Digital Subscriber Line Networks

Content tagged with "Digital Subscriber Line Networks"

Displaying 871 - 880 of 1283

Colorado and Mississippi Test White Space Technology

By on

We recently reported on the WhiteSpaces Pilot Project from the Gigabit Libraries Network (GLN). In order to find out the results in the trenches, we contacted two participant communities: Delta County, Colorado and Pascagoula, Mississippi.

The project connects libraries with vendors that supply equipment tapping into what has been television spectrum, or "white spaces." A Wi-Fi signal travels farther on white space spectrum and can travel through obstacles such as buildings and trees. 

The five libraries in the Delta County Libraries system serve a community of approximately 30,000 people. Most residents live on farms or in small towns scattered throughout the county. The libraries all offer free Wi-Fi and serve as places to socialize, connect, and hold community meetings. Library District staff installed the equipment in the library in Paonia, population 1,500.

TDS Telecom and Skybeam offer limited Internet access in the area, but many people do not live in the service areas or cannot afford the steep rates. John Gavan, IT Manager of the Libraries system, predicts that 90% of visits to the facilities focus on Internet access.

When the Delta County Library in Paonia closes down every night, the parking lot is usually filled with people tapping into the library's free Wi-Fi. The GLN WhiteSpaces Pilot went live in Paonia in October 2013. The library's Wi-Fi now sends a signal down the main street in town. They recently created a second hotspot to extend free Wi-Fi even farther. The community hopes to transmit the signal to a park located one mile from the library so summer festival vendors can to use the Wi-Fi for credit card transactions.

Gavan describes the technology as an easy set-up with minimal tech support from the vendor. The terrain in Delta County includes significant hills and trees. The ability to send the signal through obstacles is a major plus in Paonia, where the terrain can be challenging. As an IT Manager, he especially appreciates the ability to monitor and manage the white space network from any Internet connection.

Read More

Colorado and Mississippi Test White Space Technology

By on

We recently reported on the WhiteSpaces Pilot Project from the Gigabit Libraries Network (GLN). In order to find out the results in the trenches, we contacted two participant communities: Delta County, Colorado and Pascagoula, Mississippi.

The project connects libraries with vendors that supply equipment tapping into what has been television spectrum, or "white spaces." A Wi-Fi signal travels farther on white space spectrum and can travel through obstacles such as buildings and trees. 

The five libraries in the Delta County Libraries system serve a community of approximately 30,000 people. Most residents live on farms or in small towns scattered throughout the county. The libraries all offer free Wi-Fi and serve as places to socialize, connect, and hold community meetings. Library District staff installed the equipment in the library in Paonia, population 1,500.

TDS Telecom and Skybeam offer limited Internet access in the area, but many people do not live in the service areas or cannot afford the steep rates. John Gavan, IT Manager of the Libraries system, predicts that 90% of visits to the facilities focus on Internet access.

When the Delta County Library in Paonia closes down every night, the parking lot is usually filled with people tapping into the library's free Wi-Fi. The GLN WhiteSpaces Pilot went live in Paonia in October 2013. The library's Wi-Fi now sends a signal down the main street in town. They recently created a second hotspot to extend free Wi-Fi even farther. The community hopes to transmit the signal to a park located one mile from the library so summer festival vendors can to use the Wi-Fi for credit card transactions.

Gavan describes the technology as an easy set-up with minimal tech support from the vendor. The terrain in Delta County includes significant hills and trees. The ability to send the signal through obstacles is a major plus in Paonia, where the terrain can be challenging. As an IT Manager, he especially appreciates the ability to monitor and manage the white space network from any Internet connection.

