> but I think most people would acknowledge that on balance, having them them is a good thing.

Of course it is. The next question is "is it a good thing to let a single owner completely control access to this resource?"

We've actually decided in the case of highways and rails, that no, it's not. There needs to be reasonable and non-discriminatory access to these resources otherwise the trade is not worthwhile. We actually have laws that are meant to enforce this.

> the obvious solution would be to provide a small number of orbital observatories to the astronomy community for free or with heavily subsidized pricing.

Define the "astronomy community." Do we do first come first served or do we have a priority list? How do we handle disputes? Is it just US citizens or do we need to offer this to the entire world? What if the vendor fails to make good on their concessions? What sort of penalties should surround this system?

There's really nothing "obvious" about this.

Building a highways is not necessarily "progress". We really ought to stop calling "progress" the destruction of a natural habitat that we will never be able to rebuild, for the construction of a superflous road that will close in 15 years because of poor traffic anyway.

If Jeff has the right to jam my telescope with his satellite due to the lack of regulation, do I have the right to jam his satellite with my telescope due to the same lack of regulation, or does it only work one way?

What progress? I gain nothing from this. I have symmetrical cheap reliable fiber to my house.

You could turn that around.

Progress in Earth bound astronomy has the downside of less satellite internet.