Documentary explores challenges and alternatives to getting sorely needed Internet infrastructure

Rob Osborn of Sacramento, California-based shibuya-tv, LLC has released his long awaited documentary, Broadband Blindness, that discusses the challenge of building adequate digital infrastructure to deliver premises Internet connectivity to meet exponentially growing bandwidth demand.

Also covered are alternative business models to construct the necessary infrastructure to customer premises including telecom cooperatives such as the one I formed in my community, the Camino Fiber Network Cooperative.

Google's fiber to the premise "experiment" a would be broadband game changer

Nearly three years ago, I predicted Internet-protocol content providers and aggregators fed up with trying to pump their product over legacy telecommunications infrastructure dominated by telcos and cable companies would acquire or build their own infrastructure to reach consumers. It's an expected outcome of a conflict between the content providers' needs for ever increasing bandwidth and the telco/cable companies' need to conserve capital expenditures and place incremental limits on bandwidth consistent with their service offerings in which consumers pay increasingly higher rates for more bandwidth. The content providers want unlimited bandwidth delivered over big pipes. But the business model of the telco/cable duopoly is based on making bandwidth a restricted scarce commodity delivered over little pipes.

So it was no surprise when Google -- which has reportedly been quietly buying up fiber left dark after the dot com bust of a decade ago -- announced this week it would build an experimental alternative business model that would bring advanced telecommunications to consumers over a really big pipe: fiber optic infrastructure to the premises capable of throughput of 1 gigabyte per second.

Google is also clearly holding itself as an alternative to the Obama administration's program to build out open access broadband infrastructure subsidized by more than $4 billion set aside in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) President Obama signed into law nearly one year ago.

The timing of Google's announcement of its fiber infrastructure test program is also worth noting and shows the company is looking to make a statement. The window for applications for the second round of ARRA broadband infrastructure subsidies opens less than a week after Google's announcement. The deadline set by Google for local governments and communities to nominate themselves for Google's experimental fiber build closes the week after the ARRA funding round application window closes as well the deadline for the Federal Communications Commission to submit a plan to Congress to achieve universal U.S. broadband access as required by the ARRA.

While the federal agencies that will hand out the ARRA infrastructure subsidies have made assurances the money will soon begin flowing in earnest, doubts have emerged due to numerous challenges filed against proposed projects by the same incumbent providers Google wants to go around. Google likely figured amid that uncertainty, the timing was right to make its announcement.

With its self described "experimental" fiber to the premises model, Google may also be trying to debunk skeptics who believe fiber to the premises simply costs too much to deploy. That high cost has been cited as the main impediment standing in the way of investment in the fiber to the premises infrastructure that was to have been at the doorstep of every American home by 2006. If Google can show the cost assumptions upon which the business models of the incumbent legacy providers are based are wrong, then the entire game is changed overnight. That potentially puts America on course to catch up to where it should have been four years ago and where it needs to be for the future.

A broadband farce in the UK countryside

Here's an appalling story from the British countryside that has some parallels in America where folks stuck on dial up or forced to suck a satellite have been given similar stratospheric broadband price quotes (and no stock or options) from incumbent telcos and cable providers. This story also illustrates the need for the UK to ditch its outmoded, copper cable plant that relies on highly constrained "little broadband" DSL.

Looks like the village of Dufton is a representative outpost deep in the UK "broadband desert" recently lamented by Prince Charles.

Report recognizes lack of broadband access in "non urban" areas of U.S.

When it comes to discussing advanced telecommunications infrastructure, one of my major peeves is the frequent over generalization of the United States into just two categories -- urban and rural -- as if it were still the early 20th century when electric power or other utilities bypassed entire rural counties and regions before they were built out.

In the case of advanced telecom infrastructure, it's far more granular than that. It can be available on one street or road -- even in the burbs -- but not on the next. Indeed, many visitors find this blog after a search query on the vexing question of why they're stuck on dialup while a nearby neighbor can get wireline broadband.

So it's heartening to see that this recently issued forecast by The Insight Research Corporation despite its "urban vs. rural" dichotomy gives some degree of recognition that of an estimated 12 million households in the U.S. that lack access to broadband, not all are confined to rural areas. Some are situated in "non urban" areas, i.e. outlying suburbs, exurbs and less densely populated portions of metropolitan regions.

Here's the relevant excerpt:

While the exact number of households that do not have access to broadband service is unknown, even to the government, INSIGHT estimates that at least 12 million rural and non-urban market households do not have access to any broadband service due to the lack of supporting terrestrial infrastructure.

