[About Starlink]

The most interesting episode of this U.S. presidential election was the North Carolina anecdote that Trump introduced in his speech. Here’s a brief summary of his speech. (Perplexity Help)

1. Trump said North Carolina residents asked him to come and contact Elon Musk to make Starlink available.
2. Trump said he didn’t know what Starlink was at first. He said he asked Musk, “What is Starlink?”
3. Musk described Starlink as a “very good communication system.”
4. Trump communicated to Musk that North Carolina urgently needs Starlink.
5. Musk provided Starlink very quickly, which “saved a lot of lives,” according to Trump.
6. SpaceX has actually decided to offer free Starlink broadband through the end of 2024 to areas affected by hurricanes Helen and Milton.
7. However, the White House said the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) already had plans to deploy the Starlink satellite system in North Carolina.

Quite a few people know that Elon Musk is only working hard on cars through Tesla, but he is still changing the world through SpaceX. SpaceX is sometimes recognized as a company on YouTube that makes strange things by making vertical landings of rockets with its chopstick arms, or a company that satisfies Elon’s personal curiosity, but it has amazing technology that gives you goosebumps when you look inside.

The attached graph shows statistics from globally active satellites as of Nov. 15, which were listed on the website of Jonathan McDowell, an astronomer at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. According to the data, the total number of satellites currently in operation is 10,559, of which 62% or 6,566 are from one company, one company, not one country, or Starlink.

When it comes to controllability alone, the denominator will be reduced to 8,869, and then Starlink’s market share will reach a whopping 74%. Considering that the number of satellites currently operated by South Korea is 10 to 20, the number of satellites at Starlink is beyond imagination.

Starlink is determined to increase this number to 40,000 in the future, and with so many satellites, it will be possible to connect communication in most parts of the planet, as in the previous episode.

We often recognize that 5G is a wireless service, but in reality, the coverage of the base station is from hundreds of meters to about 5 kilometers long. These base stations are usually connected by wired optical cables, which are buried under roads or sidewalks. Burying such utilities requires very large funds. These infrastructures are naturally established in developed countries such as Korea, but these infrastructures rarely exist in Africa or Southwest Asia countries with low national income.

In this case, Starlink is a very useful tool. Of course, traditional satellites can play this role, but as mentioned earlier, there is too much difference in number. In addition, traditional geostationary satellites are 36,000 km away from Earth, so the communication delay is 240 ms, and in the case of Starlink, the delay is only 20 ms because it is 550 km low orbit. Thanks to this, Starlink’s communication is so fast that it cannot be compared to other satellite communication.

Earlier this year, there was a lot of talk about the cross-strait war between China and Taiwan. However, looking at these data, I wonder if China is reckless enough to wage a cross-strait war. In the event of a war now, physical combat capabilities such as defense budgets, aircraft, aircraft carriers, and nuclear weapons will be important, but the combat capabilities of global communication and cyber warfare based on Palantir and Starlink will also play a significant role.

Of course, the accuracy and operational capabilities of missiles will also be impacted by AI technology derived from state-of-the-art CPUs and GPUs. No other country is able to match the current semiconductor technology that leads to US design and Taiwanese manufacturing.

Given this, it is unlikely that a cross-strait war will take place directly within a short period of time. Of course, the current complex relationship between Russia and North Korea, and China and North Korea, must be closely watched. It is also necessary to track and manage strange phenomena that will be derived from this. This is because it is highly likely to be closely connected to our real life.

Anyway, I often see people denigrating Elon Musk’s abilities, and if you look into the world of communication networks that Starlink is currently creating, I wonder if you will change your mind a little. Of course, Tesla’s self-driving and Optimus personally have a high opinion. Looking at Neuralink here, it is questionable whether all of this can be done in one person’s 24 hours.

I desperately hope that through that brilliant talent, we will change the world “in a good way.”