I’m an unfortunate captive of the oligopoly of the internet industry in the USA. In many places, you have 2-3 choices of internet, and all of them suck ass. I’m in this situation. All internet providers in my area have a 1-1.5 terabyte data cap. So when I download Call of Duty for 250 gb and it fails and has to update or reinstall, I’ve wasted 500 gb, and have now reached 50% of my data cap in just 1 day. There are crazy fees, for example, Cox Cable says:
If you go over, we’ll automatically add 50 gigabytes of data for $10 to your next bill. That’s enough for about 15 hours of streaming HD video. If you use that 50 gigabytes, we automatically add another 50 gigabytes for $10 and so on until you reach our $100 limit of data overage charges or until your next usage cycle begins.
So your $90 a month internet can easily become $190 a month, which is fuckin criminal, like that is so scummy and asinine how that can even be legal. But it is perfectly legal. The FCC is also looking into these data caps but now that we have a new anti-federal government president elect… This is probably toast… Nothing will change now that most federal agencies are about to be deleted.
From a technology standpoint too, nothing is really getting better
Comcast is still using Coax instead of Fiber Optic and desperately trying to convince people that somehow, someway coax can be just as good. Do with that info what you will, I have no opinions on it. There was a Federal program started recently to expand rural internet access, which will probably be gutted in 2025 leaving many without suitable internet again. Fiber Optic is fast, but still, not new technology, and doesn’t solve a critical issue… It doesn’t matter if you have 2 Gigabit internet if no one in the world is uploading even half that fast. A single download on Steam is like 450 Mbps, Epic Games launcher is horrifically slow. I get like 120 Mbps max when downloading Fortnite updates even with 1500 Mbps internet hard wired to my router with top tier hardware
It’s just sad to think about the future of internet in the USA, and knowing we’ll be imprisoned by these data caps for the foreseeable future.
No. And I’m sorry to say, this administration is coming for social media as well. I hate watching the orange potato talk, and I dislike the individual who posted this, but unless you want to sit through a double long “reaction” vid by a youtuber who makes their living “reacting”, this is the shortest one.
He wants to gut moderation and make it so it requires a court order to remove any account from social media. There’s a lot to unpack here. It’s a scripted speech, illustrating the thinkers behind his administration this go. It talks about 1A, says everything in the speech is for 1A, including dumping the Hatch Act (keeps us safe at polling sites and makes buying votes illegal), but you should really listen to what he says about moderation of social media.
To me, it reads as a way of removing any anti-establishment, anti-MAGA spaces to talk without actually removing the spaces.
Echo chambering helps no one folks, I hate hearing him speak too, but you need to hear this one. https://youtu.be/xJfUXVOoFBo