Starlink in the Falkland Islands – A national emergency situation? | Hacker News Reader

Starlink in the Falkland Islands – A national emergency situation?

openfalklands.com

180 pointspelagicAustral218 comments

This is not a case of regulation/deregulation, is a case of a government being fully capable of changing the tide and repeatedly choosing not do so, in spite of a vocal majority of the population wanting to be able to provide their own internet service via Starlink.

Before, we did not had an alternative. Sure only ever gave tiny concesions when pressed to do so, or paid to do so. They are still highly subsidized by the local government.

> The horrendous de-facto ISP (Sure) charges £110 a month for 100 GB [0] of data usage at a top download speed of 5 (five, literal five [V in roman]) MBPS, while Starlink offers unlimited usage for £60 per month at an average download speed of 130 MBPS.

[0] Sure is a company with a long record of predatory conduct (more on a previous comment): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42657692

> https://guernseypress.com/news/2024/10/02/sure-ordered-to-pa...

£110 a month for 100 GB is actually less than I would have expected for a really remote place like the Falklands. As a point of comparison, I used to pay something like 10 USD per GB on flexiroam while traveling, though I think it's a bit less nowadays. Now that's what I call extortion. And it's still 100 times less than the roaming data rate on my standard mobile subscription.

As for Starlink, keep in mind that you are piggybacking on a humongous satellite network that has tons of unused capacity in remote areas. Now that it's available, it's cool to have it, but the previous provider had an exclusive contract for a reason. And presumably it's still binding, so I imagine the Falklands government is in a bit of a bind over this.

And by the way, Starlink itself is not above price gouging where they have no cheaper alternatives. Look at Starlink Marine pricing for example, which is I think 2500 USD / mo, down from 10000. So there is no actual guarantee that £60 per month unlimited usage will still be be there if Starlink is allowed to operate officially.

> price gouging

this is a crazy way of describing a lack of competitive pressure leaving prices high. compare this to the other alternatives that existed. it's not gouging.

You should describe unethical conduct as bad. Most actual human beings have a dim view of unmitigated capitalism.

If this is the caliber of internet people are dealing with, I really hope some kind local techies are helping to set people up with uBlock Origin (ideally on Firefox), ClearURLs to skip unnecessary redirects (I'm assume GEO latencies here), and LocalCDN or DecentralEyes to avoid re-downloading the same libraries and assets over and over. Probably good to add something that defaults Youtube to 360p, and use Pihole for mobile/smart devices.

There are many addons, but I find these are the minimal "set it and forget it" set that makes the most difference.

Personally I would run uBO in at least Medium Mode[1], but I expect that's probably too much for most non-technical users.

Source: I suffered through metered satellite internet for many years.

[1] https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock

Folks should probably use all those things even on less terrible internet.

Or you know...just use that worldwide broadband speed satellite network.

Perhaps some people object to using that service.

If they object, they can just not use it. As the article says, the petition for abolishing or reducing the fees of a license needed for Starlink was signed by 70% of the islands' population. I think that the main entity that is objecting is the current satellite ISP monopoly (that probably made a deal with the government that included protecting their monopoly as a condition of their investment).

  >Or you know...

Strange to think of it as an either/or choice.

All those services block things I want to block for other reasons anyway, and on fast internet they make it even faster.

It’s only 110 pounds a month? I figured it would be much more, given that ~3,500 people live there. That gives a customer base of ~1,500 or so.

There aren’t exactly many places to run a fiber connection to, Uruguay being the closest friendly neighbor (aside from the Chilean part of Tierra del Fuego), I assume the current internet connection is a satellite link?

Before starlink, the only way to get a private company to offer internet service to a tiny island with less people than my neighborhood is a monopoly, the economics simply don’t work if there is competition.

Isn’t that how Uber came to exist? Undercut pricing until you amass users then return to profit once the competition is extinct. I would love to believe the starlink price is real but history says otherwise.

pure nitpick:

  - lowercase b implies bits, which is (0|1).
  - uppercase B implies Bytes, which is* 8 bits(1100 1001). 
  - "ps" stands for "per second" and is typically used for bits.  
  - "/s" stands for "per second" and is typically used for bytes. 
  - realistically, context suggests 5120 bit per seconds, which is rather slow.
  - 5MB/s is 40Mbps, 8 times over 5Mbps, enough* for couple 4K H.265 streams.

> realistically, context suggests 5120 bit per seconds, which is rather slow.

How? "5 MBPS" must mean 5 Mb/s (megabits/s) or 5 MB/s (megabytes/s), and for internet speeds megabits are much more common, so it's rather 5 Mb/s ~ 5,242,880 bits per second, equal to ~0.6 megabytes per second or 5120 kilobits (not just bits) per second.

Starlink can achieve speeds around 130 Mb/s (megabits/s), but (normal) Starlink surely doesn't achieve 130 MB/s (megabytes/s), so that would check out.

Well an island like this is basically a big strata where dividing the cost of infrastructure between everyone makes things livable. Don’t be surprised there’s a monopoly telco, because it probably doesn’t make economic sense any other way.

And keep in mind they probably insisted on a monopoly contract because they probably spent an absolute bomb setting it up, only to get max 1500 or so subscribers.

Say: 1500 subscribers @ $100/pm and you’d be running a telco on only $1.8M per year. That’s about enough money to pay for compliance, infra upkeep, and hire maybe 2-3 staff who wear many hats.

It’s $4-600/month for 10mbps. And that’s before line rental, equipment deposit, installation charges, and the various other surprise fees they hit you with. I know Falklanders and to say that they hate Sure would be an understatement.

https://www.sure.co.fk/broadband/broadband-packages/?utm_sou...

So let the UK eat the cost of making the ISP whole. Nobody needs or especially wants the islands except for national dick-waving; the British gov was making a point that they would and could still fight and win wars. Fine, you want to play at the big dollar table, ante up.

Results of the 2013 Falkland Islands Referendum

Do you wish the Falkland Islands to retain their current political status as an Overseas Territory of the United Kingdom?

