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Comment by antithesis-nl | Hacker News Reader

> Lagos can't use starlink very much because starlink has limited capacity in any given area

That's very much not what the Starlink-proponents are, loudly, proclaiming. Because, satellite-peer-to-peer stuff, Elon-magic in general, and whatever.

Please note: I think that Starlink is mostly space pollution, and that offering meaningful Internet connectivity to Africa, or rural America, or anywhere mostly involves 'lots of fiber', some radio, and lots of cooperation.

But: "just get your Starlink dish and be done" is definitely an Internet Truth, and it's Wrong, and I think it's worth Pointing Out.

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What about rural population in poor countries? I live in Kazakhstan where we don't have a lot of money (or population), and many people live in very sparsely populated areas. Internet connectivity in cities is fine (I pay like 10 USD for symmetric 60 megabyte/s fiber), but villages are few and far between, and it's simply not economical to cover them with fiber: you'll need thousands of kilometers of it to cover maybe a few thousand people. Maybe it will be practical when/if the country has 20-30 times the population.

The government has already provided many rural schools with Starlink terminals, and many locations which only recently didn't have internet connectivity now do have it. Apparently they don't see something you do.

Providing service to sparsely populated rural areas is a good fit for Starlink, but doesn't justify the astronomical cost of the system: they need the "I got rid of Comcast and life has never been better" crowd for that, and they can't do that without inevitably running out of spectrum, bandwidth and physical space in the sky.

So, while technically very interesting, and providing some value before it all comes inevitably (and literally -- see: space junk) crashing down, all that talent and money spent on Starlink would better be put to use elsewhere.

But unfortunately it's easier to get investment for space dreams than for running fiber, even though it's the latter that's mostly needed, and despite plenty of success stories.

> it's simply not economical to cover them with fiber: you'll need thousands of kilometers of it to cover maybe a few thousand people

Are these places covered by "POTS" copper telephone access?

I have yet to see a starlink proponent suggest starlinl is a good solve for densely populated areas. Are there some misguided/uneducated people saying dumb stuff on the internet? I am sure they are out there, but you can find someone saying almost anything you can imagine on the internet.

For a significant population it's right.

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