> "This is the case in all other industries as well,"

No; it really isn't. There's no industry on the planet where "must accept" regulations are set by the world's most sensitive physics experiments.

Do we set acoustic noise regulations by what a LIGO interferometer can measure? Of course not. We'd have to outlaw the mechanical engine were it so. Regress to a medieval society of horse people (very small horses with noise-absorbing horseshoes).

Do we regulate nuclear power by what astrophysical neutrino detectors perceive? Also, no. Even though they see fission reactors on the other side of the planet, and it is noise to them.

The prior art is we that set noise regulations by what interferes with actual humans in their actual day-to-day functioning; and we set RF regulations by what interferes with the functioning of other circuits useful to humans. Not exotic physics experiments. This is a new thing to ask; and it is bold.

> You'd be surprised what becomes reasonable and possible once a requirement is set.

In that case, I'm not sure why you're concerned. Let's flip this around: set up our regulations to loosen our EMI radiation restrictions & facilitate our satellites and space exploration. According to your logic, that should be perfectly reasonable to astronomers, if that's what the regulations say, and it should be possible for them to adapt to that.

If that's not what you meant, then astronomy needs to make some concessions.

> "but it is just one US corporation that does this and they don't get to decide for all of us"

I don't understand your comment on so many levels. The ITU treaties do exist, and they do protect observational astronomy bands, and everything here is *in compliance with* extant ITU regs. As I quoted above. I can turn your words on your head: who are astronomers to make arbitrary choices for rest of the human species? Or, who are HN to? People do want their gadgets to work. They value that more highly than many things, things more important than mere astronomy experiments—more highly than human rights, for example (to contemplate all the slave labor in the modern electronics supply chains).

On another level: you say it's just one one company, but that company is obviously just an early-adopter, leading-edge of a great horde of space companies going in for the gold rush. There will be many others, and then there will be the Chinese military, and—do you think there will be more favorable outcomes negotiating with the PLA, filing complaints to the PLA over the RFI of their prized military assets? Yeah; no. In 5-10 years the landscape will certainly be utterly unrecognizable, and it will not be a SpaceX hegemony any longer. You will be opposed to a hundred adversaries of many nations—not just that one.

And following after that, there will be humans and human tourists going up, pretty soon I'd bet; by the thousands; and they'll be bringing their electronics gadgets up to visit, and later inhabit, Earth orbit. Have you internalized the numbers we're discussing here? This telescope array can detect the equivalent of a short-range wireless Bluetooth gadget at 2,000 kilometers range—and they're complaining about it, they want that banned. (Literally—if it weren't for the earth in between us, my wireless mouse right here could be radiating greater signal power through your body, dear reader, no matter where you are right now on the planet, than these satellites flashes we're discussing here. Click, click.) No way is that compatible with a future of humans inhabiting space. The space RF environment is, incomprehensibly pristine as it stands... but that won't last, can't last, there's no way humanity moving to the stars will preserve that pristine silence, you might us well give up right away. Fighting it is futile, foolish, misguided, and more than a little misanthropic.

That was the original type of communication satellite—the passive metal balloon,

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Echo ("Project Echo" (1960-69))

(Here's a historic irony: the field of radio astronomy was founded by people doing this stuff. The cosmic microwave background was discovered, by accident, with an RF horn built for this satellite relay experiment).

(Here's another weird one:)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_West_Ford ("Project West Ford" (1961-63)) ("The goal of the project was to place a ring of 480,000,000 copper dipole antennas in orbit to facilitate global radio communication")

Just send up a satellite that uses solar power to spew out sticky dust to cover everything metallic. The dust would be fairly efficient, as it would continue to orbit and stick to things over time.

Yes, this could cause problems, like loss of GPS, weather prediction and other scientific equipment, and enemies wouldn’t be able to keep an eye on each other as easily, leading to wars. But, maybe light pollution would be less annoying.