October 2017

Broadband-Boosting Bill Draft Circulated

Senate Commerce Committee Chairman John Thune (R-SD) and Communications Subcommittee Ranking Member Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii) have circulated the draft of a bill that would speed the deployment of 5G, just one a host of moves to goose the buildout of high-speed broadband.

With Sprint T-Mobile Merger Called Off, What’s Next?

[Commentary] With the Sprint T-Mobile merger called off, what’s next for the wireless carriers? Many saw the merger as the best move for Sprint, which has been struggling in a competitive wireless market. The merger was less critical for T-Mobile. But that company has been a disruptive force in the wireless industry and hasn’t been one to simply maintain the status quo.

Coders of the world, unite: can Silicon Valley workers curb the power of Big Tech?

[Commentary] Big Tech is broken.  Suddenly, a wide range of journalists and politicians agree on this. For decades, most of the media and political establishment accepted Silicon Valley’s promise that it would not “be evil,” as the first Google code of corporate conduct put it. But the past few months have brought a constant stream of negative stories about both the internal culture of the tech industry and the effect it is having on society. The Tech Left believes it must urgently transform the industry in order to stop it from serving nefarious ends.

Sponsor 

Are Tech Giants Too Big For America's Democracy?

Open Markets Institute

Wednesday, November 8, 2017

12:30 PM – 3:30 PM EST

Date 
Wed, 11/08/2017 - 18:30 to 21:30

The debate over ensuring political and economic liberty online has for years centered on restricting the powers of telecom and wireless corporations and ISPs, such as through net neutrality rules. But in recent years, a new set of extraordinarily powerful online gatekeepers – Facebook, Google, and Amazon foremost – have emerged with new techniques of organizing both discourse and commerce online.



Measuring Impact of Broadband in 5 Rural MN Communities

Access to, and use of, high-speed Internet is critical for today’s communities. Across rural Minnesota are stories of communities putting in the hard work necessary to bring the benefits of broadband home. These stories illustrate the impact that broadband investment can have on a community’s vibrancy. The purpose of these case studies is to determine the value of that broadband based on impact to the members of that community. These five communities provide a model for economic development and community vitality in rural Minnesota.