Monthly Archives: June 2011

Update on Cook County

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Thanks to Joe Buttweiler for sending me a heads up on last weekend’s big meeting in Cook County. They held the annual Arrowhead Electric Cooperative, which included a few of the following announcemnts that I was able to find on the Arrowhead Electric Cooperative blog…

To that extent, Arrowhead Electric Cooperative is very happy to say that today, June 9th we placed our first order for fiber optic cable! Our initial order is for 450,000′ (85 miles) and we’re prepared to purchase up to another 90 miles in 2011! Our ability to order fiber optic cable was made possible after receiving revised closing documents from the RUS two weeks ago and our notification from RUS and the MN State Historic Preservation Office that we are cleared of all Federal Environmental Reviews.

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Due to incidents in Japan, tornadoes in the mid-west, and numerous federal stimulus projects, most manufacturers of fiber optic cable have production lead times of 20 to even 30 weeks out (i.e October or November!) Due to Pulse Broadband’s long history and strong relationships in the business, we are able to have fiber optic cable delivered in mid to late July.

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We expect that in the next 1-2 weeks we’ll be able to happily announce a general contracting partner who can begin construction during July or August!

They were also looking to pre-register folks for service. I’d love to know how many signed up!

White House Rural Council

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President Obama just established the White House Rural Council to better coordinate Federal programs and maximize the impact of Federal investment to promote economic prosperity and quality of life in our rural communities.

The purpose of the Council is to work across executive departments, agencies, and offices to coordinate development of policy recommendations to promote economic prosperity and quality of life in rural America, and to coordinate the Administration’s engagement with rural communities. The council will include the heads of most of the Departments, which is a good way to get in from all angles and they are really focusing on public-private partnerships. You can read the details in the Executive Order.

Broadband is one of the specific topics that Council has been assigned to address. Community Daily offered this perspective…

Broadband is among the priorities of the new White House Rural Council established Thursday by President Barack Obama through an executive order. The council, which will include representatives of the FCC and the Agriculture and Commerce departments, will support Obama’s plan to expand broadband networks in rural areas, the White House said. Rural telecom companies praised the council’s focus on public-private partnerships to spread broadband. The council will provide recommendations for rural investment and increase coordination between government agencies involved with rural issues. It also will coordinate federal with state, local and tribal government efforts, and promote public-private partnerships, the White House said.

Twin Cities Twits .. er .. Tweets

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According to the Minneapolis / St Paul Business Journal…

Minneapolis ranks 32nd in the world in the number of Twitter users who put the city in their location setting, according to Twitter Grader’s Top Cities.

Not big news – but kind of fun.

New Funding Opportunity: Digital Inclusion Community Partnership Program

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We are pleased to announce a new MIRC (Minnesota Intelligent Rural Communities) funding opportunity that is open to communities throughout Minnesota, whether you are currently involved with the MIRC project or not. The Digital Inclusion Community Partnership Program builds on the demonstrated success of some of our MIRC communities and PCs for People collaborations where targeted segments of the community (those without computers, skills and broadband access) overcome their barriers to broadband adoption. Any community, county or region can submit an application.

The RFP for this program can be found online.  Grants will be reviewed on a quarterly basis. The next grant deadline will be September 1. A 1 : 1 cash match (non-federal funds) is required. Ideally, we hope see applications that include local broadband providers providing discounts and other incentives as match as well as collaboration with local CAP agencies, Head Start Programs or agencies that work with older adults. We hope to see some real creativity in the applications that we receive.

Contact me with any questions. (bill@communitytechnologyadvisors.com)

Minnesota’s take on the AT&T T-Mobile Merger

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Yesterday the Minneapolis Start Tribune ran a astory on how folks around the state are feeling about the AT&T merger. The results, as you migth expect, are mixed. (I wrote about a brief primer on the merger earlier, if the details elude you.)

