Vox

House Antitrust Subcommittee's three big ideas to take on tech power

On paper, Feb 25’s House Antitrust Subcommittee hearing was about analyzing how big tech platforms act as gatekeepers and create barriers to entry — but really it was about testing out three new avenues for keeping tech companies in line and seeing which ones might gain support from tech-skeptical Republican representatives. But at the hearing, the subcommittee moved beyond calling out bad behavior and laid out three big areas where Congress could actually take action:

Net neutrality law to take effect in California after judge deals blow to telecom industry

California may soon begin enforcing its first-in-the-nation net neutrality law after a federal judge ruled against broadband providers that had sought to scuttle the state’s open-Internet safeguards.

5G in the US is Disappointing Right Now, But It's Going to Get Better

We’ve been promised a fourth industrial revolution with fantastical things like remote surgery and driverless cars. Instead, what we have now is widespread 5G that’s more or less the same speed as (or even slower than) 4G and super-fast mmWave 5G in some parts of some major cities with highly limited range. So where is this 5G future we’ve been promised? The truth is that it’s coming along, but it will materialize more slowly and in less obvious ways than what we’ve been led to believe.