Internet/Broadband

First Tech Fund: Immigrant-founded nonprofit provides laptops, tech to students in need

First Tech Fund is a new nonprofit dedicated to closing the digital divide among underserved high school students in New York City. The COVID-19 pandemic highlighted the burgeoning digital divide among students of different economic backgrounds.

Broadband Subsidy Program Sign-Ups Lag Amid Lack of Outreach Funds

Billions of dollars aimed at helping low-income households afford internet access are going unclaimed as the Federal Communications Commission faces hurdles to enrolling participants in the Emergency Broadband Benefit Program. FCC officials and their nonprofit partners have to marshal resources for outreach to help individuals understand how the program works and overcome mistrust of government. Nonprofits and local organizations are best suited to enroll low-income individuals because they are trusted in those communities, agency officials and partners said.

Facebook is starting to share more about what it demotes in News Feed

The way that Facebook controls its News Feed is often controversial and largely opaque to the outside world. Now the company is attempting to shine more light on the content it surpresses but doesn't remove entirely. Facebook published its “Content Distribution Guidelines” detailing the roughly three-dozen types of posts it demotes for various reasons in the News Feed, like clickbait and posts by repeat policy offenders.

Chairwoman Rosenworcel Remarks to NTIA Spectrum Policy Symposium

At the Federal Communications Commission, we are focusing on five key principles to help guide our 5G future.

WISPA to States: Ignore the Feds on ARPA Wired Broadband Requirement

The Wireless Internet Service Providers Association (WISPA) has sent a letter to the governors of all 50 states asking them to ignore a prohibition against using American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) broadband funding for fixed wireless deployments. The prohibition is included in the interim rules issued by the US Treasury for $350 billion in ARPA funding directed to state and local governments.

Comcast aims to fortify broadband position with devices and services

Comcast hasn’t been shy about touting its network investments on the road to DOCSIS 4.0, but CEO Brian Roberts argued its efforts to innovate around devices and services are also a key part of its plan to fend off broadband competition. Roberts observed that the way consumers use broadband today is “virtually unrecognizable” from ten years ago and said the pace of change is likely to accelerate.

Small wireless carriers feel squeezed on multiple fronts

Small wireless carriers expressed dissatisfaction and concern about several aspects of their business at the Competitive Carriers Association (CCA) Annual Convention. They’re concerned that digital-divide money will all go toward fiber, that Universal Service Funds (USF) are drying up, that their spectrum needs are being ignored, and that they’ve missed the boat on private wireless.

Spectrum screen unlikely to happen anytime soon, says Tom Wheeler

Although he’d be all for it, former Federal Communications Commission Chairman Tom Wheeler is doubtful that a new spectrum screen would be implemented anytime soon, including before upcoming 5G mid-band spectrum auctions. AT&T filed a petition in September 2021 asking the FCC to establish a mid-band spectrum screen, pointing to T-Mobile’s vast 2.5 GHz mid-band spectrum holdings thanks in large part to its merger with Sprint.

FCC Designates September 20-24 Lifeline Awareness Week

The Federal Communications Commission is partnering with the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners (NARUC) and the National Association of State Utility Consumer Advocates (NASUCA) to acknowledge Lifeline Awareness Week, September 20-24, 2021. Lifeline is an FCC program designed to help make communications services more affordable for low-income consumers.

FCC Opens a Second Emergency Connectivity Fund Application Window

In view of outstanding demand, the Federal Communications Commission will open a second Emergency Connectivity Fund application filing window from September 28, 2021 to October 13, 2021.

Diverse Infrastructure Solutions Are the Key to Closing the Digital Divide

The digital divide has remained stubbornly persistent for decades, even as the internet has become steadily more inextricable from daily life, business, health care, and education. Research group BroadbandNow estimates that 42 million Americans have no broadband access, while a depressing 120 million people in the US are without any connection fast enough to even call the internet, according to Microsoft. These disparities are particularly severe among Black, Hispanic, Indigenous, and rural communities.

Virginia is leading on ending the broadband divide

Experts have concluded that Virginia is a national leader in bridging the digital divide.

AT&T's 30-Million Fiber Location Forecast Might be Too Low, According to its CEO

There might be a business case for AT&T to deploy fiber to more than the 30 million locations that the company aims to make fiber broadband available to by 2025, said AT&T CEO John Stankey. Defining the business model for fiber deployment may not be as clear cut as some might believe, Stankey suggested. Another impending development that could impact the fiber deployment business case, according to the CEO, is the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act that passed the Senate

The Global Drive to Control Big Tech

Global internet freedom declined for the 11th consecutive year. The greatest deteriorations were documented in Myanmar, Belarus, and Uganda, where state forces cracked down amid electoral and constitutional crises.

Facebook paid billions extra to the FTC to spare Zuckerberg in data suit, shareholders allege

Facebook conditioned its $5 billion payment to the Federal Trade Commission to resolve the Cambridge Analytica data leak probe on the agency dropping plans to sue Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg individually, shareholders allege in a lawsuit. Two groups of shareholders claimed that members of Facebook’s board allowed the company to overpay on its fine in order to protect Zuckerberg, the company’s founder and largest shareholder.

Facebook Launched Project Amplify to Defend its Image

Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook’s chief executive, signed off in August 2021 on a new initiative code-named Project Amplify. The effort, which was hatched at an internal meeting months before in January, had a specific purpose: to use Facebook’s News Feed, the site’s most important digital real estate, to show people positive stories about the social network. The idea was that pushing pro-Facebook news items — some of them written by the company — would improve its image in the eyes of its users.

Comcast Expands Internet Essentials Eligibility and Pledges $15 Million to US Connectivity

Comcast announced new steps to help advance digital equity for even more students and families.

Frontier is on track to surpass its fiber goal for 2021

Frontier Communications is on track to beat its goal of building fiber to 495,000 homes in 2021. CEO Nick Jeffery stated that Frontier will hit 600,000 homes passed in 2021, which is 105,000 more homes than planned. When asked about supply chain issues, Jeffery said that the company hasn’t experienced any issues yet and he is confident that it won’t because Frontier announced its accelerated fiber build before many other fiber providers announced their plans. This allowed the company to get contracts with vendors before many others.

Verizon CEO sees fixed wireless access as 'the next generation of broadband'

Verizon CEO Hans Vestberg highlighted continued momentum in its Fios business but pointed to fixed wireless access as a key tool in its quest to expand its broadband reach further and faster.

Are We Messing Up 5G on Our Way to 6G?

Spectrum policy leadership and planning are critical to complete the US 5G ecosystem while planning for the next-generation wireless technology, 6G. It’s also essential to shed some mistakes of the past. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo has indicated that a “whole of government” effort is critical to 5G leadership, and she’s right.

State leaders step up broadband mapping efforts

With the federal government slow to produce better maps of broadband internet coverage, state leaders are stepping up with their own efforts that they say will yield more granular information that leads to better decisions on the infrastructure buildout. Virginia became the latest state to unveil an effort to revamp its statewide broadband map in summer 2021, following Georgia's map launched in 2020.

Commerce Secretary Raimondo redoubles call for a national spectrum strategy

Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo redoubles her call for the Biden administration to develop a national spectrum strategy in remarks before the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA)'s annual Spectrum Symposium. Putting together such a strategy was a priority for former President Donald Trump, but one that was never fully developed.

New America Releases a New Toolkit to Gather Insights from Under-Connected Families

Do you have concerns about whether students and families in your community or school have adequate, consistent access to the internet and digital devices?