Facebook wants to blanket rural India in cheap Wi-Fi. Google is launching balloons to do the same around the globe. Soon, it seems, there won’t be a square inch of Earth or the heavens that isn’t connected.
These ambitious plans beg the question: should there be places in the world where cellphones, tablets and other high-tech pieces of modern communications are off-limits and their use curtailed to emergencies only? Continue reading
President Barack Obama is currently taking a two week vacation on Martha’s Vineyard, a small island off the coast of New England. My wife and I took a short vacation on the same island and left a few days before the President and his entourage landed. The island has lovely scenery, warm water and many quiet places to relax. The island also is very expensive. While I didn’t do a professional survey since I was on vacation it seemed that almost all prices I paid were about 50% higher than what exists 45 minutes away on the mainland. On the ferry back to the mainland I came up with three reasons why Martha’s Vineyard and other island getaways like Nantucket are so expensive. Continue reading