Who Knew?

We live in an era where broadband is viewed as a right, not a privilege. But the fact of the matter is that tens of millions of rural Americans are currently subsisting on dial-up Internet, unable to receive a high-speed connection into their homes. Building out the infrastructure in these places would require an investment of tens of billions of dollars, but because they are so sparsely populated, the ROI on this proposition is low. Telcos have little incentive to do it, and government grants like the $7.2 billion appropriated for the cause in the 2009 stimulus package take a very long time to start working. This article on the FCC’s Connect America Fund claims that the goal is to connect the entire country by the end of the decade. By that time we may have already moved on to a newer, faster standard. I point this out not to hold the VYou-less up for pity, but to stress that the idea of ubiquitous computing only works if we have the network infrastructure to back it up. Currently we trust the telcos to build out the network for us. Any AT&T customer with spotty 3G coverage can testify to the fact that this is probably not the best idea.

We live in an era where broadband is viewed as a right, not a privilege. But the fact of the matter is that tens of millions of rural Americans are currently subsisting on dial-up Internet, unable to receive a high-speed connection into their homes. Building out the infrastructure in these places would require an investment of tens of billions of dollars, but because they are so sparsely populated, the ROI on this proposition is low. Telcos have little incentive to do it, and government grants like the $7.2 billion appropriated for the cause in the 2009 stimulus package take a very long time to start working. This article on the FCC’s Connect America Fund claims that the goal is to connect the entire country by the end of the decade. By that time we may have already moved on to a newer, faster standard.

I point this out not to hold the VYou-less up for pity, but to stress that the idea of ubiquitous computing only works if we have the network infrastructure to back it up. Currently we trust the telcos to build out the network for us. Any AT&T customer with spotty 3G coverage can testify to the fact that this is probably not the best idea.

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