Monthly Archives: November 2013

Broadband breeds music virtuoso in Minnesota?

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Ok maybe broadband doesn’t breed a usic virtuoso, but it can help nurture them when access to some of the best music instructors in the state are just a suped up Skype call away via the MacPhail Center for Music.

The Minneapolis Star Tribune recently ran an article on the remote programs at the MacPhail Center…

Swider is part of an experiment that brings professional musicians from Minnesota’s oldest music school — the nonprofit MacPhail Center for Music in Minneapolis — to classrooms in rural Minnesota through real-time video instruction. Think video conferencing, but with excellent audio and visual capacities on a 40-inch screen.

Launched in 2011 to help cash-strapped rural school districts boost their music programs, it’s grown from a pilot project in one school to 17 school districts and 1,500 students. And the numbers keep growing.

The program is one of the first of its kind in the nation, said MacPhail President Paul Babcock. While a handful of the nation’s premier music schools for advanced students have tapped the technology, it’s never been available to ordinary — and often lower income — students in small-town bands and orchestras.

With the holidays approaching, music directors across the state are getting guest teachers to help prepare for their December concerts.

The Minnesota Broadband Task Force got a demonstration from the MacPhail Center in October 2012. (I’ve added it below too.) I was lucky enough to catch the instructor and student musicians in action on video. It is very fun to see and fun to see an application that is so simple in its elegance and proves the point that with broadband you can do more!

Governor’s Task Force on Broadband Dec 3: Agenda

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I plan to attend the meeting of the Broadband Task Force next week. I will take notes. It looks as if it’s very much a working meeting…

Governor’s Task Force on Broadband
December 3, 2013
Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development
JJ Hill Conference Room
1st National Bank Building, 332 Minnesota Street, St. Paul, MN 55101
10:00 a.m. – 2:00 p.m.

  • 10:00-10:15 Welcome/Introductions/Public Comments/Approve minutes from November 12, 2013
  • 10:15 – 1:45 Walk-thru of Draft Report (including working lunch)
  • 1:45-2:00 Update/Next Meeting Agenda/Wrap-up
  • 2:00 Adjourn

Parking is available on-street or at the following ramps and lots:
• 1st  Parking Ramp, 5th Street between Minnesota and Robert Streets
• Capital City Plaza Parking, 4th Street between Cedar and Minnesota Streets
• Kellogg Square Ramp, Kellogg Boulevard between Minnesota and Robert Streets
• US Bank/Firstar Center, Minnesota Street between 5th and 6th Streets
• Victory Ramp, Wabasha Street between 4th and 5th Streets

Danna MacKenzie Named to Head State Broadband Office

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I am happy to post the following information. I have known Danna for many years. She understands technology, policy and the role that both can play in helping a community thrive. I first worked with Danna on the Rural Datafication project close to 20 years ago. We must have been high school interns!

ST. PAUL – Gov. Mark Dayton named Danna MacKenzie executive director of the Office of Broadband Development, a new state entity that was created during the 2013 legislative session to direct broadband planning and policy statewide.

MacKenzie, who has 18 years of experience with broadband issues in rural Minnesota, has been the director of information systems for Cook County in Grand Marais since 1998. She has been an administrator on the Cook County Broadband Commission since 2009 and a member of the Blandin Broadband Strategy Board since 2005.

“Danna is an outstanding choice, with the leadership skills and experience to direct broadband growth in the state,” said Katie Clark Sieben, commissioner of the Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development (DEED), which will oversee the office. “She is highly regarded in the broadband community and has a unique ability to balance community development and business interests.”

Broadband – or high-speed Internet access – is considered a key economic development tool, with a number of national studies finding that communities with access to broadband have a competitive advantage over areas that don’t have broadband.

Increasingly, corporate site selectors expect broadband services to be available in communities where they are considering expansion projects. In many communities, broadband is considered an important piece of the local infrastructure – like gas, water, electricity, wastewater and telecommunications.

