HMD Global didn’t just revive Nokia’s smartphone business, it revived the Finnish legend’s name in the feature phone market as well. The company has brought back from the dead some of Nokia’s most iconic designs to the point that it might also end up with the same dozens of not so memorable phones. Its latest batch tries to bring the candy bar phone design back into fashion by adding some 4G chops that at least make the Nokia 6300 4G and Nokia 8000 4G usable as social media handsets.
It’s definitely amusing to see HMD Global pretty much market the Nokia 6300 4G as a WhatsApp phone, or, to be more exact, its cheapest WhatsApp phone. Thanks to its 4G connectivity, which you can easily share by turning on the phone’s Wi-Fi Hotspot function, and low specs, the phone can have you chatting day in and day out for days.
The Nokia 8000 4G, on the other hand, gives credence to the phrase “looks can be deceiving.” Despite sharing the same polycarbonate shell as the Nokia 6300 4G, the glass-like paint job and metalized chrome midframe finish make it look more premium than it really is. This phone is particularly designed for looks and comfort, the latter delivered a 3D-curved key mat.
Despite being feature phones, both powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 210 with only 512 MB of RAM, these latest Nokia candy bar handsets are still able to partake in some features of their more sophisticated and more expensive smartphone cousins. Thanks to KaiOS, the phones have access to some apps like Facebook, YouTube, Google Maps, and even Google Assistant. You might not want to bother with their cameras, though, with the Nokia 6300 4G sporting only a VGA sensor while the Nokia 8000 4G gets a paltry 2MP camera.
Of course, the selling point for these phones is their price. The Nokia 6300 4G, available in Cyan Green, Light Charcoal, and Powder White, retails for only 49 EUR ($58) while the Nokia 8000 4G, which comes in shiny Onyx, Opal, Citrine, and Topaz, goes for 79 EUR ($93). Availability in markets outside Europe, including the US, has not yet been announced.
November 13, 2020 at 10:29AM
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Nokia 6300 4G, 8000 4G bring candy bar phones to the Internet age - SlashGear
The CARES Act is now helping those deeply affected by COVID-19 financially get free internet service. With many area students possibly heading back to remote learning, it could be more important than ever."It's an emergency support program prompted by the COVID-19 pandemic," said Aaron Deacon, of KC Digital Drive.It's called the Internet Access Support Program. The goal is to pay KC metro internet payments for six months, no matter what service you have and help keep those that desperately need their internet get online."We know a lot of people are struggling and need to do things remotely," Deacon said.KC Digital Drive is a nonprofit with a mission to help those that desperately need access, get it."It is really for people who need to do distance learning or remote work or access Health and Human Services because of hardship brought on by the COVID pandemic," Deacon said.The program is sponsored by the Kansas City Area COVID Recovery Fund and the national CARES Act. Deacon said with more schools contemplating going back to virtual learning, now is a critical time to make sure everyone has internet access."Cases are getting worse right now and we don't know how much longer they're going to be in person," he said.The program is set to help around 2,500 metro families. People have until Dec. 30 to sign up for the program."It's only been up for a couple of weeks now and really hasn't been that well-publicized," Deacon said.For more information, visit KCConnect.me or text or call 816-200-0599.
KANSAS CITY, Mo. —
The CARES Act is now helping those deeply affected by COVID-19 financially get free internet service. With many area students possibly heading back to remote learning, it could be more important than ever.
"It's an emergency support program prompted by the COVID-19 pandemic," said Aaron Deacon, of KC Digital Drive.
Advertisement
It's called the Internet Access Support Program. The goal is to pay KC metro internet payments for six months, no matter what service you have and help keep those that desperately need their internet get online.
"We know a lot of people are struggling and need to do things remotely," Deacon said.
KC Digital Drive is a nonprofit with a mission to help those that desperately need access, get it.
"It is really for people who need to do distance learning or remote work or access Health and Human Services because of hardship brought on by the COVID pandemic," Deacon said.
The program is sponsored by the Kansas City Area COVID Recovery Fund and the national CARES Act. Deacon said with more schools contemplating going back to virtual learning, now is a critical time to make sure everyone has internet access.
"Cases are getting worse right now and we don't know how much longer they're going to be in person," he said.
The program is set to help around 2,500 metro families. People have until Dec. 30 to sign up for the program.
"It's only been up for a couple of weeks now and really hasn't been that well-publicized," Deacon said.
For more information, visit KCConnect.me or text or call 816-200-0599.
November 13, 2020 at 10:38AM
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Some in Kansas City could get free internet service with CARES Act funding - KMBC Kansas City
When Joe Biden is inaugurated as president on January 20, he stands to oversee a Federal Communications Commission (FCC) that could do remarkable things. Among other things, the new FCC could bridge the digital divide, ensuring all Americans have access to the internet. But even though Biden’s victory is assured, the future of the FCC hangs in the balance.
The Trump administration’s FCC has had a particular agenda. Under the leadership of Chairman Ajit Pai, the agency has pushed to deregulate the industries under its purview and, in turn, to create a business-friendly environment with few rules, little accountability, and minimal oversight for some of the biggest and most powerful companies in the world. In the months and years to come, the FCC is likely to reverse some of those policies, especially Pai’s most controversial decision: repealing net neutrality, a policy that required internet service providers to treat all types of internet traffic the same. But getting broadband internet in as many homes as possible during the pandemic is many Democrats’ most urgent goal, and one they feel the Trump administration failed to accomplish.
