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By Heather Gould | Original Tahoe Mountain News article here.

At the October 10 meeting of the city of South Lake Tahoe Planning Commission, some members of the audience noticed that Councilmember Devin Middlebrook, who was observing in the audience, and Commission Chair Jenna Palacio, appeared to be texting each other. A Public Records Act request for their cell phone activity was filed and it was discovered that the two indeed had been communicating about the redo of the Super 8 Motel which was on the agenda that day.

The pair commented on the design of the project, whether or not more chain businesses were desirable in the city and whether electric vehicle charging stations would be open to the public. The Super 8 project proposal was passed on a vote of 4-1, with Palacio dissenting. The matter brought to light an issue that has been on the rise with the proliferation of electronic devices. Whereas once people could only communicate by speaking or submitting written documentation, which was collected and filed publicly, now surreptitiously emailing or texting during public meetings is possible and public bodies have had to grapple with the consequences.

Continue reading “South Lake Tahoe Planning Commission Texting Incident Illuminates Transparency Law”

By Jonathan O’Callaghan, Jan 16, 2020 | Original Scientific American article here.

A new paper suggests that the agency broke U.S. environmental law in its approval of the satellites and that if it were to be sued in court, it would likely lose

Trails of reflected light from dozens of recently launched Starlink satellites obscure an image of the NGC 5353/4 galaxy group, as captured on May 25, 2019, during a 25-second exposure by a telescope at Lowell Observatory in Arizona. Credit: Victoria Girgis Lowell Observatory

A battle for the sky is raging, and the heavens are losing. Upcoming mega constellations of satellites, designed to blanket Earth orbit in spacecraft beaming high-speed Internet around the world, risk filling the firmament with tens of thousands of moving points of light, forever changing our view of the cosmos. Astronomers who rely on unsullied skies for their profession and members of the general public who enjoy the natural beauty of what lies above stand to lose out.

The arrival of such a large number of satellites “has the potential to change our relationship, and our connection, with the universe,” says Ruskin Hartley, executive director of the nonprofit International Dark-Sky Association. But with no binding international laws or regulations in place to protect the night sky, anyone opposing the advancement of mega constellations is surely fighting a losing battle. Right? Wrong.

A new paper to be published later this year in the Vanderbilt Journal of Entertainment and Technology Law argues that the Federal Communications Commission — the agency responsible for licensing the operation of these constellations in the U.S. — should have considered the impact these satellites would have on the night sky. In ignoring a key piece of federal environmental legislation, the FCC could be sued in a court of law — and lose — potentially halting further launches of mega constellations until a proper review is carried out.

Continue reading “FCC Approval of SpaceX Starlink Satellites May Have Been Unlawful”

This demonstrates the hurdles of positioning itself as an early mover.

Original businesswire link here

Verizon pushed back the wider deployment of its 5G Home fixed wireless access (FWA) service until the second half of 2020 due to a lack of equipment that’s powerful enough to ensure quality coverage, according to Light Reading.

Verizon is waiting on customer premises equipment (CPE), slated to become available in H2 2020, that will extend the carrier’s coverage footprint, as homes located further away from transmitters cap tap into the signal. Verizon initially launched 5G Home in October 2018, using 5G TF, a non-standards-based 5G specification.

After pausing the 5G Home rollout in January 2019, the telecom relaunched the service in October 2019 using the 5G NR industry standard — but it now faces challenges scaling the service. Verizon aims to offer 5G Home in all of its 30 initial mobile 5G markets, but has only debuted the service in five so far.

Verizon’s 5G Home service is being held back because suppliers aren’t able to deliver the equipment the carrier needs yet. Verizon has taken a mmWave-heavy approach to 5G deployment, which can restrict its network to limited but high-performing coverage footprints.

The company needs high-powered CPE to ensure customers on the edge of its coverage areas have the same quality connection as the rest of its clientele. Quality service from the beginning is important because early issues could cause customers to revert to previous broadband packages and dissuade future subscribers. The new CPE will likely also enable Verizon to deploy fewer mmWave cells, as the receivers have a longer reach. However, the nascent 5G equipment market must still catch up with Verizon’s needs.