The StarTribune spoke to a few folks in rural areas some of whom will be familiar to regualr readers: Bruce Kerfoot, owner of the Gunflit Lodge in Cook County, Pamela Lehmann, executive director of the Lac Qui Parle County Economic Development Authority and Heidi Omerza, a City Council member from Ely. Here are their takes on the merger:

Bruce Kerfoot

“I cannot be competitive with my guests’ needs for hooking up or connecting while they’re here — even though I’d prefer they didn’t,” Kerfoot said.

While the StarTribune notes that Kerkoot is “is just the kind of person AT&T Inc. has in mind as the telecom giant pushes expanding rural broadband as a major benefit of its proposed $39 billion acquisition of T-Mobile USA” they also note…

But for Kerfoot, even if AT&T’s merger leads to more rural broadband, he won’t reap the benefits. The company’s plan still doesn’t reach his neck of the woods in the northeasternmost tip of the state.

Pam Lehmann

“It’s really tough as an economic developer to get anyone from the cellular companies to respond to inquiries,” Lehmann said. “A very small rural county has limited coverage for them, so when you’re not a major player it’s tough to get them to carry on that conversation with you.”

Heidi Omerza

“Right now with all the fights going on for the limited dollars out there, it’s one more thing that can help rural America.” Omerza said. “This is one piece of the puzzle for Ely to continue to survive.

The answers are varied because of course each rural area is in a different position in terms of current deployment and adoption and each person has different expectations. Some folks will be happy with any progress, some folks are looking for more and some folks still won’t get access.

Broadband is Basic Human Right

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The United Nations have declared Internet access a human right. It focuses on the Internet as a tool for civic engagement…

The Special Rapporteur believes that the Internet is one of the most powerful instruments of the 21st century for increasing transparency in the conduct of the powerful, access to information, and for facilitating active citizen participation in building democratic societies. Indeed, the recent wave of demonstrations in countries across the Middle East and North African region has shown the key role that the Internet can play in mobilizing the population to call for justice, equality, accountability and better respect for human rights. As such, facilitating access to the Internet for all individuals, with as little restriction to online content as possible, should be a priority for all States.

There were a couple of themes in the report; some more pertinent today to a Minnesota audience than others but all were important.

Censorship

The report maintains that censorship is wrong – except in special cases (such as child pornography, defamation). In principle I think most readers will agree to that tenet. And while censorship in St Paul may not be as blatant at that in Syria I think those of us in St Paul should be concerned about the people Syria and should be aware of the potential for the same tools to e used for censorship closer to home.

There is a call back to think of providers as common carries in terms of liability for content…

Holding intermediaries liable for the content disseminated or created by their users severely undermines the enjoyment of the right to freedom of opinion and expression, because it leads to self-protective and over-broad private censorship, often without transparency and the due process of the law.

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Similarly, the Digital Millennium Copyright Act of the United States of America also provides safe harbour for intermediaries, provided that they take down the content in question promptly after notification.

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The Special Rapporteur believes that censorship measures should never be delegated to a private entity, and that no one should be held liable for content on the Internet of which they are not the author.

Privacy

The right to privacy is essential for individuals to express themselves freely.

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The Special Rapporteur is deeply concerned by actions taken by States against individuals communicating via the Internet, frequently justified broadly as being necessary to protect national security or to combat terrorism. While such ends can be legitimate under international human rights law, surveillance often takes place for political, rather than security reasons in an arbitrary and covert manner.

Privacy is something brought up in both the National Broadband Plan and the Minnesota Ultra High Speed Broadband Task Force report – but I don’t know if it gets enough attention – nor do I know if this is the place to approach it but I wanted to flag it. In the US I think our concern is with maintaining our privacy from government, individuals and private entities.

Access to Infrastructure

While the focus of the report in not necessarily the US, in fact the US is held up as a “have” country, the problems that we have with ubiquity in the US are echoed in the report…

In addition, people in rural areas are often confronted with obstacles to Internet access, such as lack of technological availability, slower Internet connection, and/or higher costs. Furthermore, even where Internet connection is available, disadvantaged groups, such as persons with disabilities and persons belonging to minority groups, often face barriers to accessing the Internet in a way that is meaningful, relevant and useful to them in their daily lives.