Insight estimates that with a minimum cost of $1,500 per household, it would cost in excess of $18 billion to build out advanced telecom infrastructure to serve them.

Second NOFA for broadband stimulus funds should include seed funding for telecom coops

Cooperatives are in the news a lot this week. Specifically, health care cooperatives as a more politically palatable alternative to a Medicare- like government insurance "public option" plan that is generating a lot of controversy as Congress crafts an overhaul of private U.S. health care finance.

Sen. Kent Conrad (D-N.D.) is currently fleshing out the concept, which would reportedly include about $6 billion in seed funding to help the health care cooperatives get up and running.

As the National Telecommunications and Information Administraiton (NTIA) and the Department of Agriculture's Rural Utilities Service (RUS) prepare the Notice of Funds Availability (NOFA) for the second round of federal economic stimulus subsidies for broadband infrastructure this fall, they should include a similar provision for telecom consumer coops. Getting adequate funding and/or loan guarantees to cover the not insignificant cost of experts and consultants to put together a preliminary network design and business case analysis/long range business plan in time to meet the NOFA application deadline can be an insurmountable hurdle for coops that might otherwise propose solid plans to better connect areas that are unserved or underserved when it comes to broadband.

The guidelines for the first NOFA (applications are due this week) allowed for up to five percent of project planning costs to be refunded -- but only if the project is approved. However, that creates a Catch-22 for coops since they can't even develop a proposal that meets the NOFA requirements without these costs covered at the outset, which means a lot of potentially meritorious projects could fall by the wayside.

The second NOFA should include a preliminary step to allow telecom coops that have or have applied for 501(c)(12) tax exempt status to apply for grant funding or loan guarantees to cover project planning costs on the condition that they engage qualified consultants on an arms-length basis and put forth a good faith effort to complete the work within a relatively short period of time (60 days, for example).

They would then have to propose their projects immediately thereafter if the planning work shows the proposed project would meet the NOFA guidelines and be economically sustainable. If the project turns out not to be so based on preliminary design and business planning, that would give coops the opportunity to tweak their proposals to comply with the guidelines or drop them, saving both them and the federal agencies the time and effort of reviewing unfeasible proposals.

Full disclosure: Your blogger is founder and president of a startup telecom cooperative in El Dorado County, California.

Obama official: Half full broadband glass "will guarantee economic stagnation and decline."

This quote is from Susan Crawford, a member of President Barack Obama's National Economic Council, via internetnews.com:

"I assure you that the administration at the highest levels really is interested in broadband and cares about this national broadband plan," Crawford said.

"It's true that access to broadband doesn't guarantee economic success, but lack of access to broadband will guarantee economic stagnation and decline."

Regional alliance encompassing 3 states eyes U.S. broadband stimulus funding

Broadband access has moved beyond a metropolitan issue to one of regional importance among officials of three states representing 15 counties in northern Illinois, southern Wisconsin and eastern Iowa, BusinessRockford.com reports.

The Tri-State Alliance was initially formed to address asphalt and concrete highway issues and has now broadened its focus to the information highway that is broadband telecommunications. It's interested in tapping into some of the $7.2 billion set aside in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act to subsidize broadband infrastructure.

Broadband black holes: Not just a rural issue

One of the most persistently inaccurate and misleading portrayals of U.S. broadband availability is that broadband black holes are confined to rural areas. Unfortunately for those marooned within them, they can be found in plenty of other places due to telco deployments of technologically limited DSL that deteriorates just a few miles from a central office or remote terminal -- and less than that if the copper cable isn't in pristine condition.

Case in point is part of the Northern California suburb of Vacaville, located not far from Interstate 80 west of the college town of Davis. AT&T is requesting a 40 percent subsidy from the California Public Utilities Commission's California Advanced Services Fund (CASF) to extend wireline broadband to 33 households in this area as one of five AT&T CASF projects up for consideration Thursday by the CPUC.

These projects -- designated for "underserved" areas where residents can't get broadband of at least 3 Mbs down and 1 Mbs on the upload side -- are being trumpeted by the CPUC as helping close Golden State's digital divide. But given their small size -- ranging from just five households for the smallest to 125 for the largest -- there's a danger this will make the CPUC look like it's putting out AT&T PR puffery.

4 of 5 proposed California state subsidized broadband projects challenged

Since the California Public Utilities Commission began accepting proposals last year for broadband infrastructure projects eligible for 40 percent subsidies from the CPUC's California Advanced Services Fund (CASF), about four out of five of 30 projects proposed to date have not been approved.

