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 100 MB/S Satellite Internet Service in 2021

Launching a New Satellite

HughesNet already offers the fastest consumer satellite internet service in the United States. The ISP isn’t finished upgrading its system, though. On August 11, it announced plans to launch a new satellite to enable download speeds of 100 megabits per second (100 MB/S).

The company said its new satellite will be operating in early 2021, and will be dubbed Echostar XXIV.  HughesNet says the new bird will serve “key markets” in the U.S., Mexico, Brazil, and several other countries in South America, doubling the company’s Ka-band capacity in the Americas. The 100 MB/S service tier will be  available where HughesNet currently offers Gen5 service.

Following Gen5

In March, HughesNet inaugurated what it called the Gen5 service platform. Since, then, it’s been moving subscribers into Gen5, which offers download speeds of 25 MB/S.

This is the the fastest speed available with any satellite internet service.

Peter Gulla, HughesNet’s SVP of marketing, spoke to Multichannel News last week. Gulla said, “Right now, it (25 MB/S) seems to be meeting the needs of our customers. But that doesn’t mean that’s the end of the line.”

Hughes has offered its internet services primarily in rural areas. It plans, though, to move into some suburban and urban markets where DSL service is weak.

About HughesNet:

HughesNet has provided satellite-based communication services for more than forty years. It serves government residential, and commercial clients, chiefly in the U.S.

In March 2017, HughesNet became the first satellite internet system to offer FCC-defined broadband service from coast to coast. Its Gen 5 tier operates at download speeds of 25 MB/S and upload speeds of 3 MB/S. With Gen5, the company offers integrated modems with built in WiFi. All Gen5 plans include 50 gigabytes of Bonus Zone capacity for use between 2 a.m. and 8 a.m.

The FCC has ranked HughesNet first among all major ISPs for consistency in reaching advertised speeds. This ranking is for all ISPs, not just satellite.

About Satellite Country:

Satellite Country is one of America’s largest retailers of TV, internet, home security, and home automation services. It has been in business since 1999. Satellite Country offers a full range of home services, and can find the best deals available where you live.

 

(For the internet service that’s best for you, talk to us. We can help.)

 

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CUT-FLOWER CIVILIZATIONS

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Do you know what a cut-flower culture is? If you’ve ever cut flowers from your garden and placed them in a vase, you can understand the concept. Your flowers, removed from the soil that gave them life, are doomed. They will look beautiful for a few days, but soon they will wither and die.

Civilizations are often like this. They too can thrive only in certain soils. They grow, slowly and painfully, on the foundation of certain religious and philosophical precepts. From these fundamental principles develop mental predispositions, which foster habits- or what we might call customs. These customs drive science, commerce, innovation, technology, family formation, and a host of other practices that define what we call civilization.

Remove a civilization from its soil and its roots, and it will die. Like the flowers in your vase, it will live for a while. It may even seem to thrive. Without the nourishment that gave it life, though, it is doomed.

What about America?

America now is such a cut-flower civilization. Our leaders and most of our people have forgotten the principles that made America possible. Our political, academic, press, and entertainment elites often treat these principles with open contempt.

We still exhibit signs of life. Our military is strong and highly lethal. Our economy hasn’t collapsed. We still seem able to innovate. The crime rate has plummeted in the last 25 years. We seem to be more prosperous than ever before.

We are a cut-flower culture nonetheless. The signs of cultural rot are all around us. The crime rate is inching upward again. Young people take much longer to marry and settle down than before. The rate of out-of-wedlock pregnancy is a national scandal, and among blacks it’s a catastrophe. The entertainment industry revels in obscenity and violence. Public schools barely function at all, despite massive funding increases.

Where Do We Go from Here?

Some people have taken hope from Mr. Trump’s Presidency. He vigorously reaffirms our national identity, they say. He plans to build up the military. He wants to restore our economic strength.

There is only so much he will do, though. There is only so much any politician can do. Reversing our national malaise will take much more than repealing recent federal policies. To recover its health, a cut-flower civilization must be planted again in the soil which gave it life. For us, this means reviving the Rome-Athens-Jerusalem axis. We need Roman law, the Greek idea that the individual is a universe of consciousness, and ethics based on the Hebrew prophetic tradition.

Full recovery of our cultural health requires reclaiming our ancient heritage.

(The enclosed image is a pastel painting by Odilon Redon. He was a French symbolist artist of the late nineteenth century.)