Minnesota officials have set a broad goal of making broadband available throughout the state by 2015.

Specifically, the Legislature wants the office to collaborate on the development of broadband infrastructure, plan strategy, find federal funding for expansion, recommend policies to improve access, and regularly report on its progress.

MacKenzie, who grew up in the Twin Cities, has a bachelor’s degree in organizational management and leadership from Concordia University in St. Paul. She was a public policy fellow at the Humphrey School of Public Affairs at the University of Minnesota in 2011.

DEED is the state’s principal economic development agency, promoting business recruitment, expansion and retention, workforce development, international trade and community development. For more details about the agency and our services, visit us at http://mn.gov/deed/. Follow us on Twitter at twitter.com/mndeed.

Technology credited with rural revival – what if we boosted technology?

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Over the weekend the Minneapolis Star Tribune ran a story of rural revival. The article features towns such as Osakis, Jackson, Mankato, Brainerd, Kiester, Benson, Hancock and Morris and notes their progress and growth. Technology – broadband technology – is given some of the credit for progress and growth. That’s exciting and I’m sure that technology has played a role BUT it also feels as if maybe the towns could do even better with more technology or as if maybe we’re being satisfied with minimal improvements when we should be aiming higher.

For example, the starts by talking about dialup access…

“If you don’t have to endure dial-up modems, it really changes everything,” said Deborah Morse-Kahn, a historian who works from a home in the woods along the North Shore. “I have a FedEx truck or a UPS truck here every other day, and I am constantly running into people I used to know in the Twin Cities who are coming up here permanently, semi-retiring, still eager to be connected to the world — but also loving this sense we have here of living in the middle of a National Geographic special, with bears fishing for trout in a stream near your home.”

Comparing the current access with dialup is damning with faint praise. Some parts of the North Shore are well served, other parts will be well served soon but there are some areas – the Cloquet Valley – that are stuck with just better than dialup access. It might be OK for semi-retired residents who are looking to keep connected but it isn’t adequate for many home-based businesses or anything larger.

Imagine the multiple generations that could move Up North if broadband was sufficient to run a full time business…

When jobs do arrive in rural areas, local people say, they enable a lifestyle that many city folks would envy. “When I see four or five cars on my way to work,” said Brett Grinager, master distiller at Panther Distillery in Osakis, “it’s a busy day. I can bring my dog to work, and 10 minutes after I’m done, I’m out hunting.”

Another example also seems to minimize the potential impact of broadband access…

Then too, technology is bringing “the sticks” a lot closer to the world.

Laura Backes, co-owner of the hardware store in downtown Osakis, takes her visitors to a backroom, whose wall bears a huge United States map with marks showing all the states she sells to via eBay, both conventional merchandise and stuff she buys up from abandoned storage lockers.

“Why a person in California buys a light bulb from Osakis,” she says, “I do not know. But they do. We kept marking the towns we shipped to on this map until we had at least one mark in every single state. ”

The Internet isn’t just for eBay anymore. I was surprised that an article that focused on farming didn’t talk more about broadband applications in precision agriculture. Wikipedia details the economic advantages of precision ag…

Precision agriculture management practices can significantly reduce the amount of nutrient and other crop inputs used while boosting yields. Farmers thus obtain a return on their investment by saving on phytosanitary and fertilizer costs. The second, larger-scale benefit of targeting inputs—in spatial, temporal and quantitative terms—concerns environmental impacts. Applying the right amount of inputs in the right place and at the right time benefits crops, soils and groundwater, and thus the entire crop cycle. Consequently, precision agriculture has become a cornerstone of sustainable agriculture, since it respects crops, soils and farmers. Sustainable agriculture seeks to assure a continued supply of food within the ecological, economic and social limits required to sustain production in the long term. Precision agriculture therefore seeks to use high-tech systems in pursuit of this goal.

