Limit to unlimited. Elon Musk limits the use of Starlink and offers to pay extra for speed
The company SpaceX, which is owned by the American billionaire and inventor Elon Musk, is introducing restrictions on the Internet service Starlink.
From now on, users of high-speed satellite Internet from SpaceX will have to monitor how much traffic they consume. The company reported that approximately 10% of service customers use more than one terabyte per month. This leads to network congestion, especially during peak hours.
Therefore, SpaceX introduces two tariffs – “Basic” and “Priority”. The difference between them is expected to be the data transfer rate. All customers are automatically offered to use the “Priority” tariff. However, as soon as the volume of consumption exceeds one terabyte, they will be forcibly transferred to “Basic”.
“During network congestion, users with basic access may experience a decrease in Internet speed and performance. This may cause some services and applications, such as video streaming applications, to degrade,” SpaceX said in a statement.
However, the company’s customers can always pay to enjoy high-speed Internet again. For those who use the service for home needs, each “extra” gigabyte will cost 25 cents. Businesses will have to pay $1 extra for the same amount of traffic.
Restrictions primarily apply to customers from the US and Canada. However, it is possible that with the expansion of the satellite communication network, they may also affect other regions. As the company noted, in order to provide as many people as possible with high-speed Internet, they will have to balance Starlink’s capabilities with user demand.
We will remind you that Elon Musk’s satellite internet works in Ukraine as well. Recently, the billionaire made several provocative statements in this regard, in particular, about the termination of the financing of the project at the expense of SpaceX. However, he later announced that he was not going to disable Starlink for Ukraine. The entrepreneur also hinted that the company may start accepting donations to expand the network in regions that need it.
