Mass. goes broadband-ish
Interesting interview with Sharon Gillett, Commissioner of the Massachusetts Department of Telecommunications and Cable in the Boston Globe.
Q The big news is the state’s $25 million broadband incentive fund, which will help bring broadband access to 32 towns that don’t have high-speed Internet. What are the details?
A [The fund] is to be used to invest in hard capital assets with long lives — things like conduits, fiber, wireless towers. Those are big parts of the up-front capital required to serve communities, and the idea is having the state invest in those assets lowers the cost for private companies to come in and do the rest of the job. The state is not a service provider . . . We’re also technology neutral — whatever works.
This sounds like Boston’s admirable plan of providing access to the backbone to anyone who wants to be an ISP, although I don’t know if it’s as aggressive as Boston’s plan. In any case, the state’s map of how many providers there are in each region (to which Gillett refers) seems to me to promote the idea that if you have a couple of big incumbents duking it out in your town, that counts as a competitive market. Boston’s plan may show us what it’s like when anyone from big businesses to non-profits can try to entice you to sign up with them.
Brookline, where I live, is rolling out its muni wifi. I occasionally get a signal in my house. It’ll be free in public parks, and there will be a relatively low fee ($20/month — but they don’t say what the speed will be, and they don’t say how much the daily or hourly fee will be) for access elsewhere. It’s being installed and managed by Galaxy Internet Services
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