What the first broadband stimulus awards tell us about how to win

It is too soon to say how well the first broadband stimulus fund awards will represent the awards that follow (they represent less than 10% of the first-round funds, and the rules may change for the second round), but given how publicly the White House touted these first picks, it would seem they're intended to be exemplary, to some degree, of what the administration wants in an applicant. Assuming that's true, what do these early winners tell us about how to win broadband stimulus funds?

1) Middle-mile projects took two thirds of the nearly $183 million in awards announced on Thursday and 70% of the funds devoted to broadband infrastructure.

2) The vast majority of broadband infrastructure funds went to private telecom service providers.

3) Public/private partnerships.

4) The vast majority of projects that won funding were contained (or mostly contained) within a single state.

5) Don't panic over protests. Program administrators had promised that it wouldn't be easy for challengers to disqualify stimulus applications, and they may be making good on that promise. More than one of the projects that won funding was opposed by companies claiming to already serve the area in question.