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RECOVERY OF AMERICAN ‘KNOW-HOW’

What is the fastest or most certain route to recovery of our cultural self-confidence? How can we recover the supreme technical competence that came with it- what our forebears called “American Know-How”?

The first step must be soberly assessing where we are now, and how we got here.

Getting Off Track

To begin with, “Know-How” itself was always on a wobbly foundation. During the fifties, when it was one of the great buzzwords of the age, its acolytes assumed the permanence of  impermanent things. They took our freedom and our questing, inventive spirit for granted, forgetting that they could thrive only in certain cultural environments. Our technical mastery could grow only in certain philosophical and religious soil.

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We can see something of the “Know-How” idea in the early work of Syd Mead. He was a popular commercial artist in the early sixties. His work featured sports cars, private planes, sleek attractive women, and colonization of other planets.

Mead’s vision assumed the permanence of certain beliefs and practices that have since waned. Marriage and the nuclear family will continue to be society’s social glue. Our economic life will revolve around free markets. Our governments will prioritize their core functions, defense and law enforcement, so we’ll be safe. The Judeo-Christian ethic will be our dominant social value. We’ll continue exploring, so energy will be cheap and abundant. The sciences will be solidly founded on experimentation, and will not be corrupted by politics. Our children will be well-schooled, and well able to think and reason.

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By the late sixties, the notion of American Know-How was hopelessly outdated. Demons that had long lurked in the recesses of the American psyche came out into the open. Student radicals taking over our streets insisted that America was hopelessly despotic and corrupt, and the system should fall. New theories of jurisprudence led to skyrocketing crime rates. We lost the war in Vietnam. The Apollo Space Program fizzled out. We suffered repeated energy crises. The seventies saw ‘stagflation’- monetary inflation with low or negative economic growth- which we’d been told couldn’t happen.

Finding Our Way Back

The Reagan Era brought partial recovery, but it was slow and incomplete. The Trump Presidency offers a robust reassertion of America’s cultural self-confidence. His personal failings, though, threaten to derail his most promising projects.

At any rate, there is only so much we can achieve through politics. Full recovery of “Know-How” requires attention to matters of spirit. It requires attention to our ancient ethical system. It requires reconsidering how we educate children. It requires reform of news and entertainment media.

Above all else, recovery requires reaffirmation of ancient creeds. We have to study again the ideas, hundreds or thousands of years old, that made the American Republic possible.

If we address only the obvious symptoms of our current cultural crisis, we will soon backslide into our previous funk. Recovery will be stalled. Dysfunction will once again become our national norm.

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Next- and Last in the Series: Driving in Neutral

 

(To find the best internet connection for you, talk to us. We can help.)

 

 

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RURAL VS URBAN BROADBAND

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Why Are You Left with So Few Choices?

People who live in densely populated urban areas usually have several options for high speed internet. In most cases, these will be cable or fiber-optic connections.

But what are your choices if you live in a rural area? You’re short of practical options there. Cable and fiber systems almost never build their networks far beyond their urban cores. You can find DSL almost everywhere, but it’s usually far too slow to be called genuine broadband. It’s unlikely to be fast enough for video streaming or for most business functions. You can get satellite internet service almost anywhere in the continental U.S., but it’s often even slower than DSL.

The Best Option

If you reside in a rural or exurban area, your best option is almost always going to be HughesNet. It is a satellite network, but very different from the others. HughesNet upgrades its satellite fleet almost constantly, which expands capacity and increases data speeds. The FCC, in fact, lists HughesNet as the only satellite system that consistently delivers broadband speeds.

HughesNet has also been independently rated first among broadband providers for consistency in reaching advertised speeds. This is a first-place rating among ALL broadband providers, including cable and fiber systems.

If you’re a new customer, you can get 10 GB of data per month for $49.99, and 50 GB for just $99.99 per month for the first year. The latter rate reflects a $30.00 discount for the first year. In the thirteenth month, the 50 GB tier will be priced at the standard rate.

Data Plan Features

With all HughesNet service plans, you’ll find the following features:

  • Built-in WiFi
  • 25 megabits per second (25 MB/S) download speed nationwide, 3 MB/S upload speed
  • No hard data limits
  • Video Data Saver

The Video Data Saver automatically adjusts your video streams to use less data. Its default setting is DVD quality (480P), but if you want to watch HD video, you can opt out of the Data Saver temporarily. And you can “snooze” it for four hours at a time.

