Once upon a time, all plane transmissions were pretty much air to ground. As inconsequential as it may seem, the positioning of antennas above the plane are a bit metaphoric for flipping things up side down. Looking out into space instead of back to earth.<p>Also notable that SpaceX keeps finding these cool (revenue generating) use cases to further cheapen the cost of sending things up to space. Pretty much dogfooding their rockets via Starlink satellites.<p>Edited with correction that most inflight wifi is actually air to space now.
Looks like a very competitive product, assuming pricing is reasonable.<p>It's interesting that they are rolling in the warranty cost with the monthly subscription. First time I've seen that.<p>It will be great for aircraft owners looking to have a full featured internet experience in flight.<p>Though the downside is that it will likely have priority when roaming into any cell, thus degrading service for ordinary ground based customers in busy areas.
Slightly off-topic.<p>I hate that internet is becoming more common on flights. One of my favorite things about flying is that it's a good chunk of time where you disconnect and don't worry about emails or messages.<p>Just sit back and watch a movie or listen to music. Or catch up on sleep.
Are there no aerodynamic concerns for that installation? The VHF instruments pictured on top of the fuselage make this thing look like a plow that would be better fit on top of a Sprinter van... they couldn't have gone for a dome?
This is a game changer. It works really, really well - better than I ever expected to see internet on a plane work. The price tag seems ridiculous, but will probably make sense for a lot of the operators of the planes on their initial STC.
"Starlink aviation" you say ? <a href="https://starlinkaviation.com/" rel="nofollow">https://starlinkaviation.com/</a>
Slightly unrelated but makes me wonder how different would be the airline industry nowadays if Musk had launched a airline company at the same time he launched SpaceX. How different would it be to take a plane and travel across the world.
I'm curious how StarLink is handling the mod and certification aspects of this.<p>It's not quite as easy as just slamming an antenna on the roof of an airplane.
I know it's done this way to be consistent with the other use-case pages, but it seems really interesting to show a proposition for which only very few people could actually seriously consider, yet anyone can register their interest; pretty neat.<p>EDIT: typos
Edit: a fatal assumption that it's the airlines providing the service underpins my original post below, whereas instead it's the providers charging passengers directly. That's an entirely different model from below, so disregard my original comment aside maybe my last line. Preserving the comment for context though.<p>---<p>At 25,000/mo, assuming a jet makes 60 trans-con segments in the US per month and a price of $20 per passenger for access on a given segment, you'd need an average of at least 20 people to pay for a full flight's worth of internet access on each segment just to clear the monthly cost, not even counting the up front investment.<p>And that's for a standard narrow-body passenger jet, not the G650 etc. business jets that they're targeting.<p>This seems like a flex, not a tool.
Won't this require spectrum licensed from every country the plane fly's over?<p>Easy in North America... But all other regions of the world a typical flight might go over 20 countries. If you can't secure a license for just one, you're gonna have a 5 hour flight with 20 minutes of no internet... Not great.<p>And I don't think they're getting a license for Russia, Iran, China, half of Africa, etc any time soon.
Just want to say the idea of joining a game at 20ms and ending it at 80ms because you've traveled thousands of kilometres is highly amusing to me.
It says 350 Mbps per plane. How much does it translate to per seat? Say if all passengers start a video call or a S̶t̶a̶d̶i̶a̶ Nvidia GE force game, then?
This would be excellent as part of a hybrid solution. Dynamically switching between standard ground to air and satellite to accommodate availability and bandwidth constraints.
I have always enjoyed the time where there was no internet on an aircraft. It has been the only time when I could really be offline without having a slight guilty conscience.
I wonder if this also means future astronauts will have wifi when launching to moon/mars. Imagine watching watching a movie while taking off to somewhere distant
Sure, airplanes are neat, but can we get good internet also on trains? Regular 4G/LTE doesn't work that great inside a metal box going 250km/h through countryside packed with hundreds of bored people wanting to use internet, nevermind all the EMI that the train might generate.
Edit: When this post was written, the majority of the popular posts were unrelated complaints and general criticisms of Musk and/or his companies. Most of them now appear to have no been deleted/flagged/significantly downvoted.<p>----------------------------------------------------------<p>What a thread, full of people complaining about unrelated things rather than what the actual link talks about.<p>I think it'll be interesting as this rolls out to more airline customers even though this specific product is more aimed at corporate jets and similiar aircraft.<p>From the FAQ:<p><i>Which aircraft types are supported for Starlink Aviation?</i><p><i>Supplemental type certificate (STCs) are in development for the following aircraft: ERJ-135, ERJ-145, G650, G550, Falcon 2000, G450, Challenger 300, Challenger 350, Global Express, Global 5000, Global 6000, and Global 7500. The Starlink engineering team will update this list as development begins on additional aircraft.</i>
Low latency for Video Calls?<p>Sure, great on private charter jets where it’s you or a couple of people who know each other.<p>Also, generally in favour of the march of technology, so I love this.<p>Do Not Ever want on a flight where I’m sitting beside some random ass stranger who will chat or video chat to whoever at the top of their voice while I’m trying to relax.
It would be nice if Starlink could honour their existing obligations as a priority first. I have reserved Starlink here in Canada nearly two years ago and received an email advising it's now been pushed to summer 2023. That's three years of waiting. I was also emailed last year advising the monthly cost has increased and so has the dish itself. Shouldn't providing down payment legally guarantee to buy a service at original said price? I'm already frustrated and not even a customer yet....
> With latency as low as 20 ms, passengers can engage in activities previously not functional in flight, including video calls,<p>I knew this was coming, but I am still not ready for it. Can you imagine being on a 5+ hour flight next to someone on a call the entire time? You know there will be people who will take their entire work day from the plane.
This will solve the "spotify didn't actually download my offline playlist" problem, but unfortunately there is rarely room to use a laptop on the plane unless you're flying business.
> No long term contracts<p>What? lol<p>Listen, if I'm paying you a 1 time fee of $150K you better be contractually obligated to provide my expensive ass internet each and every month I want it.
Not sure who this is aimed at, the existing inflight wifi solutions powered by two satellites (viasat) are sufficient for tasks that don't require low latency.