Largest commercial communications satellite ever launched in final test stage before service
DISH is experiencing a system issue that their teams are working hard to resolve.
Blog Post
Starlink tells customers that a Dish 5G plan would make Starlink “unusable”
John Pearce
International Satellite & Antenna is pleased to bring you news and information from around the globe. We have not taken a position on this matter, and are republishing to educate our customers on matters that may affect them.
Published by : https://arstechnica.com/ 6/29/2022, 4:00 PM
SpaceX is asking Starlink customers to help the company win a regulatory battle against Dish Network. In an email urging users to contact the Federal Communications Commission and members of Congress, SpaceX yesterday said a Dish plan to use the 12 GHz spectrum band for mobile service will cause "harmful interference [to Starlink users] more than 77 percent of the time and total outage of service 74 percent of the time, rendering Starlink unusable for most Americans."
Those percentages come from a study SpaceX submitted to the FCC last week, which claims mobile service in the 12 GHz band would interfere with Starlink user terminals that use the same spectrum for downloads.
Tuesday's email from SpaceX was posted on the Starlink subreddit and covered by The Verge:
It says:
Today we ask for your support in ending a lobbying campaign that threatens to make Starlink unusable for you and the vast majority of our American customers... Dish has been attempting to claim new rights to the 12 GHz band, which is the spectrum you currently use to download content with Starlink. Despite technical studies dating back as far as 2016 that refute the basis of their claims, Dish has employed paid lobbyists who are attempting to mislead the FCC with faulty analysis in hopes of obscuring the truth.
SpaceX: FCC and Congress "need to hear from you"
The email directs Starlink users to a webpage where they can submit a pre-written comment to the FCC and send a pre-written letter to US House and Senate members. The page is titled, "Don't let Dish disable your Internet."
"The FCC's proposed rule asks whether or not the 12 GHz band can be repurposed without causing interference with and disrupting services provided by satellites, like my Starlink Internet service.
The answer to that question is clearly no," the pre-written comment to the FCC says. The pre-written letter to lawmakers asks elected officials to pressure the FCC to "refrain from repurposing this spectrum for new uses that will significantly interfere with my broadband service."
Starlink's email to users said the "FCC and your members of Congress have the power to stop this effort, but they need to hear from you."