SpaceX Starlink at 36,000 Feet

While on board an international flight, Hawaiian Airlines offered free internet with Starlink, a subsidiary of SpaceX. Starlink provides satellite internet for hard-to-reach areas, and I think the Pacific Ocean falls within that category. Download and upload speeds surpass my expectations. I’m flying and surfing at the same time!

Got Internet?

I was in 6th or 7th grade when I got my first full-fledged computer, an Apple //e. It sported a revision B motherboard which was capable of displaying 80 columns of text (instead of the standard 40 columns) and double high resolution graphics (instead of high resolution). It also contained expansion slots where you could add peripherals like a printer (Apple Dot Matrix Printer, baby!), extra floppy drives (5.25 inches, woot!) or a modem which sadly I did not have. I coveted a modem which at the time ranged from 300 to 1200 baud. It wasn’t until many years later and several computers later that I finally got a 33.6K dial-up modem for my Apple PowerBook 1400cs laptop computer.

At the time, internet access was for geeks, and most user interfaces involved some kind of command line which required the user to learn Apple DOS, MS-DOS Unix, VAX, or other operating systems. However, 2 things stimulated the masses of Americans to tinker with the internet. The first was the development of graphical user interfaces which were friendlier to use because most thing could be accomplished by pointing a cursor and clicking. The second was the introduction of America Online, Prodigy, CompuServe, Earthlink, and other internet service providers.

After the internet secured a foothold in the homes of millions of Americans, people started to demand faster internet speeds as well as solutions that did not restrict phone usage while using the internet (a major limitation of dial-up modems). Integrated Services Digital Network (ISDN) modems were faster than traditional dialup modems, but their usage was confined to niche settings, and people started referring to it as “innovation subscribers didn’t need”. Digital Subscriber Line (DSL) modems gained more traction than ISDN—they used the same copper wiring as telephone lines and could support telephone calls and internet usage simultaneously.

Nowadays the most commonly used broadband internet access option is cable, although other technologies such as satellite, 5G cellular, fiber-optic, and other options are also gaining popularity. The COVID-19 pandemic gave us even more reasons to use the internet, and internet access has evolved from a curiosity to a luxury to a necessity over the past few decades.

Today the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP) was announced as part of the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law. ACP lowers the cost of internet service for low-income households to reduce disparities in access to high-speed internet service. Households are eligible for ACP rebates if they participate in one of the following programs:

• Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), formerly known as Food Stamps
• Medicaid
• Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC)
• Supplemental Security Income (SSI)
• Federal Public Housing Assistance (FPHA)
• Veterans Pension and Survivors Benefit
• Free and Reduced-Price School Lunch Program or School Breakfast Program, including at U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Community Eligibility Provision schools
• Federal Pell Grant (received in the current award year)
• Lifeline
• Certain Tribal assistance programs, including Bureau of Indian Affairs General Assistance, Head Start (only households meeting the income qualifying standard), Tribal Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (Tribal TANF), and Food Distribution Program on Indian Reservations

Several internet service providers are participating in ACP. To sign up for to find more details about service providers or how to qualify, visit http://GetInternet.gov.

Spectrum Internet - Modem Activation

This morning we had experienced what seemed like yet another internet outage. Our Spectrum internet service has been spotty during the pandemic, and it came as no surprise that we lost internet again today. I decided to run through my typical troubleshooting steps to determine if the problem could have been due to my computer, the mesh router, modem, or ISP. When I attempted to reboot the NETGEAR C3000 cable modem/router, I discovered that all the lights were off, and despite toggling the power button and removing/inserting the power supply, I was unable to get the modem to work. Time to get a new modem.

Spectrum provides a list of authorized modems that are compatible with its network. Fortunately my local Costco warehouse had a NETGEAR CM1100 cable modem (modem only, no router; I don’t need a modem/router because I already have a mesh router) in stock, and it is listed by Spectrum as approved for internet speeds up to 1 Gbps.