“Because the Trump FCC failed to meaningfully address the digital divide, tens of millions of Americans still lack high-speed internet,” Rep. Anna Eshoo (D-CA) told Recode. “This worsens the impacts of the pandemic, and the Biden administration has to take this head-on.”
She added: “Every person in our country must have high-speed internet. Period. We’ve failed for too long to expand access to rural and tribal areas, and too many urban communities can’t afford broadband.”
The Biden administration’s FCC can and likely will aid this effort by making the internet more affordable and accessible. This could involve providing more subsidies to lower-income people, continuing its work increasing broadband access, and opening up more radio frequency bands for high-speed 5G networks in order to bring the United States to the level of its peers. The agency is also poised to restore net neutrality and reclassify broadband internet as a Title II service, which would give the FCC more authority over carriers. Under the Biden administration, the agency will also probably let Trump’s anti-social media Section 230 rulemaking mission die.
With these goals in mind, Biden will get to pick a new FCC chair, who will do much to set the agency’s agenda. Beyond that, we don’t yet know who that chair will be, how many of the five commissioner seats will be available to be filled, or which party will have control of the Senate. A Republican-majority Senate may well make it much more difficult to confirm new commissioner appointments or refuse to vote on laws that could provide funding needed for Democrat-chaired FCC initiatives.
Experts and FCC insiders told Recode they foresee a Biden FCC that goes back to trying to govern and reclaims some of the authority it ceded under Trump. And the FCC’s glass ceiling may finally break with the first chairwoman in its 86-year history.
Where the FCC is now
The legacy of Pai’s FCC will be a “light-touch” approach and mass scale deregulation. Proponents say this encourages investment and innovation, and opponents argue that it favors businesses at the expense of consumers. While Pai’s FCC has made an effort to bring broadband internet to rural and tribal communities — which overwhelmingly benefits red states — it hasn’t done much to make those services affordable to lower-income people.
“We still don’t really know what the results of [Pai’s] multi-billions of dollars to rural internet service providers will be,” Gigi Sohn, a distinguished fellow at the Georgetown Institute for Technology & Law Policy who was a staff member of the FCC during the Obama administration, told Recode. “I hope it results in a lot more people being connected, but that’s the smallest part of the digital divide. The biggest part of the digital divide is affordability. He never talks about that.”
Much to the consternation of many Democrats, including the FCC’s Democratic commissioners Jessica Rosenworcel and Geoffrey Starks, the agency has dragged its feet on updating programs like E-Rate and Lifeline that could help people afford increasingly necessary internet services in their homes.
Pai will perhaps best be remembered for repealing the Obama-era’s net neutrality decision, which he vehemently opposed as a minority party commissioner. When Trump took office and promoted Pai to chair, he immediately set about undoing that decision. Under Chairman Tom Wheeler, the Obama FCC had classified broadband internet as a Title II service, subjecting it to increased oversight and establishing internet service as a necessary utility for Americans. This meant internet access would no longer be treated as a luxury, like cable television, but rather protected and ensured like telephone service. Pai’s FCC reclassified broadband as a Title I service which was largely under the purview of the Federal Trade Commission.
This was perhaps one of the most controversial decisions in the FCC’s history, seen by its opponents as a gift to internet service providers that could now charge consumers more for accessing certain sites or using different internet services. Pai framed it as “restoring internet freedom” and encouraging internet service providers to pour more money into extending their reach across the country without having to worry about burdensome regulations that would cut into their bottom line. Pai’s order was protested by millions of Americans, in person and online. Meanwhile, millions of comments supporting the end of net neutrality were determined to be fake.
One of the many protests against the Trump FCC’s net neutrality repeal.Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
So that’s how Pai’s FCC began. Here’s how it’s going: Pai’s reign will likely end, ironically enough, with an attempt to introduce more regulation through Section 230, a 25-year-old law that lets websites moderate third party content as they see fit without being liable for that content (with a few exceptions). Simply put, you can sue a Twitter user if they tweet something defamatory about you, but you can’t sue Twitter. This is what allows websites that rely on user-generated content to exist. Trump hoped to weaponize the FCC, a supposedly independent agency that has become increasinglypartisan in recent years, against social media companies that he believes censor conservative speech by making rules that could remove their Section 230 protections.
Repealing or significantly changing Section 230 has become Trump and his surrogates’ rallying cry in the latter half of his one-term presidency. But Republican lawmakers’ bills that would change Section 230 to force platforms to be “politically neutral” in their moderation or make their moderation rules more transparent and clear to users have so far come to nothing. An executive order Trump issued in late May attempted to circumvent the legislative process by asking the FCC to “clarify” what content platforms can and cannot moderate if they want to keep their Section 230 protections. Some scoffed at this authority, arguing that it was both wrong and in direct conflict with Pai’s reasoning behind repealing the Obama-era’s net neutrality rules. In effect, Pai’s willingness to accede to Trump’s demands over Section 230 means his tenure, once defined by the desire to impose as few rules as possible on private businesses, will likely end with a failed attempt to introduce more rules on some of the biggest companies in the world.
Rosenworcel and Starks have publicly stated that they do not think the FCC should play a role in Section 230, and this opinion seems to be shared by Democratic lawmakers. While Biden expressed a desire to revoke Section 230 to the New York Times in January — an opinion that a campaign spokesperson told Recode he hasn’t changed — he has yet to follow that up with any proposed action to do so, and Section 230 is not likely to be a major priority for the administration anytime soon.