Verizon is attempting to establish itself at the head of 5G FWA by capturing an early lead, but the 5G equipment market seems to be holding it back. Business Insider Intelligence forecasts that there will be almost 13 million US households with 5G FWA by 2024.

Navigating these technological hurdles can create time for competitors like T-Mobile, which plans to launch 5G FWA services if its merger with Sprint is cleared, to catch up in the lucrative market, reducing Verizon’s advantage. T-Mobile’s 5G network leverages low- and mid-band spectrum, which can give its 5G FWA service a wide initial coverage area but likely won’t match Verizon’s network speeds.

Adapted from an article by John Hendel, Dec 29, 2019 | Original POLITICO article here.

Who Needs So-Called "Small" Cells on Utility Poles in front of houses? NO ONE . . . because 4G AND 5G antennas can be installed on Macro Towers, Just like the one shown below and the other one in the Verizon Marketing video that follows . . .

 

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A worker rebuilds a cellular tower with 5G equipment for the Verizon network in Utah in November. | George Frey/Getty Images

Verizon Can Install 4G AND 5G on Existing Macro Towers

President Donald Trump envisions a not-too-distant future in which super-fast 5G networks span the country, powering everything from smart cities to remote surgeries — and getting there before China does. There’s just one thing: He doesn’t have the workforce to build it. And he’s not even close. The 27,000 tower hands working nationwide right now won’t be able to handle the workload,

Trump told POLITICO:

“We’re talking about the ability to double the existing workforce.”

Continue reading “The Big Barriers to Trump’s 5G America”

Adapted from an article by Doug Dawson, Dec 27, 2019 | Original POTS and Pans article here

It’s been really interesting to watch how much the federal government talks about 5G technology. I’ve not seen anything else like this in my adult lifetime, although there may have been times in the past, such as the advent of railroads or electricity that the federal government took such an active interest in new technology.

The government gets involved to some extent in many new technologies, but with 5G there has been a steady and persistent dialog about how 5G is vital to our economic future, and pronouncements of why we must implement 5G as quickly as possible to stay ahead of the rest of the world. As I’ve watched the way the government talks about 5G, it makes me wonder why we never heard the same urgency for breakthroughs like personal computers, the world wide web, or understanding the human genome.

A good example of what I’m talking about came in November when a bipartisan group of senators sent a letter to Robert O’Brien, the current national security advisor asking for a better government strategy for 5G. They claimed they are concerned that

1. China is winning the 5G war, which they . . .
2. Believe creates a security threat for the US.

Continue reading “The Government’s Role in 5G”

By Ron Srigley, Dec 26, 2019 | Original MIT Technology Review article here

. . . here’s what they had to say.

A few years ago, I performed an experiment in a philosophy class I was teaching. My students had failed a midterm test rather badly. I had a hunch that their pervasive use of cell phones and laptops in class was partly responsible. So I asked them what they thought had gone wrong. After a few moments of silence, a young woman put up her hand and said: “We don’t understand what the books say, sir. We don’t understand the words.” I looked around the class and saw guileless heads pensively nodding in agreement

I extemporized a solution: I offered them extra credit if they would give me their phones for nine days and write about living without them. Twelve students — about a third of the class — took me up on the offer. What they wrote was remarkable, and remarkably consistent. These university students, given the chance to say what they felt, didn’t gracefully submit to the tech industry and its devices.

The usual industry and education narrative about cell phones, social media, and digital technology generally is that they build community, foster communication, and increase efficiency, thus improving our lives. Mark Zuckerberg’s recent reformulation of Facebook’s mission statement is typical: the company aims to “give people the power to build community and bring the world closer together.”

Without their phones, most of my students initially felt lost, disoriented, frustrated, and even frightened. That seemed to support the industry narrative: look how disconnected and lonely you’ll be without our technology. But after just two weeks, the majority began to think that their cell phones were in fact limiting their relationships with other people, compromising their own lives, and somehow cutting them off from the “real” world. Here is some of what they said.

