Media, industry, and academia frequently depict the commercialization of satellite imagery as geospatial revolution with transformational effects on global politics. In doing so, they follow an understanding that isolates technology from politics. While this division is still prevalent in international relations, recent scholarship has promoted the intricate relationship of technology with politics as socio-material. Adding to this literature, I draw on the sociology of expectations to propose an alternative reading of nongovernmental remote sensing. For this purpose, the notion of technopolitical barriers is introduced to trace controversies about technological expectations of satellite imagery. Based on expert interviews and document analysis, I identify three waves of enthusiasm, which are characterized by particularly salient expectations and techno-political barriers. The first wave is fueled by an enthusiasm about the general benefits of visual transparency as opposed to Cold War secrecy. The second wave turns toward nongovernmental imagery intelligence for human security. In the third wave, satellite imagery joins multiple data streams to support political and business decisions. Taken together, the three-wave model distorts the linear understanding of a revolutionary development but reveals the political and controversial nature of the ongoing commercialization of satellite imagery. As a part of this, nongovernmental remote sensing has experienced a focus shift from visual transparency toward geospatial big data. Moreover, the three-wave model highlights the persistence of expectations and techno-political barriers in the nongovernmental sector with important implications for policymaking and the global impact of commercial satellite imagery.

媒体，工业界和学术界经常将卫星图像的商业化描述为地理空间革命，并对全球政治产生变革性影响。在这样做时，他们遵循将技术与政治隔离的理解。尽管这种分歧在国际关系中仍然很普遍，但最近的学术研究促进了技术与政治作为社会物质的复杂关系。除了这些文献，我还利用期望的社会学来提出对非政府遥感的另一种解读。为此，引入了技术政治障碍的概念，以追踪有关卫星图像技术期望的争议。根据专家访谈和文件分析，我确定了三波热情，其特点是期望特别突出且存在技术政治障碍。对视觉透明性（而不是冷战保密）的总体好处的热情推动了第一波热潮。第二波转向针对人类安全的非政府图像情报。在第三次浪潮中，卫星图像结合了多个数据流以支持政治和商业决策。综上所述，三波模型扭曲了对革命发展的线性理解，但揭示了卫星图像正在进行的商业化的政治和有争议的性质。作为其一部分，非政府遥感的重点已从视觉透明性转向地理空间大数据。此外，