I'm actually a huge fan of "unlimited slow speeds" as a falloff, instead of a cliff.
Aside from the fact it allows you to work with Starlink to buy more fast speed, it also allows core stuff to continue to function (e.g. basic notifications, non-streaming web traffic, etc).
Unrelated to the conversation, but the post title was something like "Starlink roam 50GB is now 100GB and unlimited slow speed after that", then a minute later it's now "Roam 50GB is now Roam 100GB".
Was this change made by a mod or OP, and why would someone making that change? I do think the original title was more descriptive, and the new title was completely out of context, or it's imply that everyone is using Starlink and know what's Roam 50GB is.
The guidelines[0] state:
> ...
> Otherwise please use the original title, unless it is misleading or linkbait; don't editorialize.
I would say that omitting the crucial detail about the unlimited slow speed access is pretty misleading. It's a difference between needing to set up a fallback channel, and not, which halves the complexity.
They changed two things and the title only has one of the things, so personally I think that's 'misleading' enough to append the rest.
I believe there is a rule where the HN title should mirror the article’s title
I guess the idea is that the Starlink URL is displayed after the title so it's redundant, but it definitely makes it impossible to understand at first glance if you're unfamiliar with Starlink service names
The HN website shows the host part of the URL right next to the title, so it says "Roam 50GB is now Roam 100GB (starlink.com)", but it looks strange in my RSS reader
Yes, this is weird title change.
If I were to guess, probably because Musk achieved self-fulfilling prophecy of hate and discriminatory handling against him, and now any obviously him related content gets massive, organic, figurative, score penalties.
Tesla and SpaceX posts used to routinely hit the top spots and accumulate thousands of comments here, now they hardly stay an hour on the first page. Someone on the Internet's first headphone amp is now considered more important to people here than the world's largest rocket flying, if that comes with Musk attached.
Obviously as anybody knows, that's how `hate` actually works: silent exclusion, not posturing. But that was what they advocated for years, so, here's my slow claps...
Nice that instead of completely cutting you off at the cap they put it in super slow 500 kbits. That is actually usable and used to be the fastest speed you could get at home.
I'd disagree that that is usable today. A few days ago I had some network trouble that restricted me to about 350kbps, although stable without much packet loss, and a lot of stuff just didn't practically work. At that speed, loading images and resources on webpages within timeout limits is hard. Many web apps don't work, or degrade enough that you wouldn't want to use them.
Also what do we actually use the web for? A lot of streaming video and audio that won't work. A lot of reading webpages with a lot of images and ads, that won't work. I'm sure that Wikipedia would load and work slowly, but that's not really representative of web usage today.
There's a separate argument about whether the web should be like that, but regardless of your thoughts on that, it is like that.
My first company was an ISP, and our selling point was that we had higher bandwith out of Norway than any competitors in our price range.... A whopping 512kps.
Mmmmm ISDN copper…
Copper, but not ISDN. Fractional E1 leased line. There were expensive and limited ISDN connections available in Norway at the time ('95), but not cost effective for an ISP.
I was in Northern Virginia at the time enjoying this new thing called AOL.
If I remember right we could get 64kb/s or 128kb/s if you bundled them, that was in Germany. But also, we didn't have that, we only had a 56kb/s modem and I remember really wanting ISDN when I was a kid :)
Or four bonded twin-64kbit channels with a multiplexer. Ahhh, high school…
Still with pretty low latency (25-35ms) as well (similar to the Standby (aka pause) state you can put the account into for $5/mo)
The first modem that I owned was 1200 baud. The first one that I used was 110 and it was exciting when it was upgraded to 300. It took ~20 years from when I first got online until my home internet reached 512kbps.
I bought a cheap 1200 and then once I had use for it I saved up for a USR 14.4 with a shiny extruded aluminum case. At one point I was sharing that with two roommates using SLIP and surplussed Cisco coaxial NICs.
That's faster than my cell phone in the areas where I desperately need Starlink....500kb > 0
Be aware that it is bits, so 62.5kb. But I agree, the internet is still usable with that.
> Be aware that it is bits, so 62.5kb
Ok, I’m not normally one to be the pedantic bits/bytes guy, but if you’re gonna go and make a bit/byte “clarification” you need to get the annotation correct or you'll just confuse everyone.
It’s 500kb (small b for bits) and 62.5kB(capital/big B for bytes).
If we're playing actually, then it's a speed not a quota, so whatever the correct value it should be suffixed with "per second".
K is for Kelvin, so probably not. kB or KiB, depending on intent.
People always use bits for connectivity. 62.5kB/sec -- maybe really 55-60kB/sec downloaded. Or 18 seconds to get a megabyte.
This is simultaneously fast (on my 14400 bps modem that I spent the most time "waiting for downloading", I was used to 12-13 minutes per megabyte vs. 18 seconds here) and slow (the google homepage is >1MB, so until you have resources cached you're waiting tens of seconds).
It would be nice if everything were just a touch more efficient.
I end up transferring 940kB (with a lot of blocking cranked up). Typing "hello" in the search bar takes it up to 1MB. Then the first page of search results is another 1.3MB.
Now, I assume all of this would start working before it's all transferred. But we're still talking about tens of seconds of transfer at 500kbit/sec.
(And Google at least acts like they care about bandwidth a little. So many 15megabyte pages out there...)
> the internet is still usable with that.
We lived for years on 56kbps, granted the Internet was different back then, but we'd still "use" it, download stuff, etc.
Unfortunately, the 56kbps internet was a lot more usable. I've been on 256kbps cellular connections (T-Mobile free international roaming) and it works, but it's pretty bad. Everything takes way more data these days, and nobody thinks about slow connections when writing software so there are a ton of overly aggressive timeouts and bad UI that assume operations won't take more than few seconds.