And solutions such as public-private partnerships are mentioned…

States should adopt effective and concrete policies and strategies – developed in consultation with individuals from all segments of society, including the private sector as well as relevant Government ministries – to make the Internet widely available, accessible and affordable to all.

Farmers & Federated Telcos looking at merger

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Farmers Mutual Telephone Company and Federated Telephone are both cooperatives in rural Minnesota. Farmers Mutual serves an estimated 1,000 patrons, and Federated an estimated 5,000. Both are working on FTTH for their patrons. Kevin Beyer serves as General Manager for both.

Tomorrow they are asking their members to consider a merger. Both companies are doing well financially but apparently could save $200,000 a year by consolidating. It seems that the merger is a strategy to bolster strength for potential changes in the industry.

The West Central Tribune reports…

The biggest challenge is the anticipated cuts to federal subsidies for rural telephone service. Discussions in Washington, D.C., focus on reductions of anywhere from 30 to 60 percent. That translates to a 15 to 40 percent loss in revenues to the two cooperatives, according to Beyer.

The two rural cooperatives also face growing competitive challenges from large cellular telephone service providers. Cell phone usage represents lost billing minutes for the cooperatives. Beyer said some of the large cellular providers refuse to pay an interconnection fee to the rural cooperatives; those that do only allocate one-fourth of what an interconnection fee on a land line would be.

The merger would also mean that the new cooperative can offer cable television service to patrons now served by Farmers Mutual. Currently, Farmers Mutual has been unable to find a legal avenue to allow it to provide this service. Federated has the right and offers the service to its patrons.

Jobs happen when communities invest in infrastructure

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Prairie Business Magazine ran a nice article this week on rural development. Infrastructure, specifically broadband infrastructure, plays highly into their rural development strategy. I think the following quote from the article paints the picture…

“Infrastructure, by definition, provides the fundamental facilities and systems by which any given area thrives,” states Colleen Landkamer, USDA Rural Development State Director in Minnesota. “We can’t expect to attract businesses to a community without access to clean drinking water or modern wastewater treatment. We can’t expect a business to consider locating in an area without high-speed broadband access or quality healthcare. We can’t expect businesses to remain in an area if there is not enough affordable housing to accommodate the workforce. Everything is tied together, and I think people are starting to realize that. Job creation starts with investing in infrastructure.”

I want to remind folks of the study by Minnesota Rural Partners earlier this year that demonstrated that investment in rural areas reaps benefits for both the rural areas and the Twin Cities. As the budget debates continues and money continues to be tough I think it’s good to remember that job creation starts with investing and investing in rural areas comes back to benefit the Twin Cities as well.

Blandin Broadband eNews June

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News from the Blandin on Broadband Blog

Broadband for Jobs in Minnesota
Broadband infrastructure and adoption are key economic develop tools, especially in rural areas. Experts indicate that right now adoption and cost may be the biggest barriers. http://wp.me/p3if7-1i1 The Blandin Foundation’s Minnesota Intelligent Rural Communities (MIRC) initiative is an opportunity to improve technology skills around the state. http://wp.me/p3if7-1ii

Border to Border Broadband
In May the TISP Forum looked at private-public partnerships as a way to expand broadband in Minnesota. It included a panel of experts from Lac qui Parle County and Monticello, Commissioner (of Commerce) Mike Rothman, Bernadine Joselyn from the Blandin Foundation and Milda Hedblom, the host. One recurring theme was the broadening scope of broadband plans. In Minnesota we have gone from striving for broadband in our neighborhoods, to cities and towns, to counties and now for ubiquitous or “border to border” coverage. http://wp.me/p3if7-1gU

Two New Government Tools You can Use
The national government has unveiled DigitalLiteracy.gov, a National collection of digital literacy lesson plans, tools, case studies and a forum. Minnesota also unveiled a new tool – or tools – OpenData, a collection of Minnesota government datasets. http://wp.me/p3if7-1hO

