With a lot consideration on Elon Musk’s weird Twitter adventures, it’s straightforward to neglect how briskly SpaceX’s Starlink undertaking has been shifting. In simply the previous six months, the service has launched service in 9 new international locations, a brand new service for autos, and a brand new premium tier. There’s even a spectrum combat quietly effervescent within the background. New satellites are launching usually, and the dream of a low-orbit web is just getting nearer.
That doesn’t imply the service is delivering every part it promised. Our 2021 evaluate discovered large issues with reliability — notably should you’re anyplace close to timber. A newer evaluate of the RV service was a bit of higher, nevertheless it’s clear that lots of the massive reliability points have but to be solved. Astronomers are nonetheless sad about its affect on observations, however that hasn’t slowed down any satellite tv for pc launches.
There’s one thing important taking place right here, whether or not you’re a believer or not. It’s not simply Starlink, but in addition tasks like OneWeb or Amazon’s Venture Kuiper — the entire technology of companies offering web connections by means of low-earth orbit satellites. If any of these tasks can truly make it work, it will change a number of basic info about web infrastructure.
To get into precisely why that’s totally different from the web that exists right this moment… you’ll have to observe the video.
