[usrusr]

For emergencies in truly remote locations. In a natural disaster, you have everybody at once refreshing news and checking in on friends and family that even undamaged networks could struggle.

When the network has broken down you'd better be prepared to have teams fixing what is fixable, and the ability to deploy pop-up cells on the ground. If you have skimped on that preparation betting on satellite cells to save the day the contribution of Starlink to disaster preparedness might end up being a net negative.

That being said, pop-up cells on a startlink as their backhaul could become huge in disaster preparedness. Some contract scheme for standby basestations might actually become a big component of the Starlink business model. The good news is that all talk to regular phones can't overlap with regular starlink frequencies, so unless it blocks some other bottlenecks like SDR DSP capacity it won't compete with regular connections (certainly won't have a meaningful impact on orbital backbone load)

[vermilingua]

Surely this is an ideal usecase for IP multicast? Given that SpaceX controls effectively the entire LEO retail internet at the moment they’re in an ideal position to push a standard for multicasting emergency or regional updates.

[bugbuddy]

You are talking about layer 3 while people are talking about layer 2.

[blackoil]

I am thinking true disasters, where a simple message with your location can save lives.

I believe it should be possible to disable all communication except basic sms and emergency communication like 911 or similar can be accessed without SIM.