The report we present today is a high-level analysis utilizing existing data and information that will allow the Task Force to move forward into 2012 with a foundation upon which we can develop a more comprehensive approach to broadband policy development. This process will begin in January 2012 when the Task Force will release a Minnesota Broadband Plan Outline.

But even from a high level, the report indicates that there is work to be done if we want to hit the Minnesota Broadband Goals set out in the Minnesota Broadband Law in 2010:

Universal access and high-speed goal. It is a state goal that as soon as possible, but no later than 2015, all state residents and businesses have access to high-speed broadband that provides minimum download speeds of ten to 20 megabits per second and minimum upload speeds of five to ten megabits per second.

The recent report indicates that (as of Oct 2011) only 57.4% of Minnesota households meet that goal. The Law also includes goals to make Minnesota a broadband leader – but the report indicates that in the US we rank 24 in terms of universally accessible broadband speed and 28th in terms of availability.

That’s not so hot. But the group seems ready to hit the ground running in 2012 to close that gap. I know that they are looking at the original Task Force report for some guidance; I think that’s a good place to start.

I suspect policymakers will stick with the Executive Summary so I’m glad that the need is spelled out (no one wants to be at 60 percent of goal). But for staffers and wonks – there’s more detail.

The report highlights the following sectors and facets:

Adoption – Connect MN reports indicate that 99.13 percent of Minnesotans do have access to some level of broadband but that 28 percent of Minnesotans do not subscribe. The stats for adoption are even worse when you look at particular demographics – especially among minority, low-income, rural and senior households. Cost and relevance are noted as key reasons folks don’t subscribe to broadband when the option is available. The report and the Task Force meetings have indicated that adoption will be a focus going forward.

Education – A Connect MN survey that found that for the 243 school districts where they were able to determine a bandwidth number, the speed in use by the school districts ranged from 1Gbps to 1.5Mbps. Same survey also gauged cost of broadband per district at $10,000 to $100 per month.

Health Care – Minnesota is home to several innovative e-health programs and networks such as the Greater Minnesota Telehealth/e-Health Broadband Initiative (GMTBI), Southeast Minnesota Beacon Community and Benton County’s Living Connected program

Energy – The Task Force plans analyze PUC data that tracks utilities past, current and planned smart grid projects.

Industries & Business – Connect MN surveys indicate that 73% of businesses in Minnesota subscribe to broadband and 58 percent of Minnesota businesses have a website.

Libraries – Connect MN will be working with libraries next year to update data provided in 2010 Task Force report.

Government – Minnesota’s Network for Enterprise Telecommunications (MNET) connects over 1,000 locations and 300 Minnesota cities. State networks go to schools, higher ed, agencies, court, zoos and other sites. MNET plans to deliver a minimum 100Mbps connection to each county within the next six months

Arts & Culture – Local museums are using technology; tourism is a key industry in Minnesota.

Digital Literacy – There are several state, local and national efforts to increase digital literacy.

ARRA Funding – Programs with a Minnesota interest received more than $238 million in ARRA funding. There’s a nice chart that updates progress on Minnesota programs.

The report actually indicates that people use the following:

• Internet: 51% of those who get information about local entertainment businesses rely most on some kind of online source for that material.
• Newspaper: 31% of them say they rely on newspaper material either in printed form or the website of their local newspaper for information about restaurants, bars, and clubs
• Word of mouth: 23% of them say they rely on other people most of all for news and information about for information about restaurants, bars, and clubs
• Local TV: 8% of them say they rely on TV for news about for information about restaurants, bars, and clubs – either broadcasts or the stations’ websites

For other businesses, 47 percent report using the Internet to get more info.

Kind of fun to read the full report – but important I think for restaurant and shop owners to recognize that half of their potential customers are going online to get info. And if Google is right that 60 percent of small businesses don’t have a web site – that means a lot of lost opportunity.

This week Connect Minnesota published their latest report from a summer of surveying Minnesotans about broadband adoption. It also estimates availability and speed. I think it’s a precursor to the Task Force report due at the end of the month, which will probably highlight much of the same information. So if you want a sneak preview of what’s to come – this is it.