Hot Broadband Policy Topics for the Minnesota Summer
The Commerce and Regulatory Reform Committee met in May in part to discuss Universal Service Funds (USF), Intercarrier Compensation (ICC), Inter- and Intrastate access charges. The Committee indicated that they would be ongoing issue through the summer. While detailed and fairly complex, these policy decisions may that have an impact on who gets paid to serve rural areas, which will have an impact on prices and availability. http://wp.me/p3if7-1hA

Hot Broadband Policy Topics for Minnesota Senators
Senator Franken and Senator Klobuchar have been vocal about their views on current telecommunication issues. Franken is concerned about Smartphone and user privacy. http://wp.me/p3if7-1hq He remains outspoken on Net Neutrality. http://wp.me/p3if7-1hg Klobuchar is asking questions to make sure consumers get the best deal out of the AT&T and T-Mobile merger. http://wp.me/p3if7-1hq

Local Broadband News

Alexandria
Vaultas completes a new public collocation data center facility in Alexandria. http://wp.me/p3if7-1hQ

Anoka County
Anoka County has been full speed ahead getting member institutions and cities to sign on to the public fiber network, starting May with persuasive discussion in Andover. http://wp.me/p3if7-1h8

Duluth
Duluth is courting companies that need cool air for computer centers, such as Involta. http://wp.me/p3if7-1iK

Kanabec County
With help from the Blandin Foundation, Kanabec County is looking at broadband. A crowd of 50 packed the Mora City Council chambers to discuss the importance of broadband, the current level of services in the county and the next steps towards improving access countywide. http://wp.me/p3if7-1hb

Lamberton
In Lamberton, the high school maintains local broadband service and students provide tech support to residents and 500 businesses and homes in the area. http://wp.me/p3if7-1hG

Minneapolis
Minneapolis Innovation Center is set to open July 5. http://wp.me/p3if7-1im

Minnetonka Area
Market surveys are back and residents would be interested in cheaper, faster broadband. http://wp.me/p3if7-1iA

Redwood Falls
Redwood Falls hosts a successful class on using social media. The class was sponsored by MIRC partner, MNREM (Minnesota Renewable Energy Marketplace). http://wp.me/p3if7-1hE

Stevens County
Stevens County is having great success with area hot spots. Genealogists are happy with efforts to put cemetery records online. http://wp.me/p3if7-1is

Todd County
Todd County Commissioners voted unanimously to allocate up to $20,000 funds to match grant from the Blandin Foundation to perform a feasibility study. http://wp.me/p3if7-1hW

Upper Minnesota Valley
The UMVRDC looks at the correlation between customers increasingly using Internet searches rather than telephone books for business information and inaccurate or missing business contact information and locations on the Internet. http://wp.me/p3if7-1h2

Windom
Windom has a local blogger and MIRC/UMN Extension project coordinator who is talking about the experience in her blog. http://wp.me/p3if7-1hj

(Many stories are gathered from local online newspaper. Unfortunately each newspaper has a different policy in regards to archive news and therefore we cannot guarantee access to all articles cited.)

Coleman’s Corner

Last week I attended the Intelligent Community Conference in New York. I wanted to share a few of the highlights that caught my attention, especially in terms of what is happening with the Minnesota Intelligent Rural Communities (MIRC) initiative http://tinyurl.com/2c6mhh4:

  • Eindhoven was named Intelligent Community of the Year and deservedly so. Data driven, persistent with a strong sense of community. Plus very cool sense of design applied to everything.
  • Eindhoven is very much into innovation and a concept that is called “open innovation.” They encourage people to share information so that the benefits can be shared. I was happy to think that our internal MIRC Ning and the Blandin Broadband Online Toolkits http://tinyurl.com/3mwyf4y are examples of open innovation.
  • Leadership is so critically important. Our MIRC project coordinators are hard workers; some may even be leaders. The hard work of staff is multiplied when elected and appointed officials advocate for and promote innovation and collaboration. Spending time cultivating the engagement of your local leaders for broadband-based economic development thinking may produce some great benefits.
  • People from around the world, especially Canada, are very interested in the type of work that we are doing here in Minnesota with the MIRC project.

