Groups praise U.S. broadband data bill
638191
InfoWorld - A bill introduced in the U.S. Senate this week would require the U.S. Federal Communications Commission to reconsider what bandwidth rates qualify as broadband, a move that won praise from some groups that call current broadband penetration statistics misleading.
240243
Households in Newtown, Yardley and Doylestown will be among the first in the region to have access to new high-speed Internet services from Verizon.
659434
Americans may look with envy on the super-fast Internet connections available in South Korea, Japan and parts of Europe, but they can take consolation from a new study that concludes that the U.S. makes better overall use of its telecommunications.
119242
FCC clears the way for more companies to offer the alternative form of Net access. The US Federal Communications Commission this week cleared the way for power companies to roll out broadband over power line
33855
People around the world are coming together to celebrate the world wide web and its impact on people.
407232
Will a new set of FCC rules for broadband over power lines bring the Internet to millions more homes? On Friday, proponents of broadband Internet service over power lines hailed a recent decision by the US
65680
WASHINGTON -- New rules approved this week by the Federal Communications Commission are aimed at making high-speed Internet available to more Americans.
293598
Over half of online US households are using broadband to access the internet, according to new research.
299023
Intel backs government initiatives for wireless broadband.
195861
Report describes broadband rollout trends, maps availability, and recommends deployment strategy.
722641
A senior U.S. lawmaker said on  Wednesday he had introduced legislation designed to prevent  broadband Internet providers from unreasonable interference  with subscribers' access to content.
244045
The Maine Legislature voted yesterday to study broadband and Internet  access in Maine through an amended version of L.D. 1675, Regarding Full  and Fair Access to the Internet. This study was proposed as an  alternative to L.D. 1675, sponsored by Sen.
537934
A vast online network is being used to promote social and environmental responsibility.
137710
A coalition of technology vendors, consumer groups, and think tanks has launched a campaign to persuade the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to approve wireless devices that would operate in unused television spectrum.The Wireless Innovation Alliance, which launched a Web site Wednesday, is an expansion of the tech-centric White Spaces Coalition that has been pushing so-called white-space spectrum as a possible new broadband network. At Wednesday&#39;s alliance launch, several other groups, including Free Press, the Media Access Project, TechNet, the Computing Technology Industry Association, and Educause, joined the tech companies pushing for the FCC to approve broadcast white spaces for broadband use.U.S. Representatives Jay Inslee, a Washington state Democrat, and Marsha Blackburn, a Tennessee Republican, also lent their support.Inslee called white space one of the &quot;greatest untapped&quot; sources for innovation in the U.S. &quot;We&#39;re just waiting for government to do its job, to set the rules of the road, so the geniuses in America can really use this tremendous resource,&quot; he said.The white spaces can help bring broadband to areas of the U.S. that have limited or no choices right now, Inslee added. The lack of broadband in many areas is &quot;really a sad comment on our failure to move ahead as a nation,&quot; he said. &quot;This is one of my continuing frustrations -- that we have not made adequate progress -- and the availability of white spaces is one tool to attack that.&quot;Inslee and Blackburn were among six lawmakers who signed a letter, dated Tuesday, to the FCC, calling on the agency to wrap up its ongoing inquiry into white spaces.Advocates of white-space technology have run into significant opposition and some technical problems this year.The National Association of Broadcasters (NAB), representing U.S. television stations, has raised concerns that white-space devices will interfere with TV signals. And more than 55 U.S. lawmakers have raised their own concerns about interference. &quot;Placing these devices in the television band is believed to cause unacceptable interference to television reception for all Americans and impair coverage of news and sporting events by interfering with wireless microphones,&quot; wrote Senator Mary Landrieu, a Louisiana Democrat, in an Oct. 9 letter to the FCC.In addition,&#160;the FCC rejected a device built by Microsoft and other members of the White Spaces Coalition in July, saying it interfered with TV signals. Microsoft later said the device was damaged and &quot;operated at a severely degraded level.&quot;In September,&#160;Microsoft and Philips Electronics North America submitted new tests from a functioning device to the FCC. The group is awaiting FCC action on the new device.NAB still has concerns, said Dennis Wharton, the group&#39;s executive vice president for media relations. White spaces supporters are &quot;playing Russian Roulette&quot; with TV signals, he said. &quot;It is unfortunate that Microsoft and Google continue to try to muscle their way through Washington in support of a technology that simply does not work.&quot;Blackburn urged the FCC not to &quot;pick winners and losers,&quot; but to base its decision on objective tests of the white spaces devices. A lot of areas in rural west Tennessee have no broadband, she said. &quot;It is essential for economic development,&quot; she said.Asked if any other countries are using white-space spectrum for broadband devices, alliance members said they aren&#39;t aware of any formal projects.Other countries are looking to the U.S., said Michael Calabrese, director of the Wireless Future Program at the New America Foundation, a nonpartisan think tank. &quot;The United States has led the world on unlicensed technologies from the get-go, and if we don&#39;t want to lose that leadership, we need to keep moving forward,&quot; he said.
229647
The Broadband Communications Association of Washington, civic groups and  municipal organizations say a Qwest-backed bill filed today would widen  the digital divide by allowing the telephone company to provide service  only to wealthier cities and their neighborhoods.
127571
Blog: A day after a federal agency urged against new rules for broadband operators, Democratic leaders in Congress say they're not giving up on enacting the divisive anti-discrimination laws.
153700
Congress guaranteed the flow of Internet aid to schools and libraries and provided federal funds to upgrade emergency 911 services for calls from mobile phones in a communications bill approved Wednesday and sent to the president for his signature.