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[–] 56 points 5 days ago (13 children)

Musk is charging Ukraine $2500 per month per Starlink terminal, for over 250,000 terminals. Musk is making bank for shitty service (it's not fast enough for gaming) and then he cuts services for partisan purposes, costing Ukrainian lives.

The upsell maneuver reminds me of when Verizon tried to do the same thing to California wildfire response services when communications cut out during disaster control efforts. That didn't play well, either.

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  • [–] -1 points 5 days ago (12 children)

    it’s not fast enough for gaming

    Dawg, you need like a 5 megabit connection for online gaming, if even that. Starlink offers multiple times that at the minimum.

    I can understand it being too slow for many things, but gaming is one of the worst examples you could've possibly given.

    Couldn't find a reliable source for the 250,000 figure. The closest thing I could find was 50,000 in 2025.

    I hate this as much as you do, but come on, don't make shit up.

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  • [–] 23 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago) (5 children)

    The co-founder of the Ukraine Defense Fund, which has helped secure Starlink access for the Ukrainian military, told The Atlantic that he estimates there are now over 250,000 Starlink terminals in use across the war zone.

    I found the article in The Atlantic (Paywall bypass here):

    [Musk's] company has earned hundreds of millions of dollars from the Starlink terminals operating in the war zone. Liscovich estimates there are well over 250,000 of them. In the past, SpaceX, which runs Starlink, has reportedly charged the Ukrainian government $2,500 per terminal each month, and it has cut off service when bills go unpaid. Earlier this month, when U.S. military officials asked SpaceX about the outages in Ukraine, the company advised switching to an upgraded contract to restore Ukraine’s access, U.S. officials told us. (Musk and SpaceX did not respond to questions for this article.)

    As for incapacity for gaming of Starlink, that's anecdotal, having heard it is a problem from fellow gamers here in the States that depend on Starlink. There's enough of a lag to disallow for common action games, although this is a known issue consistent with all satellite internet services. Hence the need for rural ISP buildout blocked by the big communications oligopolies (and presently the well-bribed Trump administration)

    You're remarkably antagonistic for a Lemming. Are you sure you're not a Musk-shill or a bot?

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  • [–] 3 points 5 days ago (1 child)

    I found the article in The Atlantic

    Fair enough, I couldn't find that article.

    here’s enough of a lag to disallow for common action games

    Lag is different from a lack of speed, which that person claimed. Lag = latency, nothing to do with speed.

    You’re remarkably antagonistic for a Lemming. Are you sure you’re not a Musk-shill or a bot?

    I really really really hate this redditor style tendency to call everyone who corrects facts they want to believe in a shill or a bot. I couldn't have made it more clear that I'm not a Musk fan:

    I hate this as much as you do, but come on, don’t make shit up.

    It's just that I'm overly concerned with facts, likely due to my neurodivergence. These kinds of comments feels kind of ableist, although that again is probably something I might get shit on for, as you're not supposed to call out ableism on this platform.

    I don't understand this bot thing either. I haven't seen a single one of these bots you're talking about. Repost bots, sure, but agenda pushing bots? The entities that push that stuff clearly aren't interested in this platform yet. On Reddit it's very obvious.

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  • [–] 0 points 4 days ago

    "Fast" doesn't just refer to the download speed, it also refers to the latency.

    By any competent gamer's standards, WiFi is slow. Starlink is untenable.

    One "special" mind to another, a head for facts doesn't preclude you from being wrong and/or needlessly pedantic.

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  • [–] 12 points 5 days ago (3 children)

    Yeah, but I bet those ping times are just awful. And that can definitely interfere with gaming.

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  • [–] 2 points 5 days ago (2 children)

    I thought so too, then I googled it. It's actually not a bad latency at all. Better than some cabled connections I've used in the past.

    Might not be very stable though.

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