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The Document Foundation is taking aim at Microsoft's file formats, arguing they function less like standards and more like a leash. The foundation says proprietary Office formats create lock-in that keeps users trapped, even when better alternatives exist. It's an old fight, but with AI baked deeper into productivity tools, the stakes are getting harder to ignore.
Shifting to infrastructure, UK regulator Ofcom is moving forward with a plan to open up the upper band of the six gigahertz spectrum for both Wi-Fi and mobile broadband. The clever part is a coordination system borrowed from air traffic control, letting Wi-Fi and eventually sixth-generation mobile share the same frequencies without collision. Full six-G integration is still a decade away, but the groundwork starts now.
And on the censorship front, a digital rights nonprofit has released version two of FreeSocks, a free open-source VPN built specifically to slip past state-sponsored internet blocks. The new version adds an Xray-based proxy layer and post-quantum encryption, recognizing that the tools blocking free access are themselves growing more sophisticated. It's an arms race, and this is one round going to the open side.
Keep surfing. Tech Beat out.