The potential is there for big changes if/when broadband is available. It is available in many areas – Lac qui Parle for example. But again there are areas that are left unserved. Talk to the farmers near Renville – who would happily pay the big bucks to get broadband but still can’t get it.

Many have access to some broadband – but it isn’t adequate to make a difference in their businesses. The article highlights stats from the recent Connect Minnesota report…

Broadband of some sort has grown to reach nearly 100 percent of the state’s households, and high-quality broadband rises in its reach year by year. Service at 10/6 megabits per second reached 69 percent by April, up from 56 percent in 2011, according to Connect Minnesota.

Picture1There are many businesses – even small home-based businesses – that cannot be run effectively on less than 10/6 Mbps services. And while access to “some broadband” is almost ubiquitous – access to the state definition of broadband speeds (10/5 Mbps) is available to only 69 percent of households – but geographically you can see that there are definite dead zones. Looking at that map – where would you relocate? What is there to keep the unserved areas thriving?

I may be a little touchy this week. Last week I spoke to someone who had a funny attitude about rural broadband. He seemed to think that people “who chose to live by the lake” could probably make do with whatever access they could get and/or could pay a premium for enhanced service. But it didn’t occur to him that farmers need access and that whole towns need better access. That living in a rural area didn’t always mean early retirement – it was a lifelong life choice for many – and I suspect it will be for many more when the technology gets even better.

Arrowhead Electrical Cooperative becomes Ad Hoc Community Center for Broadband Hungry

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Build it and they will come. I think that’s half true with broadband today. Build it and the interested and motivated will come. That’s what they’re seeing in Cook County. Dave Peters reports for MPR’s Ground Level…

Arrowhead [Electrical Cooperative] is running optical fiber throughout the county to provide high-speed access to anyone who wants it. Most of the construction is done. Now they need to do “a lot, a lot, a lot” of cable splicing to connect the fiber to people’s homes. First service is set for January or February, he [Joe Buttweiler] said.

But until that splicing happens, it sounds as if people are setting up shop in and around Arrowhead Electric to get the bandwidth they need…

Since then it’s not uncommon to see people sitting in the parking lot at odd hours just to use the high-speed service on their laptops or tablets, he added.

One musician Buttweiler knows had been using a coffee shop in Grand Marais to do a weekly upload of large files, typically taking an hour and a half to accomplish what he needed. Now he comes to the Arrowhead building and does the same thing in five or 10 minutes.

So there is demand! Some of that has always been there – but a huge piece of the equation has been building demand even before the fiber was deployed through Cook County’s MIRC effort and other initiatives that I know go back at least 15 years – because I remember doing Internet introductions North of Duluth more than 15 years ago.

 

 

An Hour of Code – Sign up now students of all ages!

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Computer Science Education Week is December 9-15. One of the activities the Computer Science foundation is promoting this is year an Hour of Code for every student. The goal is to introduce students to coding because we need more coders, because kids should get the exposure, because, as the video below explains, coding is cool.

Here’s more explanation from the website…

What’s an Hour of Code?

It’s a one-hour introduction to computer science, designed to demystify “code” and show that anyone can learn the basics to be a maker, a creator, an innovator.

We’ll provide a variety of self-guided tutorials that anybody can do, on a browser, tablet, or smartphone. We’ll even have unplugged tutorials for classrooms without computers. No experience needed.

Watch this “how to” video for more information. Check out the tutorials in beta.

My favorite catch phrase on the Computer Science Ed Week website is – “No math needed, no computers either.” It’s true. I was never a great math student in high school but I did well in computer class. It’s more about logic, imagination and motivation. And the Hour of Code folks have created curriculum that makes it easier for teachers and students to get involved.

I think we owe it to our students and our communities to give kids the glimpse into coding. It opens the doors to new career opportunities and interests. Also I don’t want to put any limitations on the definition of students – these tools are there for lifelong learners too. Never too old to get caught in the for-next-loop!

