Cisco has invited its faithful to travel abroad to a mass-attendance event in December 2021.

The Register today received an invitation to Cisco Live Melbourne on December 7th in the year 2021. The invitation uses the hashtag #CiscoLiveAPJC – shorthand for Australia-Pacific Japan & China – and includes a calendar marker that lists the Melbourne Convention Center as its location.

Cisco Live Melbourne has previously been a regional event and usually attracts crowds of over 5,000 delegates. The 2020 edition of the event was scheduled for March 3rd and its sudden cancelation was among the first signs that the pandemic

India’s government has ordered a broadband building blitz that will see all 45,945 villages in the State of Bihar connected by optic fibre before March 31st, 2021.

Bihar sits south of Nepal and is India’s third-most-populous State with over 100 million residents. It is India’s poorest states when measured by GDP-per-person, despite its capital city of Patma being among the nation’s most affluent cities.

The project is expected to cost US$1.36bn and is being sold as a way to bring health, education and legal services to villages at a level comparable to those delivered in larger cities and towns.

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Netgear has decided that users of some of its managed network switches don’t need access to the equipment's full user interface – unless they register their details with Netgear first.

For instance, owners of its 64W Power-over-Ethernet eight-port managed gigabit switch GC108P, and its 126W variant GC108PP, need to hand over information about themselves to the Netgear Cloud to get full use out of the devices.

“Starting from firmware version 1.0.5.4, product registration is required to unlock full access to the local browser user interface,” said the manufacturer in a note on its website referencing a version released in April

In an extraordinary display of raw political power, the organisation in charge of the .uk internet registry has responded to growing criticism of its actions by silencing critics.

Speaking at Nominet’s annual general meeting (AGM) on Tuesday morning, the organisation’s CEO Russell Haworth shocked members by announcing he was shutting down its internal web forum – the only means of independent communication between members – effective immediately.

The meeting was held virtually, and members were communicating with one another on the forum at the time, including putting together a list of questions to ask the Nominet board and executive team

EE is the UK's fastest mobile network, according to a new report [PDF] from Tutela Technologies which examines more than 180 million speed and latency tests performed between 1 March and 31 August.

Overall, the BT-owned network ranked top in a bevy of categories, including median download speed, upload speed, and overall coverage.

EE also beat the competition in the "Excellent Consistent Quality" category, which looks at how often users could perform relatively challenging tasks such as streaming 1080p video or taking part in HD video chats.

Competition to EE's crown comes from Vodafone, which scored top marks in the