Musk's Starlink Continues To Struggle With Very Basic Customer Service

from the this-is-not-what-innovation-looks-like dept

We've noted a few times that Elon Musk's Starlink satellite broadband service is going to have a hard time meeting expectations. One, while the service is often sold as a near-magical cure for the estimated 20-42 million Americans without broadband access, it only has the capacity to serve somewhere between 500,000 and 800,000 users. Due to additional supply chain issues, only about 150,000 users have received access so far. And those who've paid the company $100 to wait in line say the company is incapable of giving them any kind of timeline of when they can expect service.

Last fall, reports emerged showing how many of these users had been waiting months for any update whatsoever on the progress of their orders, and that Starlink customer service was utterly nonexistent. Nearly four months later and another report indicates that things haven't seemingly improved much. Customers who've been waiting a year for service say they've seen complete and total radio silence from the company:

"Insider spoke to more than ten people who have waited nearly 12 months for Starlink's internet service. However, they have received no updates from Elon Musk's company on when Starlink will be available in their area and if the kit is on its way."

Much like Musk's Tesla solar division, and Tesla itself on occasion, installations, repairs, and fundamental customer service are often no shows. You're apparently supposed to pretend this isn't happening for innovation's sake, but there's little use for innovation for products that don't work, or simply never arrive. In Starlink's case, users who've ordered see absolutely no contact for Starlink for a year, then when they ask for refunds that doesn't go much better:

"Jason Kirkpatrick, who is based in Michigan, told Insider that he paid $100 to secure Starlink in March but decided to request a refund in December because of the lack of contact from SpaceX. Kirkpatrick said that when he logs onto his Starlink account, it says his deposit was refunded. However, he said he never got the money back, adding that he can't get through to SpaceX to alert them of the issue."

As with many issues at Musk's companies, these problems could be mitigated if it had an actual PR department willing to discuss what's going on with the press and public. But motivated by Musk's animosity to the press, the general response to inquiries is usually snark by Musk or dead silence by the company, which doesn't add much to the overall ambiance of dysfunction. Again, you'll notice a bit of a pattern if you've read about the experiences of Tesla solar customers, where the company's response has generally been either apathy or silence.

As for Starlink, I imagine more disappointment lays over the horizon. Starlink's inability to offer service to more than 500-800k subscribers depends greatly on the success of the Space X's Raptor engine, a development process that's not going well. If Starlink can't boost its capacity dramatically it can't gain the kind of critical mass necessary to make a profit, something that even the reality-challenged Musk has been forced to acknowledge. This is before you even get to the whole light pollution scientists say is being caused by Starlink deployments.

The problems are one of several reasons why folks complained when the Trump FCC threw nearly one billion in subsidies at Starlink, despite both Musk's professed disdain for subsidization, and the fact the service -- even if everything goes perfectly well, will barely put a dent in the U.S. broadband problem. Again, 20-42 million Americans lack access to broadband, and another 83 million live under a monopoly (usually Comcast). Fixing that problem is going to take a lot more than just a capacity-constrained, delay-plagued solution from a company that's heralded for innovation but seemingly can't answer the phone.

Filed Under: broadband, competition, customer support, elon musk, expectations, satellite broadband, starlink
Companies: spacex, starlink

Chip Shortages Mar Starlink's Long-Awaited Exit From Beta

from the potentially-undercooked dept

Elon Musk's Starlink has finally exited beta, but chip shortages may mar the low-orbit broadband satellite venture's big day. The company has technically stopped calling Starlink a beta product, but warns in a new FAQ on its website that users expecting shipments of their new satellite dishes may be waiting a while:

"Silicon shortages have delayed production which has impacted our ability to fulfill orders. Please visit your Account page for the most recent estimate on when you can expect your order to be fulfilled.”

