Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai has now decided that a handful of promises, made just days ago by T-Mobile and Sprint, puts this $26 billion transaction in the public interest. But these promises are speculative, unsubstantiated, and entirely unenforceable.
At a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing about data privacy and competition policy, GOP senators signaled they are divided over whether to pursue antitrust enforcement against the country's largest tech companies.
Sens Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV) and Maggie Hassan (D-NH) reintroduced the bipartisan Rural Reasonable and Comparable Wireless Access Act to help close the rural-urban digital divide and expand access to broadband in rural parts of West Virginia, New Hampshire, and across the country. The Act directs the Federal Communications Commission to establish a national standard for determining whether mobile and broadband services in rural areas are “reasonably comparable” to service provided in urban areas.
When Verizon throttled firefighters during last summer’s deadly wildfires, the FCC did nothing to help. Without net neutrality rules in place, the agency’s hands were tied and the firefighters were forced to go to the media to plea for help. This is outrageous. We’re heading into another wildfire season, and nothing has changed. Net neutrality hasn’t been restored, and the FCC still lacks the authority to intervene when telecom companies abandon our nation’s first responders. We need Congress to pass the Save the Internet Act.
Americans increasingly are moving away from cable and satellite pay-TV services and opting to stream online video offerings, data from National Telecommunication and Information Administration’s latest Internet Use Survey show. While most households still subscribe to cable or satellite television services, the survey shows the proportion of Internet users watching videos online has grown from 45 percent in 2013 to 70 percent in 2017.
President Donald Trump’s re-election campaign has spent far more than any single Democratic presidential candidate on Facebook advertising, reprising a strategy that was central to his 2016 victory. Since entering the race late in April, former Vice President Joe Biden has pumped more than $1 million into Facebook ads, outspending President Trump’s campaign for three of the past four weeks. Much of President Trump’s spending on Facebook advertising in recent weeks has gone toward ads that have been seen by older Americans, particularly women 55 and older.
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