YES: 1513

NO: 3

Why do you not wish to accept the above democratic decision made by the islanders? We can only conclude you are trolling.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2013_Falkland_Islands_sovereig...

I have no doubt that the islanders very much wish to be British subjects rather than left on their own (they would, in that case, quickly become Malvinians). But why should someone in Glasgow want to pay taxes to support them in living there permanently?

> But why should someone in Glasgow want to pay taxes to support them in living there permanently?

you could have picked a better example, Scotland is a net drain on the UK treasury

why should someone in London pay to support people living in Glasgow permanently?

You should have picked a better example, Glasgow is a port city and almost certainly not a net drain; the rural parts of Scotland are. Just like all the rural parts of England, which leech of the English cities.

Just like all the rural parts of the US, which leech off the "coastal liberal elites."

> You should have picked a better example, Glasgow is a port city and almost certainly not a net drain

certainly true in the 1900s

unfortunately in the 2000s it's at the wrong side of the island

That was the point. If I had meant London, I would have used it.

This is how wealth redistribution works. This is how taxes work.

Yes, it is. But at a certain point you stop paying for people to live somewhere unsustainable and just pay them to leave, if it’s a financial decision.

Fair point. So do a one-time tax levy of the Falklanders to buy the telco out, since they can no longer honor the commitment they made to get service installed. Shouldn’t be more than a half million pounds each?

> We can only conclude you are trolling.

You made an excellent point and then this sentence cancelled that out. You can have major disagreements with other people, even ignorant people, without assuming that your disagreement means they are trolling / a bot / arguing in bad faith / etc.

The people living in the Falklands want the islands.

While some countries look at land like the Falklands, or Ukraine, or Taiwan, or Greenland, and think "That's Mine", Britain doesn't do that (any more), and instead says "it's upto you"

The inhabitants of the Falklands are British settlers. It is quite easy to let people choose when you know that the choice they will make matches what you want.

That being said, if Argentina had not invaded then no-one in Britain would care one way or the other (government could have handed the Islands to Argentina in whatever deal and most people in the UK would just have shrugged it off). It has become a point of principle and pride since the invasion to tell "the Argies" that they can stuff it.

That and the fact that we can’t have Argentina colonizing a place while the indigenous people are still on it.

Scotland has a referendum which didn't have a certain result before it was announced.

This is data provided by the UK government itself: the Falklands have a little above 3500 people, with about half of it being military and government personnel, and the rest being their families.

So calling them "people living there", or "settlers" or "inhabitants" or "a democracy" is nothing short of disingenuous.

Argentinians are "settlers" too, when you think of it. I think, that according to your line of logic, they should all leave Argentine and leave it to native people.

Maybe they can move to Falklands, then. Because it was empty and had no natives...

You proved my point. Argentina is full of people, as a multicultural country, including descendants of its natives (as long as you call "natives" to the first group of people ever that settled in a territory).

A planted and subsidized military operation half the world away doesn't magically become "a society" b/c they look like that on the surface.

The people living in the Falklands are descendents of the first gorup of people to settle that territory.

After Argentina did a Russia and decided they wanted the people who had lived there for generations to leave, the UK added a military presence.

I'd love to get a credible historical source saying that the conflict for that territory started around 1982 and before that there were just UK nationals casually settling there because... the weather was nice?

I'll be waiting here.

Why would soldiers, their families, and public employees have a reduced value in a democracy? Its not like they took the island by force.

Because of the law? In most western countries (including the UK), military personnel has reduced rights because of their status of having the monopoly of violence. For instance, the aren't allowed to unionize or go on strike.

I can't tell if the second part of your comment is trolling, or really not knowing the history of the UK before 10 years ago.

You forgot that in a recent referendum almost all the islanders voted to stay part of the UK.

The islanders want to be part of the UK. Great. Move to the mainland. I don’t get to settle on some random island and demand US military support because I’m a citizen. They will, at most, evacuate me.

The islands were uninhabited until 1690 when it was discovered by an English captain. The French tried to settle there in 1764 but the UK asserted its claim to it in 1765. Since the British discovered it first, it's theirs.

The islands have an exclusive economic zone, and are a supply stop in a vast ocean

They are very valuable to the UK

Great. So they won’t mind ponying up to pay off the ISP. Subsidizing people to live there is part of it.

Don't say that too loud of Trump might want them next after Greenland & Canada.

If we could convince him to buy them that would be quite good for the UK.

Depending on the valuation

And with that guy, make sure you get paid up front. He has an extremely long and well-documented history of abusing the system to not pay contractors, workers, counter-parties, etc...

It’s a loss making endeavour, just like all the remnants of empire.

The present president of Argentina is a Trump-testicle-gargler. That would make me nervous if I were a Falklander.

Sure are already subsidised to the tune of a few million pounds per year.

Honestly with those numbers, I'm pretty surprised it's even an independent company. Wouldn't such a community of 3-4k people in a very remote location be a prime example where providing internet could just be a gov/municipal service, subsided by an extraordinary tax if needed?

Nowadays in Britain, even if the government provides the service they would typically contract a private company to set up and operate it.

It looks like the Falkland are similar. Here's a Facebook post from the Falkland government announcing a deal with this ISP.

https://www.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=50310531517584...

This is what a Thatcher Conservative utopia looks like, top to bottom public private partnerships.

The whole thing is an own goal.

And this might be the big issue with solar power and also EV's. If enough people switch to solar and are no longer paying into the grid at a certain point it will become unprofitable to maintain a large grid. The same is true at this point for EV's. Buying gas we pay road tax. So not buying gas is going to reduce that tax collected. At a certain point they will need to change the way that tax is collected. Probably some sort of tax on the distance an EV drives or perhaps some other method.

I never really got these arguments. It doesn't have to be that way, does it? I already pay a monthly base fee for electricity and then per kwh on top of that. So I consider the base fee as what is being used to maintain the grid. It's not like my actual consumption influences the wear of the grid in a meaningful way

That argument would actually make more sense for roads so I see how you'd want to tax gas instead of car ownership, but even there I think it could still be acceptable to spread it out like that.