Over 500,000 users have signed up for the broadband service which delivers speeds of 100 Mbps or more for $100 a month (plus a $500 first month equipment charge). Users who had signed up for the service were already complaining that Starlink often just doesn't respond to customer support inquiries asking when a user's dish will ship, and this was before chip shortages entered the picture. There was also another Starlink website bug revealed this week that pushed back user pre-order dates by a year or more if they made tiny account changes.

Early reviews of the service have also been decidedly mixed, with complaints about line of sight and sporadic outages.

Starlink has consistently been heralded as a potential solution for the U.S.' broadband competition problem, but capacity and physics mean the service's overall reach was always going to be limited. Even Musk, who has a propensity to oversell his products, has acknowledged that the service won't be able to offer service in most densely populated urban and suburban areas. In other words, U.S. monopolies aren't sweating Starlink's entry into the market.

Early, pre-chip shortage estimates suggest that Starlink will struggle to deliver service to somewhere between 500,000 and 800,000 users, with many of those spots likely gobbled up by Musk fans. The service's $600 first month price point is also out of reach for the millions of Americans who can't afford broadband. With up to 42 million Americans without broadband access -- and another 83 million living under a monopoly -- even Starlink's maximum potential impact (which assumes the company can remain financially viable) will barely put a dent in the problem.

So yeah, Starlink will be a very good thing if you can get it, can afford it, and have no other options. But actually getting it will likely prove tricky for many. That's why there was some annoyance at the FCC throwing millions of dollars in subsidies at the planet's richest man for a service even he acknowledges many be tricky to keep financially viable over the longer haul.

Filed Under: broadband, chip shortages, competition, satellite, starlink
Companies: spacex, starlink

Survey Suggests Eager Starlink Users Don't Understand Service Will Have Limited Reach

from the good-luck-with-that dept

So we've noted more than a few times that while Elon Musk's Starlink will be a good thing if you can actually get and afford the service, it's going to have a decidedly small impact on the broadband industry as a whole. Between 20 and 42 million Americans lack access to broadband entirely, 83 million live under a monopoly, and tens of millions more are stuck under a duopoly (usually your local cable company and a regional, apathetic phone company). In turn, Starlink is going to reach somewhere between 300,000 to 800,000 subscribers in its first few years, a drop in the overall bucket.

Thanks to massive frustration with broadband market failure (and the high prices, dubious quality, and poor customer service that results), users are decidedly excited about something new. But not only are there limited slots due to limited capacity and physics, a lot of those slots are going to get gobbled up by die-hard Elon Musk fans excited to affix Starlink dishes to their boats, RVs, and Cybertrucks. As a result it will be extremely unlikely that most users who truly need the improved option will absolutely be able to get it.

But a new PC Magazine survey continues to make it clear that most consumers don't quite understand they'll never actually have the option (especially if they live in a major metro market):

Starlink is expected to come out of beta next month for a broader commercial launch, and has seen 600,000 orders so far. But many of the customers who have signed up say getting a status update from Starlink customer service is effectively impossible. While major Wall Street analysts like Craig Moffett estimate the service may be able to scale to 6 million users over a period of many years, he also notes that guess is extremely optimistic, and will require a significantly updated fleet of 42,000 satellites to achieve.

This all assumes that Starlink will remain financially viable as it works toward that goal, something that's not really guaranteed in a low-orbit satellite industry that has a history of major failures. And there will be questions about throttling and other restrictions once the network gets fully loaded with hungry users. Again, Starlink will be great for off the grid folks if they can get -- and afford -- it, but I suspect there's going to be some heartache when folks excited about the service realize the limitations of its actual reach. And this scarcity is only going to drive even greater interest in a service you probably won't be able to get anytime soon.

Filed Under: competition, satellite broadband, starlink, survey
Companies: spacex, starlink

Musk's Starlink Pre-Order Subscribers Say Customer Service Is A No Show

from the innovative-to-a-point dept

The narrative du jour is that Elon Musk's companies are just so damn innovative that they don't have to adhere to basic norms. His companies don't need a functioning PR department, for example, because Musk is just so damn charming on Twitter. As you may have noticed, this narrative isn't always particularly accurate.

