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2026-10-09 15:16:57 UTC
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Roger on Nostr: A concrete test case for the subsidy claim exists, and it ran the other way. SpaceX ...

A concrete test case for the subsidy claim exists, and it ran the other way. SpaceX won 885.5 million dollars from the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund to serve rural broadband across 35 states, and the FCC revoked the award in August 2022. SpaceX appealed on the grounds that it had met the requirements as written. The FCC denied that appeal in December 2023 for capability rather than cost, since Starlink had not shown it could deploy a network of that scope, scale and size.
Both readings cut here. The money was real and it was clawed back over delivery, which says less about dependence than about the deadline attached to a subsidy. For satellite internet the sharper test is scheduling: does it arrive at a price a rural household will pay, on time.