Community Broadband Media Roundup - March 14

Whether You’re Red or Blue, You Should Love the FCC’s Internet Plan: This Tea Party guy gets it. Why don’t DC Republicans? by Susan Crawford, BackChannel

He said (paraphrasing), “I want my freedom and I can’t stand the idea of government messing with our lives, and that’s why I like the Tea Party. But I also can’t stand that there’s a company that can tell me what kind of Internet access I can get — I can’t run my business from my home because I can’t buy the connection I need here.”


FCC Ruling

FCC order allows EPB to expand Gig service to outlying areas
Dave Flessner, Times Free Press

"We're glad that a growing number of state lawmakers are supporting proposed legislation that would remove the territorial restrictions that currently prevent municipal utilities from extending fiber services to neighboring areas," he said. "This Tennessee-driven approach is the best near-term option for serving more of the people across our state who are currently underserved or poorly served with broadband connectivity."

Here's The FCC's Ruling On Municipal Broadband
by Karl Bode

The FCC's taking aim at North Carolina and Tennessee protectionist laws first, with the hopes that other states and cities will petition the FCC for help down the line. While the FCC's net neutrality rules tries to protect consumers in the absence of competition, the municipal broadband ruling is an effort to actually create a little additional competition.

Local governments should make broadband choices
By Christopher Mitchell, Guest columnist

When Comcast announced plans last year to invest hundreds of millions in theme parks in Florida and California, its customers may have wondered why the cable giant wasn't using those funds to deliver a faster or more reliable Internet connection. While Comcast's Universal Studios faces competition from Walt Disney World, most people don't have a real choice in high-speed Internet access.

FCC decision gives counties hope of blazing Internet speeds 
by Charles Taylor, County News

Electric Co-ops as a Vehicle for Bringing Fiber to Rural Areas
by Mitchell Shapiro, Quello 

I recently listened to an interview with Randy Klindt, General Manager of Co-Mo Connect, a rural electric co-op building a gigabit fiber network in Central Missouri. It reminded me that the nation’s rural electric co-operatives can be effective vehicles for deploying advanced communication infrastructure in relatively high-cost and underserved rural areas.

...

As Klindt points out, member owned co-ops like Co-Mo have a different perspective than private companies when it comes to investment horizons. While the latter tend to prefer payback in a 3-5 year timeframe, co-ops view both electricity and communication networks as long-term infrastructure investments with payback timeframes in the 10-20 year range.

Recent FCC Proceedings Highlight Importance of Equity, Local Control
By Nicole DuPuis, Public CEO

These decisions speak to the basic tenets of democracy and equity. The internet, which is one of our country’s most sound economic engines, has also developed into a carrier of social good. It protects our right to free speech, broadens our access to information, and enables us to communicate across physical boundaries. Policies that view and protect these services as institutionalized goods to which the public should have unrestricted access reflect democratic ideals and a spirit of equality among all citizens.

FCC Chooses 12 New Rural Broadband Experiment Winners
by Joan Engebretson, Telecompetitor

 

Alabama

FCC ruling may allow Opelika to expand fiber network
by Pierce Ostwalt, The Plainsman

“I’ve been mayor for 10 years [since] last October,” Fuller said. “In my first three or four years, the most complaints I got about anything was Charter. Sorry customer service, outages all the time, pricing was going up and there was no competition.”

Fuller’s comments fall in line with many of the points made by FCC chairman Tom Wheeler before the FCC’s Feb. 26 ruling.

 "Broadband access providers have the technical ability and the economic incentive to impose restrictions on Internet,” Wheeler said. 

Idaho

Local Schools Make PLans for Own Broadband
by Chelsea Brentzel

"I think it's just something we do in the spirit of collaboration, and I think that's always important because when we talk about the school district and the city it's all the same people, and so anytime we can keep costs down it benefits everyone involved," Kirkham said.
She said the IEN crisis puts a focus on local government.
"This is always an argument for local control so whenever you have local control, then you aren't at the mercy of the decisions being made higher up the ladder and so this is one of those instances where you see that being played out," Kirkham said.

Rural schools find faster Internet at cheaper prices
by Michael H. O’Donnell, Idaho State Journal

If there is a silver lining to the mess involving the state of Idaho’s broken contract to establish the Idaho Education Network, it’s the realization that local Internet providers might be able to provide better service to small school districts for less money. 