Take Starlink, Musk's attempt to disrupt telecom with low orbit satellites providing pretty impressive broadband speeds. The service remains in beta, and because there's limited satellite capacity (an unfortunate side effect of physics), it won't be able to provide service to more than say 500-800k subscribers for some time (for scale: 42 million lack broadband and 83 million live under a broadband monopoly). So needless to say, those slots are going to be relatively precious for folks out of the reach of traditional broadband who'll genuinely be helped by having a new option.

The service, which provides speeds sometimes faster than 100 Mbps (at least on non-commercial beta network) costs $100 a month, plus a $500 equipment fee. But the users who say they plunked down $100 early this year aren't receiving any communication from the company... at all. Attempts to inquire where they are in the process or when they'll get a working satellite broadband terminal wind up being thrown into a void:

"The Starlink app doesn't have a customer service option for people with deposits, said Corey Gordon, who is based in Alberta, Canada, and paid 129 Canadian dollars ($103) for the deposit in May. "I have left a couple of detailed voicemails on an answering service at SpaceX over a month ago and still have heard nothing," he told Insider.

Reviews for the service have been decidedly mixed, though updated hardware and satellites may help mitigate many of these early complaints. Still, early adopters are, understandably, a little perplexed at why a company that designs rocket ships can't answer basic email inquiries:

"If they can send a rocket to space, why can't they figure out how to provide customer service?" he said. A deployment map would be useful to check when to expect Starlink, he added."

Granted dodgy customer service for Musk-owned companies isn't all that uncommon, especially if you spend more than twenty seconds looking at customer experiences with Tesla's rooftop solar system installations. As for Starlink, the service has already signed up 500,000 users, and it will take several years before it's able to provide service to many more than that. With so many Musk fans jockeying for those remaining slots, things could get very Lord of The Flies-esque in short order. And that's before you get to supply chain issues or potential congestion problems on a fully launched and loaded network.

Regardless, it's odd that the Musk companies' reputation for boundless innovation apparently often doesn't apply to customer service. Or a functioning PR department capable of explaining why such an innovative company can't seem to design a basic, working, automated confirmation system for Starlink subscribers.

Filed Under: customer service, elon musk, starlink
Companies: spacex, starlink

Amazon, Space X Throw Hissy Fits As They Bicker Over Government Contracts, Subsidies

from the nobody-wins dept

We've noted a few times that the Space X, Starlink satellite broadband service isn't going to be quite as disruptive to telecom as many people might think.

For one, capacity constraints mean that the company will only be able to serve somewhere between 500,000 and 800,000 subscribers in the first few years. That's a drop in the bucket when you consider 42 million Americans don't have broadband, and 83 million live under a monopoly (usually Comcast). Once Musk fanboys flock to limited subscriber slots to outfit their boats and RVs, there likely may not be many left for those that genuinely need access. And at $100 per month (plus a $500 equipment cost) the service doesn't really help with the primary reason for low broadband adoption: high costs.

Starlink, like a lot of what Musk does, is really about other things. One, to help drive up company value via press excitement (like that recent dancing robot vaporware). Two, to help subsidize Space X's other space ventures (Starlink recently courted controversy for nabbing nearly $900 million in FCC funds to serve a few parking lots and traffic medians). Other companies have the same idea as they try to hoover up government subsidies and nab lucrative contracts, which is why we've been seeing a significant boost in hissy fits between companies like Space X, Amazon, and ViaSat.