ID Insight questions broadband map

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Thanks to the heads up from Jeff Pesek from Tech.MN on ID Insight’s latest broadband access reports. I’ve written about ID Insight before; they are the Minnesota-based company that does a lot of broadband mapping. In the past their research has alligned fairly closely to Connect Minnesota’s maps – altohugh they come at the information differently. Their latest report (which is really a spotlight on broadband mapping in Arizona) details the difference between how they track broadbanc access…

Unlike the NTIA map which was generated primarily as the result of collecting coverage data and advertised speeds directly from the carriers, Scout was created by looking at over a half a billion consumer internet transactions that link the consumer’s physical address to their internet provider through their Internet Protocol (IP) address. In short, Scout is an independent survey of internet connectivity that today covers approximately 15% of all internet households in the country.

When we compare Scout to the NTIA map, there are some interesting differences:

  • Because Scout sees raw transactions, we cannot only measure availability but usage at the most granular geographic level.
  • Scout sees all internet providers, including dial-up connections which are not reported to NTIA.
  • When we measure speed, we are measuring actual speeds that have been measured for the IP address.
  • Because we are looking at millions of transactions, Scout observes nearly every carrier as opposed to the carriers that chose to participate and send their data to the states.

Here are some of the difference they note in their Arizona report versus the National Broadband Map’s info on Arizona:

  • 95 percent of the time, the Arizona map and Broadband Scout agree with respect to broadband coverage. However, when we isolate the more rural counties, only 85 percent of the time do they agree.
  • Only 74 percent of the targeted providers contributed data. Of the targeted providers, BroadBand Scout observed 96 percent of the providers.
  • When considering the largest providers, BroadBand Scout observed providers both overreporting, and others under-reporting, some by as much as 400 percent.
  • When considering broadband speeds being delivered, BroadBand Scout observed that only 50 percent of the most rural counties had actual broadband speeds above 5 mbps combined versus 100 percent reported on the Arizona map, which reports “available” speed.

I don’t know Arizona well enough to comment but I did notice that ID Insight reports that 87 percent of Minnesota providers provided information for the National Broadband Maps. I think that number is actually 90 percent and I think that even 90 percent maybe misleading as I think they have participation from the largest providers. So it’s not that 10 percent of the state is going unreported – but 10 percent of the providers.

That being said, it is nice to see data from multiple resources.

A runner up to Google for Duluth

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So far no good word in Duluth from Google – but it seems that maybe getting spurced up may have attracted another good catch to the area. The Lake County News Chronicle reports…

Lake County Commissioner Paul Bergman is leading the Lake County effort to make a formal pitch to companies like Verizon. He saw some numbers for a project in upstate New York and couldn’t help but get excited: a billion-dollar center with 200 or more jobs with salaries of $80,000 or more. “It’s off the charts,” Bergman said of the economic potential.

The New Chronicle also reports…

Last week, Involta, an Iowa-based data storage company, announced that it is seeking space in the Duluth Technology Park to build a $13.6 million facility that is expected to grow rapidly.

That facility would be a microcosm of some of the larger company’s large facilities.

One of the big draws to Minnesota is the cool waters of Lake Superior and the naturually cool climate…

[Chris] Swanson, owner of Pure Driven in Two Harbors and an organizer of the Google Fiber pitch, said companies can spend millions a month in cooling and using water from Lake Superior or even the natural cool climate here would be an advantage. “Cool air is valuable,” he said.

Nominate a MN Tech Company

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I hope folks will think about a good company to nominate. This Teknes are always a fun time to see Minnesota’s brightest and most creative.

Tekne Award applications are now open!

The Minnesota Tekne Awards honor companies, innovations and individuals that positively impact Minnesota’s technology-based economy. The Tekne Awards began in 2000, and are presented by the Minnesota High Tech Association.
Applying for a Tekne can bring extensive visibility to an organization and provide great opportunities to celebrate and showcase products and innovations within the Minnesota technology community.

APPLY TODAY!

Do you have partner organization, vendor or client that should apply for a Tekne? Nominate them here.

