site banner
PaperclipPerfector  1mo ago (text post)   28212 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of October 14, 2024

This weekly roundup thread is intended for all culture war posts. 'Culture war' is vaguely defined, but it basically means controversial issues that fall along set tribal lines. Arguments over culture war issues generate a lot of heat and little light, and few deeply entrenched people ever change their minds. This thread is for voicing opinions and analyzing the state of the discussion while trying to optimize for light over heat.

Optimistically, we think that engaging with people you disagree with is worth your time, and so is being nice! Pessimistically, there are many dynamics that can lead discussions on Culture War topics to become unproductive. There's a human tendency to divide along tribal lines, praising your ingroup and vilifying your outgroup - and if you think you find it easy to criticize your ingroup, then it may be that your outgroup is not who you think it is. Extremists with opposing positions can feed off each other, highlighting each other's worst points to justify their own angry rhetoric, which becomes in turn a new example of bad behavior for the other side to highlight.

We would like to avoid these negative dynamics. Accordingly, we ask that you do not use this thread for waging the Culture War. Examples of waging the Culture War:

  • Shaming.

  • Attempting to 'build consensus' or enforce ideological conformity.

  • Making sweeping generalizations to vilify a group you dislike.

  • Recruiting for a cause.

  • Posting links that could be summarized as 'Boo outgroup!' Basically, if your content is 'Can you believe what Those People did this week?' then you should either refrain from posting, or do some very patient work to contextualize and/or steel-man the relevant viewpoint.

In general, you should argue to understand, not to win. This thread is not territory to be claimed by one group or another; indeed, the aim is to have many different viewpoints represented here. Thus, we also ask that you follow some guidelines:

  • Speak plainly. Avoid sarcasm and mockery. When disagreeing with someone, state your objections explicitly.

  • Be as precise and charitable as you can. Don't paraphrase unflatteringly.

  • Don't imply that someone said something they did not say, even if you think it follows from what they said.

  • Write like everyone is reading and you want them to be included in the discussion.

On an ad hoc basis, the mods will try to compile a list of the best posts/comments from the previous week, posted in Quality Contribution threads and archived at /r/TheThread. You may nominate a comment for this list by clicking on 'report' at the bottom of the post and typing 'Actually a quality contribution' as the report reason.

3
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

I think it was pretty clearly written to encourage investment in running fiber in rural areas. Except in case of backhoes, good fiber should last decades with minimal maintenance and an frequently can be updated with only new parts on each end. I know relatively rural folks that have gotten fiber in the last decade funded by programs like this and they are all pretty happy with it.

While Starlink might meet some of the listed requirements, it seems in some ways not the investment they were trying to push, and doesn't necessarily end up with a durable infrastructure product to point to as a success even if the company folds. Free space RF also has inherent bandwidth limits compared to point-to-point fiber.

Granted at this point it seems on slightly better footing than a few years ago -- I have my doubts about it's financial case, but as a private company they don't have to publish the numbers and they do seem to sell like hotcakes.

I also am not entirely sure how the economics of Starlink work out. Supposedly it's profitable. But I don't know how many red numbers have been moved from the "Starlink" column to the "SpaceX" column. However they do the accounting, the fact that Starlink gets to take advantage of Falcon 9 launches virtually at cost is enormous. The fact that SpaceX has dropped the $/lb cost by almost a factor of 10 helps a lot too.

Yeah, even if they've cut the launch costs by a factor of ten, they've still launched something like 200 flights just for internal use -- around two thirds of total flights this year. And as a LEO constellation that is (at least in part) an ongoing cost to replace satellites over time. And that's presumably all getting paid for (plus the satellites themselves, the ground stations, and operations) by a bunch of users paying around $1400/yr. I haven't recently run numbers on that, but it feels at least ambitious without a deep-pocketed anchor customer willing to guarantee the bills get paid (which they may quietly have, so I'm not betting against them).

And performance degrades (something folks funding them for rural bandwidth care about!) as they start oversubscribing areas.

it feels at least ambitious without a deep-pocketed anchor customer willing to guarantee the bills get paid (which they may quietly have, so I'm not betting against them).

That customer is supposed to be high-frequency traders once they get the inter-satellite laser-link running -- light in a vacuum is enough faster than light in glass that it's attractive for comms between (for instance) NYC and London.

I think the latest version of the satellites is capable of this, but there aren't enough in the constellation supporting it yet? Haven't heard recently.

The most obvious anchor customer is the DOD, IMO. But neither side there is going to shout about it. Low-latency, worldwide comms, resistant to anti-satellite weapons by sheer numbers. Directional antennas are more robust against jamming and detection, too.

So, Bing's AI response to "Starlink Customers" was

1.5 million customers Starlink has "well over" 1.5 million customers worldwide, including consumer users and businesses. Around 80% of Starlink’s customers are located in North America, while 18% are located in Australia, New Zealand, and Europe. Starlink's Roam plan alone has over 300,000 customers subscribed, which likely nets SpaceX a minimum of $30 million in revenue every month.

Although I see a more recent PCMag article says 2.7m customers. Assuming they are all paying the same $120 a month I am, that puts them closing in on $4B in revenue per year. If I did my math right (2.7m * 12 * $120 = $3,888m).

$1400 a year... deep-pocketed anchor customer willing to guarantee the bills get paid

Airlines (United and Hawaiian air have deals), Starlink is $10k per month per airframe, and cruise lines at $5k per month. Combined with other corporate operators (biz jets, oil platforms, etc) all of whom are frigging starved for reliable high speed internet in-transit and on remote locations, frankly Starlink is going to be printing money in exponentially increasing volumes.

Starlink is almost certainly a 100b plus company standalone. You almost wonder if they will be spun out to go public at some point.

It also has substantial value in crisis contexts, in the 'natural disaster just cracked the ground-based infrastructure, can anyone tell me what's going on' sort of system.

What is this place?

This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.

The weekly Culture War threads host the most controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy; if in doubt, post!

Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts. You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.


Why are you called The Motte?

A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


Rules


Recommended Posts And Communities

Recommended Realtime Chats