Welcome to BroadbandCensus.com

By Lou Carlozo, Special Correspondent, BroadbandCensus.com

CHICAGO, November 18, 2009 - The title of Wednesday’s panel at the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners sounded militant enough: “Broadband Plan of Attack.” Yet the speakers on hand gave the distinct impression that across public, private and academic sectors, conclusive battle plans remain to be drawn. Regulators from Washington, telecom providers and researchers agree that the push forward for wider broadband access remains both a certainty and an imperative. Yet not everyone seems to be dancing the same step just yet—a fact reflected in the frank appraisal of Robert Curtis, director of deployment for the national broadband plan at the Federal Communications Commission. While the FCC is closing gaps in its broadband plan, “There’s a heavy push to get from where we are to where we want to be in the next couple of months. I’d encourage anyone who has any input to get involved now,” said Curtis. “There’s evidence of a significant economic bottleneck, particularly between the second mile and middle mile. And there’s a middle mile gap, particularly in rural areas, where we might have broadband available, but not everyone has access to it.” Curtis added: “There’s also a last mile gap in the...

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WASHINGTON, November 2, 2009 - Stephen Liu, the designer and architect of Cisco System’s myPlanNet and a senior marketing manager at Cisco, discussed the company's new computer game that puts the common man in the shoes of the broadband executive. Edited excerpt of his interview with Winter Casey, Reporter, BroadbandCensus.com, are as follows: Q: What sparked the development of myPlanNet? A: This was actually a result of an internal contest to inspire innovation in marketing. For me, it was a cool and fun way to illustrate just how far the communications have changed over 25 years and how people's lives have shifted as a result. Remember life before cell phones or when you connected to the Internet on demand vs. it just always being on? We had some fun reminiscing on those nostalgic times when creating this. Q: How long has it been in the works? It was released in October, correct? A: This has been a side project for a small team of people at Cisco for about one year. Q: Why did Cisco do the project? Did it by any chance want to get at some of the most pressing issues/debates at the time? A: There are a lot of reasons. For one, it's educational....

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By Winter Casey, Reporter, BroadbandCensus.com

WASHINGTON, November 2, 2009 – Cisco Systems has released a new computer game that puts the common man in the shoes of a broadband executive making deployment decisions. The company’s myPlanNet game attempts to make broadband deployment easy to understand – and perhaps forces broadband activists to walk in the shoes of the network executive grappling with tough issues like the underserved and Net neutrality. As a service provider in Cisco’s myPlanNet, the player manages his or her business as it evolves from the stone ages of dial-up, through the broadband and mobile connected eras, and into what it calls “the dawning of the medianet age.” Liu said the game starts out in 1990 and goes on for 25 years, looking ahead – a bit – into the future six years. The game does not make  an overt attempt to reference the federal government’s broadband stimulus funding – or the national broadband plan currently under development by the Federal Communications Commission. But players – a/k/a broadband service providers – are forced to grapple with thorny questions like network neutrality. “Certainly network neutrality is one of the topics that is addressed in the game,” Stephen Liu, the designer and architect...

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From BroadbandCensus.com Weekly Report

WASHINGTON, July 27, 2009 – The National Broadband Plan took a Great Leap Forward last week as the Federal Communications Communication accepted reply comments on Tuesday (first-round filings were due June 8) in its mammoth proceeding. By February 17, 2010, the FCC is charged with producing this national plan, and it appears to be taking this responsibility very seriously. FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski has recruited Blair Levin, himself a contender for the top FCC slot, to run this plan, and the agency appears to be gearing up to run full steam through August with a series of public workshops. In the reply comments filed last week, a divide was apparent between providers, who urged the FCC to be cautious in its scope, and tech companies and content providers who appeared to be the agency’s key cheerleaders in its ambition to bring cheap, universal broadband throughout the nation. [more...]