Sure if you pay a base fee maybe but if you went 100% solar to cover all your needs and completely disconnected from the grid so you were not a paying customer then what? How many houses have to leave the grid switching to solar before the grid is no longer viable? At some point in time we will reach a tipping point. If half of all households left the grid to solar could the other half support the upkeep of the entire grid? My guess is no. So at some point we will need to subsidize the grid for those still on it or force them to switch to solar. It will be hard. Solar is not cheap upfront even though overall it is cheaper. As for the EV's I hear it is already happening in some places you are being charged for how much you drive however they do that.

I see this far in the future, and a slow process. I already know a few people with big enough solar setups to be self sustaining even in winter with big battery packs, but they still connect to the grid "just in case", which honestly I'd do too.

As more people disconnect then sure the base price might go up but why not, the other ones don't need the grid, so why pay? And as for public infra like street lights, that will just get heavier on taxes. This is something I see happening over decades rather than years, so there will be enough time to figure this out.

Big battery packs are insane to put inside a house. I'm biased because I work for a utility scale storage company, but really, 2nd law of thermodynamics, people.

The more potential energy you pack into a volume, the higher the chance the energy will be released at a time not of your choosing and in a fashion that will make you sad. We put our product in industrial zoned places where the worst case scenario for a fire is pre-planned to not be catastrophic and so that no homes will be lost. Why put your house at risk? So you can cosplay as Henry David Thoreau and take some stance against your power utility?

> I work for a utility scale storage company

Clearly not in any sort of engineering capacity given you wildly misused the second law of thermodynamics, which has nothing to do with potential energy, but the flow of heat from hot areas to cooler areas.

Second: energy density has nothing to do with how stable that energy is. 12lb of plutonium could level a city, but not if it isn't in an extremely precisely engineered device.

Third:potential energy and volume, you say?

Do you own a riding lawnmower in your garage? Those have about 2 or more gallons of gas, which is about 66 kWhr of energy.

Pour that out onto your garage floor, strike a match, and let me know how "sad" you are when your garage is leveled, your house structurally damaged, and you're dead in your neighbor's yard.

Do you have a gas grill, and do you keep a spare tank in the garage? 20lb of propane is equal to almost 130kWhr of energy.

Do you keep a 5 gallon jug of spare gas in your garage? 165 kWhr.

So. You were saying?

> Do you keep a 5 gallon jug of spare gas in your garage? 165 kWhr

If you keep a 5 gallon jug in the garage, your risk is higher than if you don't. If you keep a lawnmower in your garage, your risk is higher than if you don't.

Like I said: the higher the amount of potential energy, the greater the risk of it being released in a way that will make you sad. It's a straightforward derivation from thermo.

Keep in mind, in the US most people park ICE vehicles (sometimes 2-3 at a time) in garages attached or part of their dwellings all the time. And those not only catch fire more regularly, but contain far more energy.

Aka people do dumb stuff all the time. And mostly survive. Frankly, this isn’t likely to even be top ten from an actuarial basis.

This is the first time I’ve seen a claim that ICE vehicles are more likely to have catastrophic fires while parked than EVs. Is that true? Any source?

https://www.google.com/search?q=recall+%22park+outside%22

These recalls from Ford, GM, and Kia are each millions of vehicles. And the number of these recalls is going up: https://turnto10.com/i-team/consumer-advocate/serious-park-o...

It's always been a significant risk; why do you think there are strict building code regs for the garage area of a home?

If I did put batteries in my house, I'd want them mounted on wheels so if they overheat I can push them out before things get exciting. Those do exist, and apart from storing juice for your house they can also take you places...

There is no way you could get close enough to a battery bank this size to push them once they started to catch on fire and not die. You might as well be trying to put out a kiddy pool of gasoline with your hands.

[https://alliedworldinsurance.com/risk-management/electric-ve...]

Far more often. Battery fires can be much harder to put out, but gasoline fires are no slouch frankly.

Thanks for the great link! Unfortunately it doesn’t speak specifically to parked/charging, which is when I would expect EV’s to be at the greatest risk and ICE’s to be at their lowest risk.

But still, seems pretty clear that EV’a are likely no more risky and possibly considerably less so in the garage. Thanks!

ICE vehicles are at risk when starting and stopping, and those happen in garages a lot.

> Sure if you pay a base fee maybe but if you went 100% solar to cover all your needs and completely disconnected from the grid so you were not a paying customer then what?

Off grid solar is exceptionally rare. The grid still serves a purpose unless you’re willing to buy a lot of batteries and always moderate your usage.

Realistically, solar users won’t be disconnecting from the grid in large numbers. It doesn’t make financial sense to buy massive battery banks to avoid a small monthly grid service fee, even if battery prices drop significantly more.

The fear of everyone dropping off grid isn’t realistic.

> Sure if you pay a base fee maybe but if you went 100% solar to cover all your needs and completely disconnected from the grid so you were not a paying customer then what?

Then they are generating substantially less pollution and CO2 than the idiots driving around in their dick-compensating machinery that gets 12mpg, and society should incentivize that.

Hint: look at all the costs to society from internal combustion vehicles. Chiefly, global warming, and the health costs (and lost productivity) from the pollution.

If I went 100% solar, I'm happy to pay the utility to be the middleman while I sell my excess solar to the neighbors.

In my state, I pay a special tax on my EV when I renew my license plates. It is based on fuel source. The point is to offset the lack of gas taxes I would be paying. Or it might just be a disincentive to buy an EV, it’s hard to tell sometimes.

Gas taxes are used to fund road work.

The nice think about gas taxes is that they’re mostly proportional to the mileage driven and the weight of the vehicle, two factors that determine contribution to road wear.

EVs tend to be heavy but not contribute at all to gas tax. A separate EV tax for road maintenance is reasonable.

Sort of but road erosion is to the fourth power of weight while fuel consumption is approximately linear with weight, so the tax is not exactly proportional to use.

