They’re incorrect for a couple of reasons. First, landline
Internet service more advanced than 1990s dialup can often be found in nominally “rural”
areas. But typically some premises have access while others a mile or two down
the road, or over the hill or around the bend do not. Even premises Internet service
providers believe are connected are not, resulting in unpleasant surprises for new
residents moving in under the impression service was available. That does not
make for a “rural broadband” problem. The problem is partial, incomplete and
highly granular landline telecom infrastructure.
By comparison, the lack of electrical distribution infrastructure
in rural counties during the first few decades of the previous century was truly
a rural problem. It wasn’t granular, with some communities and neighborhoods
having power and others left in the dark. Entire rural regions had no
electrical service, which was concentrated in cities.
The “rural broadband” label has an unfortunate aspect. It
allows legacy incumbent providers and public policymakers to segment off and mischaracterize
the problem as one affecting only thinly populated, remote regions of the
nation and thus not requiring urgent action.
It does. The United States is a generation behind where it
should be when it comes to modernizing its legacy metal cable telephone and cable
TV infrastructures with fiber optic cable connecting every American home,
business and public institution. If we continue to shrug our shoulders and
insist on believing it’s a “rural broadband” problem, the United States risks slipping
into third world nation status when it comes to its telecom infrastructure.
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