Items tagged with New York
Charter Kicked Out Of New York Over Inadequate Spectrum Internet Deployments And Willful Obfuscation
Back in March, we brought you word that Charter was skating on thin icewith the State of New York for allegedly lying about Spectrum broadband deployments, and not living up to its promises to expand rural broadband as part of its 2016 merger with Time Warner Cable. Because of these misdeeds, the New York State Public Service Commission warned Charter that it could face franchise revocation in the state and additional penalties. Apparently, Charter has still failed to live up to its obligations because the Commission announced today they that it revoked its preliminary approval of the merger between Charter and Time Warner Cable in the state. This means that the company can no longer operate...
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It's out with the old and in with the new (sort of new, anyway) for police officers at Patrol Borough Manhattan South, a large area spanning Wall Street to 59th Street. Over the weekend, the officers assembled at an old police academy in Gramercy Park to pick up their newly issued iPhone 7 handsets, as the department switches over from Nokia devices running on Microsoft's Windows Phone platform. The shift from Windows Phones to iPhone hardware was announced last year, at the time just months after the last batch of Nokia devices were handed out to police. NYPD Deputy Commissioner for Information Technology Jessica Tisch had arranged the Windows Phone roll out to police two years prior when she...
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In a letter sent to customers, Time Warner Cable (TWC) announced a series of price hikes for its various TV programming and Internet services. Perhaps ill timed, the price increases come less than two weeks after New York regulators approved TWC's proposed merger with Charter Communications.Charter confirmed back in May of last year that it agreed to buy TWC for $195.71 per share, valuing the deal at $55.76 billion. If factoring in TWC's long term debt of $22.64 billion, the value of the deal jumps to over $78 billion. Either way, it's a major move in the making, and it came one step closer to reality when New York officials gave it their thumbs up.According to the letter being sent out to customers,...
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Legislatures in New York have drafted a bill that, if passed, would require Apple and other smartphone makers to provide backdoors to encrypted handsets for law enforcement officials or otherwise eliminate encryption altogether. Failure to do so would result in a $2,500 fine per device, a sum that would quickly add up. Apple and Google have been at the forefront of the encryption debate in favor of user privacy. New iPhone and most new Android devices come encrypted without any easy means of decrypting data without a key. Even if summoned by law enforcement to unlock a device, Apple and Google claim they have no way of doing so since encryption keys are stored locally and not on their servers,...
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Time change at a rapid pace, and whereas it was once common to communicate with each other when out and about using a payphone, these days everyone owns a smartphone. Every wonder what happened to all those phone booths? In New York, they're being converted into free municipal Wi-Fi hotspots.It's part of an effort called LinkNYC. It's described as a first-of-its-kind communications network designed to bring fast municipal Wi-Fi to millions of New Yorkers and tourists at no cost. The network is being fleshed out through five boroughs at no cost to taxpayers. Instead, it will general hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue for New York over the next 12 years primarily through advertising.New...
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New York is a crowded place, but that's no excuse for ISPs to deliver under performing broadband service. To prevent that from happening, the state's Attorney General, Eric Schneiderman, is asking the public to visit a special website designed to test their Internet speed as part of an ongoing investigation. The Attorney General's probe currently targets three ISPs, including Verizon, Cable Vision, and Time Warner Cable. Schneiderman sent all three a letter asking for various details, such as any speed tests the companies have run on their own and any disclosures they've sent to customers about their broadband service. To help with the probe, Schneiderman's office setup InternetHealthTest.org,...
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Within the next four years, every New York resident will have access to high-speed Internet, or so that's the promise of Governor Andrew M. Cuomo. He and his administration laid out the third part of his "2015 State of the Opportunity" agenda, that being a $1 billion broadband program that taps into both public and private resources. As part of the plan, Cuomo will create a $500 New NY Broadband Program that utilizes capital funds from bank settlements, offering up that money as incentive to private sector parties to expand high-speed Internet access in underserved and unserved areas. To qualify for the funding, ISPs must commit to a 1:1 financial match, which in turn will push the program above...