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Subscribers may download the BroadbandCensus.com Weekly Report below. [private_monthly] broadband-census-weekly-report_7-27-09 [/private_monthly] [private_yearly] broadband-census-weekly-report_7-27-09 [/private_yearly] If you are not a subscriber, you may sign up for a 4 week free trialRead More »

BroadbandCensus.com Executive Director Drew Clark to Co-Chair Working Group with Robert Atkinson of Information Technology & Innovation Foundation; Other Groups Announced

Press Release

WASHINGTON, January 10, 2009 - The National Broadband Strategy "Call to Action" on Friday announced the co-chairs of six working groups that are seeking to craft national policies to help promote universal broadband throughout the United States. BroadbandCensus.com Executive Director Drew Clark will co-chair the working group on "Metrics" together with Robert Atkinson, President of the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation. Since its launch in January 2008, BroadbandCensus.com has been at the forefront of ensuring that information about local broadband deployment, competition, speeds and quality of service is available and publicly usable. The Information Technology and Innovation Foundation think tank has been been a key player in the effort to formulate and promote public policies advancing technological innovation and productivity. The National Broadband Strategy initiative has has been described as "an unprecedented display of consensus, a broad and diverse array of groups concerned about America's broadband future," and an effort aimed at "providing President-elect Obama and the incoming Congress a policy framework for a comprehensive national broadband strategy." The Working Group on "Metrics" has the following charge:

Timely, accurate,...

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News

By Drew Clark, Editor, BroadbandCensus.com

WASHINGTON, December 2 – A total of 55 companies and non-profit organizations, including major corporate entities such as AT&T, Cisco Systems, Google, Intel and Verizon Communications, have signed on to a “call to action for a national broadband strategy.” The document has been crafted by a wide range of parties over the past year under the stewardship of James Baller, senior principal of the Baller Herbst Law Group, and the final version was released late Monday. Verizon was a last-minute addition to the group of signatories, having joined the list in between the first and the second public versions e-mailed by Baller. Among the major trade groups that signed on to the “call to action” were the wireless association CTIA, the Telecommunications Industry Association, and the National Cable and Telecommunications Association, the Utilities Telecom Council, and the Wireless Communications Associations International Among the major non-profit groups include American Library Association, Communications Workers of America, EDUCAUSE, Free Press, OneEconomy, Connected Nation, Internet2, Media Access Project, the National Association of Telecommunications Officers and Advisors, the New America Foundation and Public Knowledge. BroadbandCensus.com is also a signatory to the “call to action.” Baller released the final version in anticipation of a 10 a.m....

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News

Editor’s Note: The following story was published in TR Daily on September 26, 2008, and is reprinted with the permission of Telecommunications Reports International, Inc. Notwithstanding the fact that content on the BroadbandCensus.com web site is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial License, this article is and remains Copyright 2008 Telecommunications Reports International, Inc.

By Carrie DeLeon, Telecommunications Reports

A national broadband infrastructure fund should include the involvement of state regulators and focus not only on the extension of broadband service into unserved areas, but also on the adoption rate of broadband service by consumers, according to California Public Utilities Commissioner Rachelle Chong. During a keynote address this morning at the Broadband Census for America Conference in Washington, Commissioner Chong advocated for the implementation of a national broadband infrastructure fund, and suggested that the Universal Service Fund be reformed to shift the focus from traditional wireline to advanced services. “More assertive national leadership on broadband policy is not only necessary, but critical,” Commissioner Chong said. In addition, the former FCC regulator said that while some states, including California, have been successful in their efforts to map broadband data, a national mapping of broadband data could be helpful to states by enabling them to compare their...

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Key Academics, State Officials and Broadband Data Collectors to Speak

Embassy of Ireland to Give Luncheon Keynote Address on Publicly-Available Broadband Data

Coverage of the Broadband Census for America Conference

• Broadband Census for America Conference Web Site
• Tvol's Flickr photostream of the Broadband Census for America Conference
• "Propriety Data Cited as Challenge for Broadband Mapping," by Lynn Stanton, TR Reports
• "Regulators, Officials Debate Need for National Broadband Policy, Fund," by Carrie DeLeon, TR Reports
• "Service Providers Should Report Better Metrics, Panelists Say," by Scott Sleek, Broadband Advisory Services, Pike & Fischer
• "U.S. Copes with Broadband Statistics Void," IP Democracy
• "Guessing at data," Susan Crawford's blog
• "Experts call for broadband transparency,"by Maya Prabhu, ESchool News
• American Library Association District Dispatch

For Immediate Release

WASHINGTON, September 8, 2008 – Many of the nation’s foremost broadband policy-makers and experts will analyze and discuss best practices for improving the collection and sharing of public data about high-speed internet access at the Broadband Census for America Conference in Washington, D.C., on Friday, September 26, 2008. Panelists at the half-day conference include Rachelle Chong, California Public Utility Commissioner; broadband data pioneer Professor Kenneth Flamm...

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