Starlink is polluting the sky for people who cannot buy its services, and who don't appreciate yet another American corporation invading into their lives, this time taking the very view of the night sky.
Then tax SpaceX for the light-pollution externality until they fix it (which they say they're going to do). I don't think depriving rural communities and poor countries of access to the internet is really the best solution to such a non-problem.
>Then tax SpaceX for the light-pollution externality until they fix it
Can Mongolia tax SpaceX? What about Chad?
Or is this just some American corporation doing whatever it wants, to hell with the consequences for the rest of the world?
Oh... but we're bringing internet to the world! Just buy this $2,000 USD base unit and subscribe for $100 USD monthly so that your Yurt in the middle of no-where-ville has high-speed internet... What? You have no shoes and only one pair of clothes? Just buy new ones on Amazon and get next day delivery!
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Bringing internet to the world is a noble goal, particularly if it's not brought to the world by the likes of Facebook, Google or Amazon with their clear ulterior motives. Unlocking access to the world's knowledge is critical for the future of all people... but we shouldn't achieve that goal through force, which is what is happening now with these massive multi-thousand satellite constellations against the protest of nations and people alike. The whole "get over it" attitude is staggeringly in bad taste.
I also highly doubt these mega-constellations + launch costs are cheaper than putting up PTP and PTMP radio dishes in regions that desire the internet. We can push multiple gigabits through these dishes now for backhaul "lines" and there's been great organizations installing these systems throughout Africa and other places for more than two decades. These folks just need more funding... but radio dishes aren't sexy - instead we're putting these satellites up in space where they impact every human being on the planet, instead of just those who are using them.
What are you talking about?? Here in Poland(which isn't a poor country!) You can't even buy Starlink here, our astronomical organisations are already complaining about the pollution of the sky, but how can Poland tax an American corporation polluting our sky????
So the question should be - how can an American corporation deprive other countries of accessible view of the sky for profit and get away with it? Because it might be accessible by everyone eventually? That's frankly not good enough. Elon Musk isn't doing this as a charity, but even if it was it still wouldn't be acceptable.
It's the same argument as for a carbon tax. It's imperfect, because the benefit only flows to the local government (when the commons is globally shared, as you point out), but it's the best practical solution since it broadly aligns incentives with that of the commons.
Your solution to simply deprive rural communities/poor countries of internet access is a non-starter. What you're ignoring is that the positive externalities of the tech vastly, vastly outweigh the negative (and supposedly fixable) externalities. Not to mention it's a take that's rather selfish since you're not the one that pays the price of banning this tech.
I'm interested in what your opinion is of the exact same thing with poor countries burning lots of coal and polluting the oceans to lift their population out of poverty. Is it okay for China and India to have their time doing industrial era style pollution today or should we try to apply our modern anti-pollution rules on them?
Because when the rich western countries have launched lots and lots of satellits then poor countries do of course have the right to launch just as many, with no further caution than we use today at launch and positioning, when it's their turn to shine on the night shy.
But Starlink isn't, wasn't, and never will be "for providing internet to poorer countries". It's always going to be first and foremost about selling internet to people in wealthy countries in areas without good local internet options. Are we really pretending that people in "poor countries" can afford the cost of the equipment and the subscription? Or that Elon Musk is doing this as some kind of charity?
The main problem that I have here is that the uniformity of a full Starlink setup means the entire earth is covered in it, and literally no one else except for Americans has any say in it. That's what's absolutely not cool in my opinion.
> selling internet to people in wealthy countries in areas without good local internet options
Even if I grant you that it's not going to be about supplying internet to poorer countries, this reason alone is sufficient. Depriving rural communities of internet over such a small negative externality is a non-starter.
> literally no one else except for Americans has any say in it
Poland emits significant amounts of carbon pollution, which impacts me, and I have no say in it.
Some negative externalities in the global commons is inevitable. You, personally, are contributing to that. Your weather and GPS satellites are contributing to it.
The solution therefore can't be a puritanical "I will not allow any global externalities whatsoever.". It's an impractical non-starter and a rule that nobody anywhere follows nor should
they try to follow it.
It's pretty hard to be upset about a trivial amount of light pollution which WILL improve lives all over the world... when there are gigatons of literal actual pollution invading the water and skies of the same countries, and barely anyone is making a real effort to fix it.
It's really, really hard for me to believe that these attacks on Starlink are truly proportional to the perceived harm. I think that 95% of the upset is directed at SpaceX as a proxy vendetta against Musk, billionaires, or the overall tech industry.