Exceptions

We don’t claim HughesNet is for everyone. Though it’s available nationwide, apartment dwellers may face difficulty getting it. Landlords often refuse to allow satellite dishes on their buildings.

Because the HughesNet signal is beamed from a satellite 22,500 miles high, it takes half a second to complete a round trip. This time lag is called “latency”. It makes HughesNet impractical for interactive video games or other purposes requiring low latency.

Final Thoughts

If you live in a rural or lightly populated suburban area, HughesNet is almost certainly your most practical broadband option- and an outstanding value.

(We serve rural and exurban areas all over the U.S. Find the internet connection that works best for you. Talk to us. We can help.)

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AMERICAN KNOW-HOW, PART III: 

DECLINE IS NOT AN OPTION

Can we restore American cultural self-confidence, and the supreme technical competence that came with it? If we can’t, could decline at least be gradual and comfortable?

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The middle-aged ex-athlete, flabby and weak, eases into his lounge chair. Watching a college football game, he remembers his own glory as the captain of his football team, when his body was agile and strong. He rues his physical decline.  The aging beauty queen, wrinkled and sagging, looks at an old photo of her triumphant moments as head cheerleader and homecoming queen, when her skin was flawless and her body was taut, and nearly every boy in her high school was in love with her. She puts the photo away and weeps over what can no longer be.

Is Decline Inevitable?

Our leading cultural critics are likewise haunted by nostalgia. They consider America’s former greatness, when she was by far the world’s dominant power. They remember when ‘American know-how’ was in vogue, and was taken seriously. They ask if it’s possible for us to recover the cultural self-confidence that led to putting a man on the moon, winning the Cold War, and unprecedented levels of prosperity. Noting the sad state of our universities and the seemingly intractable incompetence of our governments, they ask if our recent decline can be reversed.

Some say that decline is inevitable, but need not trouble us much. They cite the British Empire. In the middle of the twentieth century, the British people were tired of imperial responsibilities. They abandoned their empire, and seem not to be much worse off for it. They’ve maintained a modern economy, most of their freedom, and a reasonable level of social peace. Decline seems not to have harmed them.

Could we do the same? If America declines, could its senescence be comfortable? Could we sit on the sidelines of world affairs, watching other nations wrestle with the questions that used to vex us? Could we get used to being a bit player on the world stage?

Will Britain’s Experience Be Ours?

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We shouldn’t see British experience as a harbinger of our own future. When Britain was ready to shrug off the responsibilities of empire, it could do so without calamitous disruption of the British way of life. It could pass the baton to us. We spoke the same language and had similar largely the same traditions, a nearly identical legal system, and more or less the same geopolitical interests.

(See Mark Steyn: The Unmaking of the American World)

The same deal is not going to be available to the American people. We won’t see a gradual and comfortable decline. If we fail, we’ll be displaced by people who not only don’t speak English, they don’t even use the Roman alphabet. The Magna Carta, Lex Rex, the Protestant Reformation, and the Enlightenment will mean nothing to them. How likely are they to respect our laws or freedoms?

American failure to lead would be disastrous for us. Foreigners who don’t understand us, and many of whom are bitterly hostile to our core values, will flood our shores by the tens of millions. Jihadists will make massive headway in bringing Western societies to heel. Russia or China could be the world’s leading power, making America a vassal state. This would bring a massive loss of freedom.

America’s decline could also mean there is no real world power left. There would be no effective peacekeeper, and the globe would be in chaos. There are now pirates off the coasts of Indonesia and Somalia. We could soon see large numbers of pirates off the coasts of California and Florida. The external chaos would be accompanied by internal chaos. Tribalism would replace American identity, and the country would become spectacularly violent. The chaotic conditions would make an advanced economy impossible, and we would live under much more primitive conditions. Famine and pestilence would be frequent. Survivors would see hardship few Americans have known since the nineteenth century. Most of us wouldn’t survive to old age.

Will the Next Ten Years Be Critical?

The world offers no substitute for American leadership. Either we will recover ‘American Know-How’- the confident spirit and the accompanying technical competence- or we will face calamity. America as we’ve known it will no longer exist.

I believe the next ten years are critical. What we do during this period will determine whether we stand or fall.

Our condition is grim, but far from hopeless. We can recover- even surpass- our former vigor. It won’t be easy, but it’s within our ability.

In a future post, I’ll spell out a few steps for recovery. Watch this space.

