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by Salgat 616 days ago
Starlink is partnering with T-Mobile for this, so they're definitely going to be careful to only send signals to areas that are actually lacking in towers anyways. And this is great incentive for carriers to cooperate to make roaming cheap and preferable over satellite.
1 comments

That's not how satellites work. The beam is far larger than a cell tower, so they're absolutely going to be transmitting where there are towers.
The cell antennas are omnidirectional but the satellites are phased array. They aren't going to be that narrow, but they can avoid, for example, a city that already has extensive coverage. Remember, these are meant for out in remote areas or in areas of cell outtages, not for downtown in a major city.
They are, but that doesn't mean people have to use them that way. They will get use all over and not just in rural areas
What I'm saying is that if it really does interfere with LTE in a significant manner, then T-Mobile, a carrier partnering with Starlink, has a large incentive to work with them to reduce that interference.
Right, but carriers without deals (att) won't
Most carriers, especially in more populated areas, share the same towers.