The reason, according to a recently issued CPUC resolution as well as other documentation posted on the CPUC's Web site is they were challenged by unnamed providers on the grounds they didn't comply with CASF funding guidelines targeting unserved areas (no broadband access) and underserved areas of the Golden State (broadband access at speeds less than 3 mbs down and 1 mbs up).

There's a lesson here as the federal government revs up its own plans for subsidizing broadband infrastructure buildout: avoid going down this slippery, ever changing slope of throughput requirements and attempting to define what constitutes served, unserved and underserved when it comes to advanced IP-based services.

These metrics are simply too subjective and prone to being manipulated and gamed by providers, particularly incumbent local exchange carriers (ILECs) more interested in preserving their territorial hegemony than serving their customers' telecommunications needs.

The better course is to allow entities such as local governments and telecommunications cooperatives with priority for federal broadband economic stimulus funding determine for themselves where infrastructure buildout is most needed. Most of these entities will likely opt for fiber and avoid the issue of throughput speeds altogether given fiber's tremendous capacity to accommodate current and future bandwidth requirements.

Using U.S. economic stimulus funding for native fiber backbone and FTTH

Good piece in Network World today on using federal stimulus funding for fiber build out, both for native backbone and over the last mile. The article also touches on a point that's problematic in mainstream media coverage of broadband access: covering the issue exclusively along urban and rural lines as if it were still 1950. U.S. settlement patterns have changed substantially since then, with many Americans migrating to the exurbs, penturbs and semi-rural areas filled with broadband black holes. Here's the relevant excerpt:

In addition to building fiber backbones in rural areas, some ISPs also think that subsidizing fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) connections would be feasible for certain rural areas that have relatively high population densities. Patrick Knorr, the COO of cable and broadband provider Sunflower Broadband, says there are some suburban communities in his vicinity that have been sprouting up in rural areas that would have enough population density to justify building out FTTH infrastructure.

"Fiber to the home, like a lot of wire-based solutions, is cost intensive," he says. "But it is cheaper than DSL or coaxial cables. Fiber works better over long distances because it doesn't require as much maintenance as a lot of other technologies. The issue is that there is a significant initial infrastructure cost, which is why there should be opportunities for subsidies to build FTTH in areas that otherwise wouldn't be able to access fiber service."

The article also discusses the downside of Broadband over Power Lines (BPL), which in the opinion of this blogger isn't deserving of either investment capital or federal stimulus subsidies.

Analyst calls it wrong: DOCSIS doesn't support U.S. policy to expand broadband access

This MSNBC item quotes from an analysis by Pike & Fisher:

The Silver Spring, Md.-based research house also predicts that DOCSIS 3.0 will garner a lot of support from government officials distributing funds from the economic stimulus package.

"Considering the massive bandwidth increases that will be enabled by upgrading DOCSIS 2.0 to 3.0, the government is likely to view DOCSIS 3.0 as a most feasible and affordable near-term solution to perceived bandwidth scarcities," says P&F Chief Analyst Tim McElgunn, who authored the report.

This analysis is fatally flawed and reflects a major misapprehension of U.S. government policy. That policy is to expand broadband access -- and not to subsidize efforts by cable cable operators to increase their throughput speeds.

The issue with cable providers isn't that their broadband throughput is lacking for current needs. Rather it's the limited footprints of their local access networks that were planned decades ago when they served as single purpose TV delivery platforms that are no longer revelevant to current build out of homes and businesses that could benefit from their IP-based advanced services including high speed Internet and VOIP (Voice over Internet Protocol).

Irony abounds in comments by U.S. representative, telco and cable reps on broadband stimulus funding

A highly interesting item appears in today's PC World. It reports on a telephone town hall conversation yesterday between a Tennessee resident and her Congressional representative, Representative Marsha Blackburn (R). It's an encounter to which many U.S. residents will readily relate.

The hapless constituent is stuck on dialup just one mile inside a broadband black hole event horizon. Repeated pleas to an unidentified broadband provider to roll out broadband service produced nothing and the constituent's patience has worn thin.

Blackburn responded by asserting the market would deliver if only more folks in the displeased constituent's neighborhood demanded broadband. Thus, Blackburn reportedly said, the $7.2 billion in subsidies and loan guarantees in the recently enacted federal economic stimulus legislation for broadband deployment to rural and other underserved areas are unnecessary since the market will solve the problem. That's patently incorrect as petitions by residents and small businesses to providers -- so called demand aggregation -- don't convince providers to deploy broadband infrastructure that their proprietary algorithms reject as economically unfeasible.

