08/07/2017 Click - Short Edition

On July 12th, the internet, as we know it, will change.

Go to Amazon, Twitter, Reddit or many other sites

and you could be asked to wait on a slower connection,

or pay extra, or you may be blocked altogether.

Thankfully, these warnings aren't real.

They're part of an internet-wide protest, with the aim

Net neutrality is the basic principle that protects our freedom

It's the guiding rules that have made the internet

into what it is today, and it prevents our internet

service providers - so the cable companies like Comcast,

from controlling what we can see and do when we go online.

Under the net neutrality principle, all data should be

That means they can't slow down companies who refuse to pay

to have their data prioritised, and they can't charge customers

But the US Federal Communications Commission, the FCC,

voted recently to overturn rules from 2015 which enshrined these

neutrality principles, and which meant telecoms firms

And that, says the organiser of the July 12th protest,

will play right into the big cable companies' hands.

If we lose net neutrality, you're going to start to see

the internet look more like cable TV.

You can imagine trying to go to a social media site and getting

a notification from your internet service provider saying -

oh, sorry, if you want to access this site, you need to upgrade

You need to upgrade to our streaming video package.

You need to pay us more, in order to access the same sites

that you've been using day after day for years.

They can also go to those sites and charge them extra fees in order

And, of course, those fees get passed on to all of us.

So it's really an issue that affects every single person

that uses the internet, regardless of your political views.

And this won't just affect US internet users.

If you use an American web service - which, let's face it,

is most of us - it may affect the service that they provide to us.

The FCC says that the 2015 rules are unnecessary and may

have stifled investment in next-generation networks.

Well, this fight could have been resolved ten years ago

if it were really just about net neutrality.

This has really primarily been a fight about the FCC's power

We had our first major update to our communications law 20 years ago,

and that law made it unclear exactly how the FCC was going to regulate

the internet, and that ambiguity has left the agency to wrestle with this

And in a nutshell, there were simpler, better ways

There were other agencies that could have addressed net neutrality

concerns when they arose, starting back in 2008.

And, er, Congress has three times tried to legislate,

and both Republicans and Democrats, I think, share the blame for missing

the opportunity to craft a solution that would resolve this issue.

And that, unfortunately, has led us to where we are today,

which is a thorough rule-making at the FCC to deal with this

issue of legal authority, when the rules themselves -

the core of net neutrality - have really never been controversial.

Well, I wonder what the original inventor of the concept of net

neutrality would make of these changes.

You know, it's...very disappointing, let's put it that way.

So, you know, the Obama administration had finally put net

neutrality into law, done a good job with it, everyone

was happy, but out of nowhere, the Trump Administration...

And it's not been any public movement against net neutrality,

it's really the cable and phone companies wanna make more money,

And they have somehow kind of, under the cover of Trump's madness,

managed to start the process on net neutrality.

The thing is making the government realise that there are severe

electoral consequences for messing with net neutrality.

It has to be understood as the third rail, that you mess with this

and you're going to get people very angry and descending

Whatever happens I have the feeling it will not be the last word we hear

on net neutrality. Just hunch. Volvo announced they'll only make

electric and hybrid cars from 2019. Formula One racing team Williams

unveiled a carbon-fibre baby carrier that can transport critically ill

newborn infants by The Babypod protects

against vibrations and can be kept They are to introduce a robot cop

and autonomous patrol cars. The vehicles will use 360-degree

surveillance technology to identify suspicious objects,

launch a mini drone, Google's in the doghouse again -

this time, for a deal with a UK hospital that didn't respect

the privacy of patients. The UK's Information Commissioner

ruled that 1.6 million patients' details were provided

to Google's DeepMind illegally, to help develop an app

to diagnose kidney failure. And could tickets be replaced

by inaudible sounds? TicketMaster has teamed up

with Listener, a company that uses ultrasonic sound technology

to transmit information Checking into a venue with an app

would give off the sound, and organisers could lock

who was in and where they are - Whether you love or loathe a trip

to the shops, retail is changing, but there's more to it than people

just shopping online instead. Can I just see what colours

there are downloaded? Here's an idea that takes shopping

online a step further. One company's software allows

you to go a shop's website and, from there, you can connect

to a shop assistant in store, who'll Yeah, what do we have

there on the right? Can you please take the cream bag

off the shelf, and can you open it The shop has actually found

that the same experience being streamed to a mobile has

actually proved more popular And although I found the experience

pretty good, it does of course I thought it was going

round your waist. If, when shopping online,

you're worried about getting your size right,

then these smart They aim to be able to measure

you and tell you the exact right size of jeans that

you should be buying. LikeAGlove hopes to measure women

for the right size and style The stretchy measuring leggings

connect via Bluetooth to a smartphone app,

where your stats will be stored, so you can keep track

of your body shape. Oh, my waist measurement here seems

to be about five inches larger than I thought it was and a fair bit

bigger than the jean When I clicked through

to the suggestions, The company say these measurements

represent where the jeans would sit, rather than actual measurements

you would expect. Might upset a few people

along the way, though! But another trend emerging

is that we head back to the High Street, but shop

assistants as we know them don't. These online stores are open 24

hours a day, with only a series of cameras and microphones keeping

an eye on you. You gain access to your smartphone,

use it to scan your purchases Their first branch opened in Sweden

last year, followed by another The launch of Amazon Go's first

store in Seattle appears to have been delayed,

but aims to replace queues and checkouts by using computer

vision, deep learning It will see what you've picked up

in store and, in turn, But one US company has another

idea about self-service. Well, on first view,

this does just look like an ordinary vending machine that happens

to have a TV screen on it, but a machine like this

could soon be selling alcohol, The device uses biometric

sensors to identify users by the veins in their fingers,

meaning you can turn a standard machine into an apparently secure

one, only dispensing goods to the person with the

right to collect them. And, yes, in the US,

that item could be a gun. The company claims the machinery

uses the same level of security employed by US military and large

corporations to access If it's connected to the internet,

they say 'Where there's Where there's internet

connectivity, somebody can We've jumped through every possible

hoop we can do to make sure that only the person standing in front

of it is able to get Right, and there are guns

and alcohol available too? So some fellas are going out hunting

and they leave late from work, and they rush out of the kitchen

to catch up with their friends. Usually, you're far outside the city

limits, you've made a whole plan, you've made your trip,

you get out and you say, In this situation, a secure machine

would allow you to pick up some ammo, or even a replacement gun,

if you're in the system. Maybe get their whiskey off the one

side, get their ammo off the other, and head on into the camp

and have a fine week of hunting. OK, maybe this isn't solving

a problem that many people have. And suddenly, the idea

of shops without assistants That's it for the short version of

click. You can find us on Twitter and for the longer version on

iPlayer. Thank you for watching.