The Trump FCC could still try to get something done with Section 230 before the administration changes hands. But the agency almost certainly doesn’t have enough time since it still needs to confirm a new commissioner in order to get the majority it would need to do anything meaningful. House Democrats have also asked the FCC to stop any work on controversial items. This request was made of the Obama FCC when Trump won the election, and it was followed. At the time, then-commissioner Pai issued a statement supporting the pause, so it would be hypocritical for him to forge ahead with the controversial Section 230 business.
Wheeler, who was the FCC chair during Obama’s second term, said he would be disappointed in Pai if he refused to honor the Democrats’ request but not necessarily surprised: “It wouldn’t be beyond the way that the Trump administration has been operating: ‘It’s all about us.’”
Pai has yet to publicly acknowledge that Biden won the election at all. When Recode asked about his plans during the transition period, he did not respond.
Who will be on the FCC when Biden takes office
The FCC can only have three commissioners from the same political party and currently has a 3-2 majority of Republicans. But it won’t have the same lineup when Biden takes office. Michael O’Rielly, a Republican commissioner nominated by Obama, finished his first full term in July 2019. But Trump rescinded his renomination after O’Rielly stated that he didn’t think the FCC should regulate Section 230. Trump then nominated National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) senior adviser Nathan Simington, who assisted in carrying out Trump’s anti-Section 230 executive order and is seen as a Trump loyalist.
But Simington is not a sure thing to be confirmed before Biden takes office. Republicans likely feel that they have more important things to address before they lose the executive branch in January, and they may want to go with a commissioner they pick instead of the outgoing president’s choice, which was largely based on his personal vendetta against social media companies.
At his confirmation hearing before the Senate Commerce Committee on Tuesday, Simington wouldn’t commit to supporting Democratic initiatives like expanding the E-Rate program, which provides discounted internet access to schools and libraries, into homes that have become classrooms during the pandemic. Perhaps in an attempt to demonstrate how much work is now being done in alternate spaces, Sen. Ed Markey (D-MA) asked Simington about E-Rate via video chat from the backseat of his car. He did not seem to like Simington’s answers. Meanwhile, Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) threatened to place a hold on Simington’s confirmation because of his association with Trump’s Section 230 executive order. A spokesperson for Blumenthal told Recode that the senator has “significant concerns” about Simington’s independence, integrity, and judgment.
And then there’s Pai’s future. Biden will get to appoint his own chair when he takes office, and chairs traditionally leave the agency when a new administration comes in. But Pai won’t have to do that — he can stay on as a commissioner until his term expires, which could be as late as 2023. It’s hard to see Pai wanting to stay at the FCC in a lesser role, but Republicans may ask him to stay to have a 2-2 split if Simington is not confirmed. The most likely outcome, however, is that Pai packs up his trademark giant mug and goes.
A large mug, and outgoing FCC chairman Ajit Pai.Alex Wong/Getty Images
“It really is a fascinating situation here,” Wheeler said. “If Ajit sticks with precedent, then it’s 2-1 [with a Democratic majority]. If he doesn’t, then he can stymie any action until the Republicans in the Senate decide it’s time to approve somebody.”
There is also the question of who Biden will select as the FCC’s new chair, if he does indeed get the opportunity. Many believe that Biden will appoint a woman here, as the FCC has never had a chairwoman in its 86-year history (unless you count Mignon Clyburn’s acting chairwomanship for several months in 2013). Clyburn and Rosenworcel have been circulated as likely choices here. Both have FCC experience and both have championed broadband affordability and expanding the Lifeline program, which subsidizes phone bills for low-income people, to include broadband internet.
But Clyburn seems to have moved on from her time at the FCC, which ended in 2018. She joined the boards of Lionsgate in July and RingCentral, a cloud communications provider, in November. The Senate would also have to confirm Clyburn, and with a Republican majority it may well refuse to do so. That could be a point in Rosenworcel’s favor, since she doesn’t have to be confirmed. Rosenworcel has long advocated for FCC measures to close what she calls the “homework gap” between students who have access to reliable high-speed internet to do their schoolwork at home and students who don’t. That gap has never been more apparent or destructive than during the pandemic.
“Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel is brilliant and effective, and possesses a broad and deep knowledge of all things FCC,” Rep. Eshoo said in an email. “Hands down, she’s my #1 choice for Chairwoman of the FCC. She would hit the ground running from Day One.”
Of course, it’s also entirely possible that Biden nominates someone else — perhaps even someone completely unexpected — to head up the FCC. Clinton-era FCC chair Reed Hundt, for example, was unknown and had very little to no telecommunications experience before he was appointed. He was, however, Vice President Al Gore’s college roommate.
“I know that a whole bunch of people want it,” Wheeler said. “The fact of the matter is that Joe Biden’s been around this town for 47 years. He knows a lot of people, and it doesn’t have to be the usual suspects.”
Former FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler with then-commissioner Mignon Clyburn (left) and Jessica Rosenworcel (right) in 2015. Both women are rumored to be likely picks as the next FCC chair.Mark Wilson/Getty Images
What the FCC will do
Having a Democratic majority will make it significantly easier for whoever becomes the new FCC chair to accomplish their vision. But even without that advantage, there are ways to get things done.