I just watched a video on Student Success on the Blandin Foundation website. The students talk about the importance of trying their best. But they also talk about opportunities – this is an easy opportunity and it just might ignite a light under the next Minnesota-grown Mark Zuckerberg!

Lake County Network Issues: Frontier Pole Attachments

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Lake County has filed a complaint with the FCC about Frontier because Lake County has used Frontier poles to strong fiber and Frontier is saying that they (Frontier) want to retain the bottom position on all utility poles. That would require Lake County to move their attachments, which would cost more than $240,000.

The Lake County News Chronicle reports…

According to a release from Lake Connections, Frontier has insisted on occupying the bottom position on all utility poles, which would require the county to remove and restring cables. According to the complaint, doing so would cost more than $240,000.

Frontier responded in a statement, saying that Lake Connections attached cables to Frontier-owned poles without permission and didn’t follow an agreement the county and Frontier signed earlier.

“The simple facts, however, are Lake County attached its facilities to Frontier’s poles prior to and without Frontier’s consent and in a manner that is inconsistent with industry safety standards and the agreement it signed with Frontier,” the statement said.

In the complaint, Lake Connections says that Frontier is suggesting industry standards are “rigid” while they are actually recommendations and, taking into account the specifics of this case, it makes more sense to leave the cables as they are currently strung.

Twin Cities Unconference & Hackathon: Where technology meets civic engagement

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Ealier this month I attended CityCampMN 2013 –an unconference and hackfest sponsored by E-Democracy and OpenTwinCities. It was a two-day event. Day One focused on discussing issues, ideas and solutions on civic issues – as defined by attendees through an Open Space process. Day Two was a hackfest – where a subgroup from the previous day gathered to see what they could do to create solutions to issues raised earlier – generally using technology.

I really enjoyed the weekend! Because I would love to see this sort of event happen in smaller communities, and I know Blandin is working on that too, I thought I’d share notes both on the topics and logistics of the event. This might get a little long – I’ll try to organize my thoughts…

Day One – Unconference

Attendees – a wide range of people attendees the event – especially on day one – from teens to seniors, men and women, lots of different native languages… People came from the private, public and nonprofit sectors and there was a heavy media presence – as participants.

 

Agenda

Introductions – everyone introduced themselves by giving name, location, affiliation and 3 words to describe yourself. It was quick but it gave a nice overview of who was there and helped spark potential connections.

Introduce Open Space and Topics – attendees are invited to introduce topics they would like to discuss during the day. Folks come into the day knowing they will have this opportunity. I suspect some come with ideas and some are spurred by others. Once the ideas are all shared, the planners gather them up, organize them (some get combined) and schedule a time and place for the conversations to happen

The Ignite Sessions – while the planners work their magic, the attendees view a series of quick, high energy planned Ignite presentations.

Open Space Session – there were three rounds of discussions and a lunch. You can get notes on each session – or check out the quick list below. During each session, there are informal leaders who facilitate the discussion and note takers. Otherwise the idea is to listen, share and stay on topic if that’s what makes sense.

  • Making Government Data Useful to Communities of Color
  • ·How do you address community issues using technology?
  • Citizen Engagement for Twin Cities Neighborhoods
  • Online donations
  • Open Source Organizations and Government Entities
  • How do you put together an unconference or a hackathon?
  • Free access to technology
  • Face-to-Face Networks as a Technology
  • Open Source GED test
  • How to side-step elected officials to move government forward
  • Visualizing and gamifying economic, transportation and quality of life data.
  • Drupal in the City/How to design websites
  • How Can Cities Best Communicate Parks & Recreation Opportunities?
  • Fighting Crime (Human Trafficking) with Data
  • The fall of money, the economy of tomorrow
  • Free resources for youth classes in STEM
  • Code for Neighbors Vicini Project
  • Energy Information and Mapping
  • Making Digital Connections Personal
  • What are the most valuable data sets? 311?
  • Social Power and Technology for Digital Inclusion
  • New Ways of Voting, How to get to 100% Participation
  • Organizing through the Arts
  • Cross platform productivity tools for professionals

At the end of the day, each session reports out. And as a special treat, there was a reception to celebrate Steve Clift and E-Democracy on the Champion of Change award, originally presented to them at the White House.