Here’s the speed synopsis for anyone looking for facts and figures

Access

• 93.76% of households have access to broadband of at least 3 Mbps download speeds (50 up. The National Broadband Plan strives to get
• 100 million people access to 100 Mbps by 2020; 4 Mbps to the rest.
• 84.10% of households have access to broadband of at least 10 Mbps download speed. The Minnesota Bill strives for 10-20 Mbps download speeds (5-10 up) by 2015.
• 55.13% of households have access to broadband of at least 25 Mbps download speed.
• 46.86% of households have access to broadband of at least 100 Mbps download speed.
• 3.98% of households have access to fiber

One factor stressed in the report is that these numbers would be very different if you were looking at availability by location. About 60 percent of Minnesota’s population lives in the Twin Cities and the Twin Cities generally have pretty good access. Access across rural parts of the state is not as good and very uneven.

Adoption

•  72% of Minnesota residents have a broadband connection in the home
• 15% of Minnesota residents do not own a home computer.
  91% report accessing the Internet from either the home or someplace else
• 81% of surveyed adults report accessing the Internet from home; 44% from work; and 16% from a library
• 26% access the Internet via a cell phone or mobile device
• 9% don’t access the Internet

FCC national data indicate that non-adopters are generally senior citizens, members of ethnic minorities, rural dwellers, people with disabilities, people of low income, and/or people with less education.

Uses of Broadband

Healthcare
37% communicate with their health insurance company
31% interact with doctors or healthcare professionals online

Government
52% report that they search online for information about government services or policies.
48% conduct online transactions with government offices (such as e-filing taxes or filling out forms),
37% interact with Minnesota state government offices,
28% interact with local government offices, and
25% interact with elected officials or candidates online.

Education
46% conduct research for schoolwork online,
39% interact with teachers online,
22% take classes online

Jobs
46% go online to search for jobs or employment,
37% report that they go online to work from home at least occasionally.
20% of employed adults report that they telework
17% of retirees, nearly three out of five unemployed adults, and almost one-third of homemakers say they would likely join the workforce if empowered to do so by teleworking

The report includes a list of strategies to address the broadband availability gap:

• Research the impact of recent policy changes Universal Service Funds and Intercarrier Compensation (USF/ICC);
• Encourage statewide coordination and planning;
• Create planning activities across the state;
• Streamline local/state rules for wireless deployment
• Encourage smartgrids
• Streamline local/state rules for rights-of-way, access to poles…
• Promote public-private partnership
• Measure and map

They also have suggestions to address the broadband adoption gap

• Promote/coordinate local efforts
• Promote public-private partnerships to promote adoption and warn of risks
• Expand digital literacy programs
• Use national portal of digital literacy tools
• Measure and map
• Work with tribal communities

*Several specific grant/funding opportunities were mentioned such as getting funds through E-rate (education), Institute of Museum and Library Services and State Broadband Data and Development grant program (SBDD) funded by the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA)

My favorite part of the report

The report includes some statistics at the county level too I know in the past these county maps and data have spurred some action at the local level. I think that’s very valuable because at the end of the day I think it takes a local champion to get traction for local broadband. The case is made that broadband is most sparse and most expensive to deploy where the household density is low. So it’s difficult for national providers to create a business plan that makes it attractive to come into an area. Local folks have the “advantage” of a broader view; they can’t just focus on cost to deploy – they need to recognize the cost of not deploying too. That cost comes in added expense to reach healthcare to seniors, reduced access to education for local kids, loss of business certainly in persuading business to come into the area but even retention.

County folks may also be interested in section on FCC Availability Gap (starting on page 47). The FCC assumes that 95 percent of the country will have its broadband needs met by market solutions; they figure it will cost $23.5 billion to help the remaining five percent. If you are in that five percent, you want to make sure the numbers are right to improve your chances at receiving your support. The FCC has used a statistical model to estimate broadband coverage, but recognize that their model is imperfect. The chart on page 49 highlights discrepancies between the FCC model and Connect Minnesota research.