“There’s still a lot you can do because the chair controls the bureau and the offices,” Harold Feld, senior vice president at open internet advocacy group Public Knowledge, told Recode. “And you can do a lot on what’s called delegated authority. … The chairman is not toothless in terms of the ability to use the power of the FCC.”
What’s pretty clear is that a Biden FCC will want to do as much as possible to address the digital divide. Broadband affordability is a major part of this. Along with expanding E-Rate and Lifeline programs and continuing work to increase access in rural and tribal areas, expect a Biden FCC to reverse the net neutrality repeal and reclassify broadband internet as a Title II service under the Communications Act. This would subject broadband internet carriers to the same increased oversight and rate regulations that phone companies have. So, where Pai had to ask companies not to cut off homes or businesses from the internet if they couldn’t pay their bills during the pandemic and to expand their low-income programs, an FCC that classified broadband as a Title II carrier would have more leverage to require it.
There is also one possible privacy benefit if internet service providers become Title II carriers, as Wheeler pointed out. Under Title II, the FCC was able to establish the authority to require ISPs to get consumers’ permission before sharing certain information about their internet lives, including browsing history, location, and email contents. This was seen as a big win for data privacy, and Wheeler hopes that the new FCC will find a way to restore those privacy protections.
The Biden FCC will also have to help facilitate the spread of 5G across the country and will be responsible for freeing up more bands in the spectrum to provide it. Increased 5G access would give more Americans access to higher internet speeds in more places, which has become a priority during the pandemic. While the current FCC is already working on this effort, some think the Biden administration will promote the inter-agency cooperation necessary to do it quickly. During the Trump administration, differentagenciesfoughtover spectrum, which held back efforts to open up more bands and expand 5G’s potential.
“The way that Trump ran things was to set everybody against each other,” Feld explained. “It has become much more of a problem in that federal agencies have now just increasingly said ‘no’ to the FCC. ... It’s critically important that a Biden administration takes steps to smooth this over.”
All this said, it’s hard to say with certainty just what the Biden administration can do, especially when it comes to this already atypical transition process. The uncertainty regarding the new FCC even extends now to when and if the Biden transition team will get access to the FCC, or if the Trump administration will hold out for as long as possible just to make life difficult for the Biden team. Given the issues on the table — bridging the digital divide, restoring net neutrality, and expanding 5G — any delay in getting the new FCC running would ultimately be to the detriment of the American people. But there will be a new FCC eventually.
“It’s gonna be interesting,” Wheeler said. “This will be a great time to be chairman of the FCC.”
Open Sourcedis made possible by Omidyar Network. All Open Sourced content is editorially independent and produced by our journalists.
November 13, 2020 at 04:00AM
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How Biden’s FCC could fix America’s internet - Vox.com
People walk past a Tencent sign at the company headquarters in Shenzhen, Guangdong province, China August 7, 2020.
David Kirton | Reuters
SINGAPORE — China has drafted a slew of new anti-monopoly laws that will likely hit the country's major internet companies, says Morgan Stanley.
It comes as the competitive landscape in China intensifies and tech giants continue to fend off new rivals that are taking away chunks of their market share, according to a report by the investment bank.
China's bureau for regulating monopolies — the State Administration for Market Regulation (SAMR) — issued draft rules on Tuesday to stop anti-competitive practices in the internet sector. It said the laws are aimed at protecting fair competition in the market and safeguarding consumers' interest.
SAMR is seeking public feedback on the draft rules until Nov. 30.
"We believe potential implementation of the new antitrust regulations has negative implications for major Internet companies with dominant positions across segments," Morgan Stanley analysts said in a note on Wednesday.
It is likely due to rising risks of competition, lower barriers to entry, and higher hurdles for industry consolidation from future mergers and acquisitions.
"That said, competition has already intensified in recent years, with 'incumbents' (e.g., Alibaba, Tencent) losing market share to 'disruptors' (e.g. Pinduoduo, Bytedance), so the consequences will likely be less meaningful given reduced dominance across segments compared to a few years ago," they added.
Chinese tech shares took a beating on Wednesday, a day after the draft regulations were announced, and the biggest tech names saw $280 billion wiped off their market value within days.
Here are five internet companies that will be negatively impacted by China's potential anti-trust laws, according to Morgan Stanley.
Alibaba
There have been periodic complaints of merchant exclusivity on e-commerce platforms, including on Alibaba's Tmall platform. The Financial Times reported earlier this year that some merchants were told they would be pushed off Tmall if they used a rival platform — a local home appliance manufacturer even sued Alibaba over it, according to a 2019 report from Chinese media Caixin.
But the new proposed regulations will not have as much impact on the e-commerce giant today as it would have had years ago, Morgan Stanley pointed out.
"This is because of the already fierce competitive environment in e-commerce nowadays," the analysts said, adding that some of Alibaba's market share have already been chipped away by competitors.
The draft law mentions the use of subsidies and discounts may potentially deter fair competition, which could affect "Alibaba's promotional activities, although to what extent such subsidies will be regarded as a violation of antitrust rules remains uncertain," the analysts said.
Tencent
Tencent has dominant presence in areas like online gaming, social network, online music, video and online reading through China Literature.
The company's "focus on online entertainment involves a wide range of content innovation and can be less relevant to antitrust scrutiny," the Morgan Stanley analysts said. "Thus, the impact on Tencent could be relatively manageable except for the potential misuse of user data across platforms, or blocking competitors access to the WeChat ecosystem."