I've never heard bandwidth being expressed in bytes. But if we're being pedantic then I'd like to throw my hat in and call it 62.5kB.
Or even better, 62.5KiB (for kibibyte)
Data rates are almost always multiplied by powers of 10, because they're based on symbol/clock rates which tend to be related to powers of 10. There's no address lines, etc, to push us to powers of 2 (though we may get a few powers of 2 from having a power of 2 number of possible symbols).
So telco rates which are multiples of 56000 or 64000; baud rates which are multiples of 300; ethernet rates which are mostly just powers of 10; etc etc etc.
Of course, there's occasional weird stuff, but usually things have a lot of factors of 5 in there and seem more "decimal-ish" than "binary-ish".
Good enough to play Quake 3 Arena.
You might just be able to stream 240p youtube without stuttering with that.
No, not nice. Previously, if we exceeded the 50Gb cap, there was the option to continue on at high-speed for $1/Gb. And that's the same price per Gb as the base plan of 50Gb/month for $50. Now, it's either upgrade to unlimited, or enjoy Netflix at 500Kbps. I want the old plan back.
Wait, the price didn’t change though did it? So you get 100 gigs for the price of 50 before?
Now the cap is 100G. Seems like an odd complaint. Did you often exceed 100Gb?
It's unlikely that we will exceed 100Gb/month in the camper. But if we do, it's either slow speeds, or pay $165/month for unlimited roam every single month we use it, versus paying a little extra for the few times we go over. In the end, it'll probably work out okay for us, but I liked the previous option of being able to get high-speed data at a reasonable price should we go over the limit.
Fortunately 1. For slow speeds, it’s not like you have to live with that slowness every day. The impact is limited to the remaining few days of the month where you ran up against the 100GB, so the either-or in your statement looks worse than it is; and 2. Starlink makes it dead easy to switch from plan to plan right in the app so you can go right back to a lower plan when the higher one is not needed. With the caveat that they do change what plans are available sometimes as we’re seeing here.
If I calculate correctly then 500 kbps is actually enough for Netflix in standard quality. If one wants to binge watch 4K (7 GB per hour) then the unlimited plan makes more sense anyway.
I had a “hit” post on bsky [0] (90 likes, big numbers for me) asking whether people would want an unlimited mobile plan throttled at 256kbps for $2/month. Seems like yes?
There’s lots to say about how useable it is (I often get throttled when traveling and it’s really not that bad + it helps curb any desire to scroll videos!)
But mainly I want to ask - I looked into it for a minute and it seems like you couldn’t start an mvno because carriers wouldn’t let you cannibalize them?
You can get very cheap IoT plans but if you tried reselling IoT as esims for consumers, the carriers would kill it?
So yeah - Starlink to mobile is actually the only viable way that routes around this problem?
(((email in profile if you’re cuckoo enough like me and want to start a self service’d throttled mvno)))
[0] https://bsky.app/profile/greg.technology/post/3mbmwsytnyc23
Embeddedworks sells unlimited 750kbps service for $90/year. Its data only, no phone or SMS.
When I talked to them earlier this year they said there was potential to sell other data rates though nothing was as low as $2/month.
Unfortunately their plan is an IoT plan “Not Intended for Phones or Tablets” [0]
That’s exactly the issue - it’s a great plan, it’s just contractually stopped from being offered because a lot of people would potentially switch to that..! :)
To me, the fact that the restriction exists is a proof of the demand for this.
There is something like this but twice the prive in Finland https://www.moi.fi/laitenetti . Can't make outgoing calls but there are pay as you internet call out services for that occaddional use case.
Not just you, that might be a overall record for bsky?
This doesn't seem to have anything to do with the current advertisement being discussed.
Sorry yes - I think it does. Starlink sats can already offer 5G service directly to mobile phones (from the sky!!)
And there are other comments here talking about this specifically - how unlimited bandwidth throttled plans are actually useful and would be great to have.
Really interesting that Starlink continues to improve the service when they have an absolute monopoly on fast, portable satellite internet.
I assume they want to attract as many customers has possible while they have that monopoly - eventually they're going to need to compete with Amazon (Leo) and China (Qianfan, although I assume it'll be banned in the US). The cost of the phased-array terminals probably means there will be some stickiness.
Also as has been noted, in some markets they do compete on price: https://restofworld.org/2025/starlink-cheaper-internet-afric...
That's the magic of the free market. Even with no direct rival yet, Starlink innovates like crazy because the threat of competition is always there and consumers demand excellence. Unlike state-granted monopolies, those parasitic structures stagnate and plunder the people.
Is this why Google Search has been getting better and better every year?
Not fair - Google Search is under constant and escalating attack. If we replaced current Google Search with the 2000s implementation it would be immediately dominated by spam and SEO hacks. Simple PageRank doesn't work anymore.
It was, until Matt Cutts left.
It's probably getting better and better every year for the customers, ie the advertisers.
"Enshittification" would suggest otherwise.
They are interested in other markets where they don't have a monopoly though. Most of the time my cell phone has fast 5g internet, and my cell phone company is trying to sell me on their 5g internet (I have fibre so I don't see the point). For many potential starlink customers there is competition. If you on the ocean they are the only option. If you travel on land they can be the only option in places but you can probably live with no service in those few places.
Satellite internet's main selling point is for use in remote locations.
Absolutely monopoly? You mean other than Kuiper, right?
https://www.aboutamazon.com/news/innovation-at-amazon/what-i...
How many customers does Kuiper have at present?
that entire page is in future tense
I would guess that for many of their customers, they are still competing with non-satellite internet.
Some lessons were learned from iRobot.