Day Two – Hackfest

Attendees – This was a smaller subgroup from the previous day. The crowd tended to be younger – although age the range was teen to 70+. Women were definitely in the minority. Some people were super techie, some were kind of techie, some weren’t at all. Some people came to the event with a mission in mind, some just wanted to sign up for something that looked interesting. Most people seemed genuinely interested in coding for good. Most, but not all, had attended the Unconference.

Introductions – Everyone introduced themselves. The planners discussed the flow for the day and set reasonable expectations. They paid a lot of respect to the iterative process. The goal of the day was to move the ball further down the field – that might mean a score (creating an app) that might be preparing for an assist (getting the specs together for an app) that might mean drafting the right team.

Introduction of Topics – Attendees were invited to suggest a project/idea to hack. The other attendees chose their hack project  by hooking up with the person to called the topic. Groups formed, found space and got started.

Agenda – The day was spent mostly working in small groups. We got a presentation on a technology platform. We got pizza. We convened and provided project updates once. Most people worked in their groups most of the time – but there was crossover collaboration as well. One of our group members worked for the Parks – so he was poached by a group interested in Parks – at least for a while.

I find working in these ad hoc groups to be very energizing! In my experience they are very collegial. All talents are respected and used. I think they work best when everyone feels like they can contribute – especially when the contribution is – Hey guys, we’re wasting too much time on XYZ, let’s get back to… The groups that attended this session were varied. One group was meeting for the second time to finish a project started at the Hackfest in June. One leader had a very specific and finite mission to the group hit the ground running. Our group had a more nebulous goal and much broader vision. I feel like a learned a lot, I contributed some and our group has at least emailed a couple times to follow up with the project.

Here are some of the proposed hack projects – pulled from Tweets from the day:

  • Possible Hack Topic 1: How lack of resources affects achievement gap
  • Possible Hack Topic 2: localized data puller – pull legacy data from multiple systems into a single place
  • Possible Hack Topic 3: getting voters informed in a more structured way
  • Possible Hack Topic 4: parent mapping tool – data parents want when choose home/school/et al
  • Possible Hack Topic 5: renewable electricity info mapping and online tours
  • Possible Hack Topic 6: measuring informal usage of facilities – IE pickup basketball games
  • Possible Hack Topic 7: gamification projects
  • Possible Hack Topic 8: location dependent public services, based on local geography – tapping into location to provide service
  • Possible Hack Topic 9: Preventing human trafficking – they came up with a cool site: http://gelicia.com/MNHumanTrafficking/
  • Possible Hack Topic 10: creating an uber community calendar
  • Possible Hack Topic 11: public investment is subject to requirements (hire women/minority owned bus) – can we track?
  • Possible Hack Topic 12: Rank choice voting – took longer to declare a winner because of need for certified counting systems.

I think these events help encourage civic engagement – but they also build a sense of community among a group that can be powerful when channeled!

Latest Connect Minnesota Broadband Data: 74.5% households have access

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Connect Minnesota recently released their latest report on broadband availability in Minnesota. The good news is that we’ve gained 5 percentage points since April 2013. The bad news is that we’re still a far cry from the broadband goals set for 2015.

Here are some of the stats:

  • 74.5% of Minnesota households can access fixed and mobile broadband at speeds of at least 10 Mbps download/6 Mbps upload – the minimum speed threshold for Minnesota’s goal of ubiquitous broadband availability*. This represents a nearly 5% increase from April 2013, and for the first time in Connect Minnesota’s work, shows the impact of mobile broadband in meeting state speed goals in areas previously not served by those speeds (excluding satellite services).
  • Since Connect Minnesota began measuring availability at the 10 Mbps download/6 Mbps upload speed tier in April 2011, there has been an increase of nearly 20% in fixed and mobile broadband availability from 56.4% to 74.5%.