China's most popular messaging app WeChat — which has over 1.15 billion monthly active users — is owned by Tencent. Though the app started out as a messaging service, users can now do everything on it from making payments to hailing a ride, or even booking flights.
Rising competition from video-sharing app ByteDance has reduced the amount of time users spend on Tencent's platforms, which could also alleviate "certain concerns over Tencent capturing a majority of user mind share in China," the analysts wrote.
Still, the new rules could create more hurdles for Tencent when it comes to future mergers and acquisitions — "an effective method" for the company to build up its ecosystem of various services and platforms.
"Should the rules eventually limit the use of subsidies provided by platforms, we think that the potential limitation will affect Pinduoduo in particular, because 'Rmb10bn subsidy' is one of its central strategies to drive user engagement," the Morgan Stanley analysts said.
JD.com, another major e-commerce name in China, also employs a subsidy plan as part of its promotional activities but it does not play as crucial a role for the company as it does for Pinduoduo, according to the analysts.
Still, they said, the new anti-monopoly rules could reduce JD.com's bargaining power over its suppliers in the future.
Meituan
Meituan is an online platform with services ranging from food delivery to ticketing.
The company solidified market share in the food delivery business, competing against Alibaba-owned Ele.me, by capturing a higher portion of exclusive restaurants on its platform, according to the Morgan Stanley analysts.
"We note the potential implementation of new antitrust regulations could also weigh on Meituan's take rate charged to merchants," they said, adding, "On the other hand, Meituan has been shifting gears to focus on promoting a food delivery membership program to cultivate user behavior and raise order frequency."
With fewer restaurants in China opting for platform exclusivity, it could mitigate certain concerns about the new antitrust regulations, according to the analysts.
Correction: This article has been updated to reflect the new name for Meituan, which was renamed in 2020.
November 12, 2020 at 09:36AM
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Morgan Stanley names internet companies that will be hit by China's proposed anti-monopoly rules - CNBC
Today EFF is launching How to Fix the Internet, a new podcast mini-series to examine potential solutions to six ills facing the modern digital landscape. Over the course of 6 episodes, we’ll consider how current tech policy isn’t working well for users and invite experts to join us in imagining a better future. Hosted by EFF’s Executive Director Cindy Cohn and our Director of Strategy Danny O’Brien, How to Fix the Internet digs into the gritty technical details and the case law surrounding these digital rights topics, while charting a course toward how we can better defend the rights of users.
It’s easy to see all the things wrong with the modern Internet, and how the reality of most peoples’ experience online doesn’t align with the dreams of its early creators. How did we go astray and what should we do now? And what would our world look like if we got it right? This podcast mini-series will tackle those questions with regard to six specific topics of concern: the FISA Court, U.S. broadband access, the third-party doctrine, barriers to interoperable technology, law enforcement use of face recognition technology, and digital first sale. In each episode, we are joined by a guest to examine how the current system is failing, consider different possibilities for solutions, and imagine a better future. After all, we can’t build a better world unless we can imagine it.
We are launching the podcast with two episodes: The Secret Court Approving Secret Surveillance, featuring the Cato Institute’s specialist in surveillance legal policy Julian Sanchez; and Why Does My Internet Suck?, featuring Gigi Sohn, one of the nation’s leading advocates for open, affordable, and democratic communications networks. Future episodes will be released on Tuesdays.
We’ve also created a hub page for How to Fix the Internet. This page includes links to all of our episodes, ways to subscribe, and detailed show notes. In the show notes, we’ve included all the books mentioned in each podcast, as well as substantial legal resources—including key opinions in the cases we talk about, briefs filed by EFF, bios of our guests, and a full transcript of every episode.
You can subscribe to How to Fix the Internet via RSS, Stitcher, TuneIn, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, and Spotify and through any of the other podcast places. If you have feedback on How to Fix the Internet, please email podcasts@eff.org.
November 12, 2020 at 03:00PM
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Introducing “How to Fix the Internet,” a New Podcast from EFF - EFF
While we tackle scores of digital tasks daily on our desktop computers, smartphones, smart watches, notebooks, security devices and sound systems, and converse with Siri, Alexa and Google Assistant to answer questions or execute everyday tasks, we sometimes forget how lucky we are.
Some 4 billion people globally have no Internet. If they want to turn on a light or listen to a playlist of songs, they must actually get up and flip a switch or select a CD or record and place it in a player. That, of course, assumes they can afford such luxuries.
Google's Alphabet X innovation lab announced this week that it is developing technology to deliver high-speed internet access to regions in Africa that have been left behind in the digital revolution. The enterprise, called Project Taara, will employ invisible light beams connected to tall towers to bring low-cost Internet access to sub-Sharan Africa, beginning with Kenya.
Using beams of light allows connectivity within regions that are geographically hostile to traditional fiber cables. In other regions, protected nature zones or communities affected by conflict or war have made construction of traditional cable lines impossible.
The Taara group says a single 20 Gbps link can carry signals up to 12 miles and provide ample connectivity for thousands of residents to view videos simultaneously. As some observers have noted, it is basically a fiber optic network cable without the physical cable.
According to blog posted Monday, Project Taara General Manager Mahesh Krishnaswamy said: "By creating a series of links from our partner's fiber optic network over ground to underserved areas, Taara's links can relay high speed, high quality internet to people without the time, cost and hassle involved in digging trenches or stringing cables along poles."