I've never read Peter Thiel's books, but isn't that kinda a part of his playbook? Monopolies, but driving progress? "Competition is for losers"? I never fully understood it because it seems like then you're just competing with yourself.
Makes sense. Make your service good enough with your rocket+satellite synergy that competitors would need to spend $500B to be competitive.
Slightly off-topic: does anyone know how to reach Starlink by phone or email?
They started billing me but I never received a sat dish.
And their support Website is a chatbot :-(.
I want the old plan back. If we went over the 50Gb/month, there was the option of continuing on at $1/Gb, which is the same price per Gb as the base plan. IOW, they didn't punish you for going over. Now if we go over, it's either put up with slow speed data, or upgrade to unlimited.
This is the equivalent of having the previous 50GB base plan and going over by $50 worth of data (an additional 50GB). If you were routinely going 50GB over the 50GB plan, I'd suggest that maybe a 50GB plan wasn't the right plan for you. Under the old plan, 100GB of data would have cost $100. Residential unlimited is $120, so for most users this would seem like an improvement.
The residential plan can't be used with the Starlink mini, only the full size Starlink. At least that's the case in the US. Cheapest plan is now $165 for users that need over 100GB.
I still think this is mostly a positive change, but it is a bummer that the service plans keep changing.
That's the thing, we don't regularly go over 50Gb. Probably won't go over 100Gb, either. But if we do, it's either slow speeds, or pay $165/month for unlimited roam every single month we use it, versus paying a little extra for the few times we go over.
> every single month we use it, versus paying a little extra for the few times we go over
I'm interpreting "every single month we use it" as every month you use starlink. In that case, you're incorrect. You can change plans when you hit the limit and then change back for the next month.
So instead of paying $1/GB extra every time you go above 50GB, you pay $115 extra every time you go above 100GB.
For most usage patterns, the second option is cheaper. And it sounds like your usage pattern is one of those.
(If I interpreted you wrong, and "every single month we use it" is supposed to mean the months you go over 100GB, then "every single month we use it" and "the few times we go over" mean exactly the same thing. Why word it with such different implications each time?)
So you're mad you're paying the same for double the data, of which it wasn't completely used beforehand anyway.
You do you, I guess.
Lies, then uses my own line. Get real, but more importantly, be original.
> nor that data go unused every month
> we don't regularly go over 50Gb
I mean, you did.
And now, even if you did go over 50GB, you get 50 more GB to use at the same price. If you barely went over before, then you will likely not use up the extra 50GB, and therefore are paying less than before for the same usage.
I spend a lot of time out of reception and starlink has been fantastic. So much so that I leave it on anytime I'm driving where I have cellular reception because it's just consistently good. I get ~100Mbps whether it's a forest service road, ATV trail, or on the highway through curvy mountain passes.
I'm on the 50GB plan so doubling for free is very nice, but it looks like they yanked the ability to optionally purchase additional high speed data for $1/GB. Maybe it's still there?
Looks like you can upgrade to the $165/mo tier if you want more.
Finally I can use Codex/OpenCode even out in the woods. No work-life balance; just vibing everywhere I go.
Haha vibe coding is pretty addictive. Maybe vibe code an app that tells you how to improve work life balance in the woods ;)
Youtubing how to deal with a snakebite might come in more handy.
That’s great for me. I use it mainly for work (food trucks, not much data) but sometimes I’ll use it for personal stuff like weekend camping and hit the 50. Now I can just not worry about it ever.
Starlink has short contract duration. That means they can also increase prices at short notice. It's happened in the past (in particular for sailors).
You may think you're getting a good deal on your Starlink dish. However, when prices suddenly increase or conditions worsen, you have no recourse.
The actual thing I've experienced is they've added cheaper plans, given us coastal coverage, and international coverage. I've had it since 2024 and between the Google Fiber at home and Starlink on the move, I think this has been overall A+ experience. 5/5 on both.
Besides, there's no real alternative to Starlink right now and their price is very reasonable. If the price rose a lot I'd use the pause/resume feature or the tiny 10 G plan.
This makes the $50/mo plan viable for wan failover. Still have the cgnat issue, but there's some documentation about requesting an ipv4 address from support. Has anyone succeeded with that?
I had free Starlink wifi on a recent flight (Hawaiian) and it was an insanely better internet experience than I've ever had on a plane.
At least it's not like my mobile service, which when I run out of data also disables the payment provider for their web portal to buy more data.
That's not bad for the cheap plan. Even the slow mode is fast enough for video conferencing and doing basic remote work. They still have a separate unlimited plan for anyone who needs more.
They explicitly say video streaming will be "limited" aka it won't work like you want it to
I haven't done a video call on it but it does work for youtube. It's best to pause a video at the start but it buffers and plays just fine. Blocky but certainly watchable.
Zoom works in 500kbps environments in my experience.
You won't be in crispy 720p or 1080p, but you can still talk to other people.
If the data speed is sufficient but they’re intentionally throttling video you could maybe get around it a VPN.
I know this is probably niche, but it would be nice to be able to buy, say, 50GB and have a year to use.
I just wish they would bring back their experimental $40 plan (and make it available in my area).
Has anyone used starlink for remoting into a work desktop? If so was the latency bearable?
I work remotely and use a starlink mini for work and general internet usage since I road trip in the summer a lot. For work I'm not using doing RDP/remote desktop stuff since I have a company-issued laptop, but I have some experience using it to stream graphics-intensive games from my home PC with a nice GPU to my phone with a mobile controller attached to it.
I saw around 50-100ms of latency in ideal conditions with a clear view of the sky. There are distinct large latency spikes every 30ish minutes, which I think is due to the dish switching between different satellites.