Kentucky 

Mayor seeks companies to boost Internet speeds
City issues Request for Information as next step of Gigabit City project

New Mexico  

Rancho Santa Fe Association moves forward with plans for ‘fast, reliable’ fiber-optic network
by Karen Billing, Rancho Santa Fe Review

Norther Carolina

From Hollywood to Wilson, NC - a broadband move
By Allan Maurer, Special to WRAL TechWire

After 16 years in Los Angeles, the founders of ExodusFX moved their video special effects business to the East Coast three years ago, finally choosing the Eastern NC City of Wilson because of its gigabit municipal broadband network… 

... In LA, it would cost from $1,5,00 to $3,000 a month or more to get the necessary high speed broadband connections if you could find them at all, he says. By moving to Wilson, the company helps keep much work from going to India or China by reducing its production costs, including cost of living as well as the much less expensive bandwidth it needs. In Wilson, they pay $150 a month for their dedicated fiber hookup. 

Ohio

Progress continues on Fairlawn’s municipal Wi-Fi project
By Sean Patrick West Side Leader

“We’re the first city in our area — really, the State of Ohio — to do something like this,” he said. “We’re creating not only Wi-Fi, but also fiber for broadband. It will be a utility for residents and for businesses, so I think it’s pretty exciting.” 

Rhode Island

Chippendale: Homes Without Internet Access Leave Students Unable to Excel in School
GoLocal News

“But, there is a catch - and it’s a big one,” explained the representative. “There are approximately 232 Foster homes that have no means of accessing Broadband Internet. The students in those households want to do their homework – but they can’t. They have the high tech equipment - which taxpayers have paid for, but the technology is rendered useless in the students’ own homes! This is why I introduced House bill 5488. We must bring access to Broadband Internet to those Foster residences ASAP so these students can do their schoolwork and complete their homework.”

Tennessee

City backs TUB in broadband expansion efforts
by Andrea Agardy, Tullahoma News

The board of mayor and aldermen has officially voiced its support of the Tullahoma Utilities Board’s (TUB) bid to offer its LightTUBe Internet service outside the current limits of its coverage area.

Brian Skelton, TUB’s general manager, was among those praising the FCC’s decision.

“I am happy with the FCC decision,” Skelton said. “Municipal broadband expansion is certainly one of the answers to help get high speed broadband to more unserved and underserved Tennesseans. While I respect the concern of the state having their laws overridden by the federal government, this decision should ultimately be made at the local level, and many states, including Tennessee, have passed laws prohibiting a local decision.”

Federal authorities are not alone in taking another look at the issue. A bill to lift the restrictions on municipal Internet providers, sponsored by Sen. Janice Bowling [R-Tullahoma] and State Rep. Kevin Brooks [R-Cleveland], is currently pending in the state legislature.

Virginia

Broadband: Connecting rural Nelson County poses trials

“What is important about the NCBA’s ‘open access’ network is that businesses and residences that decide to obtain Internet are not locked into having service from only one ISP,” Carter said.“… It is the authority’s objective for additional ISPs to contract to use the NCBA network so that there will be more choice through competition for services, and that increased competition will also result in improved and expanded services.” 


And finally,

How small cable companies say they get screwed by their larger rivalsSmall cable operators have to pay the big ones for access to TV programming
by Jon Brodkin, Ars Technica  

Small Cable Ops Beg FCC For Help in Battling Cable Giants
by Karl Bode, DSL Reports

Tech Blog GigaOm Abruptly Shuts Down
by Ravi Somaiya, New York Times

When Gigabit Communities Go Rogue
Jason Meyers, THE GIGABOT

A gigabit network deployment in Pelican Bay, Fla., provides a good example of what can happen when fed up (or, perhaps, underfed) broadband consumers take matters into their own hands -- and should serve as a wakeup call for broadband service providers that may not be paying enough attention to the needs of their niche customers. 

Why America's Internet Is So Sh*tty And Slow
Adam Clark Estes, Gawker Media

You may have heard that the internet is winning: net neutrality was saved, broadband was redefined to encourage higher speeds, and the dreaded Comcast-Time Warner Cable megamerger potentially thwarted. But the harsh reality is that America's internet is still fundamentally broken, and there's no easy fix.