Unfortunately there is a great disparity in availability by County. The following map shows Broadband Availability by Percentage of Households Served by Terrestrial and Mobile Broadband Service by County.  The yellow represents areas with less than 20 access – you can see how many areas are stuck there.
Picture1

Minnesota Local Government Innovation Awards that Highlight Technology

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Last week, the Humphrey School of Public Affairs announced the winners of its seventh annual Local Government Innovation Awards. The awards—organized in partnership with the Bush Foundation and co-sponsored by the League of Minnesota Cities, the Association of Minnesota Counties, and the Minnesota School Board Association—recognize government entities for their creativity and effectiveness in redesigning how they do business.

I was pleased a see a couple of technology-centered projects get mentioned…

County Category: Carlton County: TXT4Life Suicide Prevention
The TXT4LIFE program reaches youth in ways they communicate most: Through text messaging, the Minnesota affiliate of the National Suicide Prevention Network Lifeline has experienced a tremendous increase in clients. The TXT4LIFE program covers northeast Minnesota including seven counties and four tribal nations—a geographic area that represents six percent of the state’s population but consistently reports the highest suicide rates. Marketing and outreach are key components; prior to the text program, the suicide line received 25 calls each month from youth and it now receives more than 300.

Also a MIRC community project was in the line up: City of Morris: Morris Rental Housing Commission. I wrote about their project in April 2012…

The folks at the University of Minnesota Morris have found a solution to student housing issues – that is an open and informed market for students and landlords. The Morris Rental Housing Commission received funds through the Minnesota Intelligent Rural Communities (MIRC) initiative to develop a website that helps keep everyone informed – of their rights, the responsibilities and the local rental market. They maintain a database of licensed and available rental properties.

Executive Director of the Commission was kind enough to tell me a little bit about how the website has been received. It sounds as if both the students and landlords have appreciated the site. It sounds as if the site is helping both parties make better informed decisions. She had one story that helps put into perspective what a difference a little knowledge can make…

The one story that I think epitomizes the success of the site concerned a parent and their college student child. They were looking at several different rental properties. Most parents are a bit nervous about the fact that college students in Morris sign leases for the Fall of 2012 in January or February. They had looked at some of the properties and then found the web site which provided the inspection reports on the properties. After reviewing the inspection reports, the parent called my office and wanted to talk about them. We discussed the things that are covered in an inspection and those that are not. One of the properties had failed the inspection and had not made the corrections for many months. It was a property the college student wanted to rent but the information from the website provided the information needed to avoid a problem rental.

The fact remains that most college students (as well as other new renters) are unaware of the pitfalls that can make their lives very stressful. If we can play a small role in helping them avoid just one struggle we have accomplished something worthwhile.

Fiber for Weather Forecasting

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Here’s an innovative use of fiber from Broadband Communities Magazine. Using fiber to improve weather forecasting through Collaborative Adaptive Sensing of the Atmosphere (CASA)…

As Zink explains, NEXRAD is the most advanced operational weather detection system in the world, but it is challenged in detecting low-altitude features of severe storms. NEXRAD uses 160 weather radars, each with a range of about 240 kilometers. Because radar beams travel in straight lines and Earth curves, the altitude of a beam increases the farther it travels from the radar. For this reason, NEXRAD cannot measure wind velocity in about 70 percent of the atmosphere below an altitude of 1 kilometer.

CASA, in contrast, uses clusters of three to eight radar devices mounted closer to ground level, each with a range of 40 km. The beams from each device overlap with beams from other devices, and all readings are sent over fiber connections to a control node that analyzes the data to determine wind direction and velocity. Based on this analysis, the control node also can redirect the radar to follow a tornado or other severe weather condition.

