Universal Service Modernization (Archived)

There seems to be consensus to include broadband deployment in a planned economic recovery stimulus. But is there consensus on how best to provide incentives to build high speed Internet networks?

A Q&A with Federal Communications Commission member Jonathan Adelstein focusing on crafting and implementing a National Broadband Strategy.

Much of Obama's technology plan incorporates high-level goals, but seems to skimp on details for how these things will be achieved. So what should CIOs be looking forward to? One of the first roadblocks Obama may discover is a surprising lack of basic technology and connectivity.

We have just a few days left in 2008, but there's still time for the Federal Communications Commission to give us a gift and correct a great error made on Election Day.

AT&T leads a list of group of eighteen telecommunications companies and organizations that wrote the Federal Communications Commission in support of using existing Lifeline and Link Up universal service programs to make broadband access more affordable for low income households.

The Federal Communications Commission audited a large sample of Universal Service Fund (USF) recipients -- 390 out of 1751 -- and projected the total estimated overpayment for all fund recipients based on estimated overpayments for 384 of the audited companies.

Asking a corporate CEO if he'll take money from the government is like asking a five-year-old if he wants to eat ice cream.

Universal Service Fund reform is looking like an even bigger issue for the next iteration of the Federal Communications Commission to deal with, along with a White House administration and Congress that already seem poised to make telecom issues a high priority.

The Federal Communications Commission's Office of Inspector General concludes that the FCC's High Cost Program is "a risk" because the erroneous payment rate for the program is 23.3%. The IG's initial analysis of the second round of audits of the Universal Service Fund estimates that phone companies have been overpaid more than $970 million in subsidies to provide coverage in rural areas.