I think the latency would be fine for working, but it will hardly be transparent. When using it to play games, I've mostly stuck to stuff that doesn't require fast responses or parry mechanics, etc.
Even without RDP-ing into another workstation, the latency spikes on video calls can be noticeable. Moment-to-moment video conferencing latency is totally fine, given that most of the major players in the space have pretty good latency compensation baked in.
A few details/complications:
- I'm usually within ~500 miles of my home, which is relevant because starlink satellites communicate with ground stations, and being closer to home will still have a meaningful impact on latency
- host PC is on a wired fiber connection
- I live relatively far north (~65N) and starlink's network isn't biased toward polar orbiting satellites, so my coverage probaby isn't representative of behavior further south. You can see a map of satellites and note the relatively poor arctic and subarctic region coverage here: https://satellitemap.space/
>There are distinct large latency spikes every 30ish minutes, which I think is due to the dish switching between different satellites.
The satellites are in Low Earth Orbit and zipping across the sky at an extremely high rate of speed. If you were in the middle of absolutely flat nowhere-land, you could maybe get a few minutes on a single satellite before it goes over the horizon, not 30 minutes.
Agree that it's only a few mins per satellite, but interestingly I've noticed this pause every now and then (and 30mins seems around what I've noticed) in New Zealand. The latency just spikes and sometimes connections are lost for a brief period then suddenly everything comes right again. Curious why that happens. However it's one reason why I still recommend fibre or 5G if it is availiable as both seem to be more reliable than Starlink.
Awesome news. When we started RV traveling we wanted to do the 50G plan whenever we were out of cell-range but it turned out to be such a convenient service that 50G didn't last us more than 3 days so we switched to unlimited and haven't regretted it. Absolutely worth it because even the residential dish works flawlessly while driving and the kids can game and stream all at the same time from the pickup.
I put some more details on my blog if you're interested in power specs or DNS options on the router, etc. https://bitcreed.us/bitblog/starlink-on-the-road
You can also start on the 100G plan and when you run out of data switch to unlimited right from the app. That'll bring down the first-month bill a tad and give you a chance to gauge the "slow speed" option.
Can one downgrade back from unlimited too 100?
I just checked my Starlink app and if I wanted to downgrade mine it says the change would be effective at the beginning of the next monthly billing period.
So looks like you can downgrade every month and upgrade any time. Sounds fair to me.
Thanks for this. I now withdraw my previous objections to the change. If we blow past the 100Gb, just upgrade, then remember to downgrade before the next month.
I’ve kept it on the backup service for 10 GB at $10 or whatever and it’s pretty cool. Used it off my balcony in SF when Google Fiber had a 1 hr outage, take it on road trips, and stuff like that. Totally worth it.
Musk has excellent products but I wouldn't give him a dime. I have no problem with conservative politics, but his flavour is well beyond that.
Agreed although it's getting to the point that other companies are now using Starlink to provide other services so I've often used Starlink (even if indirectly) without realising it.
For example I go tramping and pretty much every remote accomodation I've stayed at use Starlink. My mobile provider uses Starlink for direct-to-cell services. My national airline uses Starlink as backhaul for their in-flight WiFi.
I know there are other competitors coming who aim to provide alternatives to Starlink -- this should mean at some point accomodation providers, mobile networks, airlines, etc can switch to them.
Thanks for letting us all know. We needed to hear that. /s
Comments about Elon on HN have become exhaustingly cringe; dripping with devout derision, reeking of righteous reproach, and smacking of sanctimonious seething.
Apparently we must all gnash our teeth at the mere mention of "that man" or anything associated with him. It's as plebeian as it is predictable.
I'm sure this will now be downvoted into oblivion and I'll be accused of "defending an avowed racist" or some other such nonsense.
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Regardless of the price and the data, I'd never subscribe to this service due to the owner. I'm looking forward for alternatives from a more neutral vendor
I think they will have enough clients from other parts of the world to make it work. Large areas of my country can't really be covered with wired networks, it's too expensive to make it economically feasible without massive government subsidies, for which there's no money.
Starlink has already been used to connect very remote rural schools which previously only had dial-up connectivity (enough to send text email, but not much else).
And nobody here cares about American politics, we have enough of our own problems.
It's not really American politics when Elon decides to turn off your countries internet for personal gain. Having such critical infrastructure in the hands of someone unstable wouldn't be a choice I ever make for something so important.
You are probably referring to ukraine and you should know that this was entirely fake news. It was never disabled. It had never been enabled in Crimea in the first place, in accordance with US gov policy.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starlink_in_the_Russian-Ukrain...
In 2022, Elon Musk denied a Ukrainian request to extend Starlink's coverage up to Russian-occupied Crimea during a counterattack on a Crimean port, from which Russia had been launching attacks against Ukrainian civilians; doing so would have violated US sanctions on Russia.[18] This event was widely reported in 2023, erroneously characterizing it as Musk "turning off" Starlink coverage in Crimea.
Sanctions were in place because russia controlled crimea regardless of international recognition, so what's your point
Oh damn, you’re right. The US should provide a portion of the Ukraine aid to the government in Crimea.
Perhaps we can drop off some Abrams for the Donbas region next time. It’s part of Ukraine after all.
Nice to see what the colonizer imperialist state actors that love Zionism and unequal exchange side with.
USAID was ironically a significant customer for Starlink. People are probably already familiar with the 5,000 Ukraine terminal scandal, but pretty much all their offices (in Colombia at least) had 1 or more terminals. What does USAID have anything to do with this conversation? Well, DOGE was largely responsible for putting the final nail on that coffin. If you think he cares about remote rural schools having connectivity you better think again.
