Tech Industry

The White House has promised access to broadband for all Americans, as part of a major new infrastructure initiative known as The American Jobs Plan.

The plan as a whole will cost $2T over eight years, with $100B of it reserved for the broadband elements …

A new report from consumer advocacy nonprofit Public Citizen says that big tech companies are now the biggest lobbyists, and that the money they spend on influencing government policy has allowed them “to harm consumers, workers, and other businesses alike.”

However, while Apple is mentioned 27 times in the report, only one direct criticism is leveled at the company …

On Tuesday morning, a 220,000-metric ton, 1,312-foot container vessel got stuck sideways, blocking Egypt’s Suez Canal. This canal is responsible for 12% of the world trade, and a new report from NBC News explains what effect this could have on shipping logistics around the world.

A survey of 1,500 tech employees found that 77% of them think that Apple, Amazon, Google, and Facebook have too much power. Only 8% disagreed.

Tech workers were also asked about a wide range of other tech issues, including working with law enforcement, China, and legislating AI…

Smartphone addiction affects almost 40% of college students, impacting the quality of their sleep, according to a new study.

However, some academics take issue with the findings, arguing there is no such thing …

President Biden has reversed the US immigrant freeze imposed by his predecessor, and will not extend the US work visa freeze. Hundreds of thousands of foreign workers will soon be able to apply for visas and green cards, including the H-1B temporary worker visa, which Apple had said was important to its business.

Apple, Google, Microsoft, and Facebook were all among the companies to oppose the freeze and other restrictions imposed by the previous administration…

It’s the end of an era for technology fans: After nearly 36 years, Fry’s Electronics has officially confirmed that it is going out of business and closing all of its stores nationwide. The company has also completely shut down its online store and replaced it with a goodbye message.

A pandemic-induced worldwide chip shortage is continuing to hit iPhone 12 production, despite Apple’s advantages in negotiating priority with many of its suppliers. So far, the company has been affected by shortages of both power management chips and LiDAR components – and there are fears that the situation could get a lot worse.

The automotive industry has been particularly badly hit, with lack of semiconductors resulting in an estimated $61B in lost sales. Experts now fear that the impact on the consumer electronics sector could be even greater …

Interest in developing UWB applications has been significantly boosted by Apple’s decision to adopt the ultrawide band standard in its products, says a new report today, with other smartphone manufacturers following the company’s lead.

Samsung and Xiaomi have already included UWB in high-end smartphones, with two other Android brands likely to do so …

Business Insider has an interesting look at the battle for web privacy — and how Apple is effectively keeping Google’s data-grabbing ambitions in check across the web as a whole.

New web standards are agreed by the World Wide Web Consortium, also known as the W3C. In theory, each member organization gets one vote, but the site’s Shona Ghosh argues that the reality is somewhat different…

Zendure likes its beefy power banks, like the 100W one I tested back in the summer, but the Zendure SuperBase 500 has got to be the ultimate one. As the name suggests, it offers a huge 500Wh of capacity (518Wh to be precise). It provides both AC and DC power and can cope with up to a massive 600 watts of simultaneous output.

Of course, that kind of capacity requires a huge battery, so this thing isn’t small or light– but it is a fair bit smaller than the competition …

After several days of rumors and speculation, Salesforce has officially announced today that it will acquire the workplace communication app Slack. The deal is valued at over $27 billion and marks Salesforce’s biggest acquisition ever.

Controversial FCC chairman Ajit Pai has announced that he will resign as of January 20, 2021. This announcement is not necessarily surprising, as this is the same day that President-elect Joe Biden will be inaugurated and it is tradition for the FCC chairman to step down in conjunction with the inauguration of a new president.

Three tech giants had to take action in response to presidential election hoaxes. This included Twitter placing a warning on a tweet by Donald Trump, which falsely accused the Democrats of trying to ‘steal’ the election.

Twitter stated that the tweet violated its civic integrity policy, which says that users ‘may not use Twitter’s services for the purpose of manipulating or interfering in elections’ …