Wireless Internet

Network neutrality doesn’t just cover streaming video. It also ensures that you can use the devices that you want. Under the current net neutrality rules, your internet provider can’t stop you from connecting any laptop, tablet, smartphone, or Wi-Fi router you want to your home network. Without net neutrality, the days when broadband companies and cell carriers could let traffic flow faster to one brand of phone or computer over another could be coming. And that’s just the start.

With people connecting more and more devices, from voice-controlled personal assistants like Apple’s forthcoming Home Pod to thermostats to cars, net neutrality becomes that much more important, even as the federal government moves to drop its own protections. Dismissing the rules could be a big problem for the future of the Internet of Things, since companies like Comcast–which is already working on its own smart home platform–certainly have the motivation to create fast and slow lanes for particular gadgets and services. If your internet provider can decide which personal assistant or smart home gadgets you can or can’t use, the broadband can dictate the winners and losers in the Internet of Things race. That wouldn’t bode well for competition, innovation, or you.

Despite wide concern about cyberattacks, outages and privacy violations, most experts believe the Internet of Things will continue to expand successfully the next few years, tying machines to machines and linking people to valuable resources, services and opportunities. As billions more everyday objects are connected in the Internet of Things, they are sending and receiving data that enhances local, national and global systems as well as individuals’ lives. But such connectedness also creates exploitable vulnerabilities. As automobiles, medical devices, smart TVs, manufacturing equipment and other tools and infrastructure are networked, is it likely that attacks, hacks or ransomware concerns in the next decade will cause significant numbers of people to decide to disconnect, or will the trend toward greater connectivity of objects and people continue unabated?

Absolutely not announced but I'm sure they made the go decision. Recent actions have made clear Verizon is going forward to 30-50 million homes, probably 2019-2022. This will require 100,000's of thousand of small cells and possibly over a million. Verizon wants the best network in America, probably unmatched in any other part of the world as well. Senior executives have made a dozen statements pointing the way. Verizon is a world leader in 5G research, with eleven cities mostly installed and about to go live. (Fixed only, upgrading to mobile as soon as it is ready ?2020-2021.) The technology has improved so much in the last year the engineers are confident. The cost is coming in lower than expected. Verizon can expect some crucial marketing and lobbying advantages. Everything has come together to make this the logical move for Verizon.