To ensure continuous connectivity, Taara's links are placed atop tall towers or rooftops. It not only provides security for the towers but also helps ensure the networks retain unbroken lines of sight.
Alphabet is working with the Econet Group and Liquid Telecom to bring service to communities that, digitally, have remained in the 1980s.
Project Taara is an offshoot of an earlier undertaking, Project Loon. In 2013, Google X launched 30 high-altitude balloons (hence, the name "Loon") up to 16 miles into the stratosphere to establish a wireless network unencumbered by physical obstacles on land. The objective then, too, was to bring Internet service—in this instance, up to 1Mbps speeds—to underserved regions in remote and poor areas, as well as to regions affected by natural disasters.
Krishnaswamy said in his blog post, "Connectivity is more important than ever. The pandemic sparked a dramatic shift in how we work, learn and stay in touch with family and friends, and underscored just how important fast and affordable internet is to our daily lives."
"Studies show that meaningful connectivity is essential for economic growth and to fast track access to opportunity," he stated, noting that "many people still can't afford a connection that is fast enough to join a video call, let alone attend school or work remotely."
Krishnaswamy says he hopes the project will spread throughout Africa and other poor and remote communities. He invited other internet service providers and mobile network operators to join the project.
Citation: Alphabet harnesses light beams to bring Internet to Africa (2020, November 11) retrieved 11 November 2020 from https://ift.tt/3lmEnIT
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November 12, 2020 at 02:30AM
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Alphabet harnesses light beams to bring Internet to Africa - Tech Xplore
Here is my working definition of a public health expert: someone who is constantly frustrated that people will not act on clear health advice in the interests of their own health.
From smoking to diabetes, from eating responsibly and exercising to practicing safe sex, from getting an annual flu shot to wearing face coverings in the time of coronavirus, the literature on public health is awash with tricks, nudges, and sometimes outright bribes to try and get people to take care of themselves. Some progress has been made, but the feeling is often one of disappointment that so many people aren’t following the advice.
Paradoxically, Covid-19 — the biggest public health and economic calamity in several generations — is showing that people can and will listen and act. We, the people, have done remarkably well around the world when it comes to following public health advice. This is in spite of the fact that several governments, including those of the U.S. and many states, have not supported the clear public health message that people need to make enormous changes to their behaviors to protect themselves and others.
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The evidence on this is actually very clear. While the pandemic has its ebbs and flows, a month or so after the first significant outbreak in a region (say, a city like New York or a state like Illinois) things stabilize. The virus doesn’t go away. Instead, the number of new infections is about the same from day to day. Epidemiologists refer to this situation as the reproduction rate of the virus going to 1, with every person who is infected spreading it to just one other person on average. (Getting the reproduction rate under 1 is the beginning of the road to stopping the pandemic.)
This stands in contrast to earlier predictions of a large outbreak as the virus spread quickly at much higher reproduction rates based on how easily the virus could jump from person to person. In the absence of behavioral change, an international team of researchers predicted that an infected person would infect two to three other people. That happened right at the beginning of the pandemic, but then it changed. Part of this was due to governments instituting lockdowns but, somewhat amazingly, people locked themselves down faster than governments acted.
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Perhaps the clearest study of this comes from University of Chicago economists Austan Goolsbee and Chad Syverson. Using cellphone data to track visits to 2.5 million businesses in the U.S. between March 2020 and May 2020, they examined counties in lockdown states that were next to counties in non-lockdown states. Although government lockdowns did reduce visits to businesses, 60% of the reduction would have happened even without them. In other words, people were acting. The converse happened as governments allowed reopening: People did not follow.
This pattern arose around the world. Very few people saw others falling sick or collapsing in the street, as happened during the 1918 flu pandemic. In fact, we saw nothing. Nothing but the news and information from experts. And that information spread quickly. Within a week or so, people knew what was happening even if they couldn’t see it happening. And they knew what the recommendations were even though officials were still not entirely certain about how Covid-19 was spreading.
It is tempting to think of the lockdown protests and mask boycotts and conclude that solid public health messages weren’t getting through. But the data show that those were the exceptions rather than the truth. Moreover, this information penetrated the far reaches of the planet. Even in places like Sweden and Brazil, which were perceived as not having strong government interventions against Covid-19, people found out about the risks quickly and acted to protect themselves.
Think, for example, of the mask misstep. Because public health officials were initially concerned about mask hoarding, they downplayed the need for masks. That was a mistake because mask use likely was the most effective tool in combating the spread of the novel coronavirus. Even so, more and more people began procuring masks or fashioning them themselves. And they wore them which, as these things go, was a huge behavioral change. They did to protect themselves but also to protect others. The information flowed. Only later did the official advice change and Americans were called upon to wear masks when in public.
The speed and reach of these personal changes in behavior strongly suggest the influence of one thing that we have today that wasn’t around in 1918 or even in the 1980s as HIV/AIDS began to spread: the internet. While there are genuine concerns about the internet as a conduit for misinformation, when it comes to public health messaging regarding the coronavirus pandemic, we owe it our gratitude. Covid-19 may go down in history as the internet’s first truly great informational triumph.
I realize this may be a controversial view. But there was no Walter Cronkite we all watched and trusted for our news. There were no public addresses from the president. There was just the decentralized mess and flow of information from the internet to our devices. When we look at 2020, it is reasonable to say that part of the system finally worked. When we look beyond 2020, we should ask what more it can do.
Enlarge/ Piloting Taara’s wireless optical communication links in Kenya.
