Starlink Rival OneWeb Poised for Global Coverage After Weekend Launch (gizmodo.com) 40
British satellite company OneWeb is gearing up for the launch of its final batch of internet satellites, completing a constellation in low Earth orbit despite some hiccups along the way. Gizmodo reports: India's heaviest launch vehicle LVM-3 will carry 36 OneWeb satellites, with liftoff slated for Sunday at 11:30 p.m. ET, according to OneWeb. The launch will take place at the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota, India, marking OneWeb's second deployment from India. You can watch the launch at the livestream [here].
OneWeb has been building an internet constellation in low Earth orbit since 2020, and it currently consists of 579 functioning satellites, according to statistics kept by Harvard-Smithsonian astrophysicist Jonathan McDowell. The addition of 36 new units will raise the population of the constellation to 615, completing the first orbital shell. The company had originally planned on building a 648-unit constellation, but it says this final launch will cap it off and allow for global coverage.
OneWeb has been building an internet constellation in low Earth orbit since 2020, and it currently consists of 579 functioning satellites, according to statistics kept by Harvard-Smithsonian astrophysicist Jonathan McDowell. The addition of 36 new units will raise the population of the constellation to 615, completing the first orbital shell. The company had originally planned on building a 648-unit constellation, but it says this final launch will cap it off and allow for global coverage.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Elon stole their idea when they went to him for launch services. Reference: https://archive.ph/20140903223... [archive.ph]
Note: Oneweb changed their name from WorldVu.
Re: (Score:2)
They pivoted away from broadband after that, and are now focused on B2B services instead. Might actually be practical in the long run, given that Starlink has already run into bandwidth problems.
Re: Awwww ... competiton (Score:1)
Sort of. The "bandwidth issues" are all specific to individual cells and don't represent the constellation as a whole. And soon enough, those cells will get simultaneously smaller and bigger.
Re: Awwww ... competiton (Score:2)
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:1)
Aren't these all copies of Teledesic/Gates or some even older satellite plan? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Yep. But that wouldn't support the "hate on Musk" narrative, so ...
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Except whenever some company does something Elon perceives as "stealing" his idea (such as making an EV, or charging for user verification) he roasts them on Twitter. Elon is allowed to take existing ideas but nobody is allowed to take any of his companies. Except none of his companies are tech are based on genius-level ideas of their own. Is there any great invention Elon has? The idea of reusable methane rockets existed for a few years and others had even done proofs of concepts before Elon put his big mo
Re: Awwww ... competiton (Score:1)
I typically avoid topics about Elon when I encounter them, but...
Except whenever some company does something Elon perceives as "stealing" his idea (such as making an EV
You know Elon has been very open about allowing other companies to license his technology right? Particularly that of Tesla.
or charging for user verification) he roasts them on Twitter.
You obviously follow everything Elon even more than I do, which says an incredible lot in light of what I do for a living, so while I don't know exactly what comment of his you're referring to, I do seem to recall that Elon's hate club, which you're obviously a card carrying member of, was bashing that idea saying it woul
Re: (Score:2)
If NASA thought reusable vertical lander on Earth was impossible explain DC-X which worked fine 8 times until Congress chickened out. Elons contribution was money not any concept. It is like taking credit for the horse when all you did was bet on it.
Re: (Score:3)
If NASA thought reusable vertical lander on Earth was impossible explain DC-X which worked fine 8 times until Congress chickened out.
Because it wasn't congress who "chickened out", it was NASA. Pretty good discussion on this at stackexchange, particularly over the alternatives that were attempted.
https://space.stackexchange.co... [stackexchange.com]
While the DC-X was a pretty clever prototype, they ultimately determined that it wouldn't scale. That was their own determination. You may as well argue that landing rockets is easy because this guy was able to do it by himself:
https://avgeekery.com/man-land... [avgeekery.com]
Landing small rockets is much easier. Who would have
Re: (Score:2)
explain DC-X
An expensive toy, like an RC model. Not a practical vehicle like F9's first stage.
Re: (Score:2)
What was not practical about it? It showed vertical landing and multiple reuse and would have been capable of orbit, as did Masten Aerospace Xombie (which Elon Musk is documented to have forwarded videos of within SpaceX). What was the unique idea Elon had? You can believe Elon claims that it was he originated the idea of vertical landing rockets .. but the proof to make reusable rockets but it's not true. Fact is he has zero claim to any invention regarding it. He can act like he's an inventor, but he isn'
Re: Awwww ... competiton (Score:2)
What was not practical about it? It showed vertical landing and multiple reuse and would have been capable of orbit, as did Masten Aerospace Xombie (which Elon Musk is documented to have forwarded videos of within SpaceX).
Aside from the fact that it was way too small to do anything useful with? Or the fact that it never made it into orbit? Well, basically everything about it was impractical. In fact, we already had something that did everything the DC-X did about 20 years prior, only it had an actual practical use:
https://youtube.com/watch?v=rb... [youtube.com]
If I created a model teleporter and took concept shots while describing how it would work, does that mean I get to claim to be the inventor if somebody else built one that actually
Re: (Score:2)
What was not practical about it?
OK, how many spacecraft launches was DC-X involved in?
You can believe Elon claims that it was he originated the idea of vertical landing rockets
Why would one believe that? Has he made any such claim, and where and when?
