I had Starlink too and it was definitely unreliable. It’s also absolutely atrocious in any kind of weather like heavy rain or snow.
It’s better than nothing for sure, but definitely look into it more, especially if you’ll be relying on it for work.
I’d love to discuss this more if you’d be interested. I teach mass communications and visual literacy courses at a university and have over a decade of experience. I’m always interested in discussing these things further, as media literacy is extremely important and we can only educate others and make improvements with our literacy skills through discussion, learning, and practice.
Could you tell me more about the authors you mention and where you got the information from?
One thing I like about Media Bias Fact Check is that their methodology is transparent and clear. Yes, there is a certain level of subjectivity, as there is with any analysis like this. They utilize fact checking best practices and have ethical funding. Even their competitors rate them to be accurate and credible.
They are considered reliable not because people use them, but because of their methodologies, transparency, and factuality. Nothing is 100%, but it’s a good resource in my opinion.
This article, and the source it links to, appears to be talking about the UK actually.
Completely agree. Not only is it disturbing how little people care, but there’s a far bigger picture.
Right now it’s celebrities shilling products. What happens when it’s political figures? What happens when the messages spread misinformation or violence?
It doesn’t matter whether or not you fall for it as an individual. It will impact society. Full stop.
People need to be more understanding and compassionate. If you know so much and are so great at identifying these things and so technologically savvy, help educate those around you. Vote in every election, including local elections, to vote into power people who understand these issues and will act on the best interest of the people.
That’s a fair counter, and I definitely agree there are many things that could be changed to improve the situation.I also think the US needs to move away from large vehicles, and it’s a huge problem that so many people are purchasing vehicles that get poor mileage and are ultimately bad for the environment.
I would argue though that there are some issues with the motorcycle suggestion. First, in many areas of the country it’s only feasible to ride a motorcycle about half the year due to weather. In the New England area, it’s only feasible in the summer. Otherwise, the snow and ice make it far too dangerous. Plus, if you have a family/children, then you also need some kind of car, so now you have to buy, register, inspect, and maintain two vehicles. There are also costs for getting a motorcycle endorsement on your license and an additional fee each time you renew your license to maintain that motorcycle endorsement on your license.
The problem with the “pay per mpg” would be older cars. I used to drive a very old car with very bad gas mileage. I also lived in that car. There’s risk of disproportionately impacting people with low income. Of course, that could be countered based off the the year of the car, or income, or some other thing – but I’m sure there would be loopholes and other issues there.
Anyways, really interesting topic to consider. Thanks for the respectful discourse!
I get what you’re saying, but I’m not sure you realize just how much that would hurt people. Europe is much more densely concentrated and has far better public transit options. Many parts of the US are extremely rural. My nearest grocery store is a 30 minute drive away. There are no stores in walking distance at all. There are no sidewalks. There are no busses, trains, or cabs in my area, and that is not wildly uncommon.
If costs of gas doubled, at least without viable alternatives, it would absolutely bankrupt people. And it would disproportionately impact poor people in rural areas where it’s very common to commute to work 30-60 minutes of driving is a common commute. While it varies by state, US federal minimum wage in the US is $7.25/hour. Many people commute for work, and an hour drive one way is also not uncommon.
Let’s take 7.25 an hour x 40 hours = $290 before taxes.
We’ll keep it simple and say a person uses only 1 gallon of gas per day to get to and from work which, at $8 a gallon x 5 days a week = $40. Just that travel to and from work and no other travel at all (or maintenance on the vehicle) would be 14% of pre-tax income.
So many things need to change so I understand the perspective, but I think it’s really important to consider the widespread impact. Obviously the US has a lot of issues contributing to this situation.
That looks so good and fluffy!
You make an excellent point about the impact of ChatGPT and others on written assignments. I’ve been in the online higher ed field designing online courses for almost 10 years now. I also teach online.
Having students regurgitate the same information over and over in the form of discussions and papers (or other assignments with names like blog, journal, etc) are starting to become problematic. Students generally don’t like this form of assessment, and as noted in this thread, it’s very difficult to be able to prove that a student has used ChatGPT.
The reason this is really exciting for someone like me is that it will drive innovation, whether universities want to or not. We can utilize other assessment tools that allow students to test their knowledge and learn through doing. Will all writing assignments go away? Certainly not. But I do think there’s so much opportunity for online higher education and I really do think these changes in technology will force new learning modalities to be developed.
~ end nerdy online education rant ~
Absolutely, but Musk specifically said weather wouldn’t be a problem like regular satellites, which was just not true from my experience.
Overall though, I just think people should be aware that it’s not a good replacement for if you already have access to other Internet services. I’ve seen people discuss how they want to ditch Comcast for it. It’s a lot more expensive and definitely not as consistent. Again, it totally has an audience and purpose, pros and cons.