Associated Press

Many districts around the US have pulled the plug on distance learning. It's too stressful, the lack of devices and internet access is too much to overcome, and what students get from it just isn't worth the struggle. Districts around the country are ending the school year early including Omaha and some nearby suburban districts in Nebraska, Washington (DC), and some in New Hampshire.

Alabama Senate Leader Del Marsh (R-12) said he would like to use $800 million of the state’s $1.7 billion coronavirus relief funds to establish broadband through the state. Marsh said distance learning would have been easier to accomplish if the state had better internet access. “Now is the time to take some of that, a big enough section of that money, (for) high-speed broadband across this state, in every corner of this state,” Marsh said. “Had this been in place, our kids would still be in school.

President Donald Trump's reelection campaign is suing a Wisconsin TV station for running an anti-Trump commercial that pieces together audio clips of the president talking about the coronavirus outbreak in a way they argue is misleading and false. The ad by the Democratic super PAC Priorities USA features a series of soundbites in which Trump downplayed the threat posed by the virus, while a chart that is splashed across the screen gradually begins to shoot upward as cases of the virus skyrocketed across the US.

As schools, workplaces and public services shut down in the age of coronavirus, online connections are keeping Americans in touch with vital institutions and each other. But that’s not much of an option when fast internet service is hard to come by.  Lawmakers want the federal government to send schools and libraries more money to lend out Wi-Fi hotspots to students. But the Federal Communications Commission says it’s not authorized to do that under current law and is discussing a solution with Congress.

When millions of people read his coverage of the internet and its ripples, Anick Jesdanun made sure they got all the facts and the context they needed. For more than two decades, Jesdanun helped generations of readers understand the emerging internet and its impact on the world. And while his work may have been about screens and computers and virtual networks, Jesdanun’s large life was about the world and exploring all of the corners of it that he could, virtual and physical alike.

The US internet won’t get overloaded by spikes in traffic from the millions of Americans now working from home to discourage the spread of the new coronavirus, experts say. But connections could stumble for many if too many family members try to videoconference at the same time. The core of the US network is more than capable of handling the virus-related surge in demand because it has evolved to be able to easily handle bandwidth-greedy Netflix, YouTube and other streaming services.