After Years and Millions, VTel’s Wireless Promises Unfulfilled
Springfield, Vt. — When it comes to VTel’s her alded plan to bring mobile phone service to Vermont, the company isn’t talking. The Springfield, Vt., telecommunications company in 2012 and 2013 won separate funding grants from both the federal government and the state to launch wireless mobile phone service to areas of Vermont that do not receive cellular phone service. The federal money was to make mobile phone service available along...
How Conspiracy Theories Become ‘Truth’ on Facebook
Conspiracy theories, hoaxes and other variants of baloney have become so prevalent and intractable on Facebook that we no longer bother to debunk them. But a new study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences provides some insight on exactly how misinformation spreads — with big implications for the fight against it. The paper, titled The spreading of misinformation online, comes from researchers at Boston...
Are Your Christmas Lights Killing Your Wi-Fi?
Holiday lights are meant to add some cheer to your day, but a British regulator has pointed out that they may have an unwanted side effect: interference with your WiFi network. Last week, Ofcom — an agency similar to the Federal Communications Commission — named holiday lights as one of many electronic devices that can trip up your Internet connection. The agency has released a new app to check for interference that, alas, is...
The Big Event: Women’s Network of the Upper Valley Honors WISE Executive Director
T he Women’s Network of the Upper Valley honored an area nonprofit and its director at an annual dinner last month. Peggy O’Neil, executive director of WISE, received the Deborah Aliber Award for Community Service. The Lebanon-based nonprofit provides advocacy and crisis intervention services to victims of domestic violence, sexual abuse and stalking. The featured speaker, O’Neil described her work at WISE and “the necessity, sadly...
Analyst Identifies Potential FairPoint Buyers
Talk of a possible sale of FairPoint Communications has picked up recently on the heels of a collective bargaining agreement that will make the company more attractive to prospective buyers. Last week, during FairPoint’s first quarter earnings conference call, CEO Paul Sunu told investors and industry analysts, “We must consider mergers and acquisitions as either a seller or a buyer as part of our overall strategy.” If it is sold,...
