[kimburgess]

You're right that it won't be the same - it has the potential to be faster.

Speed of light in a vacuum is higher than what can be achieved in a fiber-optic. Combine that with a more direct path than what can be achieved with an undersea cable and things start to get interesting.

[anotherboffin]

Genuinely wondering why you mention “in a vacuum”, as the signal would have to go through the atmosphere.

[kimburgess]

For the inter-satellite links. First and last hop still need to pass from the ground to LEO.

The obvious solution is to start yeeting compute and/or users into space.

[notakio]

I vote for users. I'll stay down here with compute, I know how this ends.

[BenjiWiebe]

Atmosphere is practically vacuum as far as speed of light goes.

Fiber optic: 0.67c Atmosphere: 0.9997c Vacuum: 1c