Notes from ICF in NYC

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This week I’m in New York for the Intelligent Community Forum (ICF) conference. The ICF is the framework that we have been using in our Minnesota Intelligent Rural Communities (MIRC) initiative. It helps communities promote economic development through a five-segment strategy: 1) broadband, 2) innovation, 3) knowledge workers, 4) digital inclusion and 5) market and advocacy.

The big announcement here is the launch of the new Centers of Excellence project. The project is designed to brief nearly 100 Intelligent Community leaders who are part of what ICF calls its “Alumni,” on topics of key importance related to broadband and IT implementation and effective development of local economic and social activities.

Here are some of the other highlights I’ve heard:

The decision makers are key but leadership is a self-directed choice. Today’s realities are leading to trends that focus on striving for self-sufficiently. We’re looking at benchmark and everyone is concerned with the bottom line in terms of costs and impact. With an aging population, health in the revolutionary community has been a driver.

The Mayor of Chattanooga talked about 1 GB Internet. Broadband is a business attractor in their area but it took leadership, community engagement, vision. Chattanooga is an old industry town with rail, river, and a highway hub. Community leadership brought on young people and the project has been successful. They have 20 percent penetration after just a few months. They are not the low cost provider; rather their quality of service drives customer adoption. The network self-sufficiency just with energy management and savings again has been a driver. Big businesses have also been drivers – Unum wants home workers with big bandwidth. BCBS consolidated operations in chat. These goals have required local broadband.

The Dublin Ohio row ordinance resulted in a multiple conduit approach. The result was Dub link. In Dublin, conduit facilitated rapid deployment and competition. They have paid lots of attention to startups and entrepreneurs. They are starting to see emerging work on global trade.

An update from Eindhoven introduced us to a cool updated video around applications. Change has been motivating. They needed to move from a one company town to more diverse economy. Phillips lost 30,000 jobs. New collaboration, bottom up approach. Broadband has brought: 1) open innovation, 2) Research to Knowledge to products, and 3) lots of small companies supporting big companies. BRAINPORT funds innovation. Brainport is an international group that collaboratively attracts brainpower. Also they are working with kids on science and innovation.

Lake Minnetonka fiber market survey results are in

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Thanks for the heads up from Chris Mitchell on progress made by Tonkaconnect towards Community FTTH. (Chris provides concise notes on why progress is good – but the path can be arduous.) Tonkaconnect has been promoting FTTH in the area for a while now;they recently completed a market survey to determine if there was interest in a community fiber optics project.

The first paragraph from an article on the surveys in the local paper paints a picture of the results…

If the price is low enough, people in the area would be interested in becoming customers of a fiber-based network operated by the Lake Minnetonka Communications Commission (LMCC).

The survey was conducted by CCG and included telephone surveys of 1,774 individuals living in Deephaven, Excelsior, Greenwood, Independence, Long Lake, Loretto, Maple Plain, Medina, Minnetonka Beach, Minnetrista, Orono, St. Bonifacius, Shorewood, Spring Park, Tonka Bay, Victoria, Woodland and Mound.

The Tonkaconnect folks consider the results to be positive and it sounds like there is interest in moving forward but that nothing has been budgeted for further action yet – however there is a meeting planned for June to discuss the results and next steps. (While there are no details there yet, I suspect that the Tonkaconnect web site is a good place to look for more information on the meeting.)

AT&T T-Mobile Merger Cliff Notes

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There are a lot of moving pieces in broadband policy these days. I try to focus on activities, policies and businesses that directly relate to Minnesota. News items like the AT&T T-Mobilel merger fall in the cracks of things I’d like to pay more attention to if only there were more hours to the day. I’d like to pay attention because the results will have an impact on access in Minnesota.

Wireless Week posted a nice summary of ther merger. It incldues the who, what, where, when and why – especially why folks like or don’t like the merger.

Today is/was the last day to file a petition to deny the merger with the FCC – but that’s hardly the last hoop open for jumping. The article reports…

The FCC has some set deadlines coming up for comments on the merger. After today, stakeholders have until June 10 to issue their rebuttals to oppositions to the merger, and replies to those comments are due June 20.

The FCC isn’t expected to issue a decision on the deal until March 2012, at the earliest