Research

With the arrival of the peak smartphone era, users are upgrading their smartphones less frequently, and data growth is decelerating. To ensure effective spectrum management decisions, policy makers require a thorough understanding of prospective wireless broadband technologies, current trends and emerging issues. We identify three emerging issues necessary for successful telecommunication policy. Firstly, evidenced-based policy making needs to be able to measure effectively how much demand takes place where and how.

As societies and economies continue to digitize, the need to understand the digital divide beyond binary availability or adoption metrics is increasing. Understanding the quality and performance of home internet—measured by internet speeds—among different socioeconomic groups contributes to the complex digital equity landscape at a time when all U.S. states and territories are completing digital equity plans.

High-speed broadband internet access is a critically important issue for many aspects of daily life, yet populations in rural areas are often unserved or underserved with reliable internet connectivity. Expanding broadband internet coverage in rural areas may have significant economic potential, especially since it enables precision farming which in turn increases yields, particularly for row crops such as corn and soybeans.

In 2023, more than 60 bills were introduced at the state and federal level requiring greater parental consent, age restrictions, or safety-by-design measures. Half as many bills have already been introduced in the first few months of 2024. Most of these laws target youth access to online adult content and sales that are age-gated in real life. Yet some states are going further to apply age verification requirements to social media, responding to growing concerns about children’s experiences online.

This project explores three unique case studies which address digital access, affordability and adoption in  low-income multi-family housing.

High-speed Internet access is now essential for full participation in modern society. A reliable home Internet connection can have a transformative impact on a household and can lead to a wealth of previously untapped opportunities in areas like education, healthcare, employment, and civic participation. As Internet service providers (ISPs) and policymakers continue to find ways to expand high-speed broadband connectivity to all United States residents, it is essential no one is left behind.

The US population continues to age rapidly, and this aging boom has a multifold impact on the senior housing industry. Contrary to popular belief, seniors have become increasingly technology-savvy and are enthusiastic internet users. While senior residents continue to consume mainly linear/cable television, online streaming is on the rise. Seniors also increasingly use mobile applications for banking, video chatting, gaming and engaging with their local community.

County Health Rankings & Roadmaps' (CHR&R) 2024 National Findings Report highlights the importance of civic infrastructure and spaces to connect and be informed, with a focus on access to local news, broadband internet and public libraries. CHR&R calls attention to structural barriers like policies, laws and practices that can create obstacles to forms of participation such as voting and worker unionizing. Key findings include:

This report quantifies the size of the nation’s wireless infrastructure sector, including purpose-built cellular towers, indoor and outdoor small cells, macrocell sectors, annual infrastructure spending, and the American jobs that sustain this resource. Key statistics include:

Using a 2003–2019 dataset on broadband adoption in Algeria, we explore its pattern and the market structure, institutional, and socio-economic factors that influenced its pace, which was considerably delayed due to political and social instability during the decade of the 1990s. We propose an integrative model selection approach that simultaneously searches for the best diffusion model among the Bass, Gompertz, and Logistic diffusion models, as well as relevant explanatory variables.