After giving in to Putin/Xi’s demands to not provide starlink internet service over Taiwan, DOD officials are growing nervous about trusting Elon’s Space company with our national secrets
After giving in to Putin/Xi’s demands to not provide starlink internet service over Taiwan, DOD officials are growing nervous about trusting Elon’s Space company with our national secrets
The traditional satellite internet is slow and high latency. With the Starlink approach, it is indeed an issue that the satellites need to be continuously replaced, but it does provide a superior service to the user, and combined with SpaceX often launching them “almost free” by piggybacking on free space around their customer’s payloads and not having to pay anyone for launches otherwise, it does come out cheaper than the old satellite internet.
But that’s just the technology. The fact Musk is anywhere near that project makes Starlink a liability.
The vast majority of starlink are launched on their own flights.
They get a few freebies here and there but it’s not the defining factor of their success.
The success is their reusable rockets and turning satellites into a smaller mass manufactured item amd getting economies of scale, not a giant super expensive item.