Portside

Some argue that the broadband market already has been carved up into a cartel, so blocking the acquisition would do little to bring down prices. Washington should examine a larger question beyond whether the deal is good or bad for consumers: Is it good for our democracy? We haven’t needed to ask this question for more than a century because America hasn’t experienced the present concentration of economic wealth and power in more than a century.

The sad truth is that open source software — which underpins vast swathes of the net — has a serious sustainability problem. Money doesn’t necessarily buy good code, but it pays for software audits and face-to-face meetings, and it can free up open-source coders from their day jobs.

Future of the Internet; Twitter in Turkey; Netflix & Net Neutrality; Telephone Metadata; The Web Still Needs Work

Summary - Reader Comments - Big Lie about Mayor Bill de Blasio and Charters; Ukraine; Disgraceful Rejection of Debo Adegbile; Salt of the Earth - Sixty Years and Still So Vibrant; Attack on Public Schools; Member-to-Member Harassment; NAFTA Scorecard; Vermont Public Bank; Women in Labor History; 25th Anniversary of the Web; Today in History - Senate Approves Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty

Black Twitter; NYT's editorial swamp; Micro-grants for nonprofit news; NYPD finds a use for Google glasses; Fox News: dying or undead?

Racism and the end of net neutrality; Warrant-less cyber-search; Paramount Pictures go digital; Now it can be downloaded; Payment card data theft skyrockets

Hitler on the e-book charts; A new contender in rightwing media; Bookless library; Mass culture for profit; Internet - not safe for women

Edward Snowden's Christmas message - together we can end mass surveillance, otherwise "'a child born today will grow up with no conception of privacy at all.' Listen to message broadcast on England's Channel 4; and Washington Post story, based on 14 hours of interviews conducted in Moscow. "All I wanted was for the public to be able to have a say in how they are governed," Snowden said.

Judge Declares Phone Spying a No-No; Internet of Things Coming Up Fast; Many "Things" Are Already Plugged In; Social Media Becomes a Trusted News Source; San Francisco Gets Free WiFi