Internet/Broadband

Rural communities with high levels of poverty and lack of access to internet could be undercounted in the 2020 U. S. Census, according to a report. Researchers at the Carsey School of Public Policy at the University of New Hampshire have identified numerous steps the Census Bureau can take to improving census collection in rural areas. Reporter author William O’Hare’s warning is based on likely limits to budgets for Census operations and a change in methodology. The Census will rely more on the internet for data collection.

[Commentary] This blog reviews some specious claims made in Federal Communications Commission Commissioner Mignon Clyburn's statement on network neutrality.

The fiercest advocates for network neutrality are readying a new war in the nation’s capital, hoping to restore the rules that the Trump administration just eliminated — and galvanize a new generation of younger, web-savvy voters in the process. Not even a month after the Federal Communications Commission voted to scrap its requirement that internet providers treat all web traffic equally, an armada of tech startups, consumer activists and state attorneys general are preparing to take the agency to court.

The Federal Communications Commission is about to hold an auction used to dole out grants to companies to build internet in rural America. But now, a bunch of items are off the block: Companies and co-ops, big or small, will no longer be able to apply for money to build internet infrastructure in many of these regions, because Big Telecom says there’s already internet there.

Federal regulators may have opted to toss network neutrality rules in Dec, but opponents of the repeal are looking to extend the fight for a free and open internet well into the new year. One of the most outspoken supporters of net neutrality on Capitol Hill, Sen Ed Markey (D-MA) is spearheading an effort to overturn the Federal Communications Commission’s “misguided and partisan” decision using the Congressional Review Act. The day of the commission’s vote, he announced plans to introduce a joint resolution that would undo the repeal and reinstate open internet rules.

AT&T was sued by a workers' union that is trying to stop the company from instituting what it calls a "massive layoff." Thousands of employees are reportedly being laid off by the company, which reported $39.7 billion in revenue and $6.4 billion in operating income last quarter.

In most of the Twin Cities, where about 60 percent of Minnesotans live, the internet is oxygen — at once ubiquitous and unnoticed. But for somewhere between 10 and 20 percent of Minnesotans, according to recent estimates, the internet is still ephemeral.  The state has been involved in broadband since the Gov Tim  Pawlenty (R-MN) era. There is an Office of Broadband Development, and a Minnesota Ultra High-Speed Broadband Task Force, and Border-to-Border Broadband grants that have supported community efforts to get high-speed internet with $65.58 million in the last three years.

On December 21, 2017, the National League of Cities sent a letter to the chair of the Federal Communications Commission's Broadband Deployment Advisory Committee concerning filings made by a number of local government associations on broadband deployment. The NLC highlighted four points from the filings:

The city council in Fort Collins (CO) on Jan 2 voted to move ahead with a municipal fiber broadband network providing gigabit speeds, two months after the cable industry failed to stop the project. The city council vote came after residents of Fort Collins approved a ballot question that authorized the city to build a broadband network. The ballot question, passed in November, didn't guarantee that the network would be built because city council approval was still required, but that hurdle is now cleared.

[Commentary] Does the elimination of network neutrality threaten religious speech? Should Congress cement into law the right to equal access on the World Wide Web?