Great news – the Center for Rural Policy & Development recently released their annual Minnesota Internet Study report. Nothing compares to it for statistics on rural Internet use in Minnesota. And really since they started tracking urban use in 2005, they’re the best in that arena too.
Jack Geller gave us a little sneak preview of the report a couple of weeks ago – but it was still fun to see the final. Here are the aspects that I found most interesting:
- 68.7 percent of homes that had a working computer. That seems low to me – but my personal sample of friends and family might be skewed.
- Broadband adoption accelerated a lot last year (after 3 years of a 6 percent increase; the increase was 12 percent last year)
- Broadband users are happy with their connection speeds. OK, this isn’t surprising to me – but important. From 1995-98, I worked for an Internet service provider. Even back then I remember everyone talking about the need to find the “next killer app” – the definitive killer app being email. I guess we’re still looking.
- Speaking of killer apps, broadband users named a few applications that they used that dialup users didn’t: YouTube, MySpace, and iTunes but e-commerce and government applications that require broadband and are useless to dialup users.
- 25 percent of rural dialup users have downloaded video – wow those are some patient people!
The Center’s news report said, “Other findings showed that the gap between rural and metro households in computer ownership, Internet connectivity and broadband adoption has NOT narrowed. It also suggests that while some of the rural-metro difference in technology adoption is still a function of the availability of broadband, most of the gap can be explained by the demographic and socio-economic differences found between rural and metro populations.” I wonder about the availability in these areas. Is there build out of high speed internet and is it affordable.
I think the only way there will really be universal coverage with affordable high speed internet is if there are public policies that mandate it. There are some examples or rural plans at http://www.speedmatters.org that you might find interesting.
Laura,
I think the Speed Matters site is great – thanks for sending the link.
I think you may have something with public policy being a requirement to serve everyone. It’s been true with other things such as phone service or to look at a completely different field, education. In fact I just heard a presentation on how well Ireland is doing these days and free education (through college) was credited with the big up ticks in their economy. It’s an investment that paid off – and I think broadband would pay off too.
In fact I went to a presentation last night (and I’ll post the notes later today) where they talked about the need for a statewide plan – that wasn’t quite as aggressive as the one I found on Speed Matters (http://www.speedmatters.org/plan/new-policy.html) – but it’s heading in that direction. Baller Herbst has a white paper that might interest you too: 8 Bold Steps to a National Broadband Strategy (http://www.baller.com/pdfs/baller-lide_8Steps_NatBBStrategy.pdf).
The Center for Rural Policy’s annual study should be appreciated for bringing some local research to our attention. Lack of a computer is a fundamental barrier for a segment of our community; in fact, several of the Blandin Get Broadband communities have strategies for getting computers, new and used, into more peoples’ homes.
The study got me thinking about the level of satisfaction with current broadband services. The study points out that many of the new broadband users have transitioned from dial-up to broadband and being pleased with the change. In technology terms, they have moved from having an unreliable car to one that works – a big step up for them, but they have not driven the Lexus. At one time, not that long ago, people were just as excited to get dial-up service for the first time.
I also saw the list of broadband dependent applications that were cited in the report – YouTube, MySpace and others. None of these applications existed even five years ago. What applications, entertainment, health care, education and other, are in development? Will DSL and cable modems be able to support these applications or will innovation be slowed by inadequate bandwidth?
To feel better about aging, the new babyboomer motto is “60 is the new 40.” With a push to FTTP in many communities, one has to ask “Is DSL the new dial-up?” I would recommend that the Center for Rural Policy add a new category to its study to identify a (hopefully) growing number of FTTP users.
Health care and education are two big issues for the rural areas. With exciting new applications like Telemedicine and Live Interactive Education, DSL or Cable will not offer the high speeds neccesary. A National fiber network is what will be need for the future to ensure that everyone has access.
A national fiber effort would be nice –to promote that ideal we need to get more people to recognize the benefits that you have mentioned and more. As Bill points out (above) we don’t’ really know the options.
Towards that end, I’m going to try read up on and then feature some good broadband applications in the upcoming weeks. Let me know if there’s something you’d suggest or something you’d like me to research.