Ironically enough, Blackburn was disabused of her misapprehension that a competitive market exists in the natural monopoly -- and a duopoly at best -- that is wireline telecommunications service by representatives of two prominent members of the telco/cable duopoly at a panel discussion hosted by the Free State Foundation.

Thomas Tauke, executive vice president for policy at Verizon, pointed to market failure where the costs of providing service go beyond what providers like Verizon are willing to pay. Many of the areas without broadband are "very expensive to reach," PC World quoted Tauke as saying. Accordingly, Tauke added, broadband infrastructure subsidies such as provided in the stimulus legislation are entirely appropriate. The broadband funding in the stimulus measure also drew positive comment from Joseph Waz, senior vice president for external affairs at Comcast, who told the panel its inclusion is "very heartening."

That adds another layer of irony insofar as the big telcos and cablcos have gone on record elsewhere complaining the broadband funding provides little incentive for them to build out their infrastructures, arguing tax breaks would get infrastructure build out faster than grants or loan guarantees. They also object to the open access provisions attached to the stimulus funding.

Stimulus measure's broadband funding could spell economic opportunity

NetworkWorld published a piece today examining the potential economic impact of the $7.2 billion earmarked for grants and loan guarantees to finance the construction of broadband telecommunications infrastructure.

The article discusses how broadband access may effectively stimulate entire towns and regions by supporting businesses and jobs that might not otherwise locate there. In the larger scheme, broadband has the potential to more evenly distribute economic activity and population across the United States among major metro regions and less populated areas.

Here's an excerpt:

Asked whether the stimulus plan could mean call centers such as those in Mumbai could start showing up in central Kansas, Settles said, "It depends on how fast the stimulus works, but there is pent-up demand in the U.S. for broadband. If a company wanted to expand a business, broadband could decide if they go to rural Kansas rather than Milwaukee and would be a driver to get a company to open a business in a smaller community with less overhead. Generally, it might still be cheaper to go abroad, but broadband would help companies afford to build not just call centers but IT service operations."

Opening such businesses in the U.S instead of abroad would certainly lessen "administrative hassles," he added.

California broadband nonprofit hopes for share of federal economic stimulus dollars

The California Emerging Technology Fund (CETF), a San Francisco-based nonprofit that helps fund projects to improve broadband access in California using $60 million in seed funding provided by AT&T and Verizon as a condition of the telcos' recent M&A activity, is hoping to get additional funding from the federal economic stimulus legislation.

Expected to be finalized this month, the legislation calls for between $6 billion and $9 billion (House and Senate versions of the legislation, respectively) in grants, loans and tax credits to fund the build out of wireline and wireless broadband telecommunications infrastructure. The administration of President Barack Obama has characterized the broadband stimulus funding as a down payment toward the administration's overall goal of providing universal access to broadband throughout the U.S.

"We want California to be poised to take optimum advantage of the stimulus package," CETF President and CEO Sunne Wright McPeak said at the CETF's Sacramento Regional Broadband Roundtable hosted today by the Sacramento Area Council of Governments as well as several other local institutions. "We want this region to be well deployed."

If it receives federal stimulus funding this year, CETF's role subsidizing the deployment of broadband infrastructure could overshadow that of the California Public Utilities Commission. The CPUC's $100 million California Advanced Services Fund provides a 40 percent match to subsidize broadband infrastructure build out but has not attracted the level of interest hoped for by regulators.

The 3-hour roundtable discussion was attended by about 70 people representing a wide variety of individuals and organizations with an interest in expanding broadband access, applications and adoption.

El Dorado County was well represented by Carol Anne Ogdin representing El Dorado County Supervisor Ray Nutting, Woodrow Deloria of the El Dorado County Transportation Commission, Jason Harm of the El Dorado County Office of Education, Tom Straling of the El Dorado County IT Department and your blogger.

I was pleased at McPeak's obvious zeal to get broadband infrastructure deployed as quickly as possible to enable the various applications and associated beneficial impacts discussed at the event including reducing transportation demand through telework and online commerce -- a clear benefit in this era of constrained transportation funding and strapped county budgets -- and allowing remote medical consultations for individuals living in rural areas who lack easy access to medical providers and specialists. McPeak and her staff clearly understand a salient point raised by Ogdin: that it's far cheaper (and greener) to move bytes than bodies.

