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Comment by lazide | Hacker News Reader

GPS done via land radio systems would be so flakey and expensive it would still likely not be implemented. Easy to jam too. And subject to control by terrestrial authorities.

Putting a dozen satellites in orbit - and out of reach of local authorities - is so much cheaper and more reliable, it’s not just a matter of cost - it’s an entirely different product.

Same with starlink. A big part of its advantage is someone can’t just walk over and cut a cable. And no one needs planning approval to put a cable in.

Line of sight to low orbit is about the only way to accomplish that - maybe some kind of high altitude ballon/plane could (loon?) but they’re so comparatively easy to shoot down that it makes it a very different kind of situation.

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Yeah and to add to this I think people are forgetting why Bell was given a sanctioned monopoly. Because there were just cables everywhere. When people say natural monopolies exist in markets with network effects, that can mean literal networks of cables that will block out the sun. Sure, this stuff will improve too, but I think people are also forgetting about the increased surface area and the increased gravity which makes each of these cables required to be thicker or require more support.

https://history.stackexchange.com/questions/58872/did-they-r...

It seems like you are looking at it only from one side.

Undersea cables are probably more expensive than satellites today, but we'll still continue to put them in. And nope, someone can't just walk in and cut a cable sitting at 5000m under the surface.

Detecting a StarLink terminal is relatively easy from the ground, and someone can just walk in and demolish it once they locate it.

Basically, all tech has pros and cons.

Of course. But to Russias recent chagrin, blowing up/severing a fixed and very expensive cable (or underwater pipeline) is a generally far easier proposition than tracking down mobile and intermittent sources on the ground.

Still possible. But orders of magnitude harder. Nothing says that starlink ground station needs to stay in one place, after all.

Undersea cables get cut all the time, from shipping to nation states.

Trains don’t make cars obsolete, anymore than cars make trains obsolete. Taking out train tracks is much easier and more effective than taking out all possible roads though.

> Undersea cables are probably more expensive than satellites today, but we'll still continue to put them in. And nope, someone can't just walk in and cut a cable sitting at 5000m under the surface.

The cable has to come out on to the surface somewhere, though.

But barring that, dropping IEDs from a fishing boat, with a time fuse and some weight, isn't hard; the trickier part would be knowing where to drop them so they land near the cable. But there are tricks for that too.

Dragging an anchor seems to work pretty well.

D'oh. Of course!

All too easy to get bit by the curse of overcomplicating things.

You might be surprised to learn that Enhanced LORAN recently became operational around the UK's coast, specifically because satellite-based PNT is so susceptible to interference and jamming.

Not at all. It's only being installed in specific, high value areas within a specific jurisdiction. And mainly as a backup. Notably by a party which doesn't control GPS (albeit a close ally).

LORAN has also been used near airports in developed areas for a long time.

That isn't the 'base case' though.

The US military initially developed and launched GPS because of the reasons I stated, and it is still widely used as a base case for exactly those reasons.

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