Publications

Benton publications explore the intersection of broadband and the public interest

09/24/2024

Greta Byrum

As more and more essential services and activities move online, people have less and less of a choice about whether or not to participate in the digital world. Yet expanded internet use can bring with it increased risk.

09/04/2024

Drew Garner

The historic levels of funding made available through the bipartisan Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) Program will generate historic levels of construction—and this will put enormous pressure on local governments.

07/24/2024

John Horrigan

Findings from a representative sample of 2,535 households whose annual incomes are $50,000 or less.

06/04/2024

Ry Marcattilio, Revati Prasad

This report highlights how the early collective efforts of residents in east-central Vermont helped make Communications Union Districts (CUDs) a statewide, scalable strategy for ensuring locally driven connectivity today.

05/08/2024

Marjorie and Charles Benton Opportunity Fund Fellow Dr. Pierrette Renée Dagg examines the role community champions in community connectivity solutions and the factors that allow these leaders to succeed.

04/05/2024

Norma E. Fernandez

As a Marjorie & Charles Benton Opportunity Fund Fellow, EveryoneOn CEO Norma E. Fernandez examined the digital adoption journeys of low-income Black/African American and Latina women.

03/11/2024

John Horrigan

This exploration finds that every dollar of ACP subsidy returns nearly two dollars in impacts to those using the program.

03/06/2024

Bill Coleman

Own Your Internet: How to Build a Public Broadband Network

12/20/2023

John Horrigan

Affordability, Adoption, Equity, and the United States’s Universal Broadband Goals

12/12/2023

Ann Treacy

This report follows the journey of five rural counties in Illinois (Edgar, Hancock, McLean, Ogle, and Schuyler) that enrolled in the Broadband Breakthrough community engagement and broadband planning program and used the resources and open-source tools the program provides to pursue a better broadband future. The goal of Broadband Breakthrough and this report is to help rural farming communitie

12/12/2023

Dr. Michael Barts, Dr. Gerard Hayes

This white paper examines wireless technologies capable of providing broadband connectivity with an emphasis on rural farming communities.

08/01/2023

All 50 states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico are currently working on digital equity plans. One key component of the plans is the development of states’ visions for digital equity. These efforts are the initial state-level planning and envisioning at this scale and scope.

11/29/2022

John Horrigan

American Community Survey data show substantial increases in household wireline broadband adoption

11/07/2022

Robbie McBeath

For community leaders striving for digital equity, this guidebook will help communities evaluate and meet specific connectivity needs. We chart three pathways—Access, Adoption, and Use—that together offer a comprehensive approach to guide communities’ digital equity planning and provide structure for implementing effective solutions.

07/12/2022

In November 2021, the Benton Institute for Broadband & Society, Black Brilliance Research Project (BBR), and Community Informatics Lab at Simmons University launched the six-city Digital Equity Action Research (DEAR) Fellowship.

06/22/2022

Andrew Afflerbach

As state and local governments and their partners plan to invest billions of dollars in federal funding to build broadband infrastructure, choosing the best technology will have significant long-term implications.

06/15/2022

Bill Coleman

Accelerate: A Community Broadband Planning Program, a guidebook for local leaders who want to ensure their communities are not left behind. 

02/22/2022

John Horrigan

The Affordable Connectivity Program represents an inflection point for Lifeline and universal service.

11/30/2021

Joanne Hovis, Ryland Sherman, Marc Schulhof

It is the era of the broadband public-private partnership.

11/01/2021

The goal of Project OVERCOME is to select, launch, and oversee multiple proof-of-concept broadband solutions to underserved communities.

10/04/2021

Jordan Arnold

A collaboration between the Benton Institute for Broadband & Society and the United Soybean Board

07/26/2021

Christopher Mitchell, Sean Gonsalves, Jericho Casper

 

One might think this is the moment for community broadband networks. The truth is, locally-directed networks have been serving their communities for a long, long time.

06/16/2021

Ryland Sherman, Joanne Hovis, Jacob Levin

The best practices and commonalities among many of the best state rural broadband funding program

12/01/2020

Jordan Arnold, Jonathan Sallet

Residential and small-business customers have too few options for fixed, robust broadband service, what we refer to as “High-Performance Broadband.” Fixing our deployment and competition problems requires the construction of new broadband networks. In other words, we need more competition, and we need more broadband deployment.