ViaSat has been trying to derail Space X by (accurately if not self-servingly) pointing out the company's low-orbit satellites may pose environmental and light pollution threats. Amazon has also been ramping up its verbal assault on Space X and Starlink, claiming the company's plan to launch updated low-orbit satellites violates FCC rules. In filings this week with the FCC, Amazon lamented the fact that when it comes to Starlink and Space X, rules often just don't apply:

"Whether it is launching satellites with unlicensed antennas, launching rockets without approval, building an unapproved launch tower, or re-opening a factory in violation of a shelter-in-place order, the conduct of SpaceX and other Musk-led companies makes their view plain: rules are for other people, and those who insist upon or even simply request compliance are deserving of derision and ad hominem attacks.

While Amazon, like ViaSat, is absolutely engaged in self-serving behavior here (it doesn't want competition, wants government subsidies and contracts for itself, isn't much of a fan of regulatory authority, etc.), that doesn't mean it's not true. The Trump administration for example twisted itself into pretzels to throw hundreds of millions of dollars in subsidies at Starlink for broadband coverage promises that made no coherent sense. But when it comes to the light pollution both Starlink and soon Amazon are creating (something researchers say can't be fully mitigated), U.S. regulators are just completely asleep at the wheel.

Amazon's specific complaints in their latest filings focus on claims that Space X is violating FCC rules governing inconsistent and incomplete applications, and has redesigned several antenna arrays "clandestinely." The company then whined to the FCC that when you point out the company's tendency to play fast and loose with government rules, Space X acts like a brat:

"Try to hold a Musk-led company to flight rules? You’re “fundamentally broken.” Try to hold a Musk-led company to health and safety rules? You’re “unelected & ignorant." Try to hold a Musk-led company to U.S. securities laws? You’ll be called many names, some too crude to repeat. In the words of the Wall Street Journal, Elon Musk wages a “War on Regulators,” the public servants charged with uniformly applying the same rules to all. As the Journal reported, “Federal agencies say [Musk is] breaking the rules and endangering people . . . . Rather than engaging in a give-and-take with government authorities, Mr. Musk’s default response includes making public, sometimes crude, remarks via Twitter disparaging them."

Of course Amazon's sudden concern about regulatory authority is highly performative as a company that routinely enjoys tap dancing around regulatory obligations and rules when it suits it (like say its union busting). But again, that doesn't mean it's wrong that Space X is also terrible in this particular arena. Because Space X doesn't deem it necessary to have a functioning PR department, the best you get in response to Amazon's allegations is often just... more Musk tweeting:

Starlink is currently in beta and will likely launch next year. Amazon's comparable low-orbit satellite broadband service isn't expected to go live until 2023. While both services will provide users with an additional option for broadband access, limited capacity and physics means it will be some time before either has the impact their billionaire owners promised, assuming both projects can remain financially viable that long (the low-orbit satellite market is a historical highway of failures). Honestly, at least in terms of broadband access, it remains utterly uncertain if any of this endless drama is going to actually be worth it.

Filed Under: competition, elon musk, fcc, jeff bezos, low earth orbit, satellite broadband, spectrum, starlink
Companies: amazon, spacex, starlink, viasat

FCC Blocks Elon Musk From Getting Millions In Subsidies For Delivering Broadband To Traffic Medians

from the actually-paying-attention dept

Late last year consumer group Free Press released a report showing how numerous broadband providers had been gaming the FCC's RDOF (Rural Digital Opportunity Fund) subsidy program to get money they didn't really deserve. The program doles out roughly $9.2 billion in subsidies paid for by money paid by consumers into the Universal Service Fund (USF). The study clearly showed that during the last RDOF auction a long list of ISPs gamed the system to gain millions in subsidies to deliver broadband to areas that didn't make any coherent sense.

This ISP, for example, nabbed millions of dollars to deploy service to places that already had it -- like five feet outside of Apple's $5 billion new campus. Elon Musk's Starlink also managed to nab $886 million in subsidies to deploy broadband service to places like airport parking lots and traffic medians.