“Because of the control loop, we get updated information every one minute,” observes Zink. “With fast-moving events, that can be essential.”

In comparison, NEXRAD provides updates every five minutes – and in the case of the 2011 Oklahoma tornado, the four minutes that CASA saved may have been critical.

How much is that fiber network?

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The Atlantic Wire recently ran an interesting article that outlines costs of the Kansas City Google fiber network…

Google CEO Larry Page has previously mentioned vague expansion plans for Fiber during earnings calls, calling it a “good business” and not just a “hobby.” But it’s very unlikely that Fiber will see a country wide release. Most importantly, installing fibertoptic cable is expensive — just laying down Fiber in Kansas City cost $84 million for 149,000 homes… and that was before even connecting the cables to the houses. One estimate pegs “nationwide deployment” at $140 billion, which would wipe out even Apple’s big pile of cash reserves. Just another 20 million homes would cost $11 billion, according to other research.

The article goes on to talk about what made KC an attractive community…

Of course, that still leaves hope for certain parts of the country. But Kansas City met certain specifications that other cities might not: “We wanted to find a location where we could build quickly and efficiently,” Milo Medin, Google’s vice president for Fiber, said back when the K.C. pilot program was announced. “Kansas City has great infrastructure.” Specifically, Google means the “business friendly” environment that promised to keep the city officials away from Google, according to Forbes‘s Elise Ackerman. “They didn’t dangle tax breaks, but they did deliver access to public rights of way, expedite the permitting process, offer space in city facilities and provide assistance with marketing and public relations,” she writes. Kansas City made certain “development agreements” in order to snag the first Fiber deal, such as agreeing to pay for power at city locations and offering space to house Google equipment at no charge. Google also secured guarantees from the city that it would get quick responses on “mundane but important matters,” as Technology Review explains.

Interesting to look at what it takes in terms of finances and what a provider seems to find attractive in a community. Now to be fair, most providers don’t have a business plan that includes selling advertising like Google does – but still interesting.

Connect Minnesota 2013 Broadband Summit: Full Agenda

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Just wanted to share the full agenda for the Connect MN Broadband Summit on December 4…

December 4, 2013, 10 AM – 3 PM
Roseville, MN

We are down to twenty days remaining until the Connect Minnesota 2013 Broadband Summit, but it’s not too late to register. This event will be a venue for sharing and learning cross-collaborative best practices for expanding broadband and technology access, adoption, and use to move Minnesota to the forefront of the digital economy.

The agenda is as follows:

9 – 10:   Registration Opens

10 – 10:10: Welcome
William Hoffman – Connect Minnesota, State Program Manager

10:10 – 10:55:  Providers and Technology: Where We Are, Where We are Going

Moderator: Wes Kerr, Manager of Provider Relations, Connected Nation

Panelists: Brent Christensen, President of the Minnesota Telecom Alliance; Mike Martin, President of the Minnesota Cable Association; Andrew Sackreiter, Director of RAB Engineering, AT&T Mobility Services

10:55 – 11:05:  BREAK

11:05 – 11:50:  State and Federal Policy: The Impact on Minnesota’s Broadband Landscape

Moderator: William Hoffman, State Program Manager, Connect Minnesota

Panelists: Al Juhnke – Office of United State Senators Al Franken’s Office; State Rep. Sheldon Johnson – Minnesota State House of Representatives; Lindsay Shanahan – Counsel, Broadband Research and Planning, Connected Nation; Kim Babine, Director of Government Relations, Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development

11:50 – 12:00:  Break

12:00 – 1:00:  Lunch and Keynote

Thomas Cohen, Kelley, Drye & Warren, LLP – Legal Counsel, Fiber to the Home Council

1:10 – 1:55: Governor’s Task Force on Broadband: Update on Task Force Activities and its 2013 Report to Governor Dayton

