Hundreds of thousands of women came to Washington, DC to protest against President Trump’s policies.
The idea for the Women’s March on Washington to protest Donald Trump’s presidency may have started as a Facebook post, but for anyone actually at the march on Saturday sharing their experience on social media during the event was nearly impossible.
As hundreds of thousands of people gathered in Washington DC on Saturday to send a strong message to the new president that they intend to challenge his policies for the next four years, wireless networks ground to a halt for much of the day.
I was there just four blocks from the rally’s main stage on Independence Ave. By 10 a.m. when the rally began, social media sites like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram were unreachable. And it was even difficult to send and receive text messages.
Forget about live streaming speeches from feminist icon Gloria Steinem or liberal filmmaker Michael Moore, who implored marchers to flood their congressional representatives with phone calls everyday. And even Madonna’s confrontational R-rated rant likely wasn’t streaming live from anyone’s phone as it happened.
The network was simply unavailable until early afternoon when the march finally got underway and people began dispersing. Even then, uploading pictures or video was spotty at best. But at least text messages could be sent and received.
Michael Moore tells protesters at the Women’s March to get involved in the political process and to flood their Congressional representatives with phone calls.
Network issues should come as little surprise to spectators at any big public gathering. As wireless customers, we’ve come to expect it. But considering that all four major wireless carriers — AT&T, Verizon, Sprint and T-Mobile — told me that they spent the past two years and millions of dollars preparing for the inauguration, you’d think the networks would hold up better.
After all, Verizon said it had increased its wireless data capacity by 500 percent on the National Mall and throughout the city. AT&T said it spent $15 million over the past two years to increase its 4G LTE capacity by 400 percent. And yet on Friday spectators at the inauguration , which I also attended, also couldn’t get internet access to post photos and video to social media like Instagram or Twitter.
