, it's definitely not OK to abandon rural areas, in my view it's about time they were given special focus after so many years of neglect - so I *think* we agree on that one.
Second point, I have no idea, but when you live where I do, it would require a lot of helicopters to place a hell of a lot of towers. The hills and valleys here are more crinkled than used aluminium foil, and communities are tiny and isolated, sometimes with access only by horse.