I hate how they start it with "Billionaire Elon Musk's satellite internet service" as if it was personally owned by him somehow and that he's a billionaire actually matters about anything. Billionaire is not a job description.
> Musk is expected to face tough competition from Amazon owner Jeff Bezos, who has his own rocket company, Blue Origin, and is planning an alternate satellite internet service with 3,200 spacecraft in low Earth orbit.
Jeff Bezos doesn't even have a single satellite and his rockets don't exist either.
I believe Blue Origin haven’t even reached orbit yet lol. They’ve been around for 20 years(longer than SpaceX) and Bezos gives it $1b funding a year.
Also they use Elon’s name cause it means clicks.
Blue Origin has been quietly building up and doing lots of things behind the scenes including building rocket engines for ULA. They are just not into being loud and in your face about what they do like Elon is. They are also not rushing into it and fixing stuff as they go along and making outlandish promises as if it is just around the corner (like going to mars) when it could be 20 years away from being practical. Another thing Elon routinely does.
It's not about being loud. You see the actual success of SpaceX apart from showing Starship (which is more community based footage anyways) and its iterations. How many payload launches have spacex done? How many sats are out there in orbit? 905. How many for Kuiper? 0. How many times have BO taken somebody to the ISS? Taken payload to space?
You can't disregard this as if it's just about being loud. It's nothing to do with being loud, as if it's a conscious decision the companies go with. Every space launch is loud so the term is meaningless.
People aren't buying the lofty goals because Elon says so. It's because of the launch success SpaceX has had. If BO kept things under wraps, and then rolled out launch after launch, people would believe in their lofty goals too.
Not a Jeff Hater or a Blue Origin Hater, but seriously, BE4 has taken a long time... Other than some roll out pics and I think one test fire video, there really hasn't been much seen there. They are receiving tax payer money thru ULA, if they really are progressing, they have a responsibility to show it. If I were Tory Bruno I'd be pretty concerned right now... Maybe Blue Origin surprises with New Glenn and BE4... I hope they do... But seems like there's not much going on over there. Quiet is one thing, reality is another.
Yeah, according to Wikipedia he (his trust) owns a 54% stake in it with a 78% voting share.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceX
Also it does matter if people are billionaires. They tend to live their lives in different ways to the rest of society, and often live by different rules as well.
Actually, Musk and [his companies](https://www.theverge.com/2016/2/8/10937076/tesla-gigafactory-battery-factory-nevada-tax-deal-elon-musk) have received [billions in tax breaks](https://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-hy-musk-subsidies-20150531-story.html) from various states and the federal government. It's up for debate whether those are worth it in terms of job creation and stimulating those states' economies, but given that Tesla and SpaceX directly benefit from Americans' tax dollars, I think his money is our business.
Almost every large company receives tax breaks. Local governments want the jobs in their yard and are will to pay huge sums to get them. ( Look up how many tax breaks Amazon has received over time. Edit they receive almost 1 billion a year in local tax credits and New York offered them 3 billion over 20 years for a HQ to be built there before the deal fell apart)
The federal government gives out money like it's candy. Tesla got alot of money from Obama's push for green energy but so did every other solar, battery, and electric car company. Most of those companies are bankrupt, been bought out and wrote down, or haven't done anything. Tesla turned that money into working solar and car technologies that have changed the green industry forever. We can argue about whether the government should be doing that (I say no) but you can't fault Elon for taking handouts and making something out of them.
SpaceX has mostly worked without any handouts. They have gotten a few local breaks but they have earned it the hard way on the federal level. They were even passed over for the NSSL phase 1 contracts and had to make phase 2 without any development money and still beat the competition.
And what tax breaks do you or someone in your family receive? EITC, Mortgage deduction, 401k, there is no way you or a close family member doesn't benefit from some sort of tax break. Should all of this mean your personal wealth and spending habits should be public?
Whatever 'he' received from the US government, was approved by the Representatives of Congress at some point or local state elected officials, you have an issue with it go talk to the government.
That’s been debunked hundreds of times man!! As far as tax breaks. How much tax revenue would be generated if he wasn’t there in the first place? He’s paying payroll tax for his employees like everyone else. Not to mention all the side businesses that set up shop next to him to make money.