Continue reading “I asked my students to turn in their cell phones and write about living without them”

Fulfilling Its marketing promise for 2019, but this is only partial — and very limited — coverage in each of these markets

By Sascha Segan, Dec 23, 2019 | Original PC Magazine article
here

Verizon fulfilled the marketing promise it made to have 5G in 30 cities, but that isn’t translating into broad coverage across those metro areas. See more here —> https://www.verizon.com/about/news/

Verizon launched three more 5G cities today — Columbus, Cleveland, and Hampton Roads — fulfilling its promise to have 30 US cities live with its millimeter-wave 5G service by the end of the year. Hampton Roads includes Virginia Beach, Norfolk, and Newport News, so Verizon probably could have claimed even more cities, had it wanted to do so.

Verizon’s coverage maps haven’t kept up with its rush of recent city launches, with its page of maps standing at 17 cities—16, if you count Minneapolis/St. Paul as one. Our examinations of the maps, and our tests in New York, show that coverage is relatively limited within each city and that the maps may overstate the coverage people can actually see on Verizon’s half-dozen retail 5G phones. On its 5G coverage page, Verizon says that Kansas City and Little Rock are "coming soon."

Continue reading “Verizon 5G: Now In 31 Cities”

By Susannah Luthi, Dec 22, 2019 | Original Politico article here.

The court’s changing ideological makeup could wind up giving states like California less legal elbow room to challenge Trump policies.

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​Outside conservative groups say the changing 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals will reduce the odds of liberal foes of the president filing challenges with like-minded activist judges eager to freeze his agenda. | Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

​A bastion of liberalism in the federal judiciary is slowly turning rightward, threatening Democratic court challenges on everything from abortion to who gets a green card.

The Senate confirmation of Lawrence VanDyke and Patrick Bumatay to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court. This month marks nine appointments by President Donald Trump to the 29-member bench that serves as the last stop for nearly all legal complaints lodged in nine Western states. Democratic-appointed judges now hold a three-seat majority, compared with 11 at the start of Trump’s presidency.

If the trend continues, it represents a major shift in the liberal wing of the judiciary, meaning lawsuits for progressive causes won’t find a friendly ear as easily as they have. The circuit has been the go-to venue for activist state attorneys eager to freeze Trump policies on health care, immigration and other social issues. It ruled against Trump’s weakening of Obamacare’s contraceptive mandate, as well as multiple versions of his travel ban.

Continue reading “How Trump is Filling the Liberal 9th Circuit with Conservatives”

. . . and beam internet data directly to iPhones via satellites

By Michael Grothaus1 Original Fast Company article [here]https://www.fastcompany.com/90446468/apple-wants-to-bypass-carriers-and-beam-internet-data-directly-to-iphones-via-satellites)

Lookout Verizon, AT&T, and any other carrier out there: Apple is working on a way to bypass carriers and beam internet and other data directly to iPhones. That’s according to a report from Bloomberg that says the initiative is “a company priority” for Tim Cook.

According to the report, Apple has “a secret team” of engineers specializing in aerospace, satellites, and antenna design working on the project:

"Apple’s work on communications satellites and next-generation wireless technology means the aim is likely to beam data to a user’s device, potentially mitigating the dependence on wireless carriers, or for linking devices together without a traditional network. Apple could also be exploring satellites for more precise location tracking for its devices, enabling improved maps and new features."

Bloomberg’s report says Apple hopes to deploy the satellites within the next five years. If Apple does indeed use its own constellation of satellites to beam internet access to iPhones (and presumably other devices), it could have major consequences for traditional carriers, whose main business model relies on the subscription fees smartphone data plans bring in.

Apple becoming its own space-based ISP isn’t that far out of an idea. The company has increasingly made moves to design and control every aspect of its products. This started years ago with Apple making its own custom A-series silicon for its iPhones and iPads instead of relying on off-the-shelve CPUs. More recently, Apple is said to be working on its own 5G modem to replace the Qualcomm and Intel modems it has used in years past.

By creating its own data delivery system, Apple could give its customers a more uniform experience across its devices, as well as create another recurring, subscription-based revenue source.