Posts Tagged ‘connected nation’

South Carolina Recommends Most, But Not All

Tuesday, December 15th, 2009

Governor Mark Sanford (R) of South Carolina is not likely to be in office for round two of the stimulus, given the scandal and subsequent divorce. Still, the review process in South Carolina may be the same. The letter (.pdf) is taken from the Baller Herbst Law Group website.

The governor appears to have recommended most of the applications for the state, except (unless it’s in the letter under a different name) the Elauwit project which would provide free fixed wireless broadband to public housing for three years, and at a discount thereafter.

All four applications from CLEC FTC Divsersified Services, on the other hand, were approved. Here’s a typical one.

I was particularly surprised to see Connected Nation’s South Carolina education project recommended and to see Maryland-based satellite provider Knight Sky on the list.

Although South Carolina appears to have done less work than other states, given the circumstances, I think it’s understandable and I’m sure South Carolina will do more in round two.

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Nevada Supports Satellite and Connected Nation

Tuesday, December 8th, 2009

The Nevada Broadband Task Force recommended (.pdf from Baller Herbst Law Group) a large number of projects but should be commended for ranking them all.

At the top of the list, the task force placed two public computer projects (about $4 million to $6 million each) which seem to me to be very worthwhile. Detailed information is available for one of them.

I was surprised to see the projects of Hughes and EchoStar recommended so highly. Unless they can reach parts of the state that nobody else can — this is possible — I see no reason for the deployment of satellite when better technologies are available.

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Connected Nation Wins Kansas and Alaska

Tuesday, December 1st, 2009

Connected Nation, the telco-allied non-profit that wrote the mapping part of the broadband bill, won bids in Alaska and Kansas, it announced.

Art Brodsky has been warning about this outfit for years now, and we’ll get to see whether or not Connected Nation actually produces worthwhile data. It’s particularly sad that Alaska gave away its mapping oppotunity because the broadband stimulus faces special challenges there. An accurate map would reveal a wide variety of unusual technological alternatives in place there, but I’m guessing that Connected Nation will just show that most of Alaska already has broadband.

Brodsky points out that $350 million may be too much. I’m guessing that it could be 100 times the cost or even 10,000 times the cost, but the mapping project I’m thinking of won’t issue its press release until Dec. 6. I will update you then.

Most states (Delaware, Colorado, Louisiana, and so on) that have received mapping money from the NTIA are sending the cash to their own departments of technology. If in fact they get 100 times what they need for the project, the rest of the cash can be put to good use by upgrading the states’ own technology departments.

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Kansas Recommends Many Projects

Friday, November 20th, 2009

Kansas Governor Mark Parkinson (D, formerly R) recommended most of the projects that go through his state. Parkinson obtained the seat when Kathleen Sibelius, who had worked hard for Obama, especially during the primaries, resigned to become secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, a job that became very important when swine flu hit the U.S.

Parkinson, who says he plans to step down in 2010, appears to have recommended most of the applications in the state of Kansas, including several multistate applications. Kansas is one of the few states to recommend EchoStar’s nationwide satellite deployment. The governor also recommended a large and costly cellular deployment. Several of the projects appear to overlap each other.

The state even recommended a project from Connected Nation, the telcos’ non-profit.

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NYPIRG Demands Accountability in Stimulus Mapping

Tuesday, September 22nd, 2009

Art Brodsky at Public Knowledge first sounded the alarm about Connected Nation at the start of 2009, saying the organization was connected to Kentucky’s Republican governor and to telephone company lobbyists, enabling it to charge the state $400,000 and then make the state do the work.

More recently, Brodsky claimed that bids were rigged in Connected Nation’s favor in the state of Florida, arguing that there was no other explanation why the highest bidder won a broadband mapping contract.

Maps are important. They show where the government should invest money. They say who has broadband and who does not. If the maps are drawn by the phone companies, they could direct stimulus money only to the areas they don’t care about, bypassing wealthy areas they would like to deliver service to but have not yet built out.

Today, NYPIRG is calling out such policies. In its report (available in .pdf format here), NYPIRG says, “Contracts or grants to map data … must include requirements
that the mapping entity disclose any financial or other relationships to broadband providers. If data are self reported by a broadband provider and not independently verified, that should be disclosed and the data should not be considered accurate until independently verified.”

The report does not specifically name Connected Nation, but readers understand that’s the problem that’s addressed by this recommendation — a recommendation that is so obvious that it should not have to be said.

The report contains a massive number of other good ideas, endorsing structural separation, better data collection, an internet literacy curriculum and more.

NYPIRG’s report is a masterpiece.

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