Questionable benefits
Astronomy projects already produce so much data that they have to be analysed by distributing the data to many research organisations around the world. Some participating universities needed to update their data bandwidth which is remarkable since they have advanced internet backbones such as AARNET.
Upcoming astronomy projects will deliver order of magnitudes more data than their predecessors. https://datascience.codata.org/articles/10.5334/dsj-2015-011/
Bon Hannent : "one [optical] fibre could deliver the equivalent of all the bandwidth of every traditional satellite in operation". So extra satellites will not provide useful additional data bandwidth.
There are no remote universities not yet connected to the internet, even in Africa.
What is the benefit to astronomers again?
Biting the hand that feeds IT
