Whitey Basson says keeping Starlink out of SA is discouraging investment in rural areas

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mylesillidge

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Billionaire Whitey Basson says Elon Musk's Starlink must launch in South Africa

Former Shoprite CEO Whitey Basson said that keeping Starlink out of South Africa is discouraging businesspeople from investing in rural areas where there is no working communications infrastructure.

In an interview on Conversations with Lelethu, Basson said that although he supported efforts to ensure a fair balance of wealth in South Africa, some transformation laws were doing more harm than good.
 
juanthyme said:
why not do what Amazon did?
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Because Musk wants vertical integration. He did the same thing with Tesla. They don't have franchise Tesla dealerships, you buy your car from Tesla. So you get a consistent experience across the board.
 
konfab said:
Because Musk wants vertical integration. He did the same thing with Tesla. They don't have franchise Tesla dealerships, you buy your car from Tesla. So you get a consistent experience across the board.
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so it is a commercial choice?
 
While it has been obvious from the start that a service like Starlink could benefit rural areas a lot. Musk is a very political creature these days.

And I wouldn't say that he showered himself with credibility (of the relevant kind) when he so severely disrespected the confidential government records of his own countrymen back in the states a while back.

It has been confirmed that at that time Musk's DOGE troop:
  • Used unapproved servers
  • Signed a secret voter data sharing agreement (pertaining to the data they were handling) with an outside political advocacy group.
  • Willy nilly shared via email, effectively leaking, extracts pulled straight from otherwise password protected SSA data

Apart from that:
  • Are still under inspector general investigation for allegedly downloading entire SSA databases onto thumb drives with the express intent to take it to a private sector employer
  • Are still under investigation by the NRLB for allegedly exfiltrating over 10GB of case data relating to private corporate and union organizer data
  • And Treasury Department lawsuits are moving forward, pertaining to how department security was actively blocked from stopping DOGE workers from forcing their way into the Bureau of the Fiscal Service.

How's "Big Balls" doing?
 
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I think the much more important thing he said is that a wealth tax should replace transformation laws.
 
juanthyme said:
so it is a commercial choice?
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A business, making a commercial decision to run things themselves. The horror.

Such ideas should be submitted to the international court of justice, the constitutional court should have its case-log cleared and made way such that Elon Musk can be strongly told that it is fundamentally against all that is good and just in the world for him to offer satellite internet without a franchise agreement.
 
TrueSeeker said:
While it has been obvious from the start that a service like Starlink could benefit rural areas a lot. Musk is a very political creature these days.

And I wouldn't say that he showered himself with credibility (of the relevant kind) when he so severely disrespected the confidential government records of his own countrymen back in the states a while back.

It has been confirmed that at that time Musk's DOGE troop:
  • Used unapproved servers
  • Signed a secret voter data sharing agreement (pertaining to the data they were handling) with an outside political advocacy group.
  • Willy nilly shared via email, effectively leaking, extracts pulled straight from otherwise password protected SSA data

Apart from that:
  • Are still under inspector general investigation for allegedly downloading entire SSA databases onto thumb drives with the express intent to take it to a private sector employer
  • Are still under investigation by the NRLB for allegedly exfiltrating over 10GB of case data relating to private corporate and union organizer data
  • And Treasury Department lawsuits are moving forward, pertaining to how department security was actively blocked from stopping DOGE workers from forcing their way into the Bureau of the Fiscal Service.

How's "Big Balls" doing?
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Not sure how much of that is relevant to South Africa lol.
 
Mr Basson, you know what you need to do.
Offer some courtesy stuffing to Ramaphosa's mattress. The couch is full at this time I believe..
 
TrueSeeker said:
While it has been obvious from the start that a service like Starlink could benefit rural areas a lot. Musk is a very political creature these days.

And I wouldn't say that he showered himself with credibility (of the relevant kind) when he so severely disrespected the confidential government records of his own countrymen back in the states a while back.

It has been confirmed that at that time Musk's DOGE troop:
  • Used unapproved servers
  • Signed a secret voter data sharing agreement (pertaining to the data they were handling) with an outside political advocacy group.
  • Willy nilly shared via email, effectively leaking, extracts pulled straight from otherwise password protected SSA data

Apart from that:
  • Are still under inspector general investigation for allegedly downloading entire SSA databases onto thumb drives with the express intent to take it to a private sector employer
  • Are still under investigation by the NRLB for allegedly exfiltrating over 10GB of case data relating to private corporate and union organizer data
  • And Treasury Department lawsuits are moving forward, pertaining to how department security was actively blocked from stopping DOGE workers from forcing their way into the Bureau of the Fiscal Service.

How's "Big Balls" doing?
Click to expand...
Irrelevant waffle and nothing to do with this situation.
 
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