Wednesday, November 02, 2011

Show me the infrastructure: Missouri lags on Internet access

Missouri’s digital divide is growing, a trend that threatens to leave farmers and agribusiness ventures at a disadvantage unless federal policymakers make concerted efforts to improve technology infrastructure in rural communities and small towns, according to a new study by the Community Policy Analysis Center (CPAC), located in the Truman School of Public Affairs at the University of Missouri. The study shows that Missouri is significantly behind national averages for overall statewide broadband Internet access.

Tom Johnson, the director of CPAC and co-author of the study, analyzed data from multiple sources, including the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the Missouri Broadband Business Survey by the state’s MoBroadbandNow initiative, and found that Missouri is lagging behind other states on broadband access, a gap that may have serious implications for the future development of the state’s $12.4 billion agriculture industry.

Click here for the rest of this news release from the University of Missouri.

Thursday, October 13, 2011

Community networks should be eligible for CAF subsidies

U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is about to release details of its Connect America Fund (CAF) that will reform the current Universal Service Fund that subsidizes switched voice service to instead subsidize Internet connectivity in high cost areas.

The FCC faces a significant challenge in how it defines those areas eligible for CAF subsidies given that wireline Internet access is highly granular. Incumbent investor-owned cable and telephone companies parse their service areas very tightly when it comes to determining what is and what isn't a high cost area for providing Internet service. A given home or business may have access while another just down the road or street is deemed too costly to serve and is relegated to dialup or satellite. These premises can't be described as situated in remote, isolated areas since they are almost on top of areas that have wireline Internet access.

Targeting CAF subsidies to the most remote regions of the United States won't help these folks. They comprise many of the 24 million Americans that FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski noted in a February 7, 2011 speech "couldn’t get broadband today even if they wanted it. The infrastructure simply isn’t there." It's there for their neighbors -- but not for them.

Many communities have responded to this widespread problem by building their own fiber to the premises networks to fill in the gaps. These networks must necessarily overlap the footprints of the incumbent's incomplete, Swiss cheese infrastructures since telecommunications infrastructure like other utilities must cover sufficiently large geographical areas in order to be economically viable. The FCC should designate these community networks as eligible for CAF subsidies if they meet certain requirements such as providing voice and 911 emergency service at standards that meet or exceed those placed on existing wireline providers.

Sunday, October 02, 2011

Telehealth Market To Hit $6.28 Billion By 2020

The global telehealth market is headed for explosive growth over the next decade, according to a new report from InMedica, a division of IMS Research. The main reasons are increasing disease prevalence, an aging population, and governmental pressure to hold down healthcare costs.

"Many public healthcare systems now have targets to reduce both the number of hospital visits and the length of stay in hospital," said Diane Wilkinson, research manager at InMedica, in a press release. "This has led to a growing trend for healthcare to be managed outside the traditional hospital environment, and as a result, there is a growing trend for patients to be monitored in their home environment using telehealth technologies once their treatment is complete.

It's not only the aging population but also its massive numbers as the Baby Boom generation enters maturity. As one of the sources quoted in this article points out, there aren't enough doctors and institutions to care for them nor sufficient funds to pay for that care. Home-based care however will require an extensive revamp of our outdated and incomplete telecommunications infrastructure so that every home is served by big fiber optic pipe with the capacity to carry large amounts of data necessary to support remote diagnosis and monitoring.

Thursday, September 08, 2011

American Jobs Act misses on modernizing, building out nation's outdated telecom infrastructure

The Obama administration's American Jobs Act unveiled today misses the opportunity to build out the nation's outmoded wireline telecommunications infrastructure at a time when millions of Americans remain disconnected from the Internet. The White House instead continues to propose mobile broadband as the means of bridging the gap:

Expanding Nationwide Wireless Internet Services For the Public and the First Responders, in a Fiscally Responsible Way: The plan follows the model in the bipartisan legislation from Senators Rockefeller and Hutchison in including an investment to develop and deploy a nationwide, interoperable wireless network for public safety. The plan includes reallocating the D Block for public safety (costing $3 billion) and $7 billion to support the deployment of this network and technological development to tailor the network to meet public safety requirements. This is part of a broader deficit-reducing wireless initiative that would free up public and private spectrum to enable the private sector to deploy high-speed wireless services to at least 98 percent of Americans, even those living in remote rural and farming communities.
It's a major misapprehension on the part of the Obama administration to propose mobile wireless broadband as the means of connecting American homes and businesses to the Internet. Mobile broadband as its name implies is primary intended for mobile access and not to serve fixed premises locations. That's why it comes with preset caps on how much bandwidth is allotted to each customer as this post by Community Broadband Networks explains. Wireless Internet providers don't want customers using it for regularly accessing the Internet and particularly downloading high bandwidth demand video content.

Instead of taking this misguided approach, the administration should as part of its American Jobs Act fund fiber optic to the premises infrastructure and provide technical assistance grants to local governments and consumer telecom cooperatives to help them deploy it to homes and businesses where a business case cannot be made by investor owned providers to build out their incomplete networks.

Wednesday, September 07, 2011

Migrating from DSL to FTTP

More indications that providers are winding down DSL and migrating to fiber to the premises (FTTP) per this gigaom item on North State Communications of North Carolina:

North State offers an 80 Mbps down/30 Mbps up for consumers at a 12-month introductory price of $49 a month, which is about what I pay for 12-13 Mbps down/ 2Mbps up cable broadband from Time Warner here in Austin. However, the most popular package North State sells is a 30/30 Mbps symmetrical package, although he didn’t disclose penetration or take rates. Tucker also noted that the company is still supporting its 10 Mbps DSL business in its service area, but he doesn’t plan on making more investments in the technology. “Back in 2003 and 2004 and 2006, we were out there shortening loop lengths, building out fiber to the node and all that, but now we’re going to stick with maintenance,” Tucker said

Saturday, August 27, 2011

Verizon misses on price points for higher tier FiOS service

There are four key elements to a successful business offering: product, price, promotion and distribution channel. When it comes to the high end of its FiOS fiber to the premises (FTTP) Internet service, Verizon has most but not all of those elements.

The missing element? Price. At $200 a month for service providing downstream connectivity of 150 Mbit/s and 35 Mbit/s on the upside, "nobody's buying," reports Kathy Brown, Verizon's senior vice president for public policy according to this Light Reading story. Even in university towns, where Aspen Institute fellow and former government broadband policy guru Blair Levin wants to explore bringing gigabit service through his Gig.U project. Consumers, Brown notes, instead opt for cheaper service tiers providing connectivity at lower speeds.

Of course few are interested in buying Verizon's higher end service at $200 a month. That's an unacceptable price for most consumers. It's also an expected consequence of telco marketing strategy that rations bandwidth, creating an economic disincentive for customers to use more. Products and services cannot be successful when price points are set unrealistically high. It is also pointless to blame consumers for not buying when they are.