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| ▲ | wolvoleo 2 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | There's another point: most of these satellites by far have been approved by the US, nobody else had any say in them. Right now the way it works is that approval is granted by the launching nation only. As it clearly affects the whole world there should be some kind of international body governing it IMO. But I doubt that will happen because most nations are instead racing to get similar swarms of satellites up. | | |
| ▲ | wat10000 8 minutes ago | parent [-] | | Most countries are party to the Outer Space Treaty, which specifically sets it up that way. An actual international organization would probably make sense now that space activity is ramping up so much, but it's not as if the current state of things is an accident the way "Who gave anyone permission do this?" implies. |
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| ▲ | bix6 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | lol what. Regular citizens don’t get a say on satellites and many would prefer we didn’t put so many up. “National Security” will trump any citizen concerns every time. | | |
| ▲ | pintxo 3 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | To be fair, the majority of satellites now seems to exist because "money" will trump any citizen concerns every time. | | |
| ▲ | wat10000 29 minutes ago | parent | next [-] | | In other words, millions of people not only want those satellites to be there, but are willing to part with some of their hard-earned cash to make it happen. This isn't some nefarious plot to manipulate the market or irradiate all the gold in Fort Knox or something. That scare-quoted "money" comes from providing useful services to people who want to pay for them. Yes, it turns out that millions of people wanting high-speed communication for their rural homes trumps people who get angry that they have to run their astrophotography through some software. | | |
| ▲ | bix6 9 minutes ago | parent [-] | | Sorry which regular rural people are parting with their cash to launch satellites? | | |
| ▲ | wat10000 3 minutes ago | parent [-] | | There's this service called Starlink which currently accounts for the majority of satellites in orbit. Starlink uses those satellites to provide internet access to subscribers on the ground. They have several million paying customers. Their service isn't particularly competitive in most urban areas where more traditional internet services are cheaper and faster, but there are lots of rural areas where they're by far the most competitive option, so that's where most of these subscribers are found. |
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| ▲ | bix6 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | Agreed, I should’ve added that as the other overriding case |
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| ▲ | wat10000 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | Not sure how you saw "government" and read it as "regular citizens," but do go back and read it again. | | |
| ▲ | bix6 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | Exactly. The regular citizens don’t get to participate in the decision. | | |
| ▲ | wat10000 15 minutes ago | parent [-] | | Are we suddenly acting surprised at the concept of representative government? I don't understand what people actually want to happen here. Part of living on a planet with eight billion other people is dealing with the fact that some of them are going to do things you don't like. Governments, treaties, and international organizations are how we manage it. I understand if people disagree with the specific process that's in place for these things, or disagree with the decisions that get made, but they're acting like there isn't any process, or they somehow deserve to be personally consulted as part of it. | | |
| ▲ | bix6 8 minutes ago | parent [-] | | In what world is Elon getting to blanket the sky with tens of thousands of satellites a representative government? | | |
| ▲ | krapp 6 minutes ago | parent [-] | | He's a private citizen and he's allowed to do it because it isn't illegal. |
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