Portside

Tech Companies have been in bed with the Pentagon for a long time; Feds Swap Data with Thousands of Firms; Balloon-powered Internet on the Horizon; Emotional Data Tugs at Internet Heartstrings; Uncertain Funding for Nonprofit News Sites; Who Needs Reporters Anyway?

Personalizing Google Maps; Mapping Istanbul’s Protests; National DNA Database; Biometrics and Consumer Behavior

As the war on terror becomes a war on our privacy, Salon's former CEO launches project to encourage whistle-blowers

Kochs to Buy L.A.Times? Unions Say "No!"; Massive Biometric Database Proposal Hidden In Immigration Bill; NSA Releases Guide to Internet Spying; Scandal Sheets on the DoJ/AP Leak and Bloomberg Reporters Stalking Their Customers; Hollywood Challenges Books for the Blind; Girl Coder Beats the Boys in Hackathon Competition

Bombing in Boston: Social Media Got It Wrong; Digital Surveillance Got It Right; Cell Service Could Have Gotten Shut Down; Organizing Against CISPA Ramps Up; Crowdsourcing the Gun Control Bill; YouTube Shoots Down Viacom Again; The Orwellian Potential of Google Glass; NY Post Circles the Drain; A Virtual Newsroom Wins a Pulitzer; The Ongoing Gender Gap of the Global Internet; Bringing E-books to Third World Phones

Google is bringing a fiber-optic data network to homeowners in Kansas City, Mo., and Kan., but without the usual regulations. That means underprivileged neighborhoods may be left in the digital dust.