“Broadband” no longer exists. Tech Bloggers Don’t Have a Clue
I’ve read a number of tech bloggers who are crying in their beer because U.S. Citizens don’t seem to want “broadband” as much as it seems.
Broadband adoption has kept even pace with previous years, but stalled among America’s poor, according to a report released this week.
or some variation is usually the lead paragraph in the story.
I can understand laypeople (like me) using the term “broadband” to mean fast access. But people like ConnectKentucky use the term as the equivalent to DSL. To ConnectKentucky, there are two kinds of access: dial-up and broadband.
In fact, the FCC recently recognized that if the lawmakers listened to ConnectKentucky and Connected Nation, all seems right in the U.S. internet world. Of course, it’s not. The U.S. is woefully behind other industrialized nations when it comes to moving data.
Of course the FCC was using the definitions most favorable to the telecos.
It was using the definitions the global telecom industry always has used. It’s just that the relevant standards bodies haven’t changed those definitions to reflect what actually is happening in the market.
But things are changing for the better, it’s just that the tech blogs are kinda slow to pick up on it. (Except for the MSM blogger! - a dead newspaper no less!)
The FCC has finally revised its definition of broadband Internet — which had grow, ahem, somewhat outdated.
In the past, the agency said you had broadband Internet if you got just 200 kilobits per second in either direction. From now on, it will use a more ambitious and more nuanced set of definitions:
* “First Generation data:” 200 Kbps up to 768 Kbps
* “Basic Broadband:” 768 Kbps to 1.5 MbpsAnd from there, the FCC will keep track of the number of homes that get service in each of six higher speed tiers:
* 1.5 Mbps to < 3.0 Mbps
* 3.0 Mbps to < 6.0 Mbps
* 6.0 Mbps to < 10.0 Mbps
* 10.0 Mbps to < 25.0 Mbps
* 25.0 Mbps to < 100.0 Mbps
* 100.0 Mbps +The agency will also make ISPs disclose the number of homes they serve at what speed, in which locations. They’ll also have to provide more detailed maps as to where they do and don’t offer service.
This system superscedes one that let ISPs say they “served” a zip code with broadband Internet if they offered more than 200 kbs to any one home in that zip code.
(Emphasis mine.) Hopefully all this crap ConnectKentucky and ConnectedNation has been spreading about how wonderful states are doing in providing internet access to citizens will slow.
My position is that access to the internet is too important to be left to the private sector. Access should be treated like infrastucture: law enforcement, roads, bridges, fire protection, sewer, water, electricity. Cities should move now to buy out existing cablecos and use tax money to provide access to the internet.
Like other infrastruture, some communities will spend more than others. Some may elect to go with the low end, while others (the smart ones ) will realized investing in the highest speed access to the internet is a tremendous economic driver.
Access to the internet is too important to leave to investors who expect an ROI.