Moderator: Margaret Kelliher, Chair, Governor’s Task Force on Broadband, President, Minnesota High Tech Association

Panelists: Gary Evans, Task Force Member, CEO of Hiawatha Broadband Company; Richard Sjoberg, Task Force Member, President, Sjoberg Cable; Shirley Walz, Task Force Member, Senior Director of Technology for Thompson-Reuters

2:00 – 2:45:  Blandin Foundation Panel – Community-led Approaches to Increasing Broadband Adoption: Success Stories from Minnesota Main Streets

Moderator: Bernadine Joselyn, Director of Policy, Blandin Foundation

Panelists: Janice Gale, Director, Temporary Employment Program, Leech Lake Band of Ojibwe, Fatima Said, Executive Director, Project FINE, Sheldon Giese, Accounting Manager, West Central Environmental Consultants, Alice Moren, Manager, Circles of Support and PCs for People, KOOTASCA Community Action

2:45 – 2:50:  Broadband Hero Award

2:50 – 3:00:  Thank you and Close
Click here to register.

Better broadband would make donation days easier

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What would you do with a Gig? I hear that question all of the time. Well, if we all had a Gig I suspect we wouldn’t be reading about the Give to the Max servers today…

Despite hours offline due to a crush of traffic to its website, GiveMN.org’s one-day donate-a-thon Give to the Max raised a record $17 million for Minnesota nonprofits.

The number of donors, which topped 52,000, just missed last year’s record of 53,339.

The Pioneer Press had a late-night update of the donations totals after the event wrapped at 11:59 p.m. Thursday. Problems began appearing nearly 12 hours earlier, with prospective donors unable to register gifts (or sometimes, mistakenly double-donate). Minnesota Public Radio has comments from frustrated donors.

St. Paul-based GiveMN issued a statement that the volume of transactions had overwhelmed Razoo, its technology partner.

I love the idea of a day for donations. I’m glad that it seemed to work well at the end of the day. But you just have to wonder about what other ideas don’t get off the ground because the broadband isn’t there to support it.

Tekne Awards Announced – Great to see Minnesota’s finest

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Congrats to all of the Tekne winners this year. It’s always great to learn about the innovative things businesses are doing in Minnesota. I was particularly interested in learning about CogCubed; they using gaming systems to identify and treat cognitive disorders like ADHD and Autism. Very cool.

Here are the winners:

  • Advanced Manufacturing – 3M
  • Agricultural Technology – The Toro Company
  • Computer Hardware and Electronic Devices – Honeywell
  • EdTech – myON – a business unit of Capstone
  • Healthcare Delivery (Established Company) – HealthPartners
  • Healthcare Delivery (Small and Growing Company) – Corventis, Inc.
  • Impact on Industry (Established Company) – Ecolab
  • Impact on Industry (Small and Growing Company) – BankCard Services Worldwide
  • Innovative Collaboration of the Year – Boston Scientific
  • Mobile Technologies – XRS Corporation
  • Safety and Security – MPC
  • Software (Established Company) – Navitaire
  • Software (Small and Growing Company) – UpNet Technologies
  • Start-Up – CogCubed
  • STEM Education and Digital Learning – University of St. Thomas – School of Engineering

I was disappointed to see no rural businesses pick up an award this year. Only the following companies made the finalists list:

  • Winehaven Winery and Vineyard (Chisago City) – Ag Tech Finalist
  • ByteSpeed (Moorhead) – Computer Hardware and Electronic Device Finalist
  • Mayo Clinic (Rochester) – Healthcare Delivery Finalist
  • Mate Precision Tooling (Elk River) – Impact on Industry Finalist
  • Custom Control Systems, Inc. (Winona) and STEM Fuse (Sartell) – Startup Finalists

The question is – did the rural companies not make the cut OR did the rural companies not apply? Next year I hope we can make a good push to get more rural companies to apply. It’s a great way to promote rural areas and the individual businesses!