Tuesday, September 7, 2021
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Community leaders support residents seeking Emergency Broadband Benefit enrollment
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Underconnected to the Internet and Returning to Remote Learning
How Much Longer Will Schools Have to Scrape Together Technology Funding?
How the 5G experience compares across 50 states and 250 US cities
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The federal government’s internet discount is slow to reach residents. These community leaders are offering a connection
Only an estimated one in seven eligible households have enrolled in the Federal Communications Commission's Emergency Broadband Benefit Program so far. The majority of those who have received the benefit were grandfathered in through Lifeline, an existing federal subsidy program aimed primarily at telephone users. Accessibility, language barriers, and documentation requirements have beset a number of potential applicants. Most people are unaware that the Emergency Broadband Benefit exists at all. Preliminary ZIP code-level analyses from the Benton Institute of Broadband and Society show that Philadelphia has enrolled more people than Chicago, even though Chicago has over 1 million more residents. Baltimore has enrolled more people than Phoenix and Houston, both of which dwarf Baltimore in population. Baltimore, for instance, has consistently ranked among the country’s “Worst Connected Cities” — 40% of households lack wireline internet access, per an Abell Foundation report — so it follows that a high population of residents might enroll. In Philadelphia, community leaders have organized to boost enrollment.
Opensignal conducted a comprehensive analysis of smartphone users' 5G mobile experience across the US. Major findings include:
- 5G users in Illinois and Texas spent the highest amount of time connected to 5G
- New York state featured the fastest 5G Download Speed of 114 Mbps
- 5G users in all states except for Alaska experience a Good 5G Video Experience (Opensignal's metric that quantifies the quality of video streamed to mobile devices by measuring real-world video streams over an operator's networks)
- All states with a Good Games Experience (Opensignal's measure of how mobile users experience real-time multiplayer mobile gaming on an operator’s network) are on the East Coast, except for Nebraska
- US states with a higher percentage of urban populations have a higher 5G availability
If you’d like a more honest assessment of whether AT&T, T-Mobile or Verizon Wireless – or none of the above – will offer decent connectivity, you should seek an outside opinion instead of consulting the carriers' coverage maps. Some resources to do so are:
- Apps like Ookla's Speedtest can benchmark a wireless carrier’s performance.
- T-Mobile's test-drive option can let you test coverage firsthand.
- Drive testing provided by RootMetrics has provided one such source of ground truth; visit its coverage map to see its color-coded ratings of the fastest speeds and best technology for each carrier in a given area.
- The Federal Communications Commission's recent map of LTE coverage allows you to set the map to display calculated data or voice performance from any of the big three (plus the regional carrier US Cellular) or show only one company’s coverage.
Starry Internet is among the next generation of new wireless technologies that support high-speed, low-latency internet connectivity using millimeter-wave bands capable of sending large amounts of data over short distances. That sounds a lot like 5G, and I'd say it's definitely similar -- but Starry doesn't quite bill itself as a 5G home internet provider. Why not? Whereas 5G focuses on mobile, roaming access to the internet, Starry's technology is focused solely on establishing a fixed, targeted connection to your home. Quality of the connection aside, there's much to like about Starry's prices and terms, which eschew contracts, data caps, and arbitrary price increases in favor of a simple, straightforward approach that seems more customer-friendly than much of its more established ISP competitors. That, along with Starry's plans to expand service to tens of millions of additional homes by the end of 2022, makes this an internet provider worth knowing about -- and worth considering, too, if it's available at your address. Here is a complete rundown of what you should know about Starry's technology and speeds, as well as a close look at the company's plans, prices and terms.
JMA Wireless, Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Crown Castle launched a private LTE network for Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) using Citizens Broadband Radio Service (CBRS) spectrum. Plans for the project started in mid-2020, as CMU looked to upgrade cellular connectivity to support research at its Living Edge Lab on campus. Before embarking on the LTE upgrade, the university was already using a 4G private wireless network with a Band 42 3.5 GHz experimental license. The CBRS network took less than three months to construct and commission, and first went live in June 2021. The ability to utilize CBRS spectrum via unlicensed general authorized access (GAA) helped initiate the upgrade plans. A July blog by Jim Blakley, Living Edge Lab Associate Director, explained how the earlier LTE network delivered better latency than carriers could provide but was limited by coverage and a lack of commercially available devices at the time. Since then, the Federal Communications Commission opened up access to 3.5 GHz frequencies in the shared CBRS band through priority access licenses and GAA use. Federated Wireless is providing the spectrum access system (SAS) for the network. The SAS manages spectrum sharing in the CBRS band and providers are authorized by the FCC.
The radio spectrum that governments license to mobile operators is central to the development of mobile broadband services. However, there is significant variation around how much and when spectrum is assigned, as well as its costs. We assessed whether policies to assign spectrum had an impact on consumer welfare in 64 countries during the 2010–2017 period and found evidence that policies that reduce the amount of spectrum available to operators, delay the assignment of spectrum and increase the cost of spectrum all impacted two important consumer outcomes - network coverage and quality. The findings have implications for governments and regulators, particularly those betting on 4G and 5G as enablers of economic growth and sustainable development.