The whole mess was just completely ignored by previous FCC Boss Ajit "what broadband competition problem" Pai. After months of withering criticism from numerous fronts, the FCC under interim boss Jessica Rosenworcel has stepped up and fired off letters to several of the worst offenders, giving them a second chance to apply for funding with proposals that actually serve the public interest:

"The Federal Communications Commission told SpaceX and other companies on Monday that the billions in rural broadband subsidies it doled out last year can’t be used in already connected areas like “parking lots and well-served urban areas,” citing complaints. The commission, in an effort to “clean up” its subsidy auction program, offered the companies a chance to rescind their funding requests from areas that already have service."

Granted the problems with the RDOF subsidy process is just one small part of a much bigger problem. For years the government has doled out billions of dollars to telecom giants for fiber networks they then routinely half deploy. Inaccurate maps and availability data then mar the process further, obscuring not only the lack of access (up to 42 million Americans still can't access broadband) but the way a lack of overall competition harms consumers and raises rates (83 million Americans live under a broadband monopoly).

Thanks to the immense political influence giant telecom providers have over Congress and regulators, efforts to improve the entire mess comes glacially, when they come at all. That's not to ignore the huge benefit subsidies can have on less affluent and disconnected areas of the country when applied correctly, but, for decades now, regional monopolies have dictated US telecom policy. And the result has generally what you'd expect: namely billions in pointless tax breaks and subsidies thrown at companies like AT&T in exchange for layoffs, pipe dreams, and perpetually half completed networks.

Filed Under: ajit pai, broadband, competition, elon musk, fcc, jessica rosenworcel, rdof, rural digital opportunity fund, starlink, subsidies, usf
Companies: spacex, starlink

Judge Shoots Down ViaSat's Quest To Stall Starlink Launches

from the star-wars dept

For a few years, scientific researchers have warned that Elon Musk's Starlink low orbit satellite broadband constellations are harming scientific research. Simply, the light pollution Musk claimed would never happen in the first place is making it far more difficult to study the night sky, a problem researchers say can be mitigated somewhat but not eliminated. Another problem is there are simply so many low orbit satellites being launched, the resulting space junk is creating navigation hazards. US regulators, so far, have done little to nothing about either problem.

Enter ViaSat, which clearly isn't keen on having its captive business market disrupted by new competition. Back in January, the company urged the FCC to conduct an environmental review of SpaceX’s low-orbit Starlink constellation, arguing that the fledgling system poses environmental hazards in space and on Earth. Since the 80s, satellite systems have had a baked in exemption from the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), excluding their businesses from environmental review. But the sheer scale of what Starlink and Amazon are doing (more than 50,000 low orbit satellites in orbit) should change that equation, ViaSat argues:

"...given the sheer quantity of satellites at issue here, as well as the unprecedented nature of SpaceX’s treatment of them as effectively expendable, the potential environmental harms associated with SpaceX’s proposed modification are significant,” the company stated.

“Relying on the Commission’s decades-old categorical exemption to avoid even inquiring into the environmental consequences of SpaceX’s modification proposal would not only violate NEPA, but also would needlessly jeopardize the environmental, aesthetic, health, safety, and economic interests that it seeks to protect, and harm the public interest,” Viasat continued."

The thing is, ViaSat is most certainly only really interested in its own revenues here, even if the concerns it's pushing are legitimate ones. But after petitioning for change saw no reaction at the FCC, ViaSat sued the agency last May, demanding a pause of Starlink satellite broadband deployments. This week, judges made it clear that wasn't going to happen. Though the court's order (pdf) did grant a motion to expedite the appeal, which should speed up the legal feud somewhat.

The FCC and Space X have largely been aligned on this issue, insistent that any environmental harms can be mitigated. Space X, meanwhile, quite correctly notes that ViaSat's environmental concerns are likely performative and its arguments not entirely consistent:

"Viasat's newfound environmentalism is belied by its actions at every turn. Viasat failed to raise any environmental concerns in connection with any other satellite authorization, including SpaceX's authorization to operate Starlink satellites at a different altitude and its prior request (nearly identical to the one at issue here) to lower many of those satellites. To the contrary, Viasat—a non-US licensee that has previously sought to escape Commission regulation altogether—ultimately relies on "competitive harm" to support its stay request. But stifling competition and protecting profits is not what NEPA is about."