Do you have a source for this? I wouldn’t be surprised if it were supralinear but that feels high to me.

Like we have a short segment of road in my town that’s almost exclusively and regularly used by garbage trucks, which are ~10x the weight of a car. I don’t think the road gets repaved 10,000x more often than other roads though?

It's even got its own Wikipedia page - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fourth_power_law

Aha, 4th power of axle load - that makes more sense. Thanks!

Not all road structures are equal (it's easy to design a road to last 20 years before resurfacing almost regardless of the loads put on it, and the cost variances aren't that major). Temperature variations are a bigger limiter of life of a road, especially freeze-thaw cycles

> Gas taxes are used to fund road work.

"Road work" is almost entirely paid for by overall tax revenue and only a tiny fraction comes from fuel and other use taxes like registration fees. It doesn't include things like police/fire/ems response to crashes.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-05-13/debunking...

In my state, you get a 90 percent discount on your excise tax if your vehicle is of a model year newer than the current year. I don't see anyone getting up in arms about that, but someone buys an EV - which pays taxes on the electricity it uses - and people scream blue bloody murder they're "cheating", because among other things, we don't look at the total cost to society that a car has.

No, friend. These regressive taxes are because conservative idiots in dick-compensating machinery that gets 12mpg are pissed that people who made the intelligent and environmentally conscious choice are being led around by the nose by the oil cartels.

...who are subsidized, and those subsidies are rising: https://www.imf.org/en/Topics/climate-change/energy-subsidie...

https://www.eesi.org/papers/view/fact-sheet-fossil-fuel-subs...

At some point we’ll switch to mileage taxes, which make more sense for infrastructure upkeep. Gas taxes were only ever a rough proxy for “how much do hou use roads and bridges.”

How do you track how far everyone drives to tax them correctly?

Many cars are already "smogged". Would be trivial to record their mileage year to year at the same time. Require a "smog" for EVs and record their mileage and maybe scan their BMS for any faults.

There are a bunch of technical solutions, from certified shops you stop by once a year to networked cars. Implementation is the easiest part of this change.

The same way we track how much electricity households use from the grid. By using a (smart) meter.

Require a mileage readout when renewing registration, and when sold.

It's already happening in Pakistan: https://www.ft.com/content/69e4cb33-3615-4424-996d-5aee9d1af...

(For some context: gas taxes are already a subset of road expense. Significant road funding comes from other revenue sources that EV drivers also pay.)

Curious if you could provide more information about the other sources EV drivers pay? Is it at point of sale or where do they pay this? I am sure it is different depending on the region but I was always under the belief that road tax payed on gas where I am is the most significant contributor to road funding. Thank you I would enjoy learning more about what other revenue sources EV's contribute to.

State general funds -- any sales, property, or income tax of your state -- as well as Federal highway dollars (Federal income tax). Notably, non-drivers also pay into these funds.

Not the parent commenter but https://taxfoundation.org/data/all/state/state-infrastructur...

I can't tell if these figures are inclusive of interstates and all local roads, or some subset, but my impression is these numbers (for use tax pay %) look too high. The right ballpark is around 50%.

> The same is true at this point for EV's. Buying gas we pay road tax. So not buying gas is going to reduce that tax collected. At a certain point they will need to change the way that tax is collected.

WA state had a “genius” workaround for it. I remember being shocked the first time I got my annual car registration slip for my (then) new EV. It was a flat $150 fee + $75 “transportation electrification” fee, on top of all the normal annual registration fees. For more expensive cars like Teslas, proportionally it is not that ridiculous (it “only” raises the fees by about 30-40%). But for something more affordable like Nissan Leaf, it essentially doubles the registration fees (aka increases by almost 100%).

Luckily, they seem to be experimenting with it still. Just saw that starting this upcoming July, they are rolling out a voluntary program where those fees above get waived, if you opt-in and pay 2.5 cents per mile. No idea how they would track it (on a technical level; e.g., using what device? how the data is processed? does it count only in-state miles or just in general?), and that’s the part that I am honestly worried about the most.

But that seems at least like an interesting try.

> no longer paying into the grid at a certain point it will become unprofitable to maintain a large grid.

1. IDK where you live, but most people pay quite a bit for grid itself, often more than for actual power.

2. With batteries the grid can be about 10x smaller.

Already happening. I paid an EV fee on my car tabs this week.

Even worse, many states are more than double charging EVs for the comparable average mileage that determines gas tax.

Consumer electricity is also taxed, although it's not explicitly linked to roads. But then that's not really how governments work anyway, all the money goes into a ~black hole~ big pot and is spent around.

Roads are notionally supported from general taxes in the UK anyway, not fuel duty.

In NZ, EVs pay road user charges.

How is it measured? All the talk over here (UK) has frothy people talking about government tracking your every movement with a box in your car or automatic number plate recognition (the latter we already do anyway)

oil and gas subsidies repay it back. the true cost of gas is 2-3x current price.

Yeah, the only real solution here feels like paying off the monopoly, a cost which in the end is likely going to need a handout from the UK. It’s tough to identify anyone who’s done anything explicitly wrong in this story, or a solution that doesn’t end up shafting someone. Perhaps a negotiated tax on non-monopoly users there that goes to the monopoly to help defray their investment is the only sensible solution.

Waiting for the exclusive contract to end would also work. Unless they really weren't thinking ahead when they contracted this out, there must be a way to choose a different provider, but it may be a lengthy wait.

Or just allow competitors in?

Why does the monopoly need paying off? It’s risk/reward for them, if they end up loosing money on their venture why should the taxpayer foot the bill?

They agreed to set up service in the falklands on the condition that they be allowed to have a monopoly. If you take that away you’re breaking a deal you made.

You don’t have to break the deal, just serve notice.

A bit of googling on this agreement shows that there is a 5 year notice clause, so they can just serve notice now if they want. No need to pay anyone off.

(https://www.openfalklands.org.fk/leos-and-vsat-legislation-i...)

> Why does the monopoly need paying off?