11/18/2020

Colin Rhinesmith, Susan Kennedy

How are digital inclusion coalitions across the country responding to the triple challenges of the pandemic, growing economic inequality, and racial injustice facing poor communities and communities of color across the country without access to broadband internet at home?

10/14/2020

Joanne Hovis, Jim Baller, David Talbot, Cat Blake

Private-sector investment alone is not closing our digital gaps. The Public Infrastructure/Private Service model offers a promising solution that is precisely targeted to the areas with greatest broadband gaps, frequently those with lower income levels and lower population densities.

08/03/2020

John Horrigan

“Middle-skill” jobs make up a large portion of the market, has positions to fill, but suffers from a dearth of trained workers—especially when it comes to digital skills.

06/08/2020

Denise Linn Riedl

Lessons, cases, and resources developed by local technology champions and planners

This publication is a part of a discussion on how public policy can close the digital divide and extend digital opportunity everywhere.

04/08/2019

Benton and EducationSuperHighway offer tangible steps that the Federal Communications Commission should take to instruct the Universal Service Administrative Company on how best to speed the approval of E-Rate projects that meet the legal requirements of the Telecommunications Act.

10/29/2018

John Horrigan

There are well-paying job opportunities for those on the lower end of the socio-economic spectrum for so-called middle-skill jobs. These are jobs that generally do not require a college degree and pay a living wage. Roughly half of all job openings in the United States fall into the middle-skill category and most (82%) of them require digital skills – and wages are better as a result.

09/26/2018

Victor Pickard, Pawel Popiel

This report, part history and part strategy playbook, examines the tactics and policy priorities of former-Commissioner Michael J. Copps during his 10 years at the FCC. An analysis of Commissioner Copps’s tenure, his political strategies, and his legacy is a timely endeavor, both for its historical importance and for its contemporary relevance.

06/20/2018

Larry Kirkman

Combining state-of-the-technologies with traditional and new media, Benton's Campaigns for Kids in the mid-1990's reinvented fulfillment for PSA campaigns in the digital age by replacing 800 phone numbers and brochures with multimedia websites to provide information and resources for action.

09/08/2017

Next Century Cities

Municipalities across the country are increasingly using technology to ensure government is accessible and responsive to citizens, while simultaneously creating forward-looking programs to increase internet access so more residents can experience the benefits of connectivity.

05/08/2017

Colin Rhinesmith, Angela Siefer

This report describes the challenges facing community-based organizations and other key stakeholders in using outcomes-based evaluation to measure the success of their digital inclusion programs and offers recommendations toward addressing these shared barriers.

05/01/2017

Joanne Hovis and Marc Schulhof, Jim Baller and Ashley Stelfox

Local governments increasingly see before them exciting new opportunities to develop next-generation broadband in their communities—and to reap the many benefits that broadband will deliver to their residents and businesses. The goal of most of these communities is to get optical fiber connections to every home and business.

09/08/2016

Blair Levin, Denise Linn

This is a handbook for city officials seeking the affordable, abundant bandwidth their communities will need to thrive in the decades ahead.

07/13/2016

Schools, Healthcare, Libraries Broadband Coalition

The future belongs to those with access to high-speed broadband. In the 21st century, anyone seeking to launch a business, exchange medical records, conduct a research project, obtain a college degree, engage in community activities, or create his or her own path will need both a high-capacity Internet connection and the digital skills necessary to navigate the online world.

01/11/2016

Colin Rhinesmith, Angela Siefer, Katherine Bates

With library systems increasingly prioritizing equitable access to the Internet and digital literacy training, the role 21st-century libraries serve in promoting digital inclusion has become more prominent.

01/01/2016

Colin Rhinesmith

This report presents findings from a national study of digital inclusion organizations that help low-income individuals and families adopt high-speed Internet service. The study looked at eight digital inclusion organizations across the United States that are working at the important intersection between making high-speed Internet available and strengthening digital skills—two essential and interrelated components of digital inclusion, which is focused on increasing digital access, skills, and relevant content.

09/08/2013

Ted Gotsch

In order to guarantee that everyone will have access to 21st century communications, policymakers will need to take pragmatic steps to understand the opportunities and barriers; ensure that everyone can access benefits; and make certain that our newest technologies continue to support some of our oldest values.