Summary
Ontario Premier Doug Ford says the province will permanently cancel its $100 million contract with Elon Musk’s Starlink, even if U.S. tariffs are lifted.
The decision follows Trump’s 25% tariffs on Canadian imports, which prompted Ontario to ban U.S. firms from contracts.
Ford cited Musk’s ties to Trump as a factor and said he is willing to fight potential legal fallout.
Musk previously responded to cancellation threats with a dismissive “Oh well.”
Why tf we doing starlink deals with that fucking idiot in the first place?
From a consumer perspective it’s a good solution for internet in remote areas and Ontario has a lot of remote areas. I used it for a couple of years when my only other option was a local wireless provider with an expensive high speed plan with advertised downloads up to 10Mbps, but actually never got anywhere near that. I’m lucky that I now have fibre and my starlink hardware is collecting dust in the shed.
Yeah I used one on rental while camping and I have to say it was great. I hear some European alternatives are coming, looking forward to them, hopefully they also work out ways to do it that doesn’t involve as much space pollution.
Nothing will ever be as cheap as starlink until another launch provider has a reusable first stage rocket. For rural people starlink is competitively priced, but for anyone who doesn’t need it, they think it’s crazy expensive.
Now make that 50% or more for a similar service until they can fully launch on a reusable rocket. It’ll be hard for anyone to get a foothold without taking big losses, or taking the anyone but Musk business.
Ontario is a massive province and rural internet outside of a handful of areas is terrible. Satellite, esp. good, consistent satellite, is a godsend for those areas – no one is running fiber out to a town of only 2000 bodies that’s highly isolated.
It was a reasonable choice, assuming Musk was mostly sane and not onboard with MAGA.
Ah see, Im an idiot, and got star link and spacex mixed up.