(For the best internet connection, talk to us. We can help.)

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NETWORK BRANDS ERODED BY STREAMING VIDEO 

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As volatile as the TV industry has been lately, the one segment that has been relatively stable– and consistently profitable– is network broadcasting. This may be about to change.

With the release of new video interfaces such as the most recent upgrade of Comcast X1, and with the launch of multichannel live TV streaming platforms such as Sling TV, DirecTV Now, and Hulu Live TV, the most prominent broadcast networks finally have reason to fear possible extinction. They’re losing their ability to keep their brands in the public eye.

Investment Bankers Weigh In

Kannan Ventakeshwar, an investment analyst for Barclay’s, a multinational British bank, wrote a letter about the TV industry’s future to investors. In it he stated: “Every OTT product is organizing its default user interface by the type of content and not by network. So sports does not show up as ESPN or YES Network. Instead, the default interface is organized by sport and/or teams. This is also becoming true with legacy user interfaces like X1. As a result, it is tough to see the brands of individual networks retaining value in the coming years.”

Until recently, the program guides for cable and satellite TV listed channels under assigned numbers. It was only by looking up particular channels that the viewer could see what shows were airing on those channels at what times.

Viewers Want Convenience

Ventakeshwar said, though, that viewers are losing patience with this system. “…In every evolution of OTT”, he said, “the number of clicks needed to get to a program guide or a network viewing option is actually increasing. Given the importance of consumer inertia in usage patterns, this is not a trivial shift.”

In other words, the harder it is for the viewer to find the shows he wants, the
more likely he is to tune out altogether.

Listing by genre or title saves time, but reduces visibility of network brands. This threatens the network business model. Under the old model, new shows are far more likely to succeed if they immediately precede or follow established hits. A highly popular show might even carry an entire evening’s lineup. A ‘halo’ effect– the network’s reputation for airing shows the viewer likes- can induce him to try out its newer shows.

No More ‘Halo’ Effect

If video interfaces are no longer listing shows by channel, though, the lead-in.
lead-out, and halo effects nearly disappear. Each show is an orphan, standing or falling on its own, and offering little market support to other network programming.

Some streaming platforms, such as Amazon Prime Video, Netflix, and Hulu, further undermine network brands by offering their own original content. And you can find their content only on their own platforms. If you want a Netflix original, you’ll find it only through Netflix.

 

How can the networks adapt to these developments? We don’t know, but they haven’t yet. Perhaps they never will.

If they can’t figure out how to protect their brands, the giant broadcast networks may be headed for extinction. Productions studios could live or die by their latest hits.

Notes:

Comcast owns NBC Universal, the largest and oldest broadcast TV network.
With its updated X1 interface, then, the cable system is partially cannibalizing its own business.

OTT is ‘over-the-top’ video. It is content streamed via the internet as a standalone service. With OTT, no cable or satellite system controls or distributes the content.

(For streaming video, you need a strong internet connection. Is yours adequate? If it isn’t, talk to us. We can help.)

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‘CAPITALISM VS. SOCIALISM’

THE FIGHT OVER ‘NET NEUTRALITY’

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Michael O’Reilly is no shrinking violet. Speaking before the American Legislative Exchange Council last Friday, the FCC Commissioner pulled no punches in describing Title II internet rules. He said the debate over them pits “capitalism vs. socialism”.

The Title II rules enforce ‘net neutrality‘. This means they forbid blocking, throttling, or paid prioritization of internet content. The rules are meant to keep ISPs from favoring their own content over content from competitors. Some internet providers, such as Comcast and AT&T, have their own TV service divisions, and regulators thought they might treat their own video more favorably than video from Hulu, Netflix, and other streaming services. Free Press, a consumer group, says the rules are necessary for free, open communication online. Without ‘net neutrality’, it says, ISPs could block political or social views they don’t like.

The FCC enacted the Title II rules in February 2015. The biggest cable and telecom systems objected fiercely, and lobbied hard for repeal.

With a new President came new majority in the FCC. The new Chairman, Ajit Pai, has said that Title II rules should be repealed, and O’Reilly has sided with Pai. Speaking to ALEC, he said, “All of the propaganda in the world cannot paper over the fact that these new burdens were not in response to actual market place events…” O’Reilly said the rules were enacted only because of “…hypothetical concerns dreamt up by radical activists”. He called ‘net neutrality’ a stalking horse for a larger effort to “vanquish capitalism and economic liberty”.