One thing I’d like to change

The report still provides information on access and adoption to slow connection (768 Kbps to 3 Mbps). This came up at the last Task Force meeting. I think once you list those speeds in a broadband report it elevates that speeds to broadband status and gives folks an opportunity to misinterpret them. It would be nice to eliminate them. Right now these speeds of 768 Kbps to 3 Mbps seem to represent the underserved. (This goes beyond the scope of this report but) I’d love to see the 4-100 Mbps represent the underserved. Really if the rest of the country is striving for 100 Mbps – how can we thin 4 Mbps for some is adequately served?

Also it would be nice if the speeds matched up with goals. We have speeds up to 3 Mbps when the National Broadband Plan goal for second tier service is 4 Mbps. We also have speeds measured at 10 and 25 Mbps when the state goal is 10-20 Mbps.

Again I think this is a decent sneak peek at the upcoming Task Force report. (I got a very tiny sneak peek at the report earlier this week – but not enough to know how much would be overlapped and enveloped from this Connect MN report.) This report is 143 pages; I think the Task Force was fewer than 30.

Fully 95% of all teens ages 12-17 are now online and 80% of those online teens are users of social media sites.

I guess I’m a little surprised that 5 percent of those surveyed weren’t online. The teen and preteen in my house would have a lot of extra time on their hands if they were in that demographic. The report doesn’t focus on who is and isn’t online as much as what’s happening online.

The not so surprising news is that sometimes kids are mean online – and sometimes they aren’t. Sometimes they ignore the meanness, sometimes they step up and defend each other. Here are the numbers:

• 88 percent of social media using teens have seen people been mean online
• 15 percent felt that they had been the target of online cruelty.
• The most popular reaction to witnessing online meanness was to ignore the situation (95 percent)
• 84 percent reported having seen people come to the defense of the targets of meanness
• 80 percent that they themselves have defended folks online.
• 78 percent report at least one good outcome from using social media
• 41 percent report at least one negative outcome
• 44 percent of the teem social media users lie about their age to access social media sites. (Which would indicate to me that 44 percent were under 13, since that’s the stated required age for Facebook users.)

Facebook was overwhelming the most popular social media network. Twitter was one of the fastest growing. Google Plus was too new to really rank, though Google Buzz (now defunct or near defunct) was not popular.

I scan my kids’ social media use daily – so I wasn’t so surprised by most what I found. I was a little surprised at where kids were learning about how to use social media – but I was surprised in a good way. Here is what Pew reports…

For general advice and influence, parents are still the top source for teen internet and cell phone users. However, teens receive advice from a wide array of sources.

• 86% of online and cell phone-using teens say they have received general advice about how to use the internet responsibly and safely from their parents.
• 70% of online and cell-using teens say they have gotten advice about internet safety from teachers or another adult at school.
• 45% have received advice from friends or classmates, 45% have received general advice from an older relative, and 46% have received internet safety advice from a brother, sister, or cousin.
• 58% of teen internet and cell phone users say their parents have been the biggest influence on what they think is appropriate or inappropriate when using the internet or a cell phone.
• 18% of teens say their friends have been their biggest influence on appropriate internet or cell phone behavior.
• 18% say “no one” has influenced them.

I’m surprised because so many parents tell me they are lost when it comes to many of the details – but I think parents get the big picture. I was just having a conversation about kids and social media with colleagues. First – kids don’t always understand the details as well as we think. Second – I think they very often miss that big picture – like a strange is a stranger. So in the end I think the Pew Report demonstrates that kids are still kids and parents still have a role to play in helping them become responsible adults (online).

On a personal note – it’s super helpful to know the details of social media with young teens. My new best threat is tagging my preteen in Facebook posts in embarrassing places, which would be anywhere with me these days. Stops her from complaining instantly.