I actually prefer the economic system where providers don't have to care about the use cases and we're able to use the exchange of money for services to get things. I doubt Subaru cares about a yuppie couple going on a road trip to the redwoods. They just want my money. That's the sort of relationship I want with most vendors.
If Subaru started talking to me about how much they like that I take road trips with their cars I'd probably switch to a different vendor.
Well, that's opt-in, right? I don't think it should be illegal for people to have relationships with vendors. I just prefer our current system where vendor relationships don't require anyone to care.
It’s not “American politics” when a guy does a Nazi salute on live TV. So thanks for showing your political inclination.
Not to be pedantic. But facism is politics.
Fascism isn't just American. If you're going to be pedantic, at least be accurate. My point: supporting an American fascist normalizes fascism everywhere
Would you rather buy from Jeff Bezos or a Chinese state-owned enterprise? Those are your likely options within the next 5-10 years.
In 20026 that’s a question I would have to answer with «I’ll have to get back to you on that».
In fact, sometimes I wish I had chosen a profession where I didn’t need an internet connection at all.
Does Jeff Bezos believe we need white solidarity to survive because non-white people are a threat to white men?
Elon Musk is a deluded addict who thinks he's doing the right thing, Jeff Bezos is in it for himself only and knows it.
Citation needed
This is opinion, not citation. Here's what he said:
> White people are a rapidly diminishing minority of global population
Which unless you have any extra context, according to me does not entail:
> we need white solidarity to survive because non-white people are a threat to white men
Look at Elon's X replies
Nobody has been forced to switch to a space based internet solution.
You don't need to buy from any of those people.
Boycott noted, meanwhile, I’ll be enjoying double the roaming data while you wait for that legendary ‘neutral’ competitor to beam down from the heavens.
Hey, at least they won't be getting data from and enriching an avowed racist, so they got that going for them.
Enjoy your part in creating misery for people who just happen to not be white.
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something something, sounds like a bluesky post.
I respect your principles, but at the same time, using Starlink for now does encourage other potential competitors to come forth, at which time you could switch.
I’m 100% on the same boat. The only competitor I can see is Amazon Leo. Having options is great but they both suck.
As if Bezos is better. Elon has a much higher slope but he’s got a head start to catch up on, before they’re all hunting humans for sport on Ellison’s private island.
https://x.com/elonmusk/status/2009171282030653877
I disagree that Bezos & Elon are comparably bad.
i posted 4 times in this thread (once more than you), half of which were actually defending Elon Musk's contributions/companies. take care
You're all over the thread actually arguing with people over things that don't relate to the article as well. Pot, kettle.
Bezos worst offense is meeting with Trump and donating to his campaign (and if you follow the leftist ideology, being a billionaire).
But based on personal experience with some very wealthy people, I truly believe they are just out of touch with the real world to understand what they are doing politically. Imagine if your days could be spent doing all the things you ever could wish, you would most likely not even bother reading stuff like reddit or HN, and certainly won't have time to look into any snippet of news in detail.
Musk on the other hand, is mentally ill.
thank you for not bidding up the price
See also the "Fuck You Elon" exhibit at this past Burning Man, powered by starlink.
There are two Chinese alternatives being deployed right now. I believe one is called Guowang. As a red blooded American, I would rather go with Guowang over an American Nazi.
They could make it 1000GB for US$10/month and I still wouldn't give any money to a company associated with that man.
I know everyone has strong opinions about Elon, but for $10/mo I would absolutely get this. At $50/mo, I don't have enough of a need to get it.
"That man" is the only person so far who's actually helped the Iranian people get their voices heard amidst government shutdown of the entire internet.
Like it or not, Persians love him.
This is a very low effort reply. Does doing one good thing erase all the bad things a person has done? If that's the argument you're making, make it.
don't call someone else's comment low effort and follow it with little more than a strawman-ish summary of what you'd like the comment to have said
As I recently said about Scott Adams: "Good things can be done by Bad people." I think to assume that humans are these monolithic, logically consistent entities is to badly misunderstand humanity.
For example, Planned Parenthood--an organization I definitely believe in--was essentially created by a woman who was a eugenicist--something I definitely do not believe in.
Were I to be supporting PP when Sanger was still alive, I would not have been enriching her, or enabling other things that she believed in (at least not to any extent that would trouble me). Mostly because PP has always been a not-for-profit organization.
Being a Starlink customer, to me, has a straight line connection to enabling that man to do all the things he does.
> It's logically consistent for the OP to be aware that Musk is aiding internet connectivity in Iran but still oppose giving him money.
Why not flip this on its head? It's also logically consistent for people to be aware that Elon has done things they disagree with and still choose to buy his products.
people understandably love to understand complex things as simple logical puzzle pieces. they do it with words too. people have this tendency to act like words are formally-defined mathematical concepts, and then agonise over whether their experiences fit those concepts, then use those concepts as proof for their arguments. this is, of course, essentially simply a description of communicating with language, and for most words it's absolutely fine; the words have so little variance and breadth in definition that it doesn't matter. the issue arises when the words are not clearly defined, and it becomes even worse (and more common) when the words are emotionally loaded. people adore using emotionally, loaded, weakly defined terms to end an argument quickly. it's essentially sophistry. we're all absolutely awash with these terms right now due to the dominance of headlines, tweets, content titles and other short form stretches that demand dense, emotionally charged meaning in a small space. if you'd like some examples, take "fascism", "sexual harassment" and "eugenics".
don't say someone is "essentially a eugenicist". it's such a vaguely defined term that this borders on useless. if you believe something like this, justify it with: "she supported x policy I disagree with" or "she believed in the reduction of y trait in the populace" or whatever it is that triggered you to take on this belief in the first place
By this logic, Persians also hate him because he played a big factor in destroying USAID, an organization that has helped Iranians in humanitarian aid and disaster relief. Persian-language broadcasting by Voice of America and Radio Farda has been destroyed by Musk.
