is a deputy editor and Verge co-founder with a passion for human-centric cities, e-bikes, and life as a digital nomad. He’s been a tech journalist for 20 years.
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How it started
I’ve worked from home for 20 years. In that time, I’ve seen technologies supporting remote work advance considerably. But nothing has been as transformative as the arrival of Starlink, SpaceX’s internet service that lets me “work from home” anywhere I choose, be it from the open road, forest, or desolate beach.
SpaceX began launching Starlink satellites in 2019 to provide data in the large gaps that still exist between 4G, 5G, and traditional broadband networks. It now has a monopoly on high-bandwidth, low-latency internet that can be quickly and easily installed anywhere, be it land, sea, or air, or in response to a natural disaster. Other consumer satellite internet services exist with more scheduled to come, but only Amazon’s Leo (previously known as Project Kuiper) looks like it’ll be a true competitor, having just lit up the service last week for enterprise customers.
Starlink internet, like Leo, relies upon a large constellation of satellites operating in low Earth orbit (LEO) — not geostationary orbit like the Viasat and Hughesnet services, which are unusable trash by comparison. Starlink user terminals (aka dishes) lock on to the best available satellite traveling at 17,000mph about 350 miles above the Earth. Ground stations direct traffic between the satellites and the internet.
By May 2021, there were enough Starlink satellites (about 1,500) in operation for The Verge to test Elon Musk’s space internet service from the northern US. Nilay’s experience wasn’t great, calling it “very much a beta product that is unreliable, inconsistent, and foiled by even the merest suggestion of trees.”
A year later, I came away with a much different experience when testing what was then called “Starlink RV” from a camper van in Western Europe, finding it to be fast and reliable compared to the 4G/5G data networks in the remote locations I like to travel. Unlike Nilay, I was testing a more capable dish on a larger constellation of about 2,400 satellites, and I could just move my home whenever trees obstructed the sky.
I was so impressed that I immediately subscribed to Starlink and eventually bought a van to start chasing my vanlife fantasies. At the time, Elon Musk was prone to “pedo guy” outbursts and covid-19 skepticism but had yet to fully show himself.
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