McKinsey’s latest breakdown of 13 tech trends for the year ahead arrives like a glossy prospectus for progress, and yet it lands in a world where our technological currents already run thick with externalities [10]. When a river turns toxic, it is a mirror held up to our consumption habits; industries externalize costs, ecosystems pay in carcasses and silence. The same logic is migrating upstream to the sky, where connectivity, convenience, and speed promise abundance while quietly burdening shared atmospheres and orbits. If lists like McKinsey’s are to guide investment, then the outrage over hidden costs must translate into regulation and restorative justice—not as an afterthought, but as a first principle [10].
Anthropology offers a simple diagnostic: follow the stories a culture tells about limits. Across societies, water spirits once enforced restraint; now quarterly earnings do. Tech prognoses, like McKinsey’s 13-trend map, are cultural artifacts—mirrors that reflect what we reward and what we ignore [1]. The question for September 2025 is whether our trendlines acknowledge that every convenience draws from a commons, and every externality eventually returns home.
Consider the orbital rush that now undergirds everything from logistics to leisure. SpaceX just launched two dozen Starlink broadband satellites from California, another incremental layer in a mega-constellation designed to wrap the planet in bandwidth [2]. Reports also describe SpaceX developing a mobile satellite Internet chip intended to leverage Dish spectrum, the kind of integration that markets as “Starlink 5G in every phone” [3]. Meanwhile, Russia’s space chief says a Starlink analogue is in development at a rapid pace, revealing how geopolitical competition turns orbits into strategic infrastructure rather than a shared sanctuary [4].
Even at the network’s edges, suppliers are racing to certify gear for sovereign needs—the Comtech modem earning the first sovereign certification for SES’s O3b mPOWER is a telling marker of the state-market nexus at work [5]. With every new layer, the bill to the commons grows. Two European telescopes are already using lasers to track potentially dangerous space junk, a civilizational version of scanning a polluted river for dead fish before they foul the downstream intake [6]. Engineers have pitched a space junk removal concept using the exhaust from ion engines to nudge debris out of orbit, a clever broom for a mess we keep making [7].
The sky is crowded enough that a satellite recently captured a Starlink train passing underneath while it imaged a Chinese airbase—described as a very rare instance, but not impossible—a reminder that complexity multiplies with each node we add [8]. These are not the costs highlighted in upbeat trend decks; they are the taxes paid by the global commons. The atmosphere bears the tab as well. New research warning that rapid rocket growth raises alarm over Earth’s fragile ozone layer should be the kind of flashing red light that halts a planning meeting, not a footnote [9].
Yet the cadence of launches continues as if the stratosphere were an infinite sink, a silent accomplice to our logistics and livestreams. Contrast the steady proliferation of near-Earth assets with the quiet demise of Breakthrough Starshot, the billionaire-backed dream to send sailcraft to Alpha Centauri; interstellar romance fades, while utilitarian extraction close to home accelerates [10]. We are a species enthralled less by wonder than by throughput, and the ledger is kept in molecules and micrometeorites. McKinsey’s list is meant to help decision-makers allocate capital; that is precisely why it must grapple openly with externalities [1].
Trend spotters should not just chart markets; they should illuminate the hidden subsidies we demand from ocean, sky, and soil. If the year ahead is about ubiquitous connectivity, the plan must also include funding, standards, and enforcement for debris mitigation, launch emissions, and atmospheric chemistry. Otherwise, we are repeating the oldest story in the archive: the village upstream profits, the village downstream buries its dead. Our orbital river is turning toxic in slow motion, and it reflects our habits with cruel fidelity.
The good news is that the tools of repair already exist, and some are being tested in the open. Laser tracking of debris and novel concepts that use ion engine exhaust to deorbit fragments show ingenuity on behalf of the commons [6][7]. But remediation without restraint is a treadmill; each new satellite, service tier, or sovereign certification adds risk unless paired with binding obligations [5]. The crowded-sky image that caught Starlink in frame during a pass over a Chinese airbase may be a rarity, but it is also a postcard from our trajectory if governance lags [8].
The outrage so many feel about dead rivers should migrate to dead orbital shells, before we inherit both. What would responsible trendsetting look like? First, adopt polluter-pays rules in orbit: mandatory deorbit bonds, insurance pools indexed to debris risk, and enforceable end-of-life timelines that regulators can audit. Second, align launch approvals with ozone safeguards, conditioning cadence on demonstrated atmospheric impact reductions and cleaner propellant pathways [9].
Third, require transparency from constellation operators on collision avoidance and radiofrequency stewardship, so competition does not default to opacity and arms-race logics [2][4][3]. Finally, link public procurement to verifiable stewardship, so that certified systems and sovereign capabilities are also sustainable capabilities [5]. This is not anti-innovation; it is innovation that has learned from the riverbank. Hope is not a mood; it is a method.
It means translating forecasts into covenants, embedding restorative justice into the business models that will define the next decade. We can choose to treat orbits and ozone as living commons rather than disposable backdrops. If McKinsey’s next iteration elevates “externality elimination” alongside efficiency, it would signal that the cultural story is changing—from extraction to reciprocity [1]. And if courts and councils begin to read harm to the atmosphere and the orbital commons as harm to all, accountability will no longer be a glimmer but a guarantee.
Sources
- McKinsey Breaks Down 13 Tech Trends For The Year Ahead (Forbes, 2025-09-12T01:26:09Z)
- SpaceX launches two dozen Starlink broadband satellites from California (Space.com, 2025-09-13T18:44:09Z)
- Starlink 5G in every phone as SpaceX develops mobile satellite Internet chip to leverage Dish spectrum (Notebookcheck.net, 2025-09-17T11:03:00Z)
- Russia developing Starlink rival at 'rapid pace,' space chief says (Yahoo Entertainment, 2025-09-17T07:12:55Z)
- Comtech modem earns first sovereign certification for SES O3b mPOWER network (Spacewar.com, 2025-09-17T02:52:31Z)
- These 2 European telescopes use lasers to track potentially dangerous space junk (video) (Space.com, 2025-09-15T13:00:00Z)
- New space junk removal idea: Using ion engine exhaust to knock debris out of the sky (Space.com, 2025-09-16T12:00:00Z)
- Satellite snaps Starlink passing underneath while taking candid shots of Chinese airbase: 'a very rare instance, but not impossible!' (PC Gamer, 2025-09-12T12:07:12Z)
- Rapid rocket growth raises alarm over Earth’s fragile ozone layer (Science Daily, 2025-09-16T02:08:53Z)
- The Quiet Demise of Breakthrough Starshot, a Billionaire’s Interstellar Mission to Alpha Centauri (Scientific American, 2025-09-16T10:00:00Z)