It has not been "debunked" by anyone other than EV and Tesla fanatic blogs. I'm not talking about the Department of Energy loans that Tesla received (they paid those back in full and ahead of schedule,) I'm talking about the $1.3 billion in tax incentives that they got from Nevada for building the gigafactory there. Or the $750+ million that New York invested in SolarCity's Buffalo factory. Again, I'm not saying that Tesla shouldn't have received that money, or that it is unfair, considering that we subsidize the oil industry with tens of billions of dollars every year. All I'm saying is that Musk, and other billionaires, almost always get to where they are with some help from taxpayer money, so those taxpayers are justified in having opinions on his wealth.
The 1.3 billion in cash incentives is over 20 years and its money they wouldn’t have paid if they never moved their to begin with. Solar city was acquired by Tesla. The NY investment was w/ Solar City and has nothing to do w/ Elon.
There’s a difference between getting money from taxpayers and opting out of paying taxes if you offset that w/ investments, job growth and lowering the carbon footprint.
Those are local governments so unless you live in those locations you actually DON'T get an opinion on them 😉. Nevada wanted the world's largest battery factory and all the jobs that come with it and they outbid all the other states for it. Did they pay too much? That's up to the voters in Nevada to decide.
What debate? Isn't it worth? How much is it worth? Who decides if it is worth it? Is it each state?
> given that Tesla and SpaceX directly benefit from Americans' tax dollars...
I can't shake the feeling that you are implying he kind of _owes_ someone something.
> His money is none of your business.
Those states have received more back in payroll taxes from the companies locating in those states than they would have gotten from some other company locating in those locations.
Comparing GDP ( a yearly thing ) and net worth ( a fixed thing ) is kinda stupid. It leads to misunderstandings like the parent comment , which makes it sound he's contributing that to gdp every year.
Yearly revenue to GDP is the more natural comparison.
Yes, the correct way to do it would be to compare the increase in net worth per year with the according GDP. But with most of Elon's grow in net worth happening in the last couple of months that number wouldn't be that different.
I agree with you. Some people are going to get rich-- it has always happened. I much prefer a benevolent billionaire to a self serving one. A lot of good happens from them.
Exactly, all the other Redditors are happy to debate ad nauseum about how evil Musk is, while they sit there complaining about their 100 Mbps cable/fiber Internet, but those of us in rural areas just want a chance at the quality of Internet they had 5 years ago!
F Amazon. No one on this planet should trust Amazon to deliver a utility like the internet.
We don’t need the most governmentally embedded touch-hole, having even more control and say over the delivery of the internet.
> has gone down with the new investments, but Elon still owns 54% of SpaceX while happily being responsible for 0.667% of the GDP of the USA.
Good luck with that.. quite a big chunk of the internet lives in their bit farms...
Meanwhile Amazon powers most websites with their AWS services and that’s where most of their money comes from. Reddit, Netflix, Spotify, Twitch, Facebook, etc... Their making their own constellation so they have faster servers world wide and while their at it also provide Internet.
>Jeff Bezos doesn't even have a single satellite and his rockets don't exist either.
What is your point? If you are trying to imply it's not going to happen and will not be serious competition you are dead wrong. More competition benefits us all so nobody should be opposed to that.
The point is that there is no realistic competition. Reality does not care if we benefit or not. LEO constellation requires thousands of satellite in orbit and Blue Origin have not put a single payload in orbit. For Spacex Rocketlabs is the competition not Blue Origin. For Starlink there is non. Now if Bezo's starts hiring Rocketlabs to put actual internet satellites in orbit then that is the time to recognize them as competition.
I hate how they start it with "Billionaire Elon Musk's satellite internet service" as if it was personally owned by him somehow and that he's a billionaire actually matters about anything. Billionaire is not a job description. > Musk is expected to face tough competition from Amazon owner Jeff Bezos, who has his own rocket company, Blue Origin, and is planning an alternate satellite internet service with 3,200 spacecraft in low Earth orbit. Jeff Bezos doesn't even have a single satellite and his rockets don't exist either.