Re: (Score:2)
The DC-X used actual orbital rocket engines that took rockets to orbit. It's demonstration of the control required to direct engines of that power to landing. If you think that's the exact same thing as controlling the lunar rocket engines what can I say besides you're being stupid. The RL-10 engines on the DC-X had higher specific impulse than the Falcon 9. And no, your teleporter example is not applicable. if you demonstrate a small teleporter than can teleport a mouse, then yes it'd be worthy of a Nobel
Re: (Score:1)
The DC-X used actual orbital rocket engines that took rockets to orbit.
/facepalm
Dude...that literally means nothing at all. Just because you put engines capable of orbit in a rocket doesn't necessarily mean your rocket will even reach orbit. Let alone land or anything like that.
It's demonstration of the control required to direct engines of that power to landing. If you think that's the exact same thing as controlling the lunar rocket engines what can I say besides you're being stupid.
No, because that's not even the point. The point is that you're trying to argue that because somebody tried earlier, and ultimately never succeeded, that they're the ones who deserve credit for it.
And no, your teleporter example is not applicable. if you demonstrate a small teleporter than can teleport a mouse, then yes it'd be worthy of a Nobel prize becasue you'd actually shown the concepts needed to make a human teleporter. If you can show something that teleports or a detailed design of one, then making a physical or larger version are obvious to anyone .. the guy who steals your blueprints and makes it shouldn't get a nobel prize. Think about it this way, Robert Goddard can claim it was his idea back in the early 1900s to make a liquid fueled rocket. De Laval can claim the shape of the rocket nozzle was his idea. Someone on von Braun's team can claim to have invented gyroscopic stabilization. We know some dude named Alexey Isaev in the Soviet Union first had the idea to do full flow staged combustion. Now what idea was Musk's that made the Falcon 9 possible other than "pay someone to build a scaled up version of someone else's demonstrated idea? What engineering design was his invention?
No... /facepalm
Holy shit dude... Ok, we're on the topic of flight in general, so let's go with that. Basica
Re: (Score:2)
There is no innovation to simply scaling something up. The Wright brothers figured out the essenitals needed to make a controllable heavier than air flight work. The Montgolfier brothers had the novel idea of building a large hot air balloon out of paper to carry people. There is no concept from the Montgolfier brothers work that is used in modern airplanes. The Wright brothers ideas such as controlling the wing surface shape and adjust for pitch, yaw, and roll are fundamental to aircraft of today. In Falco
Re: Awwww ... competiton (Score:1)
Right, the way to make everything scale is to simply add more material. Rockets, t-shirts, it's all the same stuff...Not that you had much to begin with, but you just flushed the rest of your credibility down the toilet. /thread
Re: (Score:2)
So they go to him with a business plan, and he's like "oh that looks good, I'll copy it!" .. that's something a person with good moral character would do? Come on!
How is this modded informative? (Score:2)
One of the SpaceX VPs from the start was part of Teledisc [wikipedia.org], which was the Starlink (attempt) of the 1990's! SpaceX probably always had it in mind, hence hiring that VP, and when technology matured they went for it. Sure, they discussed partnering with WorldVu, but WorldVu did not have the idea (it existed before the 1990's Teledisc, I am sure) and apparently the partnership didn't work out (I suspect because SpaceX was bringing most things on the table anyway?).
Why all this SpaceX hate, they've been humanity
Re: (Score:1)
Jealousy, residuals from rumor-spreading by Tesla shorters, and because Elon told lefties to go pound sand.
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
No we have a problem with people who just copy other people's business plans. That doesn't speak to good moral character, sorry.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
At last someone with a clear path forward.
Re: (Score:2)
So they go to him with a business plan, and he's like "oh that looks good, I'll copy it!" .. You think that's something a person with good moral character would do? Come on!
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
You can't 'steal' an idea that had been publicly know for at least two decades.
There's a difference between an idea existing in the ether and someone demonstrating that the opportunity is ripe and technology ready by building a startup around it.
Just look at EVs, the idea existed forever, but Tesla accelerated the migration of the auto industry by demonstrating the idea was ready.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
...SpaceX was literally THE company that demonstrated the "ripe opportunity". The business case for a Starlink-like system was literally made possible by SpaceX's cheap launch vehicles. Are you saying they weren't allowed to reflect on themselves?
There's a big gap between an idea existing on paper and demonstrating that idea is ready for a commercial venture by going through all the work and development of building a company around it.
I mean you can literally see Musk tweet the start of SpaceX investigating micro-satellites when WorldVu started working with them [nbcnews.com].
I don't know why the original partnership fell apart so I don't know if SpaceX did anything unethical, but if WorldVu never existed StarLink probably doesn't happen for several years (if it
Re: (Score:2)
Oh goodie (Score:3)
More crap clogging the starry skies.
Alien Sightings Increase Again. (Score:2)
More great stories from the nutjobs.
Really? (Score:1)
Re: Really? (Score:2)
I agree that would make sense but we've got the obvious international concerns (who owns space?) And all the national security issues (there are like 4 GPS constellations right now due to security) and also Starlink would have to be heavily regulated or even nationalized to some degree.
Not again! (Score:2)
So the heavens stand to be littered with competing constellations of satellites the way the city skyline was made a nest of matted wires during the early days of electrification?
Room for both? (Score:1)