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New York City seems to be on a mission to provide Internet access to everyone. While the LinkNYC program is converting old payphones into Wi-Fi hotspots, it was recently announced that NYC libraries are rolling out a program that will provide free Wi-Fi device rentals after Google donated $1 million to the program and 500 Google Chromebooks. Called The Library Hotspot program, it is designed to give families that lack broadband access the chance to borrow free Wi-Fi devices from a local library. With Google’s $1 million donation, in addition to a $500,000 grant from the Knight News Challenge, the program has expanded to all three library systems and is looking to offer around 10,000 families...
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Thanks to a generous $2 million donation from financier Glenn Fuhrman, nearly 80,000 residents living in 95 city blocks in Harlem will have access to a new outdoor public Wi-Fi network at no cost to them. Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg announced the initiative today, saying that the Wi-Fi network will be the largest continuous free outdoor public wireless network in the nation. "Our new Harlem wireless network brings critical connectivity to residents and visitors, giving them 24/7 access to everything from education materials for kids, to information about Harlem’s rich history and attractions, to everyday needs like paying bills, checking library hours – or even just keeping tabs on...
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Get used to hearing the term "Text Stop" because it's a real thing now. New York Governor Andrew M. Cuomo announced the creation of special "Texting Zones" where motorists can pull off the road and safely respond to that all-important text message that just can't wait. The initiative is an ambitious effort to reduce the prominence of distracted driving due to texting while behind the wheel, which some studies have shown is even more deadly than drinking and driving. Existing Park-n-Ride facilities, rest stops, and another parking areas along New York's Thruway and Highways will serve dual-functions as Texting Zones, with signage placed along the highway to let drivers know how close they are...
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Starting in late September, Silicon Alley and Silicon Valley will be collaborating on high-tech solutions to the problems both cities face. The mayors of New York and San Francisco announced that they will be holding two Digital Cities summits (one in each city) to develop new ways of handing old threats, such as flooding and power outages. The summits have already attracted the likes of Jack Dorsey, who is well-known as a co-founder of Twitter and Square. New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee announce the Digital Cities summits. Image Credit: NBC News Corp New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee made the announcement while in San Francisco, with...
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Attention citizens of New York, be careful where you wield your iPhone, lest you make yourself a target for thieves. The crime rate is up in New York City, and according to Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, the reasons is because of the number of iPhone and iPad thefts that have occurred. A rise in thefts of Apple devices directly contributed to a slight bump in New York City's annual crime index, a statistic that also includes some big time felonies such as murder and grand larceny. As of Monday, there have been 3,484 more major crimes in 2012 compared to last year. In the same time period, Apple product thefts increased by 3,890, more than offsetting the rise in crime. "If you just took away the...
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Thanks to an agreement between Boingo and Transit Wireless, New York Subway Stations will be getting underground Internet access over the next five years. Once the rollout is complete, New York City's subway riders will be able to connect to the Internet from their smartphone, eReader, tablet, and other wireless devices while waiting for a train. The service will be available at stations throughout Manhattan, Brooklyn, the Bronx, and Queens. To use the one-click Wi-Fi access, you'll need a Boingo account or an account with one of Boingo's Wi-Fi roaming partners which include Skype, Sprint, T-Mobile, and Verizon. NYC Subway Stations to Get Wi-Fi Via Boingo and Transit Wireless Agreement Boingo...
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Who says real estate isn't booming? It is if you're Taconic Investment Partners, Jamestown Properties and the New York State Common Retirement Fund. Google has just announced that they've purchased the former Port Authority Building at 111 Eighth Avenue, at a cost of $1.9 billion. That's a huge, huge amount of money, and it's clear that "Investing in New York" is exactly what Google is doing. Of course, Google has grown tremendously since it was founded. They're so much more than a search engine today. They have Chrome, Chrome OS, Android, Google TV, and tons more. The building has a helicopter landing pad on top, and of course, the Internet service there is likely the best in all of NYC. Google's...
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New York City is home to a lot of wild new technologies. Being as big as it is, tech companies often roll out trials and tests here before anywhere else, and new Wi-Fi technologies are no different. Despite having a wealth of cutting-edge solutions surrounding its citizens, NYC is certainly a place where hardly anything comes free. That's part of the reason why this plan sounds so incredibly good to dwellers, not to mention tourists. NYFI, a well financed neutral host Wi-Fi provider, has submitted a proposal to the Metropolitan Transportation Authority of New York (MTA) to build and operate a new Wi-Fi network on Metro-North and Long Island Rail Road trains. What's unique about this effort (which...
