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December 2015

Home Broadband 2015

Three notable changes relating to digital access and digital divides are occurring in the realm of personal connectivity, according to new findings from Pew Research Center surveys.

First, home broadband adoption seems to have plateaued. It now stands at 67% of Americans, down slightly from 70% in 2013, a small but statistically significant difference which could represent a blip or might be a more prolonged reality. This change moves home broadband adoption to where it was in 2012.

Second, this downtick in home high-speed adoption has taken place at the same time there has been an increase in “smartphone-only” adults – those who own a smartphone that they can use to access the internet, but do not have traditional broadband service at home. Today smartphone adoption has reached parity with home broadband adoption (68% of Americans now report that they own a smartphone), and 13% of Americans are “smartphone-only” – up from 8% in 2013. Some of the most significant changes in these adoption patterns are taking place among African Americans, those with relatively low household incomes and those living in rural areas.

Third, 15% of American adults report they have become “cord cutters” – meaning they have abandoned paid cable or satellite television service. Many of these cord cutters say that the availability of televised content from the internet and other sources is a factor in their move away from subscription television services.

Home broadband adoption: Modest decline from 2013 to 2015

Broadband adoption in the United States has experienced a modest decline in recent years, falling from 70% in 2013 to 67% in 2015. These changes in home broadband adoption are concentrated among lower- to middle-income households, rural households and African Americans. There has also been a drop in home broadband adoption among parents of children under the age of 18. 68% of Americans now have a smartphone, an increase from 55% two years ago. This increase in smartphone adoption has compensated for the downturn in home broadband adoption in two ways:

More Americans are more likely to have both means of online access (in other words, a smartphone as well as home broadband service) than was the case two years ago. As of July 2015, 55% of adults report having both a smartphone and a home broadband subscription, up from 47% in 2013.
More Americans are “smartphone-only” in 2015 than was the case in 2013. Today 13% of adults rely on their smartphone for online access at home (that is, they have a smartphone but no home broadband subscription), compared with 8% in 2013.

The consequence is that the “advanced internet access” picture, which we define as having either a smartphone or a home broadband subscription, has changed little between 2013 and 2015. Today 80% of American adults have either a smartphone or a home broadband connection, a small change from 2013, when 78% had one of these two access means.

Charter Plans $14.99 Low-Income Broadband Post Merger

Charter Communications announced it will launch a new fast-broadband service for low-income Americans within six months of concluding its pending merger with Time Warner Cable and acquisition of Bright House Networks. Charter expects the service will be available throughout its service territories within three years of close. The low-income broadband service will offer the highest speeds of any comparable offering, delivering speeds of 30/4 Mbps for $14.99 per month, Charter claims. Charter provided further details of the new low-income broadband offering as follows:

  • Eligible customers will also be able to receive promotional video service and phone bundle offerings
  • The service comes with a modem at no extra cost and free self-install
  • Eligible subscribers include families with students who participate in the National School Lunch Program and seniors 65 and older who receive Supplemental Security Income program benefits
  • Also eligible are current Charter service subscribers who meet either of the above two criteria
  • Ineligible are those with Charter/TWC/BHN broadband subscriptions within 60 days of sign-up
  • Those eligible do not need to undergo a credit check, but they must clear any bad debts with Charter, TWC and BHN

CenturyLink wants to consolidate ILEC operations in states where it has multiple operating companies

CenturyLink has asked the Federal Communications Commission for permission to merge some or all of its incumbent local exchange carrier (ILEC) operating companies to reduce the number of Study Areas in each state it serves. In an FCC filing, CenturyLink said that ILECs in each Study Area will initially be able to operate under a single tariff with uniform Transitional Intrastate Access Service, Tandem and End Office Access Service, and Dedicated Access rates (a.k.a. "Transitional Access Rates"), participate in a single statewide Federal access tariff filing, and consolidate their eligible recovery before merging. If the FCC accepts its proposal, CenturyLink expects consolidations and restructurings will initially occur in connection with the nine ILECs it operates in Louisiana.

"In Louisiana, all nine of the CenturyLink Louisiana ILECs first will consolidate their rate structures in a single tariff by March 2016 and participate in a single Federal access tariff filing on July 1, 2016," CenturyLink said. "They subsequently will be merged with and into a single corporate entity that will assume all regulatory duties pertaining to CenturyLink's provision of ILEC service in the state."

Competition and community savings

[Commentary] Minnesota has just one more month to achieve its goal of high speed Internet access available to every resident and local business. In 2010, the Legislature set a 2015 goal for universal Internet access at speeds just under the current federal broadband definition. But the state never really committed to anything more than a token effort and will fall far short.

Rather than allowing communities to decide locally on the best strategies to improve Internet access, Minnesota discourages them by requiring a supermajority vote before a community can offer telephone service. This requirement particularly harms Greater Minnesota, where mobile phones are far less reliable and telephone service plays a more important public safety role. The state should be lessening barriers to investment, not maintaining them at the behest of large cable and telephone companies. Local government strategies will play an important role in ensuring our communities can thrive in the digital age.

[Christopher Mitchell is director of the Community Broadband Networks Initiative at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance]

A Citizen's View: The Responsibility of the Media in a Democratic Society

[Commentary] The first amendment protects freedom of the press, but with freedom comes ethical responsibility. One obligation is a better balance of news and analysis. Another obligation is to balance getting the story out quickly with reporting accurately. Market share is a desirable goal but ought not to be the primary driver when errors in reporting spread faster than the corrections that come later. Still another ethical obligation is to educate, to get below the surface of events and political posturing. Too often content with a juicy headline or sound bite, the media fail to ask questions that test a candidate's thinking.

The media also have an obligation to differentiate between fact and opinion among their reporters. The distinction between "analysis" and "news" has been blurred nearly to the point of extinction, allowing reporters to push corporate or personal politics into coverage while claiming to be objective. Opinions select their facts instead of facts leading to reasoned opinions. This slipshod approach to their task has led over half of Americans to report little or no trust and confidence in the mass media.

[Terry Newell is the founder of Leadership for a Responsible Society]

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