Tuesday, September 8, 2009
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) asked for input last month on what actually should constitute "broadband" connection speeds. The government sets a standard for what is technically considered broadband and what is not. The motivation, at least originally, was simply that we could not allow dubious tech companies to slap a road-runner emblem on a 56K modem and try to advertise it as broadband.

But the current definition was recently opened to debate by the FCC, eliciting a range of responses from those affected by any modifications. A public interest group called Free Press, urged the FCC to dramatically ramp up requirements to 5 mbps for both upstream and downstream. For a sense of perspective, that would be over 8x the current definition for downstream speed, and 25x the current upstream speed. But companies directly affected by any decision, such as Verizon Communications Inc., urged the FCC to be more conservative.

Appeals to the FCC cited competing nations' who have set the bar for broadband far higher than the U.S. However, it's important to note that the nations cited in Reuters report (France and Japan) are in fact 1/18th 1/26th the size of the U.S. respectively. The challenge of Rural Broadband presents a uniquely different landscape for technology and business in the U.S. than in most other nations on the globe.

Where do you think the bar for broadband should be set? If higher, how shall we ever get there? If the same, what will motivate carriers to improve?

Labels: Broadband, Broadband Speed, FCC, Rural Broadband, Verizon

posted by Unknown at 9:31 AM Link to this Article

Comments:

Setting the bar low enough will make it easy for Verizon and others to deliver minimal wireless or copper based broadband to rural areas. But we'll just have to turn around and do it all over again as Internet applications require more and more bandwidth. Better to pull the fiber out there and get ready for the future. Also see this editorial: http://t1rex.blogspot.com/2009/07/rural-broadband-stimulus-hopes-to-one.html
posted by  T1 Rex : September 8, 2009 at 6:28 PM  


I don't think bandwidth demands are going to continue scaling at the same rate over the next decade as they did in the past decade. Oh, they'll increase, but not by the staggering 10x or more that they have since 2000.

What we're up against is the same thing that plagued power companies in the early part of last century: if there's not enough customers on the circuit, it just ain't worth the money. That's capitalism. So how did rural areas finally get power service? The gov't coughed it up. Sound familiar - "broadband stimulus"?
posted by  Unknown : September 15, 2009 at 5:07 AM