Broadband

Building Resilient Broadband Networks: Lessons from the Power Industry’s Transformation

It's almost impossible to talk about broadband at the community level without talking about resiliency and redundancy. It's hard to find rural communities that haven't experienced a broadband outage due to a fiber being cut somewhere. The issue hits the news when there are reports of regional or national broadband outages. more

BT Working on 300Mbps Residential Pilot Project

Openreach, the lead deployment arm of BT, has issued an announcement asking residents and landlords of apartment blocks to join a pilot project that will eventually bring broadband download speeds of up to 300Mbps to residents. "Participants will gain access to Openreach’s Fibre to the Premises (FTTP) technology which delivers super-fast broadband speeds," says Openreach. more

Internet Suffers Significant Slowdowns After Michael Jackson’s Death

Maggie Shiels reporting from BBC: "The internet suffered a number of slowdowns as people the world over rushed to verify accounts of Michael Jackson's death. Search giant Google confirmed to the BBC that when the news first broke it feared it was under attack. Millions of people who searched for the star's name on Google News were greeted with an error page. It warned users 'your query looks similar to automated requests from a computer virus or spyware application'." more

The Fiber Land Grab

It's becoming clear that we are now deep into a fiber land grab. By that, I mean that companies that overbuild fiber in the United States are moving into markets to build fiber as quickly as possible. The biggest ISPs have publicly discussed their plans for building a lot of fiber in 2023. Following are some of the latest projections for 2023: more

Getting Serious About Satellite Texting

One of the more interesting telecom announcements at the CES electronics show in Vegas was the announcement from the partnership of Qualcomm and Iridium of plans to bring satellite texting capability to many more cell phones and other devices. We've already seen a few other announcements recently of the ability to make emergency text calls when out of reach of cell coverage. more

Internet a Key Catalyst for Sustainable Development, Says ISOC CEO

Internet Society President and CEO Kathy Brown wrote about the critical role that the Internet has in enabling the implementation of the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). more

China Developing Cyber Weapons to Gain Control of Enemy Satellites

According to a leaked US intelligence report, China is developing capabilities to "deny, exploit or hijack" enemy satellites as a core part of its goal to control information.  more

WiMAX Has Early Lead Over LTE, Says New Report

Mobile WiMAX will outpace LTE over the next few years due to its head start on deployments, reports In-Stat. While WiMAX and LTE will take very different paths, the report suggests Mobile WiMAX already has commercial deployments where as LTE won't be commercially available until late 2009. more

No Ifs, Ands or Butts, the New FCC Must Focus on Neutrality

The Denver Post today urged a new FCC to get its mind off of "buttocks" and onto more serious issues like Net Neutrality. The editorial board was referring to a case now before the U.S. Court of Appeals, in which the agency's top legal minds are trying to determine the appropriate definition for the human posterior to better guide efforts to fine ABC for a few errant cheeks featured on a 2003 episode of NYPD Blue. more

Google and Facebook Join Forces to Directly Connect Los Angeles to Hong Kong via Undersea Cable

TE SubCom, leading provider of undersea communications technology and marine services, along with Facebook, Google, and PLDC (Pacific Light Data Communication Co. Ltd.), have announced that they will co-build the Pacific Light Cable Network (PLCN), a 12,800 km transpacific submarine cable system that will provide the first direct undersea route between Hong Kong and Los Angeles, California (USA) with ultra-high capacity transmission. more

Google Fiber Launches 5-Gig Service in 4 of Its 12 Existing Metro Markets

Google Fiber is boosting its internet speeds and availability by offering a new 5-gig tier in four of its existing markets. Nick Saporito, Head of Multi-gig and Commercial Product, made the announcement in a blog post on Valentine's day titled: Fall in love with fast -- 5 Gig is here! more

Undersea Cables as a Layer of the AI Tech Stack

As AI shifts from experimentation to real-world deployment, its unseen foundation - undersea cables - emerges as a strategic frontier. Their resilience may shape not only infrastructure policy but the outcome of US-China AI competition. more

New York City’s Broadband Reversal

New York City has done a 180-degree turnaround on the concept of the City providing broadband to low-income households. In 2020, then-May Bill de Blasio announced a plan to bring affordable broadband to low-income households. That Master Plan said that the City would make a $157 million infrastructure investment to provide broadband to around 600,000 homes that includes 200,000 residents of public housing. more

Broadband Now or Later?

I just heard about a U.S. County that is using its American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds to build fixed wireless broadband. This is a traditional fixed wireless broadband technology that will probably deliver speeds of 100 Mbps to those close to the towers, slower speeds to homes further away, and which will not reach all homes in the County. more

Who Uses the Internet?

Pew Research finds most Americans are online, yet access still tracks income, age and geography. Broadband gaps persist as subsidies fade, while smartphone dependence rises, reshaping how millions connect to work, services and civic life. more