Congress should reject telco whining over broadband requirements in economic stimulus measure

Economic stimulus legislation on a congressional fast track that would allocate $6 billion (House version) and $9 billion (Senate version) for broadband telecommunications infrastructure build out to underserved areas is unsurprisingly eliciting whining from the big telcos.

Industry representatives and think tanks that front for them complain the measures' minimum connectivity speed requirements for wireline and wireless service to underserved areas as well as open access requirements would not dispose them to applying for broadband infrastructure grants, loans and loan guarantees.

What they want instead are tax breaks just as telcos received under the 1996 Communications Act that was to have brought broadband to all Americans in a decade's time. Bottom line: business as usual. Continued proprietary (and geographically limited and underpowered) DSL access over crappy, aging (depreciating from the telcos' perspective) copper cable, maintaining wireless Internet connectivity at or below the less than impressive capabilities of current deployments and continuing to tell millions of Americans to go suck a satellite or live in dial up purgatory.

Congress should reject these whiners that have led the U.S on a race to the bottom when it comes to advanced IP-based telecommunications services. The telcos propagated a broadband boondoogle with the 1996 Communications Act. Broadband access is too important to allow them to repeat the fiasco.

Maintaining open access requirements in the stimulus legislation will assist local governments and citizens by providing seed funding to form their own fiber cooperatives. That will allow them to break free of the telco/cable duopoly that has failed to provide them adequate broadband access for their current and future needs.

Fiber infrastructure build out -- not throughput speed-- should be focus of planned stimulus funding

The Washington Post reports today a debate is brewing over how broadband should be defined under the incoming Obama administration's goal to fund new broadband telecommunications infrastructure as part of its planned economic stimulus package. Specifically, the debate is over what level of throughput defines broadband.

Throughput speed is not the issue. Building out fiber optic infrastructure over the local access network -- the so-called "last mile" -- is. Fiber provides a proven, future proof technology that can accommodate the rapidly increasing demand for bandwidth needed by video and other bandwidth-intensive applications. Art Brodsky of Public Knowledge correctly observes in the Post article that providing stimulus funding to telcos for increasingly obsolete metal wire-based broadband services would turn into a wasteful boondoggle.

History supports Brodsky's warning. The bell companies that today comprise AT&T, Verizon and Qwest were to have built out their networks with the tax incentives provided more than a decade ago under the Telecommunications Act of 1996 to provide fiber connections to all homes and businesses by 2006. They didn't. Consequently, the U.S. suffers with incomplete telecom networks that leave millions unable to get decent Internet access more than a decade after the law's enactment. Repeating this error would ignite a race to the bottom and leave the U.S. even further behind other developed nations when it comes to broadband Internet access and modern IP-based telecommunications services.

Rather than large telcos and cable companies, economic stimulus funding should be directed to local entities including for profit companies, nonprofit cooperatives and local governments to construct fiber optic infrastructure over the critical but long neglected last mile.

Study estimates tax incentives for fiber to the premises would create more than half million jobs over 3 years

The Fiber to the Home Council commissioned a study issued this week that concludes tax incentives to spur the deployment of fiber optics to the premises (FTTP) would generate more than 200,000 jobs in each of the next three years (2009-11) and increase economic output by more than $100 billion during the period. The report examines the economic impact of allowing builders of broadband infrastructure to fully depreciate their investments and authorizing private and public entities to issue bonds that feature federal income tax credits to help cover the outlay for the deployments.

The report's release is apparently timed in hopes it will be considered as part of a massive federal economic stimulus and infrastructure construction measure being readied by Congress for President-elect Barack Obama's signature soon after he takes office later this month.

The report cites data compiled by Morgan Stanley estimating the U.S. residential broadband penetration rate at approximately 56 percent of all households, projected to grow to 61.1 percent by 2011. Without the proposed tax incentives, an average of 7.3 million homes (equal to six percent of all households) will lack broadband access from 2009 through 2011 without the proposed tax incentives, the study concludes citing Morgan Stanley estimates.

What's odd about the study considering it was done for an organization promoting the use of fiber is that it also examines the effect of tax incentives directed at upgrading and building out existing metal wire-based cable and telco DSL infrastructure offering throughput of 5 Mbs down and 1 Mbs up.

As this blog recently asserted, federal incentives and funding should be targeted to local private and public sector entities with the specific goal of modernizing telecommunications infrastructure over the last mile. History has shown that tax and other financial incentives put in place as part of the federal Telecommunications Act of 1996 failed to provide adequate impetus for large incumbent telcos to build out broadband infrastructure to serve all homes and businesses, leading to the current problem of widespread and persistent broadband black holes.

