HBO's online only service, HBO Now, is now available for people with Apple TV and Apple iOS devices, as well as for Cablevision's broadband subscribers. Apple's rivals -- including Roku, Google's Chromecast or Microsoft's XBox -- won't be able to offer the $14.99 streaming service until at least July.

Rep. Tony Cardenas (D-Calif.) tells Salon why he opposes Comcast's $45 billion merger with Time Warner Cable. He says that if the merger goes through, Comcast will “dwarf everyone else in that space.” Cardenas adds: "If they get bigger, they’re just going to crush the competition in certain areas. 

Cable lobbyists say in a new Federal Communications Commission filing that Internet service providers need protection from online video companies, the Washington Post reports. The cable companies are warning that TV blackouts could become Web blackouts, as networks start offering more material online and “using a cable company's own video-hungry Internet subscribers as point of leverage in fee negotiations,” the Post says.

Many of the people and organizations supporting Comcast's proposed merger with Time Warner Cable have received donations from Comcast, The New York Times reports. Comcast Executive Vice President David Cohen didn't dispute that many supporters received money, but told the Times that he was offended by the suggestion that the endorsements were made in return for money.

European courts are clarifying when search engines must remove results in order to comply with people's “right to be forgotten,” Ars Technica reports. In one recent case, the Italian Privacy authority sided with Google, ruling that it didn't have to remove a report about a judicial inquiry. But another recent decision went in favor of the person complaining about the search results.

The Federal Communications Commission has sent the net neutrality rules to the Federal Register for publication, TechCrunch reports. The rules won't take effect until 60 days after they're published. Two lawsuits have already been filed challenging the rules, but more cases are expected after they take effect.

The average global downstream Internet speed is now 4.5 Mbps, according to the latest report by Akamai. South Korea is the fastest country, with average downstreams of 22.2 Mbps, whilie the U.S. ranks 16th, with average speeds of 11.1 Mbps, according to DSLReports.

Snapchat received 403 governmental requests for information between November and now, the company revealed in its first transparency report. Officials in the U.S. accounted for 375 of those requests, TheNextWeb reports.  

Comcast will soon start offering some Atlanta residents Intenet service at speeds of up to 2 GB -- twice as fast as Google Fiber, according to The Verge. The cable company expects to offer the 2 GB fiber service to as many as 18 million homes by the end of this year.

Lawmakers on Capitol Hill recently received numerous messages critical of net neutrality, but many of those messages appear to have come from people other than real constituents, Politico reports. The messages all contained the same copy as messages organized by American Commitment -- a group led by a former aide at an organization backed by the Koch brothers. Aides to Rep. Jackie Speier (D-Calif.) investigated, and found that some missives came from people who said they didn't remember sending them.