Welcome to BroadbandCensus.com

WASHINGTON, December 7, 2009 - A new report using an innovative approach to broadband data finds that the percentage of households in the United States that have adopted high-speed internet services is 72.9 percent. The report was generated by comparing the Census blocks in which broadband is available with the number of subscribers that carriers report to the Federal Communications Commission. By linking the number of subscribers in a particular state (from FCC data) to a data-set of Census block-by-Census block tabulations of broadband availability, consultant Brian Webster believes that he is able to peg the nation-wide broadband adoption rate for homes passed at 72.9 percent. That number is about 10 percentage points higher than what other studies have found. That's not surprising - precisely because he is attempting to count adoption of homes passed, and not of the population as a whole. “That’s a difference that could have a significant impact on the decisions made to deploy broadband in the remaining un-served markets,” says Webster. One other facet to the data used in the report: the FCC data used in the report also includes mobile broadband counts, in addition to wireline broadband counts. Because a home could have two or more broadband...

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By Drew Clark, Editor, BroadbandCensus.com

WASHINGTON, November 30, 2009 - The news that the National Telecommunications and Information Administration aims to seek access to the Form 477 database is positive news -- providing that the public obtains access to the database, too. Even before the founding of BroadbandCensus.com more than two years ago, the individuals associated with the data side of BroadbandCensus.com have been urging the public disclosure of basic broadband data. We call this the Broadband SPARC: for Speeds, Prices, Availability, Reliability and Competition. In comments in July 2008, BroadbandCensus.com urged greater disclosure of this data. We repeated these comments, adding a new twist - that a National Broadband Plan must be accompanied by a National Broadband Mashup - in June 2009. As readers of BroadbandBreakfast.com are aware, Broadband Census LLC has recently split our operations between our news and events, which we publish on BroadbandBreakfast.com, and our data operations, which continues on BroadbandCensus.com. BroadbandBreakfast.com continues our tradition of reliable news reporting, as BroadbandCensus.com continues to urge disclosure and - through our mapping from publicly-available sources - create the best possible database of broadband speeds, prices, availability, reliability and competition. The news of the NTIA's interest in the Form 477...

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By Drew Clark, Editor, BroadbandCensus.com

WASHINGTON, November 19, 2009 - Today, Broadband Census News launches BroadbandBreakfast.com, a new daily web site with definitive and independent news on broadband stimulus funding, wireless internet, and the national broadband plan. This new domain, BroadbandBreakfast.com, will be used for the journalistic operations of Broadband Census News LLC -- our company's news subsidiary -- and will cover broadband technology and internet policy. Our reporters are passionate about broadband, and we aim to maintain our focus on core issues of broadband technology and internet policy. Meanwhile, the web site BroadbandCensus.com has been relaunched for the purposes of Broadband Census Data LLC: ensuring that the public has free and transparent access to basic and granular broadband information about broadband Speeds, Prices, Availability, Reliability and Competition.

Going Forward with Broadband News AND Data

In previous entries in this series of five blog posts, I’ve highlighted the history of BroadbandCensus.com. We've been leading the charge for public and transparent broadband data for more than three years. In that time, much has changed about the opportunity that we face, and our country faces, in bringing better broadband data to consumers, and to policy-makers. I’ve highlighted the history of BroadbandCensus.com's efforts...

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By Drew Clark, Editor, BroadbandCensus.com

WASHINGTON, October 30, 2009 – Over the summer, BroadbandCensus.com split our operations between the news and events that we host, and the Creative Commons database with the local broadband SPARC: the Speeds, Prices, Availability, Reliability and Competition in the local broadband marketplace. As we’ve now entered the fourth year of this saga in which BroadbandCensus.com has been leading the charge for public and transparent broadband data, much has changed about the opportunity that we face, and our country faces, in bringing better broadband data to consumers, and to policy-makers. In previous versions of this series of blog posts taking stock, I’ve highlighted our efforts to start the ball rolling on crowdsourcing broadband data, and on uniting scholars and state officials through the “Broadband Census for America” conference that we hosted  on the eve of the passage of the Broadband Data Improvement Act. Today, I’d like to speak about some of the major changes that 2009 has brought to BroadbandCensus.com – particularly as both our news and our data side have helped to set the table for the national broadband plan currently under development. In the final series of these blog posts, next week,...

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By Drew Clark, Editor, BroadbandCensus.com

WASHINGTON, September 22, 2009 – Public and transparent broadband data has now been elevated to the level of a fundamental principle, at least in the Monday speech by Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski. But it’s worth reflecting on the time – not so long ago – when the quest to collect this kind of broadband data was an unrealized vision at the losing end of a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit. On Monday, I recounted the history and aftermath of this FOIA request and lawsuit that the Center for Public Integrity filed again Kevin Martin’s FCC. In many ways, that defeat directly set the stage for the launch of BroadbandCensus.com in the fall of 2007. All this week, during One Web Week, I’m speaking about the history of BroadbandCensus.com from a personal perspective. In this series of blog posts, I’m going to speak about what we’ve been through, who we have worked with to advance the principles of public and transparent broadband data, and what we ultimately aim to achieve at BroadbandCensus.com.

• Part 1: The debate begins with the Freedom of Information Act lawsuit in 2006.
• Part 2, on One Web Day: The founding...

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By Drew Clark, Editor and Executive Director, BroadbandCensus.com

WASHINGTON, July 19, 2009 - Over at O'Reilly's Radar, Carl Malamud discusses the need for a crowdsourced national communiations census, or a broadband census. He writes:

My last tour of duty in DC was Chief Technology Officer at the Center for American Progress. One of the fun things I got to do was figure out what everybody else did, including my fellow Senior Fellows, the folks that generated most of the policy work, many of whom are now occupying senior posts in the new administration.

One of the most fascinating was Mark Lloyd. An experienced Emmy-winning television producer, communications lawyer, and community activist, Mark is the author of a well-regarded book aboutcommunications and democracy and numerous columns. He's currently at the Leadership Conference for Civil Rights.

The project Mark Lloyd was working on was a National Broadband Map to show our true communications capabilities. And, he wanted to crowd-source the map from community groups, supplementing that with census and other data from several different places to create a big mash-up. This was in 2005, around the same time Adrian Holovaty was thinking about chicagocrime.org.

Here's my reply on the O'Reilly...

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