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FCC allocates $67 million to boost rural broadband adoption
The FCC is acting on its promise to pour more money into rural broadband. The regulator has formally offered an additional $67 million to 207 rural carriers through the Connect America Fund on the condition they "significantly expand" access to service with at least 25Mbps downloads and 3Mbps in uploads. If you ask the FCC, this could speed up internet access for as many as 110,000 households across 43 states.
Under Trump the future of Net Neutrality and broadband is uncertain
On January 20th, Donald Trump will be sworn in as president of the United States. With a Republican-controlled House and Senate behind him, things in this country are going to change... a lot. One of the things that might be on the chopping block early in his administration is Net Neutrality.
FCC report says 19 million Americans still without broadband access
The FCC believes that 19 million Americans don't have access to broadband, defined as internet access at a speed of 4 megabits per second or more. Understandably, rural areas are the worst hit, with 14.5 million out in the sticks without access, with areas like West Virginia lacking coverage for 45.9 percent of its population. It's not limited to the wide open spaces of states like Montana (16.7 percent) however, even tech-heavy states like California lack access for 35 percent of its denizens. The commission's Connect America fund is charged with closing this gap, and has already awarded CenturyLink $35 million to connect 45,000 homes in under-served areas as part of a plan to help seven million more people get online by 2018.
CenturyLink gets $35 million FCC grant to connect 45,000 rural homes to the internet (updated)
CenturyLink has announced that it's getting $35 million from the FCC's Connect America Fund to hook 45,000 homes in rural areas up to the internet. The company isn't hiding its disappointment at the donation, since it was originally angling for closer to $90 million. However, the conditions attached to the extra cash made further deployment "uneconomic," so the company will have to settle at this first target to begin with. There is some hope for countryside folk: CenturyLink mavens have filed a waiver application which, if granted, would let the company connect a further 60,000 homes where service is currently too expensive to install. Update: The FCC has made its own announcement, pledging that it'll connect up to 400,000 unconnected citizens in the next three years and up to seven million in six. The full text is after the jump.
FCC's 'Connect America Fund' redirects phone fees to provide rural broadband
The Federal Communications Commission has just unveiled a new plan that'll overhaul an $8 billion fund that's currently used to "subsidize phone service in rural areas and for the poor," pointing that money towards buildouts in the ambitious rural broadband initiative. Most critics suggest that the existing fee model is severely outdated, and in fact, encourages "perverse schemes by carriers to stimulate certain kinds of phone traffic." Not surprisingly, FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski has said that he "doesn't expect" phone rates to increase for most consumers, and the agency's currently estimating a $2.2 billion savings from fees that are currently paid out to phone companies. Politics aside, the goal here is to provide broadband access (however that's defined) to every American by the end of the decade, with Genachowski quipping: "We are taking a system designed for the Alexander Graham Bell era of rotary telephones and modernizing it for the era of Steve Jobs and the internet future he imagined." Pretty sure more than just Jobs had visions of a connected future, but we're following the logic, Jules.
