Earlier this month rural electric and broadband cooperatives gathered in Washington, DC, for their fifth-annual Broadband Leadership Summit. The topic du jour was broadly unpopular changes made by the NTIA to the Broadband, Equity, Deployment, and Access program (BEAD) created by the 2021 infrastructure bill.
Lawmakers are pushing the Trump administration to stop being murky on whether states will be able to access tens of billions in “non-deployment funds” mandated by Congress that have been temporarily hijacked by the administration’s unpopular changes to a once-in-a-lifetime federal grant program to expand high-speed Internet access.
California and the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) continue to heavily invest in state efforts to expand affordable Internet access, and bolster digital equity, inclusion, and education programs to ensure freshly-connected communities are able to make the most of it.
Chris and Doug Dawson unpack a new survey of rural Americans, the lawsuit over the Digital Equity Act, and what the FCC's latest satellite decisions could mean for the future of our skies
Moore Haven, Florida-based Glades Electric Cooperative has completed a long-planned fiber broadband network into largely unserved parts of the Sunshine State.
Today, The Verge published an in-depth piece authored by our own Sean Gonsalves and ILSR contributor Karl Bode that examines the BEAD program from its inception to the boondoggle its become.
The State of North Carolina is currently awaiting a decision from the U.S. Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals as the court considers the FCC's February decision to roll back state barriers. North Carolina Attorney General Roy Cooper's office is heading up the state's appeal, but is his heart in it?
Montana may have high speed limits on roads, but this Montana coop’s network will let you surf the web even faster. Triangle Communications received an almost $30 million loan from the USDA to provide rural Central Montana
Four low-income neighborhoods in Madison will soon have access to fast, reliable, affordable Internet access, thanks to a municipal fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) pilot program.
In a new video, Tennessee Fiber Optic Communities profiles what it is like for a family living in Bradley County, just outside of the reach of Chattanooga's EPB Fiber Optic network. Debbie Williams describes how she and her family struggle with a long list of issues most of us associate with the bygone era of dial-up Internet.
The Tri-Gig High Speed Broadband Initiative, an effort by communities and universities within Greensboro's Piedmont Triad Region, recently announced plans to release an RFP in an effort to improve regional connectivity.
Out on Cape Cod, municipal networks are taking hold. Public buildings throughout the town of Falmouth, Massachusetts, experience great connectivity and the town saves $160,000 each year with its own Institutional network (I-Net).
The 2016 Broadband Communities Summit will be held on April 5 - 7 in Austin, Texas. Participants can save $540 by registering early before November 30th. Register online and use the VIP Code: Austin2016 to get a special rate of $410.
Want instant updates on the world of community networks, broadband and Internet policy, or fiber-to-the-home? We have compiled several Twitter lists and a list of community networks' Facebook pages. Use these as resources to connect with advocates, to find new groups, or just to learn about community networks.