Vermont Challenges FCC Fabric, BTX Gets President, Starlink Performance Dip

November 30, 2022 – Vermont has challenged the Federal Communications Commission’s preliminary broadband map, saying 11 percent of the FCC location data don’t match Vermont’s own map, according to a story from VTDigger.

Vermont said 22 percent of its known locations don’t appear on the map, according to the story. Vermont created its broadband maps that show 29 percent of houses went underserved last year.

“The difference seems to come from claims on the new FCC maps that satellite and fixed wireless broadband can reach huge numbers of folks—something that is not true in hilly and wooded Vermont,” the story reads.

Other states have created their own maps to challenge the FCC’s map, which was released earlier this month. New York said it is challenging some of the data.

New ISP BTX Fiber has a president

Lit Communities announced Tuesday that Richard Hogue has been named the new president of new subsidiary internet service provider BTX Fiber.

BTX Fiber is building a fiber network to provide high-speed broadband service to Brownsville, Texas. It launched in October and plans to install 100 miles of middle-mile cable and 500 miles of last-mile cable, including plans for other communities throughout the area, a press release said.

Hogue has over 20 years of telecommunications construction and management experience. His most recent position was the general manager of Point Broadband in Maryland.

“Brownsville is quite literally pushing out the leading edge in broadband internet availability to the community. BTX Fiber is thrilled to be crucial to this effort in partnership with the City of Brownsville,” said Hogue.

Starlink performance dropped in third quarter: Ookla

The download speeds of satellite broadband company Starlink dropped 17 percent in the U.S. in the third quarter compared to the last quarter, according to data released by metrics company Ookla on Wednesday.

Median download speeds dipped in the third quarter to 53 Mbps , and dropped by at least 14 percent in Canada.

“Over the past year, as we’ve seen more users flock to sign up for Starlink (reaching 400,000 users worldwide during Q2 2022), speeds have started to decrease,” Ookla writes. “Without a doubt, Starlink often can be a life-changing service for consumers where connectivity is inadequate or nonexistent.

“Even as speeds slow, they still provide more than enough connectivity to do almost everything consumers normally need to do, including streaming 4K video and video messaging. The biggest thing you might have issues with is if you’re trying to play multiplayer online games — even being a low-earth orbit (LEO) satellite, latency still lags far behind low-latency fixed broadband connections,” it added.

Starlink provides global high-speed satellite internet coverage and aims to provide coverage to rural and remote areas. The FCC has already denied Starlink funding from the $9.2 billion Rural Digital Opportunity Fund, in part because of its alleged unreliability. Starlink has since appealed.

In August, Starlink announced its partnership with T-Mobile in an effort to expand cell coverage to remote areas in the US.

Ookla is a sponsor of Broadband Breakfast.