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Historical records reveal the bitter truth about 17th-century Transylvania's climate

Phys.org
5 days 1 hour ago
For roughly five centuries from about 1300, Europe experienced periods of unusually cold weather and extreme conditions collectively known as the Little Ice Age. Transylvania, a historical region in modern-day Romania, was also affected, but information about just how severe things were had been scattered in old town records, church logs, travelogs and administrative and monastic diaries.

Elon Musk wants to take on Verizon, AT&T, and T-Mobile. He may have found a way

Fast Company
5 days 1 hour ago

If he can’t build it, he’ll buy it.

The world’s richest man commands electric vehicles, spacecraft, a fleet of satellites for an internet network, robots, an AI tool, a social media platform, and more. Now Elon Musk is eyeing wireless phone service.

SpaceX, the parent company of various Musk ventures including Starlink, is reportedly in talks to acquire low-cost carrier Boost Mobile—or at the very least, gain access to its network—according to reporting by The Washington Post. This deal could see Musk upend the telecom space as his plans to launch a mobile phone service through SpaceX failed after the three major carriers—Verizon, T-Mobile, and AT&T—refused to give the company access to their networks.

The deal would end weeks of escalating speculation about how, exactly, Musk will fulfill his ambitions after being rebuffed by the major carriers. Last month, SpaceX paid about $8 billion to buy a portfolio of nationwide low-band cellular spectrum licenses, which would allow its Starlink Mobile to provide cellular service within buildings.

That deal addressed “one of the key remaining technical gaps that will pave the way for Starlink Mobile to become a major mobile carrier in the U.S.,” the company said in a statement.

At the same time, Musk was also reportedly meeting with Charlie Ergen, chairman of EchoStar, which owns Boost Mobile. The men discussed SpaceX acquiring Boost Mobile or SpaceX gaining access to its network, which it leases from AT&T and T-Mobile US, two people familiar with the negotiations told The Washington Post. Despite losing roughly 2 million subscribers since 2020, Boost Mobile still has more than 7 million subscribers. 

Meanwhile, Starlink has been expanding rapidly, thanks in no small measure to an ad blitz that’s continued since Musk aired his first-ever Super Bowl spot in February. The strategy appears to be paying off: Starlink reported 13.6 million subscribers as of its most recent quarter, a nearly 90% increase from the same period in 2025. 

HOW COMPETITORS ARE REACTING

The Boost Mobile deal would hardly be the first to see Musk back into a floundering company in an unconventional way. Look no further than how he came to Tesla or Twitter. But the potential backdoor deal to take over Boost Mobile’s lease agreements with AT&T and T-Mobile US would still require sign-offs from the major carriers, according to The Washington Post. 

Representatives for SpaceX, EchoStar, Verizon, AT&T, and T-Mobile didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment from Fast Company. 

Verizon CEO Dan Schulman weighed in on Starlink’s ambitions during the company’s quarterly earnings call last week, saying Verizon is open to working with satellite providers. But he limited that potential to direct partnerships or joint ventures—not a deal with a mobile virtual network operator, which is how Boost Mobile operates. 

Though Schulman said he takes SpaceX’s ambitions to create a terrestrial network “quite seriously,” he cautioned that it would require a minimum of four to six years and hundreds of billions of dollars to build out what Verizon currently has today. Only then, he further estimated, could Starlink Mobile emerge as the sixth competitor in the market.

“Frankly, at that point, I welcome the opportunity to compete against them,” Schulman said during the call. “It’s very hard to throw a punch against something that doesn’t exist. But once they come into the market, we will be ferociously competitive.”

HOW INVESTORS ARE REACTING

Schulman may be downplaying the potential impact of Musk’s efforts to upend the industry. And Musk may be particularly motivated as his mobile carrier ambitions are reportedly key to providing communication to a colony on Mars, the long-term goal of SpaceX, which the billionaire has been fervent about for more than a decade.

Drew Cupps, a portfolio manager at Polen Capital, told The Washington Post that traditional carriers are rightfully “spooked and agitated” by Musk’s recent moves, noting a “massive strategic question” for carriers now is whether to ally with him, no matter the means, as they could stand to benefit. 

Investors, meanwhile, aren’t shrugging off the implications of a potential deal. Shares of both SpaceX and EchoStar rose about 2% in late-afternoon trading on Monday amid declines in the broader U.S. stock market.