But again, ViaSat is correct that the concerns about space junk and light pollution are legitimate ones that aren't being taken particularly seriously at the FCC. But the solution to that problem likely isn't going to come at the hands of a company predominately and transparently only looking out for its own best interests.

The FCC under both Trump and Biden has been very eager to give Musk's Starlink pretty much anything it wants, including some extremely dubious subsidies. All of this favorable treatment and subsidization comes despite the fact Starlink isn't going to have quite the innovative impact many assume. As noted previously, the service will only have the capacity to reach 400 to 800,000 subscribers in its first few years (a max of 6 million several years from now), a small drop in the bucket when you consider upwards of 42 million Americans lack broadband access, and another 83 million live under a broadband monopoly.

So there are still legitimate questions here about whether Starlink will really be worth the cost(s), and whether Starlink will be able to remain financially viable (the majority of past efforts on this front have not). And while a self-interested competitor like ViaSat may have been the wrong messenger for worries about space junk and light pollution, the concerns themselves likely aren't going anywhere.

Filed Under: broadband, competition, fcc, light pollution, satellite broadband, space pollution, starlink
Companies: spacex, starlink, viasat

Starlink Reviews Show The Limitations Of Musk's Broadband Play

from the do-not-pass-go,-do-not-collect-$200 dept

So we've already noted several times that while Elon Musk's Starlink internet broadband service will be a great thing for folks certainly out of the range of existing broadband options, it's not going to be the massive disruption many people assume. For one thing, the service is only going to serve around 800,000 subscribers in a country where up to 42 million Americans lack broadband access and another 83 million consumers live under a broadband monopoly. So even at the high-end, extremely optimistic, longer term goal of 6 million total Starlink subscribers, we're talking about a small dent in a very big problem.

Another problem is that for many of America's underserved populations, the real issue is cost. And given its $500 initial down payment for hardware, and $100 monthly price tag, the service is going to be well out of range for many folks who really need it. That said, if you can actually get it, and actually afford it, and currently have no access to fixed line service, it's going to be an upgrade. Probably, anyway.

New reviews at outlets like The Verge have taken some additional bloom off the rose, noting that line of sight and other technical issues are marring the service, at least during its current, ongoing 10,000 user beta. Says The Verge's Nilay Patel:

"Starlink, a new satellite internet service from SpaceX, is a spectacular technical achievement that might one day do all of these things. But right now it is also very much a beta product that is unreliable, inconsistent, and foiled by even the merest suggestion of trees."

Throughout the review, Patel makes it clear these problems aren't small potatoes:

"I am going to emphasize the line-of-sight requirement, since it is crucial to understanding what Starlink can and cannot do right now, and it’s an important reality check on what it might be able to do in the future. Like the similarly over-hyped mmWave 5G, Starlink is remarkably delicate. Even a single tree blocking the dish’s line of sight to the horizon will degrade and interrupt your Starlink signal. Whatever satellite internet dreams you may have will run crashing into this reality until you can literally rise above."

It's likely things will improve, but even at max capacity (see above) we're talking limited impact. It's clear Musk is mostly interested in using Starlink to fund and market Space X, even though he's acknowledged that profitability will be difficult and the low orbit satellite broadband market is paved with failure. There's also that whole polluting the night sky and derailing scientific research both Musk and US regulators seem largely apathetic to. So this system, while promising and assuming it survives, will impact business interests (shipping, nautical) far more than residential broadband.