Presumably because they have a piece of legally binding paper saying they do? Changing the law to cut out the monopoly is the government reneging on the agreement they made with the monopoly to pony up the cash and presumably a tort.

They could also simply fail to enforce the law. Or use that as a threat to come to a negotiated settlement with the monopoly.

> They could also simply fail to enforce the law

The article says that that’s the status quo but Starlink aren’t ok with it. Not enforcing the law would also seem to be actionable under any agreement signed though. Finally, any precedent set here will make it much harder for the government to strike any other kind of deal next time it wants to encourage a company to invest.

The reputation and credit rating of governments falls if they fail to respect contracts they've signed under their own laws.

They could just exit using the clauses in the agreement though, like the one they have seems to have a 5 year notice clause.

I’m not saying break contracts, just saying there are usually sensible alternatives to exiting these sort of things that don’t involve just paying someone off.

I would imagine there is a contract stipulating that they’re a monopoly because otherwise the economics don’t work out.

There is but it has a 5 year notice period that can be enacted.

Their revenue is north of £100M p.a., and they are owned by batelco. They are not hurting for cash.

> Their revenue is north of £100M p.a., and they are owned by batelco.

Looking at the wiki page for Sure, they serve many island jurisdictions with a total pop of ~265k, and the falkland islands is only ~3500. That's a ratio of 1:75, 100/75=1.3 million lines up pretty well with OPs comment of the budget for the falkland islands.

This monopoly right is roughly equivalent to a bond (it is a bond in the archaic sense of "law"), given by the Falklands government to the satellite company, in exchange for the satellite infrastructure. The Bond's "coupon" isn't precisely fixed; it's the revenue that the company makes from its customers. To dissolve the monopoly would be roughly to default on this bond.

You can imagine an alternate timeline in which the Falklands literally sold bonds to finance this infrastructure. They would have sold bonds; the proceeds would have paid for the satellites; tax dollars (rather than subscription dollars) would then go to service the bond.

The core problem is that the infrastructure just isn't as valuable as people thought it would be, as a result of technological disruption.

There is probably value in the Falklands maintaining some infrastructure of its own for reasons of national autonomy. If they destroy this national monopoly, they'll be left dependent on a Starlink monopoly, over which they have even less control.

They should probably split the difference: Remove the monopoly, subsidize the company with tax revenue to keep it alive, and allow people to use Starlink if they want. This is a "partial default", but it doesn't totally screw anyone, and it looks out for their own autonomy.

This is the most sensible comment in this dumpster fire of a thread.

> using Starlink in the islands continues to be illegal and is considered a criminal offence

What is wrong with this place? A criminal offense?

> protecting Sure International’s telecommunications monopoly

Ahh, that explains it. Mafia in power, essentially.

> Ahh, that explains it. Mafia in power, essentially.

It's not so cut and dry, really. Imagine you're an ISP - and you want to set up infrastructure to about 3600 people. Really, it's actually 1200 - many people live in a single household.

Now, you want to get internet TO the island. How do you do that? Easy! Point to point from the nearest terrestrial base. Oops! That's too far! Also, that's Argentina and they hate you (long history).

Okay so, that leaves satellite - famously historically affordable. That requires a lot of bandwidth from satellite and this requires some pretty expensive infrastructure. By the way, it's a lot cheaper if you set up multiple "streams" and distribute them - versus everyone having their own dish.

And we haven't even gotten to the cost of laying out the cable, cell service, etc.

So if this sounds all really expensive - and it is - you better have an agreement from the government that your huge up front investment won't be ruined by some competitor which causes a collapse of both parties. That sounds unreasonable, but honestly, it isn't - this stuff is expensive!

Anyways, they got completely wrecked on the math by Starlink, and so it's probably time for them to go away. But honestly, considering how remote they are, it wasn't really that bad of a deal for quite a long time!

Prior to Starlink, the Falklands had two choices when it came to internet service: no internet at all, or sign a monopoly agreement that allows a private ISP to make a profit. The UK government could’ve provided internet as well, but that’s unlikely, leaving the two options on the table.

It’s not mafia in power, it’s simply the economics of providing internet service to a tiny population of ~3,500 living on an island that is almost a thousand miles away from friendly allied nations.

Just about all radio communication is illegal until licensed. Starlink had to get approval from the FCC in the US even before the first satellites went up, to provide fixed broadband service, and before allowing it to be used on mobile vehicles.

Starlink gets licensed in different countries to use specific frequencies to avoid congestion/interference with other services

Illegal sure, but criminal?

I think the criminal was added by the blog poster. The bill talks about "civil or criminal prosecution". I imagine its the same as elsewhere in the world: if you transmit on an illegal frequency you would likely be taken to the civil courts. If you continue and/or cause interference with other services you'd be taken to criminal court.

https://assembly.gov.fk/jdownloads/Executive%20Council/Execu...

Many countries have rules like this. India, being one with quite a few people in it.

[https://www.communicationstoday.co.in/uk-issues-travel-advis...][https://www.newindianexpress.com/amp/story/nation/2025/Jan/1...]

A lot of places ban unlicensed satellite communication devices for the same reasons.

Being a criminal is illegal in many places.

Is it? Committing criminal acts maybe, but it’s relatively rare for mere existence, absent any other fact, to be illegal.

Writers write, bakers bake, drivers drive, and murderers do 25-life deterrence, so you don't eg. use satellite internet in the Falkland's.

Technically correct. Best kind of correct. I stand corrected.

Is it criminal for Ukraine to transit Russian gas during the war? Yes, but is it illegal? No.

If there's no punishment, the law is just a polite suggestion.

The problem is more musk, to anybody outside US he is potentially an enemy, a self-made one but thats irrelevant.

Internet access is a strategic resource to certain extent, you dont want to pay your enemy for such service. Europe also doesnt want puttin's gas and oil

That's not relevant here.

Not quite. Elon has made it clear that slights against his companies are personal attacks; see, for example, the Trump Administration's shutdown of USAID in retribution for investigating Starlink contracts in Ukraine.