> By this logic, Persians also hate him because he played a big factor in destroying USAID, an organization that has helped Iranians in humanitarian aid and disaster relief.
Is this a joke? Persians never received such aids. If USAID sent any money to Iran, it went straight to the islamic regime's proxies in the region.
As the other poster said, low effort reply. You can start with the Bam earthquake and work your way to the loss of Radio Farda. You beloved Musk put an end to the Middle Eastern Broadcasting Network.
And Escobar financed hospitals.
The same guy could help some people and kick others in the dirt at the same time.
The same Persians in a western country would be called a threat to western culture by parties Musk endorses
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That's such an unique viewpoint that no one has expressed on the internet.
Thank you for bringing value to this comments section.
I'm surprised that you signed up for an account just to say something this empty
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Just FYI you accidentally replied to wtfHN26 instead of PaulDavisThe1st
I was hoping to bring my karma down a bit.
Et tu, wtfHN26.
The more I learn about Musk's past, his family, his ties to the paypal mafia, the more I want absolutely nothing to do with him.
Him or any of his companies will never see a penny from me.
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Noted, your principles are clearly priceless. The rest of us will just keep enjoying the world’s best mobile internet while you hold the line.
You are good.
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Thank you!
This resonates for me.
I do not want my technology tied to some person I consider of despicable character. Would I buy a cell phone, even at a good deal from Putin? No. Corporations have increasingly become political. Thanks, United vs FEC! So we see them taking a knee to gain commercial advantage. And as in this case harm to our democracy.
In my opinion, no discussion about Starlink is complete without considering whether the money you pay will be used to profit people or causes you do not want.
If you need this, then great. But I have other choices, just as I would not touch a tesla even if you gave it to me. I just am not that desperate.
I’m always amazed how much people attribute to citizens united, a ruling that overturned portions of a law that was only on the books for 7 years at the time.
A large part of it is mistaking the effect of the central holding in Buckley v. Valeo (1976) as stemming from Citizens United v. FEC (2010).
A law that existed to forestall or stop a trend of increasing regulatory capture via bribery, er, "campaign contributions"
Apple is incorporated in California, USA. Does this mean that you're not buying iPhones either because you don't like Trump?
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Guy is literally mask of white supremacist, why are you supporting this buddy? But yeah, the people that think his robot legions will solve world poverty and bring "sustainable abundance" for all are the sane ration thinking ones.
While I semi-agree, they both do plenty to encourage it. I mostly just wish Elon would stop using the R word. Not enough that I’m going to cancel my plan, but come on.
I get the fight to keep one word to remain non-offensive, instead of changing it every ~10yrs. It might be a locality thing too, when I was going to school the teachers used "special education" but now I've unintentionally offended with that as well. Google says it's "Intellectually Disabled" now. It's hard to keep up, and pretty annoying to constantly be tip-toeing around certain words.
I leave it to others to fight that fight, but I'd take any word.
I'm not certain what "the R word" is, but if you mean "retard" (and derivatives), then there's absolutely nothing wrong with that word. No reasonable person is offended by calling things retarded.
I do get that certain people go way too far with the PC stuff, but I’m happy to increase the number of words I don’t use by 1 in this particular instance because it is reasonably offensive to some people. I just lump it in with racial slurs.
And like I said, I’m not dropping my Starlink over it, I just think the world would be a tiny bit better if he didn’t use it.
I find the Nazi salutes more distasteful than the word.
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You don’t have any savings in the bank, right? That money you’re hoarding could be buying mosquito nets to save lives - you’re killing people by not donating everything you have.
There is no moral requirement for me to impoverish myself in response to an idiot cutting government/public spending on critical assistance to those in need.
There might be other moral imperatives which indicate that I ought to cash out the 401(k) and give it to people who need support, but this guy and his fucked up "DOGE" bullshit ain't it.
Why is that money I'm hoarding currently being devalued by tax cuts to the ultra-wealthy and bonuses paid out to ethnic cleanser shock troops?
Totally the same. $1 is $1, and it can go to saving those very lives you’re talking about. Put your money where your mouth is - otherwise you just want to virtue signal with my tax dollars.
How's that? Are you referring to his work on the DOGE team efforts that were simply recommendations?
Ah yes the "recommendations" that lead to dismantling USAID and where ~400k people have already died due to those direct cuts:
https://www.newyorker.com/culture/the-new-yorker-documentary...
[citation needed]
These are hypotheticals / estimates, not verifiable.
If the funding cuts were so critical why have other wealthy countries or individuals not stepped in to fund them?
Are they all evil too?
Wait until you hear about what the early pioneers of the electronic device you're using right now used to think... And do.
You gonna throw your computer away?
My concern is that man, not the many people who work in the corporations who make the computing devices that I use. It's not exactly that those corporations have an unblemished record, but compared to what that guy did during his brief utterly ruinous stint with DOGE and in his election support of that other guy, there isn't a computing device company that doesn't look like St Francis of Assissi.
Don't worry, this is the type of project that can easily get nationalized with zero pushback if anyone with authority wanted to.
That might have pretty negative long time consequences. Nationalize a few companies and soon the corporates might relocate.
Where are they going to go? Honest question, because capital flight is always a threat that never materializes. Turns out the actual pillars of wealth can't easily be extracted out of the country.
yes but only by a US authority.
Yes and the seeds have already been planted by the current US administration taking various financial stakes in public companies as a condition of corporate welfare.