Read More

Big City Community Networks: Lessons from Seattle and Gigabit Squared

By on
A few weeks ago, a Geekwire interview with outgoing Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn announced that the Gigabit Squared project there was in jeopardy. Gigabit Squared has had difficulty raising all the necessary capital for its project, building Fiber-to-the-Home to several neighborhoods in part by using City owned fiber to reduce the cost of building its trunk lines. There are a number of important lessons, none of them new, that we should take away from this disappointing news. This is the first of a series of posts on the subject. But first, some facts. Gigabit Squared is continuing to work on projects in Chicago and Gainsville, Florida. There has been a shake-up at the company among founders and it is not clear what it will do next. Gigabit Squared was not the only vendor responding to Seattle's RFP, just the highest profile one. Gigabit Squared hoped to raise some $20 million for its Seattle project (for which the website is still live). The original announcement suggested twelve neighborhoods with at least 50,000 households and businesses would be connected. The project is not officially dead, but few have high hopes for it given the change in mayor and many challenges thus far. The first lesson to draw from this is what we say repeatedly: the broadband market is seriously broken and there is no panacea to fix it. The big cable firms, while beating up on DSL, refuse to compete with each other. They are protected by a moat made up of advantages over potential competitors that includes vast economies of scale allowing them to pay less for advertising, content, and equipment; large existing networks already amortized; vast capacity for predatory pricing by cross-subsidizing from non-competitive areas; and much more. So if you are an investor with $20 million in cash lying around, why would you ever want to bet against Comcast - especially by investing in an unknown entity that cannot withstand a multi-year price war? You wouldn't and they generally don't.
Read More

Big City Community Networks: Lessons from Seattle and Gigabit Squared

By on
A few weeks ago, a Geekwire interview with outgoing Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn announced that the Gigabit Squared project there was in jeopardy. Gigabit Squared has had difficulty raising all the necessary capital for its project, building Fiber-to-the-Home to several neighborhoods in part by using City owned fiber to reduce the cost of building its trunk lines. There are a number of important lessons, none of them new, that we should take away from this disappointing news. This is the first of a series of posts on the subject. But first, some facts. Gigabit Squared is continuing to work on projects in Chicago and Gainsville, Florida. There has been a shake-up at the company among founders and it is not clear what it will do next. Gigabit Squared was not the only vendor responding to Seattle's RFP, just the highest profile one. Gigabit Squared hoped to raise some $20 million for its Seattle project (for which the website is still live). The original announcement suggested twelve neighborhoods with at least 50,000 households and businesses would be connected. The project is not officially dead, but few have high hopes for it given the change in mayor and many challenges thus far. The first lesson to draw from this is what we say repeatedly: the broadband market is seriously broken and there is no panacea to fix it. The big cable firms, while beating up on DSL, refuse to compete with each other. They are protected by a moat made up of advantages over potential competitors that includes vast economies of scale allowing them to pay less for advertising, content, and equipment; large existing networks already amortized; vast capacity for predatory pricing by cross-subsidizing from non-competitive areas; and much more. So if you are an investor with $20 million in cash lying around, why would you ever want to bet against Comcast - especially by investing in an unknown entity that cannot withstand a multi-year price war? You wouldn't and they generally don't.
Read More

Big City Community Networks: Lessons from Seattle and Gigabit Squared

By on
A few weeks ago, a Geekwire interview with outgoing Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn announced that the Gigabit Squared project there was in jeopardy. Gigabit Squared has had difficulty raising all the necessary capital for its project, building Fiber-to-the-Home to several neighborhoods in part by using City owned fiber to reduce the cost of building its trunk lines. There are a number of important lessons, none of them new, that we should take away from this disappointing news. This is the first of a series of posts on the subject. But first, some facts. Gigabit Squared is continuing to work on projects in Chicago and Gainsville, Florida. There has been a shake-up at the company among founders and it is not clear what it will do next. Gigabit Squared was not the only vendor responding to Seattle's RFP, just the highest profile one. Gigabit Squared hoped to raise some $20 million for its Seattle project (for which the website is still live). The original announcement suggested twelve neighborhoods with at least 50,000 households and businesses would be connected. The project is not officially dead, but few have high hopes for it given the change in mayor and many challenges thus far. The first lesson to draw from this is what we say repeatedly: the broadband market is seriously broken and there is no panacea to fix it. The big cable firms, while beating up on DSL, refuse to compete with each other. They are protected by a moat made up of advantages over potential competitors that includes vast economies of scale allowing them to pay less for advertising, content, and equipment; large existing networks already amortized; vast capacity for predatory pricing by cross-subsidizing from non-competitive areas; and much more. So if you are an investor with $20 million in cash lying around, why would you ever want to bet against Comcast - especially by investing in an unknown entity that cannot withstand a multi-year price war? You wouldn't and they generally don't.
Read More

