Peggy Braffet and her husband think about broadband a lot. When guests show up to their pick-your-own berry farm, they sometimes expect to be able to pay with credit cards, but the Braffets' slow internet connection won't allow it.
In a far cry from the early 2000s, most US adults today say they use the internet (95%), have a smartphone (90%) or subscribe to high-speed internet at home (80%), according to a Pew Research Center survey conducted May 19 to Sept. 5, 2023. Though adoption of these technologies has surged over the past two decades, there are notable differences by age, household income and educational attainment. There are large gaps between the lowest- and highest-income Americans in whether they have a broadband subscription.
CEO's from Meta, Snap, X, TikTok, and Discord testified in a contentious and emotional Senate hearing on child online safety. Lawmakers invoked the stories of online child abuse victims—many of whom sat directly behind the tech leaders—to issue a stunning rebuke to Meta's Mark Zuckerberg and other executives.
Precision agriculture involves collecting, analyzing, and taking actions based on data.
It’s always been a hassle when a business loses broadband. But in the last few years, an increasing number of businesses have been telling me that they are practically immobilized when they lose broadband. This is because businesses, especially small and medium businesses, increasingly rely on software in the cloud. So many day-to-day functions, from timekeeping and payroll systems, reservation systems, to online sales portals, now require a broadband connection. This has made businesses become hyper-aware of broadband outages.
It seems cable internet providers are still lagging behind in customer satisfaction, especially when it comes to cost. In a 2024 CableTV survey, the best major internet service providers for overall satisfaction were either fiber or wireless providers, those being Google Fiber, T-Mobile, Verizon and AT&T.
During the fourth quarter 2023, the top three wireless operators in the US reported a total of 1.78 million new postpaid phone subscribers. How can each carrier report growth in postpaid phone subscribers each quarter in a country whose population is not growing very much? Recon Analytics Analyst Roger Entner said that question is top-of-mind among the operators, who pay Recon substantial sums of money for survey data to try and figure out the answers.
Tracking broadband funding awards as they happen. In January 2024:
The fate of the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP) remains unknown, but with the Federal Communications Commission scheduled to halt new enrollments in February, internet service providers are thinking about how a shutdown would impact the consumers relying on the subsidy. Some of the bigger companies like AT&T, Comcast and Verizon, said on their earnings calls they have backup plans if the ACP goes away. But what do the regional and rural providers think about the situation?
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