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I was a little startled in the last week of advances in satellite internet technology, a promising but overrated way to deliver internet service over networks of relatively small satellites. Amazon, boeing and one many other companies can join soon Elon Musk’s SpaceX beaming internet service from space.

Yes great. But companies involved and people excited about satellite internet tend to exaggerate how well it can realistically do. Technology has its limits and the structural barriers to internet access cannot be solved by technology alone.

The pandemic has helped focus the attention of many people, companies and governments on making internet access an essential utility like electricity or clean water. This cannot happen unless everyone works together to improve government internet policies, reduce economic and social barriers to internet access, and take on all other human challenges to get more of the world online.

Satellite internet technology encourages me and I regularly hear from On Tech readers who feel the same. However, let me examine both the limitations of satellite internet services and the narrow-minded focus that sometimes focuses solely on technology.

Almost all the policy experts and technologists I’ve spoken to about satellite internet services say the same thing: Satellite internet will be unrealistic for most people and places.

The technology is a useful complement to regions of the world where traditional internet pipelines cannot reach easily or affordably, such as mountainous or remote areas.

But those fascinated by the idea tend to talk about technology this way: a potential cure for global internet access issues. Satellite internet is not a magic bullet.

With a glimpse of realism, Musk said Starlink, SpaceX’s satellite internet service, aims to serve “up to 5 percent of the world’s population that traditional fiber and wireless networks cannot reach” this summer.

Five percent of the world is potentially hundreds of millions of people who would not otherwise be online. But compared to the few billion people who don’t use the internet today, that’s a drop in the bucket.

Technical problems are far from the only reason why many people don’t use the internet. It’s about ineffective government policies, social and economic inequalities, entrenched corporate interests, and people with more pressing needs than online.

And yet satellite internet executives like Musk and Amazon’s Jeff Bezos rarely talks about addressing these broader challengesnor do they tend to present themselves as part of a shared mission to make the internet more accessible, affordable and relevant.

Musk has been tweeting about their taxes in the past few days and return flight Astronauts inside the SpaceX capsule. He didn’t say a word I could find about the US infrastructure bill. $65 billion in new taxpayer funding trying to get more Americans online (although like many US internet companies Starlink receives too much government funding).

Most of the new taxpayer money will be grants for state and local governments to spend on small-scale projects they believe are best for expanding internet service. Some states including Virginia and Minnesotahave a background in supporting effective projects to get more people online, Anna ReadA senior officer at Pew Charitable Trusts’ Broadband Access Initiative told me.

The inch-by-inch improvement is a frustrating but possibly necessary piece of expanding internet access. It will also be helpful for the powerful people and companies behind satellite internet projects to see the big picture as part of their work.

What if Musk returns his support? Young people successfully campaigning for free internet service in Baltimore for your neighbors? What if Amazon’s satellite-internet executives also pointed this out? high cost of mobile internet service In sub-Saharan Africa? What if Boeing used its lobbying power in Washington to force legislators to frequently say no to major internet providers? stand in the way of effective online policies?

Everyone I just mentioned has the same goal: breaking down barriers to get more people online. However, it is satellite managers who tend to act as if they operate in a vacuum of innovation separate from the realities of Earth.

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Before you go …

• Cows are cool now: Shortcomings of computer chips empowering the once boring companies that produced them, my colleague Don Clark writes.

• Here’s how an 8-year-old explains the metaverse: Anton, the Roblox-loving son of my colleague Alex Williams, futuristic concept explained Better than Mark Zuckerberg: “You can ride a motorcycle, host a house, throw a party. You can get a job at 8.”

• When tech for schools goes wrong: Parents in Stockholm were frustrated with using the school-provided buggy app for kids’ attendance, grades, and cafeteria menus, so they made their own version. School officials said the new app was a crime privacy threat. wired reports, but the two parties may be reaching a compromise. (Subscription may be required.)

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A Fox briefly ran onto the field during a college football game last weekend. (The fox ran up the stadium stairs and eventually headed for an exit.)

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