Education
What It’s Like to be Underconnected to the Internet and Worried About Returning to Remote Learning
Advocates for better and more affordable broadband are relatively pleased with the infrastructure bill's broadband components, even if the new legislation doesn’t go as far as they want. Improving access is especially important for families with school-age kids, as the Delta variant spreads and outbreaks of COVID-19 may cause schools to pivot back to remote learning for weeks or months. It’s particularly worrying for families who struggled to stay online during remote learning in 2020-2021—for families like Janice Myers’. Myers’ story shows what daily life is like when families with kids have unreliable internet access and inadequate devices, as well as the numerous roadblocks to getting help. Here, she talks about the importance of connecting not just to faster networks or new devices, but also to people who know how to help and understand where she is coming from. And she points out that parents and caregivers may not have access to scanners, printers, or other digital tools for sending documents required by registration systems. She hopes the new legislation will recognize this instead of making it even more difficult to get the resources her kids need.
Many people think the "digital divide" and access to technology simply boils down to whether students have a working device and a reliable internet connection. But the needs—and the costs—are more complicated than that. K-12 school districts must plan for a variety of costs related to technology integration. Schools and districts are forced to haphazardly fund technology-enabled learning because of failures to do so in a consistent way at the federal and state level. The National Educational Technology Plan, created by the US Department of Education in 2017, recommends districts make sure students have equitable access to technology through an unspecified mix of federal programs and reliance on nonprofit organizations. But this inconsistent approach to funding will not meet the estimated $6 billion to $11 billion needed to provide enough devices and internet access for students during remote learning, nor will it continue to sustain technology-enabled learning in a post-pandemic reality. In this particular moment, as students and educators begin a new school year flush with more technology than ever before, we have an opportunity to develop a better way forward. Policymakers and school leaders can work together to ensure our students have the technology and internet access they deserve.
[Allison Starks is a doctoral student at the University of California, Irvine, studying digital technologies, children and education. She is a former K-12 teacher and district technology integrator.]
Starlink hopes to bring high-speed satellite internet to many of the 3.7 billion people on this planet who currently have no internet connection at all. SpaceX’s internet service, which uses a growing fleet of 1,600 satellites orbiting Earth to deliver internet access to people on the surface, reported close to 90,000 users in July 2021. Underdeveloped parts of the world might find Starlink to be a boon since many of these places do not have physical networks like the cable system. The company has stated that its technology would be particularly beneficial for rural areas as well; however, for many customers the service is still much more expensive than current options available to them, and it is unclear how reliable the constellation of satellites will be for a large-scale subscriber network. Starlink must get costs down fast in order to expand its customer base, but it must also make enough money to continue launching hundreds or even thousands of satellites every year. It’s a delicate needle that could be impossible to thread.
CenturyLink, since renamed Lumen, has agreed to pay the Department of Justice (DOJ) $275,000 to settle the department's complaint stemming from the company's violation of the terms of its acquisition of Level 3 Communications. According to the DOJ, it is the second such violation by CenturyLink. The DOJ will file a civil contempt claim in DC federal court and at the same time ask the court to accept the settlement, which resolves the claim. “CenturyLink is a repeat offender,” said acting Assistant Attorney General Richard Powers of the Antitrust Division. “The request for a finding of civil contempt is appropriate because the company violated its amended obligations immediately after the court imposed them. When companies fail to comply with court-ordered obligations, the Antitrust Division will take action to enforce them.” CenturyLink's previous violation was in 2018 following the final judgment that paved the way for its Level 3 purchase. The company then violated the August 2020 settlement of that violation, which is what prompted this settlement of the civil contempt claim.
Stories from Abroad
EU Court states ‘zero tariff’ options are contrary to regulation on open internet access
Two German courts put questions to the European Union Court of Justice concerning the compatibility with EU law of the limitation, on the part of an internet access provider, on bandwidth, tethering or on use when roaming, where the customer chooses such a ‘zero tariff’ option. Those courts must rule on disputes relating to such limitations between, on the one hand, Vodafone or Telekom Deutschland, and, on the other, the Bundesnetzagentur (Federal Network Agency of Germany) or the Bundesverband der Verbraucherzentralen, a German consumer protection organisation. The Court of Justice notes that a ‘zero tariff’ option, such as those at issue in the main proceedings, draws a distinction within internet traffic, on the basis of commercial considerations, by not counting towards the basic package traffic to partner applications. Such a commercial practice is contrary to the general obligation of equal treatment of traffic, without discrimination or interference, as required by the regulation on open internet access. Since those limitations on bandwidth, tethering or on use when roaming apply only on account of the activation of the ‘zero tariff’ option, which is contrary to the regulation on open internet access, they are also incompatible with EU law.
Benton (www.benton.org) provides the only free, reliable, and non-partisan daily digest that curates and distributes news related to universal broadband, while connecting communications, democracy, and public interest issues. Posted Monday through Friday, this service provides updates on important industry developments, policy issues, and other related news events. While the summaries are factually accurate, their sometimes informal tone may not always represent the tone of the original articles. Headlines are compiled by Kevin Taglang (headlines AT benton DOT org) and Grace Tepper (grace AT benton DOT org) — we welcome your comments.
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