The National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) is telling states they will be shut out of the Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) Program if they set the rates that Internet service providers receiving subsidies are allowed to charge people with low incomes. In its latest BEAD FAQ, NTIA challenges states considering laws that would force Internet providers to offer cheap plans to people who meet income eligibility guidelines. Although the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act requires Internet providers receiving federal funds to offer at least one "low-cost broadband service option for eligible subscribers," it also says the NTIA may not "regulate the rates charged for broadband service." NTIA points to the latter language in its argument that ISPs alone must choose the price of the low-cost option. The new version of the BEAD FAQ says that states may not require specific rates for the low-cost service option (LCSO), even when required by state law. The BEAD law "prohibits NTIA or the Assistant Secretary from engaging in rate regulation," the FAQ said. "Because the Assistant Secretary must approve the LCSO in the Final Proposal, the rate contained may not be the result of rate regulation." The NTIA released a BEAD Restructuring Policy Notice (RPN) in June. The RPN eliminated Biden-era "requirements dictating price and other terms for the required low-cost service option," the FAQ said. "Per the RPN, states may not apply state laws to reimpose [low cost option] requirements removed by the RPN... Violation would result in rejection of the Final Proposal."

Minnesota’s “Benefit of the Bargain” round received ten fewer applications from fiber providers and left 22,000 locations without any bids. “There are about 22,000 of the 76,000 eligible locations that did not receive a first-round bid,” explained Minnesota Office of Broadband Development Executive Director Bree Maki. “We lost ten applications from fiber providers because of it—and rightfully so. This is confusing.”

You probably know Benton for our newsletters and our own reporting on what is happening in the broadband and tech policy world. But in the last few years, we have been working at the state and community level—with advocates, policymakers, and just passionate folks who want better broadband for crying out loud. In 2023, we launched the Broadband State Education Project in Missouri, Pennsylvania, and Arizona, and later expanded into Western North Carolina. Our goal is to seed and support public interest broadband and digital equity coalitions in each state—coalitions that can bring together advocates, local leaders, community organizations, small internet providers, and public institutions to shape policy from the ground up. Each of these coalitions is different. But they all share a few things in common. They are:

• Led locally by people with existing credibility;
• Supported structurally by Benton, which provides technical assistance, research, and administrative help; and 
• Focused not just on information-sharing—but on advocacy, coordination, and accountability.

A growing number of companies are launching AI agents that can do things on your behalf—actions like sending an email, making a document, or editing a database. Initial reviews for these agents have been mixed at best, though, because they struggle to interact with all the different components of our digital lives. Part of the problem is that we are still building the necessary infrastructure to help agents navigate the world. If we want agents to complete tasks for us, we need to give them the necessary tools while also making sure they use that power responsibly. Anthropic and Google are among the companies and groups working on exactly that. Over the past year, they have both introduced protocols that try to define how AI agents should interact with each other and the world around them. These protocols could make it easier for agents to control other programs like email clients and note-taking apps.