Wired

Science fiction author William Gibson famously said that the future is already here, it’s just not very evenly distributed. Smartphones and on-the-go internet access have made many of our working lives more efficient and flexible. But the requirement for constant connectivity isn’t only a fact of white-collar work—it has spread to workers up and down the income ladder. And while the requirement has spread, the resources that workers need to maintain it are not evenly distributed. More than a quarter of low-income Americans depend solely on their phones for internet access.

The way we use the internet has changed—and fast.

The administration began disbursing $2 billion in funds extending broadband access to reservations and tribal lands, part of the recent $1.3 trillion infrastructure law. But that’s far short of the need.

Facing heightened scrutiny for its social media policies and relentless quest for growth, Facebook is now turning its attention to getting more people high-speed internet access in hard-to-reach places. The move comes with some irony, as it comes on the heels of Facebook’s own massive outage, which temporarily took down all of the apps in its empire.