Guiding principles for U.S. broadband infrastructure economic stimulus

As Congressional leaders and the incoming administration of U.S. President-elect Barack Obama mull economic stimulus legislation including a portion of which is expected to be devoted to telecommunications infrastructure to boost broadband Internet access, I offer these guiding principles:

1. The focus should be on the so-called "last mile" or local access network portion of the system. There's a broad consensus that the lack of adequate broadband access in the United States is due to technological shortcomings on this segment of the telecommunications infrastructure, its weakest link. The overall goal should be full build out of this currently incomplete but vital infrastructure to serve all residents and businesses.

2. The "copper wall" that comprises the last mile telecommunications infrastructure is the primary barrier to wider broadband Internet access. It has been obsolete for about a decade and will become increasingly so as demand for broadband access and more bandwidth intensive content like video grows. The copper wall should be torn down and replaced with fiber optic cable, either aerial or buried depending on local construction cost factors and neighborhood preferences. Calls by large telcos for funding for DSL over copper should be rejected. Funding for such projects would keep the U.S. lagging behind other developed nations on broadband telecommunications technology and constitute an economic bailout to build increasingly obsolete technology rather than a true stimulus.

3. The last mile is the most local element of the nation's telecommunications infrastructure. Accordingly, stimulus should favor local entities to replace copper with fiber such as locally owned private companies, local governments and fiber cooperatives, the latter aided by incentives to encourage homeowner-owned fiber over the last mile.

The 12 year period following the enactment of the 1996 Telecommunications Reform Act has shown providing tax breaks and other incentives to large publicly traded telcos has not resulted in adequate capital expenditure on infrastructure to serve the nation's future telecommunications needs or the selection of broadband technology best suited to do so.

As for private providers, Congress and the Obama administration should note that even generous subsidies to incumbent telcos to build out broadband infrastructure may prove indequate as seen from their less than enthusiastic response to a California Public Utilities Commission program that subsidizes broadband deployments in unserved and underserved areas with a surcharge on intrastate voice long distance calls.

The investment cycle of these companies is apparently too short to earn a return on broadband infrastructure investment even at the 40 percent funding level provided by the program -- and even for arguably obsolete DSL equipment proposed in the handful of projects approved by the CPUC in 2008. Accordingly, broadband infrastructure stimulus funding directed to community-based cooperatives, nonprofits and local governments would likely produce the most rapid deployments.

Sacramento Bee: Internet access still a wish for many in rural areas

The Sacramento Bee is out with a story today that's likely to be familiar to folks all over the United States and not just in the Bee's Northern California circulation area. Your blogger is featured. Click here for the story. As for my recommendations re this issue to the incoming Obama administration, click here.

The difficulty getting good solid broadband Internet access isn't by definition a rural issue given that U.S. residential development isn't confined to only urban and rural areas. For much of Northern California, it's far more "granular" as demographers would say when the exurbs and quasi-rural areas are taken into account. Most of the Sacramento Bee's circulation area is considered part of the Sacramento metropolitan area.

It's also worth noting that some of those who have posted comments on the Bee's Web site at the online version of the story are located relatively close in, including one from Silicon Valley. Broadband black holes like their physical counterparts in space can be found anywhere. See also Silicon Valley’s shameful secret: lousy broadband at MuniWireless.

BTW, the article didn't include the name of my WISP (Wireless Internet Service Provider). For you El Dorado County and Amador County residents looking for service, it's Remotely Located.

France adopts universal broadband requirement but sets bar too low

More international broadband developments this Thanksgiving weekend. While the Australian government struggles to implement near universal broadband access in the land down under and wrangles with its partially state owned telco, Telstra, over build out requirements, Reuters reports a French government official said his nation would require telcos (called telecoms in Europe) to provide universal broadband access providing connectivity of at least 512kbs throughout France starting in 2010. According to the Reuters dispatch, France had been pressuring the European Union to adopt a universal broadband mandate for telecoms that provide universal voice service but abandoned the effort due to lack of consensus among EU member nations.

France's 512kbs minimum speed requirement is really setting the bar low, perhaps in order to allow French telecoms such as France Telecom to attempt to deliver DSL over long and ancient copper loops commonly found in broadband black holes in the U.S. and elsewhere. That throughput level is already obsolete and is below even the minimal 768kbs "basic" broadband standard adopted by the U.S. Federal Communications Commission earlier this year.