Everything you mentioned might well be true (it's not; most of the monetary value for Starlink in Ukraine is from the military via pLEO. Not the measly single digit USAID)

But it's not relevant here.

Saint Helena is another example of an island with an internet monopoly which outlaws satellite terminals,

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37645945 ("Saint Helena Island Communications" (2023), 145 comments)

At least Saint Helena recently got a submarine cable. I wonder if part of that deal was exclusivity for the operator(s) funding it (hopefully for a limited time).

It would obviously better to make that happen without government restrictions on individual usage, but I can see how recouping a significant private investment for a few thousand people is harder than Starlink just providing services using the satellites that are overflying all of Earth anyway, whether they get used in a given region or not.

>I wonder if part of that deal was exclusivity for the operator(s) funding it (hopefully for a limited time).

Google is the owner. The EU funded the connection.

Wow, it's worse than I imagined: https://www.kentik.com/blog/ending-saint-helenas-exile-from-...

> While internet service has improved exponentially in Saint Helena, tariffs are still quite expensive when compared to the average local income, and basic users face a data cap which seems hard to justify given the most expensive component — the submarine cable — was essentially gifted to Saint Helena by European taxpayers.

> Lastly, Saint Helena islanders connect to the internet via ADSL2+ copper lines, meaning they rarely achieve more than 10Mbps download. The SHG began building their own FTTH network, but a major issue is Sure’s license to operate, which states that the SHG is required to compensate Sure for all its infrastructure if their exclusivity is not protected.

Starlink is amazing, but if I were the Falkland Islanders I'd be quite nervous about relying on a service from a company owned by someone who is so openly hostile to the UK.

This is what everyone said he’d do in Ukraine (after he spoke against expanding the service into Russian controlled Crimea) yet the service continues to be a critical part of their military and Russia is still excluded from using it. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starlink_in_the_Russo-Ukrainia...

Russia is allowed to use Starlink namely because apparently Starlink only geo-fences so in order to let Ukraine use Starlink in an area you have to allow anybody else to use it.

Presumably over the past 12 years they could've implemented some of linking accounts to a region and ban the use outside of the region. (Although wait, didn't they do that to counter-act people using them with RVs/Boats in the US!?)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starlink_in_the_Russo-Ukrainia...

> Presumably over the past 12 years they could've implemented some of linking accounts to a region and ban the use outside of the region

I'm sure they could do better but it's messier than this, because Ukraine units self-fund much of their equipment purchases and will buy Starlinks etc third party (because Starlink can't sell individual units as military equipment... technically).

It's actually not easy to trace down exactly which are being used by Ukraine and which are used by Russia, especially when captured equipment gets reused by the other side not infrequently.

> The high level of Starlink usage sparked a successful petition backed by 70% of the island’s population. This petition demanded both a reduction of the £5,400 FIG VSAT licence fee and formal approval for Starlink’s operation in the Falkland Islands.

Kind of incredible that anglo trend towards governmental gridlock extends to an island of 3,600 people. A blanket majority of the population endorsed the petition... why was it necessary that "proposal was subsequently forwarded to the Falkland Islands Government (FIG) for implementation... However, the effective date for this approval has now been delayed until April."?

Just call the law passed and let Starlink know it's legal now. Why do the islanders put up with this bureaucratic molasses. What am I missing.

Interestingly Frank Herbert wrote about the hidden value of slow and measured bureaucratic processes. His essential argument was that a slow bureaucracy has time to review not just the letter of laws and policies, but the impact that they will have after enacted which may not be part of the conversation to get them passed. The story he writes on this is borderline satirical with a government agent called a saboteur, whose sole job is to slow down and muck up an incredibly efficient future government which is able to pass laws which have sweeping impact across the nation in hours, and in some cases seconds.

While most of us corporate drones often laugh at the speed of government, considering the lightning fast decision-making often made in the world’s top companies, that book always made me think about the fact that government operations often have far more riding on them than any private enterprise ever will. So maybe that time is being spent more effectively than you assume.

Personally, this whole scenario makes me very wary. Though I understand the complexities of the infrastructure we’re discussing here, I’d be super nervous to have my Internet lifeline to the rest of the world governed directly by Elon Musk.

OK but they aren't deliberating. They're just delaying implementation until April for no particular reason.

That's an argument for a small government. Private entities are both much faster than current governments, and more careful with their money. And when they fail, you basically get free infrastructure (as part of the bankruptcy process) instead of a black hole in which public money keeps getting sunk.

Reading the rest of the comments in this thread it seems like the original decision was at the very least sane: you need major investment in telecom infrastructure, and to facilitate this the government offered a monopoly to incentivize said investment. Makes sense, at face value. Problem is that technology advanced, and now a centralized solution is worse than the state of the art (Starlink). So instead of the infrastructure provider living or dying on merit, you have regulations sustaining it artificially, and no incentive to have them upgrade or become more efficient.

I'm not sure private entities are more careful with their money. More importantly, it's their money, it doesn't necessarily flow back to the public.

The danger is in monopoly. Then you're left with no choice and also no vote. At least with public infrastructure you have a vote.

The situation in the Falklands sounds like a mess, and I'm not faulting anyone for using Starlink in those circumstances. But I suspect if the island becomes dependent on Starlink they will find themselves with other problems later.

These private-public arguments are misguided IMHO because the real issue is choice versus monopoly. Public services provide choice to those who might not have it otherwise, and give a nonmonetary mechanism for feedback. But they can become monopolies as well. Private services can provide options but when they become monopolies you have no options for feedback other than to withdraw from the service, which sometimes isn't a real option. Also, the moneys aren't necessarily redistributed back to the community, which can be an opportunity cost.

Country with no or failing public school or no or failing public Healthcare looks just like a failed state.

And about none of them has overall good conditions, except for the richest.

The proposal could be the other way around. You'd ideally want some time to protest a proposal.

It's similar to using Starlink in a cruise ship. The cruise companies hate it and prohibit it for good. They want you to buy their expensive wifi plans. Some people still sneak them in and run them on the balconies.