Huge difference between taking an equity stake in a failing company and nationalizing a successful company. Either way, those seeds were planted well before this admin, though this admin can be seen to have watered/tended them.
Those were just repaying the loans, having a stake in a company is completely different. It's not hard to push that further and in more creative ways too.
I don't see this as a good analogy, because the financial crisis bailout appeared to save the companies from shuttering, which is not what happened under the current admin.
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The willingness to keep backing his companies, despite his political trajectory, is honestly hard to understand.
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Don't like what the guy says [0], but this is incredible technology and I'm impressed by how early we are getting it.
> I'm actually a huge fan of "unlimited slow speeds" as a falloff, instead of a cliff.
When on cellular, I like to call that "HN-only mode." It is one of the few web properties that is entirely usable at 2G speeds.
I would kill for a web renaissance to return to this format of webpages, as least as an option. Not only loading improves, but also navigation and accessibility.
Indeed. That's why, when they finally kill old.reddit, I may legitimately stop using it entirely. They've already banned most of the good apps, forcing the pretty terrible official one.
My favorite feature is how you click a reply notification and it takes you to a page that doesn’t show the reply half the time.
RedReader is a lovely, lightweight Android app for Reddit.
Development is slow, but I've been happily using it since RiF was killed.
Same thing happened to me, this fixed it: https://www.reddit.com/r/help/comments/1odehgj/is_old_reddit...
Had that happen a few times but switching the use old reddit box off and back on fixes it.
CBC News has a lite version of their news site that they tend to promote around times of natural disaster.
(1) https://www.cbc.ca/lite/news
CNN: https://lite.cnn.com/
NPR has one too: https://text.npr.org
> but also navigation and accessibility
Counterpoint, HN is notoriously hard to use on mobile (still better than some, but it's clearly designed for desktop, and not super responsive).
But agreed, that's independent of the slim nature of the webpage (which is still possible with a good mobile UX).
I've found HN pretty easy to use with both Chrome and Firefox on Android, at default zoom, with my own pocket supercomputer.
Sometimes I manage to hit the updoot or downdoot buttons incorrectly, but that error happens so rarely that I'm amazed at my success.
Responsiveness is very good, as well. Loading is lightning quick in all but the very worst network environments.
It's not perfect by any means (the text box I'm writing this into really should be resizeable, for instance), but it's not bad at all...for me.
I find it works perfectly on Safari on iPhone.
It's very frustrating whenever this topic comes up that people see no middle ground between "the website as it is right now" and "some bloated JavaScript monstrosity". There is lots of room for improvement that would not turn it into "a bloated JavaScript monstrosity". How about bigger touch targets? Half the time when I go to vote on a comment on mobile I vote in the wrong direction and have to undo it. Same goes for using the search feature: I constantly fat-finger the drop-down search options on mobile.
Even though I usually prefer mobile websites to apps, most of the time for HN I browse using Octal instead of the website because the website is such a pain. And it wouldn't take very much to make it better, which makes it so annoying that people have knee-jerk anger to the prospect every time the subject comes up.
Agreed. To upvote I often zoom out to make sure I tap the upvote botton and no the downvote one!
Maybe someone can build a service that translates webpages into "reader mode" format, which you can then consume on mobile devices with low bitrates.
That's effectively what Opera Mini did. (And apparently still does, I had no idea it was still functional.)
This is a pretty promising vector for man in the middle attacks.
If only we could make that conducive to resume-driven development for web developers.
2G speeds are awful, and cell companies clearly want it that way since 3G plans throttled to "2G speeds" and 5G plans still usually throttle to "2G speeds".
Starlink is offering 1Mbps here, which is enough for a normal internet experience. It's enough to stream video at 480p or 720p depending on the exact content and encoding settings.
I've been listening to 32kbit radio streams while on a 64k falloff. It used to be an important feature for me, the 64k up and down. Sounds like nothing, but is usable.
Yeah but it's all links to the other places.
My mobile data plan is like this. It’s funny because when I’m “out of data” my provider sends an SMS suggesting I upgrade to more gigabytes, but then it still continues to work. And yes I checked my bills to make sure that they are not charging me for any usage excess of what’s included in the plan. It’s not even particularly slow. I can still browse the web, send and receive WhatsApp messages, images and videos, watch videos on TikTok etc.
My current plan is 2GB with rollover. Last month I used 2.5GB, and somehow this month has 2GB included + 2GB rollover = 4 GB available which by itself is also weird. Maybe most of the 2.5 GB I used last month was rollover from the month before that or something.
In total I have used 4.6 GB of mobile data so far this month, which is more than the 4 GB (2+2) I have available for this month and it’s still working.
There are still telcos offering 2GB plans. Wow. I’m on the cheapest plan and it comes with 400GB.
Shockingly to some, the level of network development, especially wireless network, is not the same everywhere. Even population density varies greatly. I just checked our operators, the cheapest mobile plan comes at 1 GiB of data per month. Prices climb really fast after that, making 10-15 GiB (or more) too expensive for many, though you can get 5 GiB/mo subsidized for cheap if you have some sort of disability.
I always think by law any ISP that advertises speed and a has a cap must express the cap in terms of the advertised speed.
So telcos can advertise "Up to 200Mbps" for their package.
But then if they have a 2GB cap, they also need to say, "Caps at 80 seconds of usage".
Because that's what you're paying for at that speed, 80 seconds of usage per month.
Sure, you're not always (or indeed never) doing 200Mbps, but then you're not getting the speed you paid for.
That's kind of my point, ISPs use that max speed in their advertising when it isn't really relevant, especially if it hits your cap in a minute or two.
Where are you and how much do you pay?
