Hacker News Reader

Comment by rasz | Hacker News Reader

>(being paid for by the US, after Musk initially provided free service early in the war after a Ukrainian request

1 Musk never provided free service for Ukraine. All dishes have subscription. What Musk alluded to was "free upgrade" while demanding Ukrainians start paying for Mobile Priority plans.

2 "As of October 2022 there were 18k Starlink terminals in Ukraine. At the time State Department (USAID) paid for ~2K units, Poland paid for >12K units – over half of all terminals came from one relatively poor EU country.

December 2022 number rose to 22K. Apparently as of June 2023 there are >40K terminals in use, with USAID share rising to at least ~5K."

US paid for 1/8 of all terminals up to June 2023. I stopped tracking numbers last year.

>what about dishes that get captured by Russia?

Havent heard a single case of this happening.

>As noted, what about all the privately paid-for dishes?

should still be registered with AFU

View on HN

Are the mobile priority plans too expensive for satellite service in general compared to what other satellite providers charge?

Never provided free service? Not even a single dish? Ever?

We have video from the Avdeevka coke plant of captured equipment

I have personally obtained two Starlink dishes in Ukraine. One I preordered more than a year before the war, which was fast tracked by SpaceX shortly after the war started. This was a lifesaver in the early days when power outages took down landline and mobile internet. I paid the $599 for this one.

I then ordered a second one later in 2022, thinking it will be years away. It was ready to ship in a month or so and spacex offered to ship it with no additional charge (just the $99 deposit I paid). I accepted this generous offer and am grateful to SpaceX for their help.

So technically it’s correct that SpaceX did not provide either of these dishes for free. I also paid the monthly service which is discounted compared to US rates but not free. However it’s also correct to say that SpaceX was generous in making Starlink available and gave at least one dish away for nominal cost in the early days. I’m sure I’m not the only one who benefited from this.

Starlinks are used a lot on the front. Of course they get captured by Russian forces sometimes.

There were several people who had their equipment and/or service comped in Ukraine after asking support to waive costs

Apart from that those dishes were sold at a loss in general and until recently starlink dishes were manufactured above 599. Ukranians still go abroad today and buy it on sale. Leading to a situation where most dishes in Ukraine are imported. And contributing to the Russians are using starlink crisis.

There's people that would go ahead and tell you they've never and there's never been a free dish in Ukraine. Not even from any government. Or service.

Do you think starlinks mobile priority service is too expensive a price to charge the US government as compared to other satellite providers?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com