That said, Patel's review of Starlink does something tech coverage of broadband often doesn't do: he clearly acknowledges that US broadband is a busted and uncompetitive market thanks to decades of failed US telecom policy. He then uses that historical context to properly frame the potential promise Starlink offers:

"Starlink also represents something else: the American telecom policy establishment’s long-standing, almost religious belief that consumers are best served by something called “facility-based competition.” Starlink is a new facility for accessing the internet, one that does not rely on existing infrastructure. “Facility-based competition,” telecom lobbyists feverishly whisper while handing out their dirty, sweat-stained checks in Congress. “That is the American way.”

AMERICAN BROADBAND POLICY STINKS, AND WE ALL PAY TOO MUCH MONEY FOR SLOW SPEEDS AND TERRIBLE CUSTOMER SERVICE Of course, the only thing a decades-long commitment to “facility-based competition” has brought to most Americans is… a total lack of competition. Reality, as I have said, is quite irritating.

(By contrast, in Europe, where the prevailing philosophy is called “service-based competition,” large incumbent providers are required to lease fiber access to competitors and there is a thriving market for internet access with much lower prices for much faster speeds. If the United States were in Europe, it would have the most expensive broadband in the region.)"

FCC data has long shown that open access networks (where multiple ISPs compete over a single, centralized fiber network) results in better, faster, cheaper service. But because that would bring competition to regional monopolies, we've never really embraced that approach. We did try to hack together some flavor of line sharing as part of the 1996 Telecom Act, but it was dismantled by telecom lobbyists before the ink was even try, resulting in an absolute bloodbath for smaller broadband providers.

Which brings us to the most important thing: the reality is you're just not going to fix US broadband dysfunction with spit, innovation, and elbow grease. That's because what's driving US broadband dysfunction is two major things: extremely politically powerful regional telecom monopolies (most of which are tied directly into our intelligence gathering apparatus, shielding them from accountability), and the state and federal corruption that protects this broken mess. Innovative tech can help, but it's not going to truly get to the root of the problem because the problem is human ethical failure, not technical.

For decades, telecom monopoly lobbyists have argued that you don't need functional FCC or FTC regulatory oversight of telecom -- or pro-competition policies that disrupt monopolization -- because a miracle technology is waiting in the wings to fix everything. Back during the big deregulation push in the early aughts, broadband over powerline (BPL) was hyped as a holy grail. Former FCC boss Mike Powell (now a top cable lobbyist) told anyone who'd listen that his decision to deregulate lumbering telecom monopolies was wonderful, because BPL would act as a competitive layer that would fix everything.

But BPL wound up being aninterference prone mess. And instead of telecom Utopia as promised, we just saw regional monopolies double down on the same bad behavior, now free of both functional regulatory oversight and competition.

These days it's 5G that's being treated as a miracle market panacea, despite the fact that 5G isn't a competitive silver bullet either for a number of reasons we've well explored. The real solution to improving U.S. broadband involves driving as much residential fiber to homes as possible, regardless of whether that's the private sector or community broadband

That's not to say 5G and Starlink can't help! But again, the problem at this point is incompetent and corrupt policymakers on the state and federal level. Policymakers in mindless sway to monopolists. We could have delivered fiber to every home in America several times over by now for less than AT&T spent on its bungled AT&T Time Warner merger. We don't do that not because it's all that expensive and hard, but because this would upset dominant regional monopolies that effectively own US broadband policy and despise anything even resembling real world competition.

Filed Under: competition, satellite broadband, starlink
Companies: spacex, starlink

Annoyance Builds At Elon Musk Getting A Billion In Subsidies For Starlink Broadband

from the not-really-helping dept

So we've noted a few times how Elon Musk's Starlink is going to be a great thing for folks stuck out of reach of traditional broadband options. Though with a $600 first month price tag ($100 monthly bill and $500 hardware charge) it's not some magic bullet for curing the "digital divide." And without the capacity to service more densely populated areas, the service is only going to reach several million rural Americans. That's a good start, but it's only going to make a tiny dent for the 42 million Americans that lack access to any broadband, or the 83 million currently stuck under a broadband monopoly (usually Comcast). Starlink is going to be a good thing, but not transformative or truly disruptive to US telecom monopolies.