Alphabet will soon deliver wireless Internet over light beams in Kenya using a technology that can cover distances of up to 20km. Alphabet's Project Taara, unveiled under a different name in 2017, conducted a series of pilots in Kenya last year and is now partnering with a telecom company to deliver Internet access in remote parts of Africa.
Kenya will get the technology first, with other countries in sub-Saharan Africa to follow. Project Taara General Manager Mahesh Krishnaswamy described the project in an announcement from Alphabet today:
Project Taara is now working with Econet and its subsidiaries, Liquid Telecom and Econet Group, to expand and enhance affordable, high-speed Internet to communities across their networks in Sub-Saharan Africa. Taara's links will begin rolling out across Liquid Telecom's networks in Kenya first, and will help provide high-speed connectivity in places where it's challenging to lay fiber cables, or where deploying fiber might be too costly or dangerous—for example over rivers, across national parks, or in post-conflict zones.
Like fiber, without cables
Illustration of a Project Taara terminal delivering Internet access from a tall building to a remote area.
Similar to fiber-optic cables, Taara's technology uses light to transmit data, but without the cables. Krishnaswamy continued:
In the same way traditional fiber uses light to carry data through cables in the ground, Taara uses light to transmit information at very high speeds as a very narrow, invisible beam. This beam is sent between two small Taara terminals to create a link. A single Taara link can cover distances up to 20km and can transmit bandwidth of up to 20Gbps+—that's enough connectivity for thousands of people to be watching YouTube at the same time.
By creating a series of links from our partner's fiber-optic network over ground to underserved areas, Taara's links can relay high-speed, high-quality Internet to people without the time, cost, and hassle involved in digging trenches or stringing cables along poles.
The technology requires line-of-sight connections, so Alphabet deploys the terminals "high up on towers, poles, or rooftops." Krishnaswamy wrote that Taara links can "offer a cost-effective and quickly deployable way to bring high-speed Internet access to remote areas and help plug critical gaps to major access points, like cell towers and Wi-Fi hotspots." Alphabet encouraged other ISPs and mobile network operators to get in touch about deploying Taara in additional areas.
Project Taara is one of the "moonshots" developed at Alphabet's X subsidiary (formerly known as Google X). Taara grew out of X's Project Loon, which had developed a balloon-based network to cover remote areas.
As Alphabet explains, "the Loon team needed to figure out a way to create a data link between balloons that were flying over 100km apart" and thus "investigated the use of FSOC (Free Space Optical Communications) technology to establish high-throughput links between balloons." After using those links to send data between balloons in the stratosphere, Loon engineers wondered if they could "apply some of that science to solve connectivity problems down a little closer to Earth," and Project Taara was born.
November 11, 2020 at 02:29AM
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Alphabet delivers wireless Internet over light beams from 20km away - Ars Technica
Nickolas Friedrich lives in central Montana, where his local broadband connectivity hasn't been good.
Every month, he pays about $120 for a measly 0.8Mbps download speed from the only DSL provider in town. And his connection can freeze up when too many neighbors are on the service at once.
As a result, streaming videos isn’t really possible. Instead, it can take an hour to download a low-quality 240p video from YouTube. The situation is so bad Friedrich used to go to the local library to download internet videos to his laptop so he could watch them later.
But recently, he’s been able to enjoy Netflix and YouTube at home, where the internet speeds can now shoot up as high as 170Mbps. The reason? Starlink, the next-generation satellite internet service from Elon Musk's SpaceX, that Friedrich has been helping test out.
“It has been a lot faster than the only ISP that still services us with DSL,” Friedrich told us in a chat on Reddit. He's now considering canceling his account with CenturyLink—which has long promised a fiber rollout, but without any specifics—and switching to Starlink.
Is Starlink the Real Deal?
About two weeks ago, SpaceX began sending the first invites for Starlink’s public beta, which costs $99 a month plus a $499 one-time fee for the equipment. Now that the system is finally serving actual consumers, we've been wondering, does it actually meet the hype?
To find out, we interviewed four beta testers, and all described Starlink as a game changer, particularly for rural internet users, who have limited access to fast fiber optic networks common in urban areas.
(Credit: Nickolas Friedrich)
Imagine getting a package in the mail that can suddenly elevate your home internet to 100Mbps and higher. That’s what Friedrich received last week.
“I've tried calling multiple ISPs—Charter, Montana Internet, and even tried HughesNet (a satellite internet provider)—which ended up being a bad pain of bills and fees,” Friedrich said of his previous attempts to find faster internet. But since installing the Starlink kit, which includes a satellite dish and modem, Friedrich has seen internet download speeds at or over 100Mbps.
A speed test score over Friedrich's Starlink connection.
Every now and then, the service will cut out for about 10 seconds. Or the speeds will drop down to as low as 20Mbps. That's likely due to the limited number of Starlink satellites in orbit, currently around 800. But overall, Friedrich said the system represents a massive upgrade over his DSL provider.
“If you were to just use Starlink to watch YouTube or Netflix where they download a buffer, it'll feel like great city cable internet,” he added. “Upload also ranges between 10 to 38Mbps.”
What Starlink Is Fixing
(Credit: Harris Wilson)
Harris Wilson is another Starlink user who’s had to endure limited broadband options where he lives in Sidney, Montana, which has a population of 6,000. The neighboring internet is so slow or costly that people generally avoid using streaming services. Instead, many residents still rely on DVDs to enjoy their favorite TV shows and movies.
