Stories
Slash Boxes
Comments

SoylentNews is people

posted by martyb on Saturday July 24 2021, @01:33AM   Printer-friendly
from the entrenched dept.

Judges reject Viasat's plea to stop SpaceX Starlink satellite launches:

SpaceX can keep launching broadband satellites despite a lawsuit filed by Viasat, a federal appeals court ruled Tuesday.

Viasat sued the Federal Communications Commission in May and asked judges for a stay that would halt SpaceX's ongoing launches of low Earth orbit (LEO) satellites that power Starlink Internet service. To get a stay, Viasat had to show that it is likely to win its lawsuit alleging that the FCC improperly approved the satellite launches.

A three-judge panel at the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit was not persuaded, saying in a short order that "Viasat has not satisfied the stringent requirements for a stay pending court review." The judges did grant a motion to expedite the appeal, however, so the case should move faster than normal.


Original Submission

Related Stories

Amazon Asked FCC to Reject Starlink Plan Because it Can't Compete, SpaceX Says 42 comments

Amazon asked FCC to reject Starlink plan because it can’t compete, SpaceX says:

Amazon's attempt to block proposals for the next-generation Starlink system is a "delay tactic" and a continuation of Amazon's strategy of "hinder[ing] competitors to compensate for Amazon's failure to make progress of its own," SpaceX told the Federal Communications Commission yesterday.

"Amazon's track record amply demonstrates that as it falls behind competitors, it is more than willing to use regulatory and legal processes to create obstacles designed to delay those competitors from leaving Amazon even further behind," SpaceX told the FCC in its filing. Approving Amazon's request would hurt consumers by denying them "access to faster-moving competition," SpaceX said.

Amazon last week urged the FCC to reject an update to SpaceX's Starlink plan [...]

Previously:
Blue Origin Employees Are Jumping Ship
Judges Reject Viasat's Plea to Stop SpaceX's Starlink Satellite Launches


Original Submission

FCC Defends Starlink Approval as Viasat, Dish Urge Court to Block SpaceX License 16 comments

FCC defends Starlink approval as Viasat, Dish urge court to block SpaceX license:

With oral arguments scheduled for December 3, final briefs were filed on Tuesday by the FCC, Viasat, Dish, and SpaceX. Judges at the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit previously rejected Viasat's motion for a stay that would have halted SpaceX's ongoing launches of low-Earth-orbit (LEO) satellites pending the resolution of the lawsuit. Judges found that Viasat failed to show that it is likely to win its case alleging that the FCC improperly approved the satellite launches. Judges said at the time that Viasat did not meet "the stringent requirements for a stay pending court review" but granted a motion to expedite the appeal.

[...] (Update 9:39 pm EDT: After this article published, a lawyer who has been observing the case pointed out to us that the briefs we described as new are largely identical to ones that were previously filed. This week's filings were submitted on the October 26 deadline for final briefs, but the FCC brief was also submitted in a largely identical form on September 21. The only major difference is that the new versions have page citations to a joint appendix. We didn't cover these briefs at the time they were originally filed, and they are still relevant for the oral arguments scheduled for December 3; the rest of this article is unchanged.)

Previously:
Amazon Asked FCC to Reject Starlink Plan Because it Can't Compete, SpaceX Says
Blue Origin Employees Are Jumping Ship
Judges Reject Viasat's Plea to Stop SpaceX's Starlink Satellite Launches


Original Submission

This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.
Display Options Threshold/Breakthrough Mark All as Read Mark All as Unread
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
(1)
  • (Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 24 2021, @01:39AM (12 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 24 2021, @01:39AM (#1159503)

    Care to mention why viasat is opposing spacex starlink? Most of us likely never even heard of viasat.

    • (Score: 2) by Frosty Piss on Saturday July 24 2021, @02:35AM

      by Frosty Piss (4971) on Saturday July 24 2021, @02:35AM (#1159506)

      They feel it’s unfair for Elon to be making money hand over fist…

    • (Score: -1, Redundant) by aristarchus on Saturday July 24 2021, @02:35AM (1 child)

      by aristarchus (2645) on Saturday July 24 2021, @02:35AM (#1159507) Journal

      Probably nothing to do with the degradation of the night sky, and chaos for astro-photographers.

      • (Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 24 2021, @04:30AM

        by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 24 2021, @04:30AM (#1159524)

        "Viasat will suffer unwarranted competitive injury."

