Re: [Starlink] Starlink no longer available to the Ukrainian army?

[Sebastian Moeller <moeller0@gmx.de>]

Hi Dave,

On 16 October 2022 18:31:07 CEST, Dave Taht <dave.taht@gmail.com> wrote:
>On Sun, Oct 16, 2022 at 1:45 AM Bruce Perens via Starlink
><starlink@lists.bufferbloat.net> wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>> On Sun, Oct 16, 2022 at 7:42 AM Sebastian Moeller via Starlink <starlink@lists.bufferbloat.net> wrote:
>>>
>>> I wonder whether some form of communication would not be better handled by a dedicated PR department:
>
>I have rather hated the return  of over-processed communications in
>the last decade, and the lack of a place to yell back at the screen. I
>liked blogs and websites and media that had comments, and better, had
>authors that read the comments.

Yes, I generally agree.
However in this case, I disagree somewhat. Twitter IMHO is a terrible tool for anything of relevance and outside small circles of friends or like minded individuals. As a tool for communicating policy or complex content I am less convinced that twitter adds much (sorry if this sounds old man shouting at the clouds).
But in the starlink/ukraine topic it might be fascinating seeing decision making changing in 'real-time', but neither Starlink nor Musk come out looking all that good.
Which is somewhat puzzling, as they earned a lot of goodwill by their initial (and apparently their continuing) actions, so why go screw this up? In this instance I believe some PR experts to discuss any intended tweet to make sure it truly reflects the intended policy seems an improvement to me.


>
>I like a wacking good, long form, debate... which is why I miss
>netnews and email so much.

+1; that is a different beast than twitter though which is essentially for unvetted hot-takes, no?


>
>If you think stuff run by PR departments is better, please read Ed
>Bernay's work, which has fallen out of copyright.

Given that so far I liked all your recommendations I should check this out. However I do not think PR publications are generally a good thing, just in this instance it might have been a useful tool to avoid unnecessary u-turns.

>
>>
>>
>> Unfortunately the biggest PR problem SpaceX/Starlink has is not one that can be mediated by a PR department. Elon says stupid things.
>
>>"There is the far-right conspiracy theorism,"
>
>I don't see "far-right" conspiracy theorism except from commenters.
>Got a concrete example?
>
>I am hopefully well known as a pretty rigorously "fair" person.[1] It
>comes from this:
>
>http://ronsravings.blogspot.com/2012/10/memorial-service-eulogy.html
>
>and to a huge extent my outlook on life and the American way, is
>actually reflected by the fq_codel and cake algorithms -
>
>" fq codel (now IETF standard RFC8290) is a uniquely “American”
>algorithm. It's *fair*. It gives the “little guy” - the little packet,
>the first packets in a new connection to anywhere, a little boost
>until the flow achieves parity with other flows from other sources,
>with minimal buffering. This means that all network traffic gets
>treated equally - faster. Isn’t that what you want in a network
>neutral framework? DNS, gaming traffic, voip, videoconferencing, and
>the first packets of any new flow, to anywhere, get a small boost.
>That’s it. Big flows - from anybody - from netflix to google to
>comcast - all achieve parity, with minimal delay and buffering, at a
>wide variety of real round trip times." -
>https://blog.cerowrt.org/post/net_neutrality_customers/
>...
>
>Elon has definitely shifted right in the past years moving from
>california to texas, and even if it's an uncalculated move (doubt it)
>- in order to sell "green technology" into the other half of the
>country, he needs to talk to things that those folk care about.
>
>If that means offending the green yuppie tesla base into buying more
>rivians, and convinces the red set in the center of the country to
>switch to electric trucks from ford... It's still a win, from his
>long-stated perspectives of converting the economy over to greener
>energies.
>
>"his belief that population collapse will end society if we don't
>start having more babies, "
>
>He's stopped far short of "banning abortion", for example, and the
>effects of population collapse can be demonstrated in
>aging populations in Japan, especially, who have also made a big
>investment into robotization.
>
>It does bug me that in repeated posts he doesn't show how, in America
>at least, immigration has countered the not-enough-for-replacement
>birth rate. I'm a big fan of immigration, always will be - (but I'd
>emigrate if only I could find a country willing to take me in!)
>
>"and his recent statement on how he believes the war in Ukraine should
>be ended. "
>
>Someone(s) need to propose answers on how wars can end. I already
>posted my interpretation of the Nicaraguan
>peace, as to what happened when both sides couldn't send in bullets anymore.
>
>"A lot of this seems totally nuts to me and is not going to endear him
>to people. The impacts upon SpaceX and Tesla have been palpable."
>
>It is impossible to be endearing to all people.
>
>"The hell with it … even though Starlink is still losing money & other
>companies are getting billions of taxpayer $, we’ll just keep funding
>Ukraine govt for free."
>
>https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1581345747777179651
>
>>
>> I spent some time with Steve Jobs in 12 years at Pixar. There were horror stories about him, but he'd matured. He wasn't perfect, but a lot better. The problem is that he was probably as old then as Elon is now.
>
>Did he thrust iphones into a war? witness the complete collapse of all
>other infrastructure technologies? Run the risk of nuclear war, with a
>communication tech that was hoped to bring the benefit of the internet
>to all?
>
>A really good question might be - what would steve jobs' have done, in
>this situation? Think different?
>
>Gandhi?
>
>Pol Pot?
>
>Winston Churchill?
>
>
>>
>>     Thanks
>
>[1] for the record, I have published very little about my politics,
>and hope to not have to care more than I do. This
>piece is the closest I came to skewering every perspective there is:
>http://the-edge.blogspot.com/2003_06_15_the-edge_archive.html#105582160924824821
>
>and if someone could tell ME what my politics are after reading that,
>I'd probably find something to quibble with.
>
>
>>     Bruce
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