Speed isn’t great, but that’s about 25% of “full speed” use over the course of a month, 600k seconds. Considering sleep is about 30% of a month as well, and assuming you’re not on a phone all day while working, it might be hard to hit that cap. Speed isn’t great, to reiterate. The cost is 30x cheaper than what I pay, and my speed, at my house, is 10mbps. No cap, but I use like 5gb/month.
Or am I way off and you hit the cap every month?
More datapoints in USD (Chile) from checking various companies:
150GB-200GB ~15 USD
400GB-450GB ~19-20 USD
Unlimited (without throttling) ~21-27 USD
This is the price after the new client ~20% discount expires (generally 6 months). The unlimited and higher tier usually include stuff like Amazon Prime Videos subscriptions, local IPTV or roaming gigs. All plans obviously include calls and texting.
You should shop around! Some of the MVNOs are offering unlimited fast data at a similar price these days, and something similar to what you have now for cheaper.
I got Connect by T-Mobile a few years ago when it was $10/mo prepaid ($11.03 with tax), and I am grandfathered in. It has a hard cap of 1GB/mo, then nothing. Then I got Hello Helium with a physical SIM on my exercise phone (out in the rain, at the gym) and it is completely free with ... wait for it ... 3GB/mo of data. Go figure. The Hello Helium app used to require location permission on at all times, but they eliminated that.
I'm in WA - I pay $20/mo for 15GB on Mint Mobile. I used to do $15/mo for 5GB but kept sometimes bumping into it (tethering and stuff) so I just bit the bullet and upgraded.
I imagine they are not from USA. But it's a surprisingly low plan, even considering that
They'd rather you keep paying monthly than start price comparing options.
Years ago, I picked cell carrier because of this. When I ran out, it switched to O(200kbps), which is fine for email, basic web search, etc.
It was actually a bit ironic that, at the time, you could burn through the whole high-speed quota in seconds or minutes, if you went to the wrong web page. Most carriers would stop or bill you an arm-and-a-leg after.
5G data roaming is hilarious for this. Verizon offered 500MB of high speed data roaming per day in Canada before throttling down to ~128kbps. I ran one single speedtest in the middle of Ottawa on Rogers 5G, didn't even finish the speedtest (hitting an error at the end that it failed), and got the text message going "You've run out of high speed data today. Do you want to buy another 500MB for $5?"
At least it's 2GB/day now. And my 5G roaming is off...
Roaming in some countries is like $10,000/gigabyte...
At that price, I dunno why they offer it at all. Are they just hoping to sue someone to get their whole house because they once watched some netflix overseas and forgot to use wifi?
Mobile has been like this for me for like a decade or so. But in the before times it was just barbaric and ridiculous to either be cut off or absolutely ravaged by fees.
Thing is, the heaviest users are often the ones with some malware on their machine using up 100% of the bandwidth. When you limit that to 512kbps, thats still 129 gigabytes a month, on top of the 100 gigabytes a month you let the user use at high speed. When a typical user might use just 10 gigabytes a month, it seems dumb to let one user use 23x what everyone else is paying for/using, especially when that user is most likely just malware infected and not even personally benefiting!
A better limit I think is to limit the user to 10 kbps over a rolling 24h window, 100 kbps over a rolling 1h window, 1Mbits over a rolling 1 minute window, and 10 Mbits over a 1 second window. That way they can quickly check an email or load a web page... But it quickly slows down if they try to (ab)use it for hours on end.
It's not like 100GB is some huge amount of data. It's easy to hit, so if we're judging the overage amount we should be comparing it to the full 100GB, not some made up guy that only uses 10GB. There are users on unlimited consuming many terabytes, and they're not paying all that much more. It's not unfair to anyone if the cheaper plan is able to slowly reach 200GB or 300GB in a minimal-impact way.
Also dropping all the way to 10kbps with enough use would just suck. It's effectively unusable and it would be extreme penny-pinching to make sure the maximum 24/7 user can't squeak out more than 3GB extra on their 100GB plan. You get more variance than that from different month lengths.
> it seems dumb to let one user use 23x what everyone else is paying for/using
Bandwidth is use-it-or-lose-it. If nobody else was using it, then it doesn't hurt anything. And during high demand traffic shaping hopefully gives their traffic even lower priority.
Starlink’s plans vary between markets, but in Australia they have a dirt cheap ($8 AUD per month or something) standby plan that gives you unlimited data capped at something like 500Kbps. If you’re going on a trip and need faster data, you can upgrade to a bigger plan for the rest of the billing month, charged on a pro rata basis, and then revert to the standby plan afterwards.
I used to use Inmarsat BGAN. BGAN would top out at around 250Kbps on a good day, and cost a few bucks per MB on a terminal that cost almost ten times as much as a Starlink Mini.
I tried this and it's actually even enough to play YouTube at 1080p after some initial buffering. Calls definitely work
As a residential customer Starlink gave me the unlimited slow speed with a free mini for $60/year, as a tease to promote the full speed at $300/year. But it does everything I need it to, so I'm not incentivized to upgrade. I can listen to YouTube audio, make voip calls, download map tiles or talk with a chatbot without limitations. It's a large quality of life improvement for me because in my rural area there is no cellular connection during most of my driving.
I do think it's vastly superior to preferential treatment for some traffic, which seems to be the most popular alternative. The one caveat is that ISPs need to be forced to be transparent about this. Often, with cell providers, it's "Unlimited 5G" advertised, with a tiny asterisk pointing to even tinier disclaimer text at the bottom explaining that they throttle your rates once you hit a (fairly low) cutoff. That type of misleading marketing undercuts the fairness of the offer.
Have they quantified the slow speed? Because when I had Viasat the slow speed so so unbelievably slow it had a hard time loading a regular SPA page in 2-3 minutes.