New Feature on BroadbandBreakfast.com: Question of the Week
Broadband Calendar, Broadband Data, FCC, National Broadband Plan January 26th, 2010BroadbandBreakfast.com Staff, BroadbandBreakfast.com
WASHINGTON, January, 26, 2010 – BroadbandBreakfast.com today launches a new feature: We’re seeking answers to questions from our readers, and we will publish some of the answers that we receive back. This question will help prepare for the upcoming Broadband Breakfast Club on Tuesday, February 9, from 8 a.m. to 10 a.m.: “Setting the Table for the National Broadband Plan: Collecting and Using Broadband Data.”
The question: “How Can the FCC Help Collect and Release Better Broadband Data?”
Send your replies to question@broadbandcensus.com, and/or post replies in the comment section below.
Tagged with: Broadband Breakfast Club, Broadband Data, FCC
January 29th, 2010 at 5:27 am
The Answer: Engage a competent company using tried and tested analytics and person on the ground/grassroots efforts to take an accurate temperature gauge on the true level of services. Have an economics analyst conduct a thorough and comprehensive assessment of the economics surrounding the barriers to infrastrucure investment. WE talk about these in the abstract and pontificate on the reasons of limited investment from the incumbents, but what are the true economics at the root of the barrier. Will government subsidized projects be able to overcome the adoption gap? If not, we are wasting our money by funding projects to go into these communities? Or is it worth building the network as in “if you build it, they will come” sort of way.
Thanks for taking this answer/question.
January 29th, 2010 at 12:02 pm
It can’t and it shouldn’t. Private, open-source organizations can do it better and more objectively, through crowd sourcing and by finding profitable uses for aspects of the information that the public will not have an interest in anyway. If the last year should have taught us anything, it is that the road to hell is paved with the best of intentions. Centralized, non-competitive, political influenced solutions simply do not work.
January 29th, 2010 at 6:43 pm
In order for the FCC to have the data necessary to determine wireless broadband coverage, they need to collect information about each licensee’s transmit system – including location of transmitters, their height, power, orientation, etc. Commercial mobile radio service licenses issued over the last 15 years do not require operators to file this information making it impossible for the FCC or anyone else for that matter to easily map nationwide broadband coverage. The FCC needs to both enhance access to the data it currently has as well as expand its collection of data to allow for more transparency and better facilitate broadband access.
February 2nd, 2010 at 7:15 am
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