> The cruise companies hate it and prohibit it

The prohibition on all and sundry on using their own radio trancevers (yes, that includes satellite transceivers) is to prevent the risk of causing RF/electrical interference with the ships systems. The use of low power Wi-Fi and cellular phones is fine, but poorly set up directional VSAT terminals can play havoc with ships navigation and comms kit. This is historically the reason for banning their use without explicit permission in writing from the ships master.

Source: Marine engineer.

I'm an electrical engineer - I don't understand how what you said can be true at a wide and effective scale. Of course any device can interfere with something else - But what kind of evidence exists that starlink terminals, and in particular the pattern steering and bands use, actually cause interference in a meaningful way to activly used marine system used on these kinds of crafts.

Starlink used Ku and Ka bands, so we are talking about 10-12Ghz and 37-42Ghz downlinks, and 14Ghz and 47-51Ghz uplink. This is highly directional radiation, and even with beam forming and reflections is not likely to have any specific high interference risk. Clearly the downlink transmission from the satellite is exceptionally low power at the ground, even with the beamforming used in the satellites.

I would love to learn that this is a real problem with actual tested data.

> This is highly directional radiation

That's the entire point!

A poorly set up antenna can cause havoc. This is historically the reason for denying passengers use of radio transceivers. Maybe Starlink is harmless, I don't know. But if it is, it will still take time for international maritime safety legislation to catch up.

Source: Marine enginner

I fully understand the risk of highly directional radiation - but that is why I was asking if there was some actual specific testing done. I believe the software in the Starlink (and the beamforming) is designed to only transmit when it knows where it is pointing ( it uses receiver information and ephemeris data to know where and how to transmit ).

I would suspect that if the dish was instead pointing directly at someone with no direct satellite reception there would not be high transmit power.

Again, of course it could be catastrophic in unheard of ways, but is there any evidence of that as a real outcome, potential and likely outcome, or even likely theoretical outcome?

I can understand it takes time for legislation to catch up, although that is far more a 'choice' than a requirement.

Ah yes, the old "interference on the tenth harmonic" explanation.

Really? Which bands are in use that are interfering? Why are the downlinks not wreaking havoc today?

> Why are the downlinks not wreaking havoc today

The entire point is the concentration of RF energy per unit space.

Downlink from a satellite in LEO, this is fuck all.

The uplink, in front of a directional VSAT antenna, this is very significant.

The fact you do not understand the difference suggests you are commenting outside the area of your expertise.

"The uplink, in front of a directional VSAT antenna, this is very significant."

This is reasonable, and I fully can understand that direct transmission at reasonable power going into a sensitive receiver can be problematic. In practice I suspect it would require some particularly aggressive intent to aim it such that you see that condition - and of course at the point you are at intent the 'rules' are optional.

Never ceases to amaze me that glibertarians think they can do their thing on board a ship more than on land.

They can if it's their ship.

The ship has to fly a flag, and be captained by a master mariner licensed for that tonnage, by the country flying the flag.

> glibertarians think they can do their thing on board a ship more than on land

Who are the glibertarians?

I assume you mean rich passengers (and libertarian seasteaders!) rather than the ships master concerned about the vessels safety.

Exactly. The people who think they can bring their ideology to a platform where you have to obey the captain.

Some cruise lines like Oceania use Starlink for their own wifi.

most of them do now. it's massively cheaper and faster than what they had available before.

No, they don’t. They’re just going to charge you an insane price to use it, other than that they all know the service is better.

I was hoping starlink would shake things up in Canada a bit, and then I read... rogers is involved, so I presume more of the same for us then? (for those unaware Canada may as well be Falkland Islands when it comes to our telco monopolies, although ours are marginally, (marginally I said), justifiable because of the size of our country)

I pay a hundred bucks for 1GBit/s and unlimited data, how is that comparable to Falkland Islands where it’s more expensive, much slower and has data caps?

monopolies can exist in various markets causing different effects within their markets, that doesn't negate relative monopolistic effects, my comment was more about the former than the latter.

Telco monopoly got lapped. Shut it down.

I find it quite interesting that roaming is available at all, even if just for a limited time period. As far as I understand, satellite operators need a local license to offer any kind of service in a country's territory (and I believe even in its airspace).

For older systems, especially those with relatively large beam sizes, there's an argument to be made that provider-side regional limitations are technically infeasible, but that obviously does not apply to Starlink.

stupid question: isn't starlink effectively beyond the reach of tiny countries' governments? why comply? they can't do a thing about satellites, physically can't touch them, and America owns the payment rails the company uses. why pretend that these countries have the ability or right to regulate this?

I'm guessing they deal with it at the citizen level. Just investigate, raid the property and confiscate all the equipment.

It’s only ~3500 people on the islands, it’s not exactly a difficult to find if someone brings it in.

> Regardless of differing opinions

Those opinions seem to be relevant here.

It looks a lot like the people of the Faulklands demoraticaly elected a bunch of monopololists to run the place, and will have to use the same means to get things sorted out. Or to put it bluntly, not bieng up to speed on todays internet is litteraly shackling the population to decling incomes and standards of living, plus no one in there right mind would emigrate there.A business?, startup? It sounds like its a lot like rural Argentina.

This is just lobbying.

Why don't they just bury and undersea cable from the closest mainland? 300 miles from the coast doesn't sound like much for that kind of project.

Oh wait.

Good idea, where's HMS Invincible these days?

There's some history here, so that particular coast might not be very amenable to any such project.

Strong FAFO vibes.

By who? Are you blaming locals who want to use Starlink, or the incumbent monopoly that's likely twisting arms behind the scenes to ensure it retains the stranglehold on communications to the islands?

> ...twisting arms behind the scenes...

Falkland Islands, pop 3,600 [0] - can they sustain a "behind the scenes"?

The Chinese National People's Congress is around 3,000 members. A bit of net emigration and the Falklands would be smaller than a legislative body.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falkland_Islands

It's much easier to sustain corruption in a small community. The current setup will be personally beneficial to someone.

