The bar wasn’t anything special; it was just a strip of neon and some wobbly stools in the corner of a bus station. But there was one thing that glowed the same way on every table: phone screens. A student tried to use a VPN that kept dropping to get to a news site that had been censored. A migrant worker watched a video that was buffering, with the progress bar stuck at 3%. A tourist in a branded hoodie sat next to them and casually scrolled through TikTok, using a smooth Starlink Wi-Fi hotspot in his backpack. The internet is the same for everyone. At least in writing.
Starlink promises freedom, but it comes with a price.
Starlink Mobile is marketed like a myth of freedom on tech blogs and at launch events. No more cables, no more state-owned monopolies, and internet from space that covers the whole world. The sky and the web are both open. It sounds like the story of a sci-fi movie with a happy ending.
But if you walk outside of a big city, you’ll see a small thing that changes everything. Most of the people who dream the most about having access to reliable, uncensored internet aren’t the ones who can spend a few hundred dollars on a satellite phone plan.
Garden centers dislike this resilient plant because it makes many decorative flowers unnecessary
In rural Mexico, Elon Musk proudly tweeted about how Starlink connected schools that were far away from each other. The pictures are inspiring: kids gathered around laptops and a satellite dish pointing at the blue sky. You can’t see that the subscription alone can cost more than a family’s monthly income. Parts of Nigeria, Brazil, and the Philippines have the same story. Starlink comes, the news is good, a few people share connections, and then you do the maths.
For a lot of people, the only way in is to stand around a single dish in a community center and hope the connection stays strong.
This is where the idea of “internet for everyone” slowly changes into something else. A parallel web where people who can pay get fast, open, and relatively uncensored access, while others have to deal with slow mobile data and patched-together VPNs. A slope, not a wall. The promise of being able to connect with people all over the world is right above our heads, flying in low orbit. The access key is still a credit card, a stable currency, and the peace of mind that comes from not having to choose between groceries and internet access. *That’s the gap that no one on stage really talks about.
How Starlink on mobile could make the digital divide even worse
Picture your phone in a few years. There is a small “Starlink” icon under the signal bars instead of 5G or Wi-Fi. You’re on a desert road, a train cutting across a border, and a beach in a country that blocks half of the internet. You tap on a news site that is usually blocked. It opens right away. No VPN. No mistake. This is just the raw, unfiltered web.
Now think about the same moment for someone next to you who doesn’t have that icon.
We’ve already seen this movie with data plans. Cheap 4G in India made it possible for a lot more people to get online, but real freedom still depended on who could afford enough gigabytes to stay online. First came social media and short videos. Critical journalism, a lot of research, and safe messaging? Those needed more information, more time, and more risk. The price goes up again when you use Starlink on your phone. Rich people, businesses, expats, and digital nomads all want a link that works all over the world and can’t be censored. It turns into a high-quality layer of reality.
While everyone else keeps refreshing their slow, filtered, government-approved internet, the spinning wheel becomes a kind of quiet censorship on its own.
The reasoning is very simple. States can stop local providers from working, put pressure on undersea cable operators, and scare VPN companies. A satellite link that goes straight into your phone goes around a lot of those controls, especially if it is billed outside the US and encrypted from end to end. So, authoritarian governments and regulators will put pressure on the next thing they can control: who can afford it, where it is sold, and who can legally use it. To be honest, no one really reads those 40-page terms and conditions about “lawful use” and “national compliance.”
The danger is that “open internet” will quietly turn into “open internet for those who are rich or mobile enough to get around the rules, or brave enough to ignore them.”
What regular people can really do in this new world
If you’re reading this on a mid-range smartphone, you’re already in the middle of the story. The first step you can take is painfully simple: know what your options are. Before you start dreaming about a phone that works with Starlink, look at the tools you already have, like local ISPs, eSIMs from other countries, privacy-friendly browsers, and decent VPNs that still work in your area. If you don’t have a lot of money, it might be better to get a cheap local data plan and use a friend’s faster link every now and then than to pay for a personal satellite subscription.
The point isn’t to get the newest tech; it’s to figure out how you really get information every day.
A second, less exciting step is to get information from more than one source, not just how fast it loads. A satellite feed won’t make a social media bubble go away. Even if you have the most open connection in the world, you can still read the same three influencers saying the same three things. That’s a trap that a lot of us fall into. We scroll more, not deeper, when speeds go up and friction goes down. We read the headlines, not the sources.
You won’t be able to “beat” a stacked internet system overnight. You can, however, quietly teach yourself to click past the first page, search in a different language, and compare one local store to one from another country. A silver dish on your roof won’t give you as much freedom as small habits that you do over and over.
A digital rights activist in Nairobi told me, “Connectivity is not equality.” “If access costs a lot, then censorship is just pushed out to the market.” “By default, not by law, the poor are silenced.”
Keep track of what you really needDo you really need high-bandwidth, uncensored access all the time, or are there times when a paid premium link or shared connection is enough, like when you’re working, studying, or doing sensitive research?
Shared hubs like libraries, co-working spaces, community centers, and even cafés with better connections can be informal gateways to a more open web, especially when they are shared fairly.
Help out with local projectsCommunity networks, mesh Wi-Fi projects, and small ISPs can keep prices low and keep the big satellite companies from getting too powerful.
Know the lawSome countries already limit the use of satellite dishes and foreign SIM cards. Reading a short local guide now can help you avoid bad surprises later.
Talk about the difference in cost.When friends talk about “internet from space,” gently remind them of who isn’t there. Making that question normal is a quiet way of fighting back.
A future where the doors are locked but the sky is open
If Starlink and its competitors keep growing, the way we use the internet may change in ways we can’t see. Above: fast, worldwide, and lightly regulated internet access that is perfect for people who travel, work online, or can put the cost of a satellite plan on a company card. Below: access that is spotty, filtered, and sometimes weaponised for people whose SIM cards live and die by national rules. There won’t be any sirens or slogans when that split happens. It will sneak in through shiny ads, quiet pricing pages, and “premium” connectivity bundles that come with high-end phones.
We’ve all been there: the moment when you get a new gadget and realise it’s not just a toy, it’s a sorting machine.
The open internet was never really fair, but for a while it felt like a shared space held together by cables, routers, and a few global rules. Satellite-based mobile access brings something more fragile: a sky owned by a few companies, carrying a web that can be technically reached from anywhere but is too expensive for many people. Some people are slower or more censored, which is a risk. It’s that the idea of a common information base is fading away, one subscription level at a time.
| Key point | Detail | Value for the reader |
|---|---|---|
| Cost creates a hidden barrier | Starlink‑level access can exceed local monthly incomes in many regions | Helps you see pricing not as a tech detail, but as a political filter |
| Access does not equal freedom | Fast satellite links can still sit inside bubbles, algorithms, and local laws | Encourages more intentional media habits beyond just getting online |
| Small choices still matter | Shared hubs, local initiatives, and awareness of laws shape who is left out | Shows concrete ways to resist a two‑tier internet in everyday life |
