broadband

Mono County homes line up for gigabit service

Not well served. Yet.

Four small communities in southern Mono County could be getting gigabit class fiber to the home service by the end of 2015. The California Public Utilities Commission is scheduled to consider a resolution to spend $4.7 million on an FTTH project for the Aspen Springs, Chalfant, Crowley Lake and Sunny Slopes areas at its 26 June 2014 meeting.
The project was proposed last year by Race Telecommunications, one of five the company submitted in the current round of applications to the California Advanced Services Fund.… More

Broadband as vital as water to Santa Cruz County economy

1 June 2014 by Steve Blum
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Upgraded broadband infrastructure is at the center of Santa Cruz County’s proposed economic development plan, and the public is being asked to comment on it. Santa Cruz County supervisors voted unanimously to start a formal 45-day review process for the draft Economic Vitality Plan that sets out 7 steps for improving the local economy.

Broadband facilities would be as important as any other type of public infrastructure, such as roads and water. The document is laced with references to broadband development goals.… More

Build economic demand to grow broadband supply

30 May 2014 by Steve Blum
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There’s no credible argument that telecoms companies are dedicated to anything like universal high speed, low cost Internet service. AT&T, for example, wants to send you a bill no matter where you live, but picks and chooses where to build fiber – “high potential” growth areas like central business districts and pricey new subdivisions – and where to rely on hit and miss mobile infrastructure, like inner cities and rural communities.

You can call that cherry picking, as I do, or redlining, as Harold Feld blogs in a couple of 5 minute videos (h/t again to Connie Stewart).… More

Long shot for federal broadband grants in California

29 May 2014 by Steve Blum
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Federal broadband infrastructure grants are pretty thin. Earlier this year, congress approved $10 million a year for five years for rural gigabit pilot projects. The FCC is looking at putting money into rural broadband experiments, but isn’t saying how much. And the US department of agriculture’s rural utilities service – which usually just makes loans – has $13 million available now for “advanced communications technology in rural areas”, via its Community Connect grant program.… More

The name of the gigabit game is fractal hopscotch

28 May 2014 by Steve Blum
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Look familiar?

Cox is the latest major Internet service provider to announce that it’s getting into the gigabit business, saying that upgrades…

…will start with new residential construction projects and new and existing neighborhoods in Phoenix, Las Vegas and Omaha. In all Cox locations, the company will begin market-wide deployment of gigabit speeds by the end of 2016.

If those three cities sound familiar, it’s because CenturyLink has already targeted Omaha and Las Vegas, and Phoenix is one of the blessed 34 cities on Google’s maybe list for fiber-to-the-home (but not CenturyLink’s).… More

CPUC to incumbents: upgrade broadband by April or else

27 May 2014 by Steve Blum
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New draft rules for governing the California Advanced Services Fund (CASF) were released today by the California Public Utilities Commission. If approved, incumbent telephone and cable companies would be given a hard and short deadline to upgrade existing service areas, or face the prospect of competition from CASF-funded independents.

The CPUC is implementing a law passed last year by the California legislature that added $90 million to CASF and allowed independent Internet service providers and local governments to apply for grants and loans to build new broadband infrastructure, albeit under tight restrictions.… More

Bill hiking broadband construction costs approved by California assembly

27 May 2014 by Steve Blum
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The initial roll call, subject to revision.

Taking little more than a minute, the California assembly approved assembly bill 2272 this afternoon. The measure would add broadband infrastructure subsidised by the California Advanced Services Fund to the list of publicly funded projects that are subject to what are called “prevailing wage” requirements. That would mean that all work done – including work paid for by private matching funds – would be done according to union pay rates and rules.… More

Without competitive pressure, fiber can be as slow as copper

26 May 2014 by Steve Blum
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A new home development on the back side of the former Ft. Ord in Monterey County is getting fiber to the home. But don’t confuse that with fiber-to-the-home service, which so far doesn’t appear to be in the cards.
The East Garrison development has been in the making for several years. It was ready to move forward just as the Californian housing crash came in 2008, which put it and several other nearby developments into a deep freeze.… More

Broadband construction cost hike slides toward California assembly vote

26 May 2014 by Steve Blum
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Assembly bill 2272 is primed for approval by the California assembly. It would jack up the cost of subsidised broadband infrastructure projects – nearly double in some cases – and make it harder, perhaps impossible, for independent Internet service providers to get money from the California Advanced Services Fund (CASF).

On Friday the appropriations committee, by a 13 to 4 margin, sent the bill forward to a vote on the assembly floor. It didn’t quite split along party lines – republican assemblyman Eric Linder, who represents the Corona area, joined the dozen democrats on the committee in voting aye.… More

Major ISPs are a major consumer fail

22 May 2014 by Steve Blum
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Outside of arms reach of desire.

Big Internet service providers have the worst customer satisfaction rating of any of the 43 industries rated by American Customer Satisfaction Index in the past year, and Time-Warner is rock bottom of the bunch. Comcast and Charter aren’t much better.

A three-way merger of the bottom feeders is likely to lead to less customer satisfaction, not more…

“Comcast and Time Warner assert their proposed merger will not reduce competition because there is little overlap in their service territories,” says David VanAmburg, ACSI Director.

… More