Earlier this week JoAnne Johnson, from U-reka Broadband, gave a great presentation on broadband policy at the state and national level as part of the Policy & Progress: Border to Border Broadband pre-conference webinar series. You can access a recording of the session online.
Few people are as knowledgeable as JoAnne when it comes to broadband policy. If you rarely think about policy, I think this will be a good primer on the topic; if you do try to follow broadband I think you’ll pick up some new info too. (For example a quick look at what’s happening in neighboring states.)
Here is the presentation:
Folks at the session had asked how JoAnne keeps up on the latest happenings. She was kind enough to send a bibliography of resources:
FierceTelecom
FierceCable
US Telecom Daily Lead
Washington Watch (NECA)
Telecompetitor
Broadband Communities
Washington Post
Morning Tech (Politico)
broadbandbreakfast.com
Opastco.org
Americasbroadbandconnectivity.org (this one carries negative stories under the news as well)
Iowa has a new effort called the Great Disconnect
NTCA.org
There a lot of discussion on funds available from Federal and State Government for investments in broadband and none on what local telephone companies can do; how they should invest in new broadband deployments.
Its amazing that telephone companies continue to succesfully argue, through individuals and presentations such as this, for the need for Governments to create incentives for investment in next generation networks and at the same time claim that the existence of robust competition eliminates the need for any sort of government involvement. Both cannot be true.
Dereg larger telophone companies and they will just invest? How has that worked over the last decade? It hasn’t work and it won’t work. These companies have monopoly control over acces to their communication network. Until we recognize that these companies need to be regulated accross the board for all communications that travel accross their networks we won’t be able to get investment in these areas that have the least competitive pressures and that are the most costly to serve. We have to talk less about incentives and more about requirements and enforcement.
Andy – that’s an interesting perspective and one that I think has worked in other countries. There are telephone companies that have served their communities well – and some that aren’t as focused on service. It will be interesting to see what happens with Universal Service Funds – it’s an opportunity to regulate through rewards. The question is who will be rewarded. It sounds as if we’ll see that play out in the upcoming weeks.
Thx! Ann