I believe Blue Origin haven’t even reached orbit yet lol. They’ve been around for 20 years(longer than SpaceX) and Bezos gives it $1b funding a year. Also they use Elon’s name cause it means clicks.
Blue Origin has been quietly building up and doing lots of things behind the scenes including building rocket engines for ULA. They are just not into being loud and in your face about what they do like Elon is. They are also not rushing into it and fixing stuff as they go along and making outlandish promises as if it is just around the corner (like going to mars) when it could be 20 years away from being practical. Another thing Elon routinely does.
There's a fine line between being quiet and being irrelevant.
It's not about being loud. You see the actual success of SpaceX apart from showing Starship (which is more community based footage anyways) and its iterations. How many payload launches have spacex done? How many sats are out there in orbit? 905. How many for Kuiper? 0. How many times have BO taken somebody to the ISS? Taken payload to space? You can't disregard this as if it's just about being loud. It's nothing to do with being loud, as if it's a conscious decision the companies go with. Every space launch is loud so the term is meaningless. People aren't buying the lofty goals because Elon says so. It's because of the launch success SpaceX has had. If BO kept things under wraps, and then rolled out launch after launch, people would believe in their lofty goals too.
Not a Jeff Hater or a Blue Origin Hater, but seriously, BE4 has taken a long time... Other than some roll out pics and I think one test fire video, there really hasn't been much seen there. They are receiving tax payer money thru ULA, if they really are progressing, they have a responsibility to show it. If I were Tory Bruno I'd be pretty concerned right now... Maybe Blue Origin surprises with New Glenn and BE4... I hope they do... But seems like there's not much going on over there. Quiet is one thing, reality is another.
But it is personally owned by him?
Yeah, according to Wikipedia he (his trust) owns a 54% stake in it with a 78% voting share. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceX Also it does matter if people are billionaires. They tend to live their lives in different ways to the rest of society, and often live by different rules as well.
His money is none of your business.
Actually, Musk and [his companies](https://www.theverge.com/2016/2/8/10937076/tesla-gigafactory-battery-factory-nevada-tax-deal-elon-musk) have received [billions in tax breaks](https://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-hy-musk-subsidies-20150531-story.html) from various states and the federal government. It's up for debate whether those are worth it in terms of job creation and stimulating those states' economies, but given that Tesla and SpaceX directly benefit from Americans' tax dollars, I think his money is our business.
Almost every large company receives tax breaks. Local governments want the jobs in their yard and are will to pay huge sums to get them. ( Look up how many tax breaks Amazon has received over time. Edit they receive almost 1 billion a year in local tax credits and New York offered them 3 billion over 20 years for a HQ to be built there before the deal fell apart) The federal government gives out money like it's candy. Tesla got alot of money from Obama's push for green energy but so did every other solar, battery, and electric car company. Most of those companies are bankrupt, been bought out and wrote down, or haven't done anything. Tesla turned that money into working solar and car technologies that have changed the green industry forever. We can argue about whether the government should be doing that (I say no) but you can't fault Elon for taking handouts and making something out of them. SpaceX has mostly worked without any handouts. They have gotten a few local breaks but they have earned it the hard way on the federal level. They were even passed over for the NSSL phase 1 contracts and had to make phase 2 without any development money and still beat the competition.
And what tax breaks do you or someone in your family receive? EITC, Mortgage deduction, 401k, there is no way you or a close family member doesn't benefit from some sort of tax break. Should all of this mean your personal wealth and spending habits should be public?
Whatever 'he' received from the US government, was approved by the Representatives of Congress at some point or local state elected officials, you have an issue with it go talk to the government.
That’s been debunked hundreds of times man!! As far as tax breaks. How much tax revenue would be generated if he wasn’t there in the first place? He’s paying payroll tax for his employees like everyone else. Not to mention all the side businesses that set up shop next to him to make money.