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If there was a city in the US that you would look to as front-runner in pioneering new emergency alert, warning and information systems, most likely one of the first to come to mind would be the great Big Apple. New York's rebuiling process since the 911 attacks is taking shape in a number of forms but perhaps none more so than the extent of preventative measures the city's local government is taking to keep its citizens safe and hold firm to their mantra of "never again and never forget". In addition, getting the word out quickly, in the event of an emergency, is obviously a critical component of protecting people from any threat of the natural kind or otherwise. ...
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It's a crazy world we live in. While some industries are shutting retail locations down to cope with a slower economy, the consumer electronics realm seems to be ramping up for growth. While Apple has already made the (smart) decision to open a 24/7 location in the Big Apple, Best Buy still has yet to open a single store that remained open around the clock. But all that changes in a month.On the ever-so-spooky Friday the 13th in November, the company's first-ever 24-hour location will open in the heart of New York City. The 48,000 square foot store will be located on the corner of 14th Street and 4th Avenue, right smack dab in the midst of historic downtown Manhattan’s Union Square. If our math...
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For years now, data centers have been consuming more energy than companies would care to admit. Thankfully, the "green push" has convinced a number of higher-profile firms to re-evaluate their power plans and establish new methods of energizing their servers. IBM is a huge proponent of energy efficient server farms, and it seems as if Yahoo! is hoping to one-up even it in an effort to create one of the greenest data centers on the planet.Parking a new center near the raging waters of Niagara Falls in New York gives Yahoo! a distinct advantage: it has loads of consistant green power just across the street. Working in tandem with officials in Buffalo, NY, Yahoo! is hoping to make its future NY-based...
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Early last week, we spent a day or so with a number of representatives from Global Foundries, learning about the company's plans for a new fab that will be built in upstate New York. The name Global Foundries may be unfamiliar to many of you, but the company's origins may not. If you remember back to October 2008, AMD and the Advanced Technology Investment Company (ATIC) of Abu Dhabi announced the creation of a leading-edge global semiconductor manufacturing company, born from AMD's existing fabrication infrastructure. That company officially became Global Foundries on March 2 of this year.While touring the area in Upstate New York where Global Foundries plans to build its cutting edge fab, we...
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Early last week, we spent a day or so with a number of representatives from Global Foundries, learning about the company's plans for a new fab that will be built in upstate New York. The name Global Foundries may be unfamiliar to many of you, but the company's origins may not. If you remember back to October 2008, AMD and the Advanced Technology Investment Company (ATIC) of Abu Dhabi announced the creation of a leading-edge global semiconductor manufacturing company, born from AMD's existing fabrication infrastructure. That company officially became Global Foundries on March 2 of this year. While touring the area in Upstate New York where Global Foundries plans to build...
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We've previously written about the so-called "Amazon Tax," New York State's move to expand the definition of a physical presence in a state so as to be able to force a retailer to charge sales tax. WEe also wrote that this was just the beginning, and as we expected, things are accelerating. As many states face budget crises, they are looking for as many ways to increase revenue that they can. The sales tax some states feel is lost on Internet sales, which, in the past, would not be taxable if the retailer did not have a brick-and-mortar physical presence in a state would be welcomed. New York State's "Amazon Tax," expands the definition of physical presence by adding the presence of an affiliate...
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The days of sales tax-free purchases on the Internet edged closer to an end on Monday, as a New York court dismissed the lawsuits which had been filed by Overstock.com and Amazon.com over the so-called "Amazon Tax." New York enacted this tax on Internet retailers that have affiliates based in the state. Previously, only retailers with a "physical presence" in the state were required to collect sales tax. New York changed its law to say that having an affiliate (meaning, a site like this one that has Amazon.com ads and gets revenue from click-thrus) constitutes a physical presence. Overstock.com eliminated any New York affiliates, but still filed suit. Amazon's argument was three-fold: The statute...
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