Thought this might be of interest…

The FCC issued a Public Notice on February 27, 2014, announcing it will hold a Rural Broadband Workshop on March 19, 2014, as announced in the January 31, 2014 IP Transition Order. The Rural Broadband Workshop will include presentations to help develop “ideas about how to structure experiments that will inform our policy decisions regarding the deployment of next generation networks in rural, high-cost areas.”

The Rural Broadband Workshop will be held on Wednesday, March 19, 2014, in the Commission Meeting Room (TW-C305), 445 12th Street, S.W., Washington, D.C., 20554. The workshop will include an examination of the broadband needs of rural populations and the unique challenges of both broadband
deployment and adoption in rural areas. In addition, the discussion will highlight the economic, educational, and healthcare benefits that can be realized through broadband deployment and adoption. The workshop will also examine different business models that have been used to deploy broadband in rural areas, including a discussion of the factors that drive investment decisions and technology choices of different types of providers in rural communities. Finally, the workshop will examine the role that states have played, and can continue to play, in meeting the rural broadband challenge. Additional details
concerning the workshop agenda and panelists will be forthcoming.

The workshop will be free and open to the public, and will also be streamed live at http://www.fcc.gov/live. Reasonable accommodations for people with disabilities are available upon request. The request should include a detailed description of the accommodation needed and contact information. We ask that requests for accommodations be made as soon as possible in order to allow the agency to satisfy such requests whenever possible. Send an email to fcc504@fcc.gov or call the Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau at 202-418-0530 (voice), 202-418-0432 (TTY).