There are a few other issues with the tech as well. One is the creation of light pollution that's harming scientific research (which US regulators have absolutely no plan to mitigate). Then there's the fact that Musk's Starlink recently gamed the broken FCC auction process to nab nearly a billion dollars it doesn't really deserve. Consumer group Free press did a good job breaking down how we're throwing a billion dollars at the second richest man on the planet via an FCC RDOF auction that's very broken, and by proxy easily exploitable by clever companies:

"But lest I be accused of West-Coast bias, here’s a parking lot outside the Pentagon, where Elon Musk’s Starlink is getting scarce ratepayer funds to offer his “coming soon” satellite service, one that he’s previously said was intended to bring broadband to the hardest-to-reach rural areas. Apparently Uncle Sam wants you to pay for completely unnecessary satellite-internet service to an urban parking lot a few feet from one of the most connected properties on the planet.

Again there's really no reason to be subsidizing Musk here. Especially for somebody that has lots of deep thoughts on stuff like "socialism." Needless to say, there's a growing roster of companies and broadband co-ops that also aren't particularly keen on Elon Musk getting money that could be going to truly struggling local broadband providers, many of which operate on highly restrictive budgets, and are deploying actual fiber connections:

"SpaceX’s broadband-from-orbit “is a completely unproven technology,” said Jim Matheson, chief executive officer of the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association, which has members that vied for the funding. “Why use that money for a science experiment?"

I think it's less about the tech not working (early beta reports are pretty great), and more about not throwing a billion dollars at a billionaire for a low orbit satellite technology that's both inferior to fiber, and easily funded by Musk without the government's help. To get money from the government, Musk's Starlink promised it could deliver 100 Mbps to each consumer. And while users on the largely empty network are seeing those speeds, another report this week suggested they'd probably never hit that benchmark for most users:

"Boiled down further, the study estimates that 56% of SpaceX's RDOF locations in a "low capacity" use case (average data usage of 15.3 Mbit/s per location) and 57% of locations in a "high capacity" use case (average data usage of 20.8 Mbit/s per customer) "will experience service degradation during peak times and not meet the RDOF public interest requirements." The Cartesian study also estimates that 25% to 29% of locations will receive an average of less than 10 Mbit/s of capacity during peak times."

To be clear, some of these critics are companies that are simply worried about having to compete with Starlink. I imagine that smaller WISP CEOs aren't sleeping particularly well right now. Traditional satellite providers, whose costly, capped, and high latency services have been mocked for decades, aren't going to enjoy competition from Starlink either. Rural cellular companies are also probably going to lose some subscribers. Especially if Starlink winds up being easy to use and delivers consistent speeds (which we won't see until they launch a fully loaded commercial network).

But that still doesn't really address that the planet's second wealthiest man shouldn't be subsidized for a project he would have paid to deploy anyway, and is only likely to put a small dent in the overall problem. One more time for scale: Starlink will probably help serve somewhere between 485,000 to 1.5 million subscribers. There are 42 million in the US without broadband, 83 million stuck under a monopoly, tens of millions more stuck under duopoly, and then countless millions more who can't afford service due to monopolization. Starlink will be helpful, but it's a drop in the bucket.

There's a lot of middle and last-mile fiber-based broadband solutions that will have a lot more capacity, being pushed by companies for which a few million bucks is a life or death equation. Instead we're throwing a billion at a billionaire for a service that's not really all that affordable, and, once fully loaded to capacity is very likely to come with all manner of throttling, deprioritization, and other restrictions in the post net neutrality era. Add in an FCC whose broadband maps suck and auction processes are completely broken, and you can probably see how this isn't a recipe for success.

Filed Under: elon musk, starlink, subsidies
Companies: space x, starlink