SpaceX Starlink engineers take questions in Reddit AMA—here are highlights

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SpaceX Starlink engineers answered questions in a Reddit AMA (Ask Me Anything) on Saturday, covering topics such as data caps (which they hope to never implement), when the public beta will expand to more users, and how the satellite-broadband service will expand and change in the future.

“Starlink is an extremely flexible system and will get better over time as we make the software smarter. Latency, bandwidth, and reliability can all be improved significantly,” the engineers wrote under the Reddit username “DishyMcFlatface,” which is also SpaceX’s nickname for the Starlink satellite dish.

Here are some highlights from the AMA.

No data caps “at this time”

When asked if users will ever face data caps, the Starlink team gave a vague answer: “At this time, the Starlink beta service does not have data caps.”

While that response covered the present but not the future, a subsequent comment from DishyMcFlatface gave a more detailed answer that suggests SpaceX is trying to avoid data caps:

So we really don’t want to implement restrictive data caps like people have encountered with satellite Internet in the past. Right now we’re still trying to figure a lot of stuff out—we might have to do something in the future to prevent abuse and just ensure that everyone else gets quality service.

Expanded beta in January—no bribes required