Posts Tagged ‘high-speed internet access’
Broadband Plan: A Guide To America’S Web Revolution
The federal government plans to give Americans the world’s fastest Internet access. How will they do itand when will it happen?
Could the FCC’s National Broadband Plan transform America?Photo: Corbis
Best Opinion: NY Times, Politico, BusinessWeek, Wash. Post, CNET, PC Mag
Truth, justice, and high-speed internet access for all? The Federal Communications Commission is set to present Congress with an “ambitious” proposal to establish a super-high-speed broadband Internet network throughout the USA within the next 10 years. Not everyone is thrilled with the “National Broadband Plan”: Television broadcasters say it will compromise their business, and are already gearing up to fight it. Here, a concise guide to the FCC’s plan, what it could mean for Americansand why it might not work:
What’s the goal?
The National Broadband Plan is designed to give every American access to affordable high-speed Internet, and to increase broadband download speeds from an average of 3 to 4 megabits per second to at least 100 Mbps.
How many Americans have access to high-speed broadband right now?
Just over one-fourth of the population, or around 81 million citizens.
How does that compare with, say, Germany?
In terms of broadband access, America’s ranking has dropped to 15th (down from fourth in 2009) behind countries like Germany, Sweden, and Canada (the Netherlands ranks first). While not all studies confirm that ranking, says FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski in The Washington Post, “none puts us even close to where we need to be” competitively. (Watch an interview with the FCC chairman.)
How will the National Broadband Plan work?
It will expand high-speed Internet access to rural areas and open up new wireless bandwidth. You’ll be able to use smart phones or wireless devices like an Apple iPad as easily in Montana as in Manhattan.
How much will this vast undertaking cost?
The FCC estimates the plan could cost up to $350 billion over the next 10 years.
Who’s going to foot the bill?
This remains unclear. A corollary question: How much of the cost will be covered by tax dollars versus private investment?
Why is this so important?
Americans will pay less for high-speed Internet access. Beyond that, the FCC says the plan will improve education; reduce costs of health-care providers; allow the technology sector to innovate more aggressively; and give small businesses greater access to customers, especially in rural areas. But the “biggest winners” may be “mobile phone companies” like AT&T and Verizon, says Todd Shields in BusinessWeek, since the plan would greatly increase access to nationwide high-speed wireless signals.
When could we start seeing changes?
The FCC hopes changes will take place within the next five years, but that doesn’t factor in opposition to the plan, expected to be significant. “Each bullet point [of the plan],” says analyst Craig Moffett in an interview with The New York Times, “will trigger its own tortuous battle.”
Who opposes it and why?
The most fervent objections come from television broadcasters, who’d be required to “voluntarily” donate 500 MHz of their unused wireless bandwidth to the federal government, which would, in turn, sell the “spectrums” to the highest telecom bidder and give the TV stations a percentage. Broadcasters say this plan compromises their own expansion potential.
Is it just TV broadcasters who don’t like it?
No. Many in Washington and elsewhere are raising the specter of government Internet regulation. “Say goodbye to an open, flexible, consumer-driven Internet,” says an anonymous blogger at RedCounty.com, and “say hello to a big-government, regulated, censored behemoth.”
New Data: 40 Percent In Us Lack Home Broadband
The Obama administration and Congress have identified universal broadband as a key to driving economic development, producing jobs and bringing educational opportunities and cutting-edge medicine to all corners of the country.
“We’re at a point where high-speed access to the Internet is critical to the ability of people to be successful in today’s economy and society at large,” said Larry Strickling, head of the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA), an arm of the Commerce Department that released the data Tuesday.
The NTIA and the Rural Utilities Service, part of the Agriculture Department, are in the middle of handing out $7.2 billion in stimulus funding for broadband. Most of that money will be used to build networks in parts of the country that lack high-speed Internet access.
And next month, the Federal Communications Commission will deliver policy recommendations to Congress on how to make universal broadband a reality. Among other things, the FCC is expected to propose expanding the fund that subsidizes telephone service in poor and rural communities and finding more airwaves for wireless broadband services.
The NTIA report released Tuesday stems from a Census Bureau survey of about 54,000 households conducted in October of last year. The statistics show that U.S. broadband usage continues to grow, with 64 percent of U.S. households subscribing to high-speed Internet as of October, up from 51 percent two years earlier.
But the results also highlight remaining hurdles, particularly in rural America. While 66 percent of urban households subscribed to broadband in October, that was true for only 54 percent of rural households, the survey found.
That is partly because broadband is not as widely available in rural areas. The phone and cable companies that provide the bulk of broadband connections in the U.S. have been slower to build high-speed systems in places that are too sparsely populated to justify the costly network investments.
Lack of broadband availability is only part of the challenge for Washington, however – because even in places where broadband is available, not everyone subscribes. Among households that do not have broadband, the survey found, 38 percent said they don’t need it or are not interested. Twenty-six percent said it is too expensive. Only 3.6 percent said they do not subscribe because it is not available where they live.
For policymakers, Strickling said, this means that helping people see “what they are missing” is another important piece of the puzzle. Last year’s stimulus bill set aside at least $250 million for broadband adoption programs to teach people computer and Internet skills and ensure they have the equipment to get online.
Other key survey findings include:
- 89 percent of Americans with an annual household income greater than $150,000 used a broadband connection at home in October, compared with 29 percent of Americans with a household income less than $15,000.
- 67 percent of Asian Americans and 66 percent of Caucasians used broadband at home in October, compared with 46 percent of blacks and 40 percent of Hispanics.
- Home broadband usage was highest among people aged 18 to 24, at 81 percent, and lowest among people 55 and older, at 46 percent.
Source: www.physorg.com