In the sense that island communities are invariably quirky and the sexual abuse tends to be off the charts bad, sure. But nothing is happening behind the scenes. There isn't enough else to gossip about and people can't hide their wealth or stay off the radar.

It isn't really possible to fight the community on an island that small. If a lynch mob forms it could potentially include the entire 10 people in the police force and nobody saw nuttin'. Corrupt, but overt.

> The Chinese National People's Congress is around 3,000 members. A bit of net emigration and the Falklands would be smaller than a legislative body.

That's not really a great example; the reason 人民代表大会 can be so big is that the legislative decisions it formalizes are mostly made elsewhere.

The Chinese National People’s Congress isn’t a legislative body, it’s a pastiche of one.

This monopoly seems to be preventing unexpected changes. Maybe better Internet would cause it to turn into a digital nomad paradise, which would cause more demand for visiting or living there, and that in turn would cause greater tension in https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falkland_Islands_sovereignty_d...

> Because Sure International holds an exclusive monopoly telecommunications licence, Starlink’s use in the islands is currently illegal.

The national emergency seems to be that they want to do something that is explicitly illegal. The article seems to be missing important context on why they expect to be able to do what they are doing.

The article also says the law was changed but it will take two months to take effect.

Ask one of the large nation states nearby to supply service.

Argentina would be a good candidate. Islas Malvinas and all that.

Or Uruguay. Lots of IPv6 in Uruguay

That would probably really sour their relationship with Argentina

Huh, an arbitrary tax from a remote sovereign. Sounds familiar.

This tax is entirely local

Are we all pretending starlink is financially viable and discussing it on that basis or from a different angle?

Is it insensitive to say “move somewhere less corrupt”? It doesn’t seem to be anything to do with Starlink as it seems they can’t legally offer service there.

Mobile technology is promoted for use under the law of the universe. When human laws contradict the law of the universe, human laws are in violation of universal law.

The use of the name Falklands is problematic because the Islas Malvinas are a disputed territory between Argentina and the UK. The UN has recognized this dispute and has urged the UK to negotiate their return, something the UK has ignored so far. Using the name imposed by the occupying power contributes to erasing Argentina’s legitimate claim and disregards the international legal stance on the issue. The proper approach would be to refer to them as Islas Malvinas or at least acknowledge the dispute in any discussion about them.

> the Islas Malvinas are a disputed territory between Argentina and the UK

Not according to the Islanders who live there.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2013_Falkland_Islands_sovereig...

Please understand the word democracy.

The 2013 referendum is not a valid argument in sovereignty disputes. The UN has repeatedly recognized the Islas Malvinas as a disputed territory and has urged the UK to negotiate with Argentina (Resolution 2065 and subsequent resolutions).

The islands were uninhabited until European explorers discovered them.

Spain had no more or less right to them than Britain in the 18th century.

UN resolutions on such cases are entirely political.

The history is pretty well documented and the islanders overwhelmingly voted to align with the UK.

Self-determination does not apply here because the current population is not indigenous but was implanted after the UK forcibly took the islands in 1833, displacing the original Argentine population. The UN considers this a decolonization issue, not a matter of self-determination.

The argument that the islanders “chose” to remain under UK control ignores that democracy cannot legitimize colonial occupation. A referendum by settlers cannot override international law, just as a vote by European colonists in Africa in the 19th century wouldn’t justify occupation. The UK has consistently refused to negotiate, violating UN resolutions and international norms.

> Self-determination does not apply here because the current population is not indigenous

What a ridiculous (even racist) argument!

Are you seriously going to tell us that only native North Americans can vote in the next US or Canadian elections!

> in 1833, displacing the original Argentine population

Quoting https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reassertion_of_British_soverei...

> Argentina claims that the population of the islands was expelled in 1833;[11] however, both British and Argentine sources from the time, including the log of the ARA Sarandí, suggest that the colonists were encouraged to remain under Vernet's deputy, Matthew Brisbane.

So again, I repeat: this is all very well documented by this point. The other commenter also already pointed out the other issue in your text here so I'll leave it at this.

If I moved to the middle of nowhere because of Starlink and them... "The sudden shutdown of Starlink services clearly qualifies as a National Emergency due to the widespread and unforeseen consequences such an action would have."

I didn't read the article deeply, but my impression is that it's mostly people that already live there - one firm has an exclusive license to provide internet. I think it's ok to complain about such a situation as internet is not the exclusive reason someone might choose a place to live.

I often hear people complain about milder internet monopolies -for instance, one cable provider in their town. But this sounds higher stakes because that internet provider has a single satellite for the island, so one malfunction could cut (most? All?) access completely.

They seem to have outages quite frequently, and only recently started offering speeds above 5mbps (and price cuts) as a result of competition from starlink.

Is a third part of your comment missing or ...? I think this puts a focus on how much Internet connectivity is nearly necessary

What makes you think they moved to the middle of nowhere because of Starlink? These are people who've lived there for hundreds of years.

The first permanent settlement in the Falklands was by a German in 1826. So hundred of years.

Hundreds - two of them.

I worked for a satellite provider's customer service years ago.

I'd get tons of calls from people upset that the service was only available in the US. About 40% were people trying to use it outside the US.

(The other 60% were all from the same American state.)

It's amazing what shit people expect sometimes.

Were a lot of those 40% near the US and with a good view of the satellite? If so I don't see why it's amazing they want to purchase services from your company.

Alaska?

Texas

My guess was Hawai'i but I too am curious which State it was.

Any other company, sure lets have a discussion of pros and cons and weight cost in. With musk, you have no idea where his emotional imbalance and childish pettiness will carry him next day, he already feels entitled to mess with other (friendly!) countries' internal affairs and politics. He (in)famously turned off starling for Ukraine military mid attack.

I would lightyears and beyond to avoid having all internet dependent on such person.

Musk-free is good these days unfortunately, especially for non-US, meaning >95% of the world

He did not turn it off FYI

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starlink_in_the_Russo-Ukrain...

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