O’Reilly also criticized the offer of discount municipal broadband. He compared it to Venezuela’s offer of low-cost gasoline. The state required oil companies to sell their product for less than production cost, leading to massive shortages. O’Reilly said that municipal offers of free or cheap broadband would also produce shortages.

O’Reilly said he would support subsidies for the poor. However, he firmly opposes “…allowing government sponsored networks to use their unfair advantages to offer broadband services”. Capitalism, he says, is absolutely necessary.

(For broadband service, talk to us. To find out how to get the most out of it, talk to us. We can help.)

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I DEMAND MORE! MORE! MORE!

WHY WE’LL ALWAYS WANT MORE BANDWIDTH

PART ONE:  EDUCATION

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No matter how much you get, you want more. You’ve always wanted more, and you always will.

No, this isn’t about your love life. It’s about your insatiable demand for internet bandwidth. No matter how much you get, it will never be enough. This is mainly because as the pipeline expands, you will think of ever more material to fill it with.

What Makes the Web Different from Older Technologies

In this respect, the internet differs from previous means of communications. In over a hundred years of home telephone service, bandwidth usage for it changed hardly at all. Innovation brought modest improvements in convenience and sound quality, without fundamentally altering the nature of voice transmissions. The internet, though, is constantly evolving. Increasing bandwidth promotes innovation, and innovation promotes demand for increased bandwidth.

Increased bandwidth doesn’t just improve the speed of e-mail. It makes entirely new functions possible. At the dawn of the internet age, few of us would have guessed that it would become a major medium for commerce, telephony, streaming video, or social media such as Facebook or Twitter. Now these uses are so commonplace, we could scarcely imagine living without them.

Education

Technology is forcing massive changes in education. A few decades ago, knowledge was quarantined, and difficult to find. Seeking information in libraries was tedious and cumbersome, and the most important and timely information was in the hands of corporate and government elites.

Now, though, we carry nearly all of the world’s knowledge in our pockets. Whatever we want to know, we can usually find it in a few seconds. Education is now mostly guidance in what to look for.

It was inevitable that greater access to information would affect demand for formal schooling.

MOOCs and Home Schooling

As college tuition rates skyrocket climb into the stratosphere, and millions of students take on crippling debt, and with many of the most prominent universities mired in stifling intellectual conformity, demand for alternatives multiplies. Multiple open online courses (MOOC) are one answer. They cost far less than standard university courses, and are often at least as effective, perhaps more effective, in communicating course content. Unlike textbooks, material on the web can be updated constantly. Students can log in for real-time class discussions on video, download their assignments, and upload their homework.

The web is also becoming vital to home schooling (elementary and secondary levels). Parents can tailor course content to the needs and aptitudes of their children, and students can learn at their own paces, without being either rushed or slowed by the learning abilities of classmates.

Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality

We have learning tools that previous generations could scarcely have imagined. No longer bound by school schedules, we can learn as we need to. Without waiting for others to teach us, we can constantly upgrade our professional skills online.

Virtual reality (VR)  and augmented reality (AR) can hugely enhance effectiveness of online training.

VR is digital simulation of 3D environments.  With VR, you’re not held to one fixed perspective, as when you’re watching a movie.  You can look around and ‘move’ in the digital environmental.

At a trade show in Barcelona, Spain, a reporter climbed into a control booth owned by a heavy machinery firm. Wearing a VR helmet and manipulating levers in the booth, he operated an earth mover in real time in Sweden, 1500 miles away. Think, then, of VR’s potential alter construction, inspection, and manufacturing. It has already changed training for skilled trades. We could learn surgery, piloting of aircraft, and other skills without all of the risks that come with learning them in real environments.

Augmented reality is the overlay of a digital environment over a real one. With AR, an apprentice mechanic or plumber can see a repair diagram laid over real pipe or a real engine. The AR app provides constant feedback on his work, so he can see and feel how the task should be done.

AR and VR can revolutionize education, because they help develop habit or ‘muscle memory’. When he tries his new skills in real environments, the student already understands them from memory. VR and AR are much more effective for skill training than written manuals could ever be.

Of course, such forms of education require huge amounts of bandwidth. For this reason, among others, we’ll always demand more.

(Demand the best internet connection. Demand the best deals in internet service. Talk to us. We can help.)