        The remedy they want is for Starlink to be subjected to the strictest multi-year environmental review possible and then some (and be forced to stop operations during that time) while ViaSat gets exempted from any oversight at all. Basically the same thing OneWeb demanded, only using NEPA instead of radio interference as the bogeyman. The unspoken part in both cases is that Starlink has an FCC imposed deadline to finish deployment or they will lose their broadcast licence.

    • (Score: 5, Informative) by Runaway1956 on Saturday July 24 2021, @03:20AM (5 children)

      by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Saturday July 24 2021, @03:20AM (#1159513) Journal

      I'm sure you can find this on your own, but I'll put it out there for those who can't or won't:
      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viasat_(American_company) [wikipedia.org]

      I've heard enough about them to have a general idea who and what they were. They aren't what anyone can call "big players" in anything, but they have fingers in several pies.

      The problem is, when Musk gets his fleet of satellites completed, a lot of Viasat's business is going to lose value. Exede's 12 Mbit satellite internet was pretty good internet, in 2014. Musk is going to blow that away though, so Exede will either sell their services dirt cheap, or fold up.

      Oh well, so sad. Viasat was in a position to take the lead, and put up their own fleet of satellites, 15 years ago. They sat on their thumbs, and collected rent on aging technology instead.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 24 2021, @05:13AM

        by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 24 2021, @05:13AM (#1159527)

        A quick read of that and it looks like providing internet to airliners was their cash cow that funded a lot of acquisitions. They never developed much of anything else on their own. Losing that to Starlink is going to hurt them.

      • (Score: 2) by Freeman on Monday July 26 2021, @02:19PM (3 children)

        by Freeman (732) on Monday July 26 2021, @02:19PM (#1159996) Journal

        No one was in Starlink's position 15 years ago. Starlink is benefiting hugely from SpaceX's reduced cost to orbit.

        --
        Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
        • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Monday July 26 2021, @02:29PM (1 child)

          by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Monday July 26 2021, @02:29PM (#1160002) Journal

          Well, let me restate that then. 15 years ago, they could have been investing and researching the very things that Musk was investing in, and researching 15 years ago. Musk had dreams and goals that none of the other investors were interested in.

          Viasat could be a competitor to Spacex and Starlink, if their goals hadn't been skimming money off old tech rent properties.

          • (Score: 2) by Freeman on Monday July 26 2021, @02:35PM

            by Freeman (732) on Monday July 26 2021, @02:35PM (#1160004) Journal

            Perhaps, but Viasat was never a rocket company. They were building their business on assumptions that SpaceX blew to smithereens. When they saw Starlink getting going, they potentially had a chance to compete. Now, they're way behind the curve. It's likely that Starlink is the nail in their coffin.

            --
            Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 26 2021, @06:09PM

          by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 26 2021, @06:09PM (#1160081)

          It's an interesting chicken and egg problem: Nobody could build a satellite constellation like Starlink without access to a cheap high cadence launch vehicle, but nobody could afford to operate such a vehicle without a high cadence customer to keep it busy. It took someone willing and able to say "Why not both?" to make it happen. That is why Starlink exists, by the way, because SpaceX would be facing bankruptcy without it now that the backlog is gone.

    • (Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 24 2021, @04:34AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 24 2021, @04:34AM (#1159525)

      Buggy whip manufacturers always hate those newfangled automobiles cutting into their profits. The difference this time around is that it is multi-billion dollar companies complaining, but the song is always the same.

    • (Score: 2) by FatPhil on Saturday July 24 2021, @12:07PM (1 child)

      by FatPhil (863) <pc-soylentNO@SPAMasdf.fi> on Saturday July 24 2021, @12:07PM (#1159560) Homepage
      They're pretty much the biggest player in the satellite internet access game, how can you not have heard of them?
      --
      Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 24 2021, @01:36PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 24 2021, @01:36PM (#1159578)

        And those of us who knew of Viasat, mostly know of them for Satellite channels they rebroadcast for others, either free to air or paid with cablecard requirements.

        Honestly though their selection of satellites has basically been unchanging since the 1990s or early 2000s, They've had maybe 5 satellite releases since then and only to replace lost units not to expand service.

        So yeah, while I won't say they deserve to die, they deserve to have to scramble to reestablish themselves.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 24 2021, @07:16PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 24 2021, @07:16PM (#1159624)

    viasat and one web CEOs should be sent to jail for wasting the courts' time.

  • (Score: 2) by eravnrekaree on Sunday July 25 2021, @06:05PM

    by eravnrekaree (555) on Sunday July 25 2021, @06:05PM (#1159800)

    Good. The public interest has to rule and that is clearly SpaceX who can offer the fastest internet speeds everywhere.

(1)