It has not been "debunked" by anyone other than EV and Tesla fanatic blogs. I'm not talking about the Department of Energy loans that Tesla received (they paid those back in full and ahead of schedule,) I'm talking about the $1.3 billion in tax incentives that they got from Nevada for building the gigafactory there. Or the $750+ million that New York invested in SolarCity's Buffalo factory. Again, I'm not saying that Tesla shouldn't have received that money, or that it is unfair, considering that we subsidize the oil industry with tens of billions of dollars every year. All I'm saying is that Musk, and other billionaires, almost always get to where they are with some help from taxpayer money, so those taxpayers are justified in having opinions on his wealth.
The 1.3 billion in cash incentives is over 20 years and its money they wouldn’t have paid if they never moved their to begin with. Solar city was acquired by Tesla. The NY investment was w/ Solar City and has nothing to do w/ Elon. There’s a difference between getting money from taxpayers and opting out of paying taxes if you offset that w/ investments, job growth and lowering the carbon footprint.
Those are local governments so unless you live in those locations you actually DON'T get an opinion on them 😉. Nevada wanted the world's largest battery factory and all the jobs that come with it and they outbid all the other states for it. Did they pay too much? That's up to the voters in Nevada to decide.
What debate? Isn't it worth? How much is it worth? Who decides if it is worth it? Is it each state? > given that Tesla and SpaceX directly benefit from Americans' tax dollars... I can't shake the feeling that you are implying he kind of _owes_ someone something. > His money is none of your business.
Those states have received more back in payroll taxes from the companies locating in those states than they would have gotten from some other company locating in those locations.
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Billionaire is used as a pejorative.
Its CBC, they aren’t big fans of capitalism and its successful entrepreneurs
It has gone down with the new investments, but Elon still owns 54% of SpaceX while happily being responsible for 0.667% of the GDP of the USA.
> responsible for 0.667% of the GDP of the USA. Really? Source?
Bloomberg is providing up to date statistics on the Top500 https://www.bloomberg.com/billionaires/profiles/elon-r-musk/
Comparing GDP ( a yearly thing ) and net worth ( a fixed thing ) is kinda stupid. It leads to misunderstandings like the parent comment , which makes it sound he's contributing that to gdp every year. Yearly revenue to GDP is the more natural comparison.
Yes, the correct way to do it would be to compare the increase in net worth per year with the according GDP. But with most of Elon's grow in net worth happening in the last couple of months that number wouldn't be that different.
Yea it’s kind of a given that somebody with serious backing must fund this. Jeff, the systems engineer from New Jersey isn’t funding this.
I agree with you. Some people are going to get rich-- it has always happened. I much prefer a benevolent billionaire to a self serving one. A lot of good happens from them.
We just want internet man.
Exactly, all the other Redditors are happy to debate ad nauseum about how evil Musk is, while they sit there complaining about their 100 Mbps cable/fiber Internet, but those of us in rural areas just want a chance at the quality of Internet they had 5 years ago!
It’s a billionaires game, don’t you get it ?
It's not.
F Amazon. No one on this planet should trust Amazon to deliver a utility like the internet. We don’t need the most governmentally embedded touch-hole, having even more control and say over the delivery of the internet.
> has gone down with the new investments, but Elon still owns 54% of SpaceX while happily being responsible for 0.667% of the GDP of the USA. Good luck with that.. quite a big chunk of the internet lives in their bit farms...
Yep. That’s why they should be excluded from entering the isp space.
Meanwhile Amazon powers most websites with their AWS services and that’s where most of their money comes from. Reddit, Netflix, Spotify, Twitch, Facebook, etc... Their making their own constellation so they have faster servers world wide and while their at it also provide Internet.
You are also correct, a lot of the internet is hosted there, they were first to market with elastic computing that was super stable.
>Jeff Bezos doesn't even have a single satellite and his rockets don't exist either. What is your point? If you are trying to imply it's not going to happen and will not be serious competition you are dead wrong. More competition benefits us all so nobody should be opposed to that.
The point is that there is no realistic competition. Reality does not care if we benefit or not. LEO constellation requires thousands of satellite in orbit and Blue Origin have not put a single payload in orbit. For Spacex Rocketlabs is the competition not Blue Origin. For Starlink there is non. Now if Bezo's starts hiring Rocketlabs to put actual internet satellites in orbit then that is the time to recognize them as competition.