“If you want to stream something, you have to set the streaming option on the lowest quality,” he said in a phone interview. “With HBO Max and Disney+, you essentially can’t have them, because they automatically stream at the highest quality.”
Where Wilson lives, there isn't much competition for broadband. So previously he had to settle for a 25Mbps home internet connection from Mid-Rivers Communications, which charged $20 a month. The only catch? He had to also pay 20 cents for every gigabyte he used. That means downloading a single video game or binge-watching a TV show could end up burning through 100GB, for an additional cost of $20 on his internet bill.
“When you got halfway through the month, it’d be $100 bucks. Then you have to turn it off. That’s the only way to control that,” he said of his need to ration his home’s internet use.
“It’s been really bad lately,” he added. “Because of the corona(virus), you have two, three, or four kids at home and they’re using Zoom for eight hours a day. One of my friends spent over $500 a month.”
Eventually, Wilson resorted to using his phone’s 4G cellular connection to act as a Wi-Fi hotspot for his home. But even then, the internet service was spotty. Fortunately, his family is now receiving steady, high-speed broadband access through Starlink, which he installed this past weekend, placing the satellite dish over the roof of his garage.
Wilson says the dish does warm up, so it should stay heated in cold weather. (Credit: Harris Wilson)
“For the most, it’s always been between 140 to 170Mbps,” he said. “The setup was very, very easy. The way the (Starlink) kit comes, it’s kind of designed to just be put out in your yard.”
The system has also gotten rid of his internet rationing anxiety. Now he can download whatever he wants, given that Starlink has no data caps.
Wilson also has no complaints about the service, although he wonders how the Starlink dish will fare in the winter season, when the temperature drops and the snow begins to arrive. But in the meantime, he’s recommending Starlink to anyone still stuck on a slow internet plan.
“I think it will forever change the game,” he added. “It’s going to take something like Starlink to change how the internet is out here. Once they start stealing customers and offering a better service, the other companies will have to compete or collapse. That’s what I’m looking forward to the most.”
It Works in the Rain Too
Another beta tester is Curtis Nims, who described himself as a “fairly huge skeptic” of Starlink. Nims currently works as a networking and system administrator in Rathdrum, Idaho, an area that's home to 6,816 people. He’s also tried out Viasat and HughesNet, two other satellite internet providers.
"I would get 600ms plus latency on a good day with either of those options," he said in an email interview. "The delay on traditional satellite is noticeable even when browsing web pages."
However, Starlink has clearly been superior. Now Nims is receiving internet download speeds reaching 170Mbps with an average latency of 30 milliseconds, which is on par with ground-based internet. “Needless to say, I have been blown away and am eating my words,” he said. “They (Viasat and HughesNet) aren't even comparable.”
Nims also reports that Starlink does work in the rain and heavy fog. He’s uploaded a YouTube video showing himself playing Counter-Strike: Global Offensive over the Starlink network during a heavy downpour. Despite the rain, his connection still reached 113Mbps for downloads, and 15Mbps for uploads.
(Credit: Curtis Nims)
His video also demonstrates that you can game over Starlink too. In fact, Nims said he wouldn’t be able to differentiate the experience from a wired connection. “I was a little skeptical if they (SpaceX) could deliver on their goals, but it seems to me they are on track,” he added.
The beta testers we spoke to had no complaints about Starlink, which is bound to only get better. SpaceX’s goal is to eventually supply 1Gbps download speeds. To do so, the company plans on launching thousands of additional satellites into orbit in the coming months and years to enable global coverage. But a major unanswered question is how the service will fare once it exits the public beta, and begins serving thousands, and then millions, of consumers. Will the speeds and bandwidth hold up?
Our interviews with the public beta testers also underscored the sad state of broadband in rural America. With Starlink, there’s now hope that anyone in the US, and potentially the world, can receive high-speed internet at a reasonable price.
Another beta tester, “Mr. Kramer,” is a high school science teacher in central Washington state, who preferred not to provide his full name. Thanks to Starlink, he can now remotely teach his students from home, where he used to only get 18Mbps download speeds, and 5Mbps on uploads. For those speeds, he was paying $100 a month. But still, the internet wasn't good enough to hold remote teaching sessions.
"I would have to go up to the school and teach in an empty class because my internet was too slow at home or not stable enough for live lessons,” he told us in a chat over Twitter. “Many times students would complain of a delay in video or audio or poor video quality.”
With Starlink, Kramer is now receiving downloads speeds at around 140Mbps, and upload speeds at 15 Mbps—although the quality can degrade in the rain. “When Starlink jumps up to its best, it just makes what I have been paying with my local ISP seem frustrating,” he said. “Other neighbors around me want to buy one right now because of how great it has been.”
To receive an invite for Starlink, you can go to the official website, and sign up for the email newsletter. Currently, SpaceX is testing the satellite internet service in the northern US, with plans to expand the public beta to the southern US, possibly by January.
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November 10, 2020 at 09:02PM
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From Painfully Slow to Lightning Fast: SpaceX's Starlink Makes Rural Internet Usable - PCMag
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(Credit: Nickolas Friedrich)
A speed test score over Friedrich's Starlink connection.
(Credit: Harris Wilson)
Wilson says the dish does warm up, so it should stay heated in cold weather. (Credit: Harris Wilson)
(Credit: Curtis Nims)
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