I thought that replacing my modem should have been easy as plugging in the power supply, turning on the modem, and connecting the ethernet cable between my modem and mesh router. However, on my 2016 MacBook Pro running macOS 10.15.7 (Catalina), I was only getting speeds of 0.85 Mbps even though I subscribe to a 60 Mbps plan. On my mid-2007 iMac running Mac OS X 10.11.6 (El Capitan), I saw the following pop-up window:

Although clicking the “Get Started” button returned me to the same screen resulting in an infinite loop, fortunately it provided a link to https://activate.spectrum.net/ at the bottom of the window which I visited via a web browser. After logging in, it told me that my modem was offline.

Clicking the 3 dots to the right of the modem icon gave me an option to replace my modem. Upon selecting that option, I entered the MAC address listed on the new modem. A few minutes later, my new modem was successfully activated, and I am back to normal internet speeds.

Carnival Cruise Revelations and Factoids

Given that the theme of this blog is about my digital lifestyle, today's post could be considered antithetical to the purpose of the blog.  Nevertheless, I'd like to share some revelations and factoids from a 1-week Mexican Riviera cruise that I took last week.

• Caffeine Cleansing. While on board, the food, water, and juice was part of the all-inclusive fee, but there were extra charges for sodas so I remained soda-abstinent for a full week.  While the offered free coffee, I typically don't drink much coffee so I avoided that too. I thought that after going a full week without any caffeine, I might begin to feel some symptoms of withdrawal or perhaps even a sense of elation, but I simply felt no different.
• Internet Cleansing. I rarely unplug completely from work and social media, but when I saw the rates that Carnival was charging for satellite internet, I decided to forego connections to the rest of the world. Going a full week without internet access was not as hard as I thought it would be, especially with the fee schedule below.

• Cellular Cleansing.  There are no cellular towers out at sea, so communication can be difficult without cell phones, especially with large parties (we had 14 in our group).  Walkie talkies would have come in handy aboard the cruise ship.
• Body Cleansing. Given that I shared a room with 3 other people, there was competition for bathroom time which forced me to look for alternatives.  To my surprise, I discovered that the showers in the gym were better than the ones in our personal cabin.  The gym showers were equipped with rain shower heads and 4 additional shower heads on the side (not that I needed them), and there was much more space to dress.
• Wallet Cleansing.  I was not too surprised to encounter sneaky hidden fees—for example, the waiters asked if we would like sparkling water or bottled water, but they did not mention the option to drink regular ice water which was free.  After being charged $5 for 1 liter of bottled water during my first meal, I learned to ask for regular ice water.

Do you have any questions for me about my Carnival cruise experience?  Let me know by posting a comment and I'll do my best to reply.

Cyber Monday

As we approach the end of the Thanksgiving weekend, just around the corner looms the Monday after Thanksgiving, otherwise known as Cyber Monday.  While Black Friday has traditionally been known as the unofficial start of the end-of-year holiday shopping season with retailers having their brick-and-mortar stores jam packed with ravenous shoppers looking for good deals, Cyber Monday is a term that marketers have used to describe the following Monday when people would resume shopping online using their computers at work.

While online shopping may have spiked on Cyber Monday in previous years, I wonder if the same trends apply today.  The reason is that about a decade ago when the term "Cyber Monday" was coined, most homes were equipped with dial-up modems, if any at all, while their connections at work were significantly faster.  For example, does anyone remember their employers having ISDN lines (a whopping TWO sets of 56K modems in parallel) or DSL?  Nowadays, home broadband connections are commonplace, and even though I have a 50 Mbps connection, Speedtest.net gives my connection a "B" grade, stating that my connection is faster than only 68% of the United States:

Speeds in this range are more than sufficient to shop online.  Therefore, I hypothesize that while there may still be a surge in online shopping on Cyber Monday, it may be far less pronounced than in previous years since many online shoppers will have already done that from the comfort of their own homes over the Thanksgiving weekend.  Might we see a day when we will retire the term "Cyber Monday" from our vernacular, similar to "record player" and "rotary phone"?  Will we someday have to explain to our children (who will have broadband connections in their cars, watches, and eyeglasses) what "Cyber Monday" once meant?