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HACKERS DEFEATED BY MICROSOFT

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Hackers defeated… This is always good news, right?

We’ve often been critical of Microsoft. Its operating systems have usually been buggy and slow, and they seem to require multiple patches to work properly. Occasionally, though, the brainchild of Bill Gates functions exceptionally well. When it does, we want to give it proper credit.

With this in mind, we call your attention to last night’s announcement by Microsoft regarding a potential security threat. Earlier in the day, a group of hackers called The Shadow Brokers released a suite of Windows ‘exploits’ which could have enabled hackers to compromise computers operating on multiple versions of Windows. But Microsoft had already moved to forestall the attacks.

In a blog entry posted last night, Microsoft described the attacks and its responses. Microsoft had repelled one, ERRATICGOPHER, before the release of Windows Vista. Another, ETERNALCHAMPION, it had patched along with two unrelated vulnerabilities.

Yesterday’s Microsoft Security Bulletin spelled out the company’s responses to The Shadow Brokers. On March 14, it patched ETERNALBLUE, ETERNALROMANCE, and ETERNAL SYNERGY. The company didn’t bother patching three others. These were: EXPLODINGCAN, ENGLISHMANDENTIST, and ESTEEMAUDIT. Microsoft left these alone because it couldn’t simulate the attacks on any systems it supports. This evidently means any systems it provides updates for- Windows 7 or newer.

The hackers apparently made the mistake of testing their exploits on a ‘clean install’ of Windows. A ‘clean install’ is a version without recent security updates. The hackers then, had no idea how their attacks would fare on properly updated systems.

We’ve mentioned this before, but it bears repeating. Update your computer’s operating system often. Be especially vigilant when you hear about critical threats.

(To find out more about computer security, follow this blog. For the strongest internet connection, talk to us. We can help.)

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FACEBOOK: A THREAT TO YOUR PRIVACY?

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Can you trust social media? Is your privacy always safe in the hands of Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram?

Most of us don’t give much thought to how social media are handling our personal data. Perhaps we should.

The network effects of digital communication enable extremely rapid growth for firms that get in early, and over time they can dominate their market segments. Within a few years, they can acquire monopolies or near-monopolies. Once such near-monopoly is Facebook. Because of its massive user base- numbering in the billions- it gets close attention from advertisers. It crowds out other media- especially print.

This, in itself, could create serious problems for you. But what if Facebook becomes the dominant means of authenticating personal identity? You may soon be unable to handle the ordinary business of life without an account.

“The Zuckerberg Mafia finally hit me where it hurts.”

Consider the case of Jason Ditzian, who operates the website The Bold Italic. He was recently kicked out of a San Francisco ride-sharing service, City CarShare, after Getaround bought it. Getround had founded its platform on Facebook, and authenticated membership through it. Lacking an account, Ditzian could no longer use City CarShare. As he put it, “The Zuckerberg Mafia finally hit me where it  hurts.”

Getaround’s user agreement states: “We may permit third-party advertising networks to collect information about your use of our service over time…” It goes on to state that this could include location information. Getaround, then, would know where you’ve been- and when you’ve been there. Could this be a threat to your well-being?

What are you telling the world about yourself?

Most people post huge amounts of personal data on social media. Your Facebook posts may reveal:

  • Where you live
  • Who your friends or lovers are
  • Where you travel
  • What pets you have
  • Where you work
  • What you read
  • Your musical tastes
  • Your political or religious commitments and opinions

This can provide a nearly complete profile of your personality, background, and interests. What happens if this information falls into the wrong hands?

Could governments get your data?

 So far, your social media posts are used mainly to benefit advertisers. This may not be a serious problem for you. But what if governments or hostile political activists get their hands on the data? Consider China, for example. It has begun assigning “citizen scores” for applicants for housing or jobs. Its scores are derived largely from information on social media.

Could something similar happen here? Could the state use your data to ruin your life? Could it guess your location at any given moment, based on your Facebook posts?

The personal information Facebook can collect now is already a severe threat to privacy. At least you can opt out of participating, though.

What if that option is taken from you? If enough businesses and social groups require social media proof of I D, you may have to give in. Your survival may require it. You would have to leave yourself vulnerable to those who would use your personal data against you.

(For the best broadband connection, talk to us. We can help. To get the most out of your broadband connection, read our blog. Comment and share for your friends.)

The enclosed images are from Black Mirror, a Netflix series. It is said to be a contemporary version of The Twilight Zone.