1. Rural economic developers appear to be well ahead of their urban counterparts in the area of planning.
2. “We need a gigabit” has become the rallying call for broadband supporters everywhere; rural survey respondents say that 100 to 120 Mbps is the minimum they’ll need during the next three years to impact their local economies.
3. While the FCC and other policymakers continue to try to make a silk purse from a 4Mbps sow’s ear, economic development professionals aren’t buying it. At least 92 percent see no economic impact coming from this minimum national “standard.”
4. “Finding a job” is one of the most frequently cited personal economic benefits of broadband for low-income populations
5. As expected, fiber is clearly seen as the leading broadband technology to attract businesses to a community.
6. Not all wired broadband technologies are equal.
7. Perseverance is still important.
8. As the second decade of the new millennium moves along, 7 percent of respondents still only have dialup as their broadband option; 13 percent of rural respondents say they don’t expect to ever have broadband sufficient enough to impact economic development.

You’ll have to check out the original article (or his full report) for more details.

Raw data from the NTIA report comes from the results of a Census Bureau survey of about 54,300 households. Through statistical methods they have extrapolated the survey results to represent 119.5 million American households. Connected Nation used telephone interviews conducted last summer with 27,086 residents.

Here is a comparison of the results:

Household use/adoption of broadband

• NTIA – 68 percent of households used broadband Internet access service
• Connected Nation – 65 percent of residents have broadband

Computer ownership

• NTIA – 77 percent of households had a computer
• Connected Nation – 82 percent residents had a computer

Top reasons for not going broadband

NTIA

1. lack of need or interest (47 percent);
2. lack of affordability (24 percent);
3. inadequate computer (15 percent)

Connected Nation

1. Broadband fees are too expensive (18 percent)
2. No content worth viewing (18 percent)
3. Computer is too expensive (7 percent)
4. Not available (7 percent)

The final percentages (reason for not going with broadband) are a little skewed – but otherwise the numbers track, especially given that Connected Nation is looking at households and NTIA looks at residents. There were a few other nuggets in the NTIA research that struck me:

I’ve heard many talk about the growing rate of folks accessing the Internet through handheld devices – rather than desktops or laptops. The NTIA research indicates that 2 percent of those surveyed had only a handheld device. (Whereas 17 percent had a handheld and a computer; 58 percent had only a computer.) But the folks who use handheld devices are serious about their broadband…

In addition to having a stronger preference for mobile broadband Internet access, users of handheld devices were also more likely than their counterparts using only personal computers to  subscribe to fiber optic broadband services and less likely to subscribe to DSL services.

Connect Minnesota has a collection of the mapping and tools available. Last summer they did a phone-based survey with residents focusing on broadband use; they also have an ongoing project mapping broadband access in the state. Here’s more info on bother from their website:

Consumer Broadband Adoption Trends
Connect Minnesota has conducted a survey of 3,032 residents across the state to see if they access broadband, and if so, how they are using it. In addition, we have conducted the largest state-level survey of people who do not subscribe to broadband to see what is preventing them from joining the digital community. Get more info by visiting the site to check out their interactive infographic.

Broadband Landscape
The Connect Minnesota mapping initiative is working closely with broadband providers from across the state to develop a variety of broadband inventory maps for public use.

The idea is to find HAP candidates who are broadband users and work well with groups and to encourage them to become local champions, provide them with tools they need and reward them for their efforts. Local HAP volunteers are key to highlighting the Elaboration Likelihood Model because it opens to the door to locally grown trainers who have a higher probability of knowing their neighbors, of encouraging their neighbors to get engaged with broadband program and of reaching students in various classes and other sessions.

The local trainer becomes part of the local capacity that does not go away when the grant funding ends. So it’s an effective way to build lasting capacity.

In the spirit of full disclosure, I’m kind of an academic junkie so I could go on for hours here – but I’m going to hold back except to say that I think the power of ELM cannot be stressed too much. A super abridged version of it says that people are persuaded two ways: 1) the message and 2) the messenger. By training local folks to promote and facilitate broadband adoption we can hit the target market with a one-two punch a clear message presented or promoted by someone they know.

I was just on the phone with folks planning local broadband training and heard what I’ve heard for years – the greatest challenge is getting people to attend the first session. Once a connection has been made (assuming the class and trainer are a good fit) subsequent training sessions are much easier. We said the key is having a local connection – that may mean a local trainer, it may mean a local person making one-on-one connections with potential attendees to persuade them (through their existing relationship) that the class is a good fit for them. It’s interesting to read the theories behind what we’re finding in practice.

