Rebecca Heilweil

More than 900 complaints that mention SpaceX or its Starlink internet service have been filed with the Federal Communications Commission over the past five years, according to files obtained through a public records request. The complaints provide a view into how the technology has already evolved into a critical lifeline for some rural U.S. residents.

There are many, many maps of New York City. There are the decor maps, sold on Amazon, and the tourist maps, which focus, erroneously, only on Manhattan. There’s the iconic subway map. There are the Eater and Grubhub maps, which tell us where to eat. And then there’s the map that really matters: the official legal map for the city, which quite literally rules the streets, complete with boundaries and widths. It’s also the map that doesn’t currently exist, at least in one singular and easy-to-use form. That’s changing, though.

Austin Bonner has been promoted to Deputy Chief Technology Officer for Policy. The position builds on her current role at the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, where she focused on a range of telecommunications issues.

Space internet has the reputation for slow service. With its questionable signal strength and hardly Netflix-friendly bandwidth, the internet that’s beamed down from low-Earth orbit is the kind of thing you only turn to as a last resort or if you’re stuck on a long-haul flight. But in 2023, satellite-based internet is getting a major revamp. Private companies and governments are getting serious about their space internet projects.

There’s a tense fight in Washington between Republicans and Democrats over President Biden’s infrastructure plan, from the amount of funding in it to the very definition of infrastructure. But on the question of addressing the internet and bridging the digital divide, there appears to be resounding agreement that broadband is very, very important and very, very bipartisan. This is a mirage.

The US is racing to vaccinate millions of people for Covid-19, but online appointment registration systems are slowing down or preventing access to vaccinations for some of the people most vulnerable to the virus: older Americans. Nearly 30 percent of people in the US over the age of 65 do not use the internet, and more than 40 percent did not have broadband access at home. For older adults, broadband internet access isn’t the only hurdle, explains Becky Preve, who directs New York’s Association on Aging.