It is a goal of the state that by 2015 and thereafter, the state be in:

(1) the top five states of the United States for broadband speed universally accessible to residents and businesses;
(2) the top five states for broadband access; and
(3) the top 15 when compared to countries globally for broadband penetration.

So here are some of the global highlights:

Broadband General Stats:

• 3.4% increase (from the first quarter of 2011) globally in the number of unique IPv4 addresses connecting to Akamai’s network, growing to over 604 million.
• The global average connection speed was 2.6 Mbps, and the global average peak connection speed was 11.4 Mbps.
• High broadband (>5 Mbps) adoption grew to 27% in the second quarter
• Broadband (>2 Mbps) adoption increased to 65% globally

Mobile General Stats:

• Average connection speeds on known mobile providers ranged from 5.3 Mbps down to 209 kbps.
• Average peak connection speeds ranged from 23.4 Mbps down to 1.2 Mbps

Japan, South Korea, Hong Kong, the Netherlands are all doing well. The US is not doing that well as demonstrated by the charts below.

Minnesota is also not rocking it – as the following charts demonstrate:

Minnesota was mentioned as the stats with the lowest growth of peak speed – but that’s better than the 7 states that didn’t see a growth in peak speed. I think I would feel less discouraged by these stats if Minnesota had not made a couple of these top ten rankings in the 2010 Q3 report, when we were #10 for average connection speed and St Paul was #7 for average connection speed by city.

There is a new feature to the Akamai reports that allows us to track progress in Minnesota over the last couple years (from 2007 Q3 to current 2011 Q2):

Mostly the report pulls out data already available from the interactive tools released last week but it’s nice to see it in a list…

The survey reveals that:

• 39% of Minnesotans living in rural areas do not subscribe to broadband service at home.
• When comparing to the 72% of all households that do subscribe, there remain large gaps among key demographics:
• 53% of low-income households;
• 51% of Hispanic households; and
• 68% of seniors are without broadband.
• 54% of low-income households with children are without access to this essential tool at home.
• The biggest gap is among low-income seniors. Only 21% of low-income seniors subscribe to broadband and only 32% have a computer at home.
• The largest barrier to non-adopters is relevance – 29% of non-adopters say there isn’t Internet content worth viewing. The second most commonly cited barrier is that it is too expensive.
• The number one reason Minnesotans say they started using broadband is because they needed it for business.

The Pioneer Press asked Bill Coleman what this meant on the frontlines…

Go a mile or two outside of, say, Mora, in Kanabec County, 70 miles north of the Twin Cities, and broadband availability practically vanishes, said Bill Coleman, a broadband consultant for the Blandin Foundation, a nonprofit concerned with rural Minnesota issues.

Seventy-five percent of Kanabec County has no available broadband, he said. The lack of access means residents are cut off from the increasing numbers of services offered online for convenience’s sake, whether it’s paying one’s taxes or buying a plane ticket, he said.

“Life becomes less easy and more expensive if you can’t get online,” he said.

I think it does emphasize the need for projects such as the ARRA-funded, Blandin Foundation-led Minnesota Intelligent Rural Communities (MIRC) initiative. I’ve been featuring stories and videos from visits in the field over the last couple of weeks.

A key to the success of the MIRC project is that each participating community was asked/allowed to come up with local solutions to boost broadband use – and they came up with projects that address the deficiencies above. Here are some examples that we’ve just mentioned here in the last week or so:

• Benton County – is getting computers into the hands of people who need them through PCs for People
• Willmar - is working to get access to computers in schools and working to get seniors online to connect with friends and family online
• Lac qui Parle County – provides access and training to residents through their mobile computer lab in a bus that goes to several towns each week.
• Morris - is using their web site and online newsletter to share events and news with community – especially to reach their growing Hispanic population
• Stevens County – has computer and wireless access in the American Legion hall, a great place to reach older veterans and a great way to reach recently returning vets