Big City Community Networks: Lessons from Seattle and Gigabit Squared

By on
A few weeks ago, a Geekwire interview with outgoing Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn announced that the Gigabit Squared project there was in jeopardy. Gigabit Squared has had difficulty raising all the necessary capital for its project, building Fiber-to-the-Home to several neighborhoods in part by using City owned fiber to reduce the cost of building its trunk lines. There are a number of important lessons, none of them new, that we should take away from this disappointing news. This is the first of a series of posts on the subject. But first, some facts. Gigabit Squared is continuing to work on projects in Chicago and Gainsville, Florida. There has been a shake-up at the company among founders and it is not clear what it will do next. Gigabit Squared was not the only vendor responding to Seattle's RFP, just the highest profile one. Gigabit Squared hoped to raise some $20 million for its Seattle project (for which the website is still live). The original announcement suggested twelve neighborhoods with at least 50,000 households and businesses would be connected. The project is not officially dead, but few have high hopes for it given the change in mayor and many challenges thus far. The first lesson to draw from this is what we say repeatedly: the broadband market is seriously broken and there is no panacea to fix it. The big cable firms, while beating up on DSL, refuse to compete with each other. They are protected by a moat made up of advantages over potential competitors that includes vast economies of scale allowing them to pay less for advertising, content, and equipment; large existing networks already amortized; vast capacity for predatory pricing by cross-subsidizing from non-competitive areas; and much more. So if you are an investor with $20 million in cash lying around, why would you ever want to bet against Comcast - especially by investing in an unknown entity that cannot withstand a multi-year price war? You wouldn't and they generally don't.
Read More

Big City Community Networks: Lessons from Seattle and Gigabit Squared

By on
A few weeks ago, a Geekwire interview with outgoing Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn announced that the Gigabit Squared project there was in jeopardy. Gigabit Squared has had difficulty raising all the necessary capital for its project, building Fiber-to-the-Home to several neighborhoods in part by using City owned fiber to reduce the cost of building its trunk lines. There are a number of important lessons, none of them new, that we should take away from this disappointing news. This is the first of a series of posts on the subject. But first, some facts. Gigabit Squared is continuing to work on projects in Chicago and Gainsville, Florida. There has been a shake-up at the company among founders and it is not clear what it will do next. Gigabit Squared was not the only vendor responding to Seattle's RFP, just the highest profile one. Gigabit Squared hoped to raise some $20 million for its Seattle project (for which the website is still live). The original announcement suggested twelve neighborhoods with at least 50,000 households and businesses would be connected. The project is not officially dead, but few have high hopes for it given the change in mayor and many challenges thus far. The first lesson to draw from this is what we say repeatedly: the broadband market is seriously broken and there is no panacea to fix it. The big cable firms, while beating up on DSL, refuse to compete with each other. They are protected by a moat made up of advantages over potential competitors that includes vast economies of scale allowing them to pay less for advertising, content, and equipment; large existing networks already amortized; vast capacity for predatory pricing by cross-subsidizing from non-competitive areas; and much more. So if you are an investor with $20 million in cash lying around, why would you ever want to bet against Comcast - especially by investing in an unknown entity that cannot withstand a multi-year price war? You wouldn't and they generally don't.
Read More

Big City Community Networks: Lessons from Seattle and Gigabit Squared

By on
A few weeks ago, a Geekwire interview with outgoing Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn announced that the Gigabit Squared project there was in jeopardy. Gigabit Squared has had difficulty raising all the necessary capital for its project, building Fiber-to-the-Home to several neighborhoods in part by using City owned fiber to reduce the cost of building its trunk lines. There are a number of important lessons, none of them new, that we should take away from this disappointing news. This is the first of a series of posts on the subject. But first, some facts. Gigabit Squared is continuing to work on projects in Chicago and Gainsville, Florida. There has been a shake-up at the company among founders and it is not clear what it will do next. Gigabit Squared was not the only vendor responding to Seattle's RFP, just the highest profile one. Gigabit Squared hoped to raise some $20 million for its Seattle project (for which the website is still live). The original announcement suggested twelve neighborhoods with at least 50,000 households and businesses would be connected. The project is not officially dead, but few have high hopes for it given the change in mayor and many challenges thus far. The first lesson to draw from this is what we say repeatedly: the broadband market is seriously broken and there is no panacea to fix it. The big cable firms, while beating up on DSL, refuse to compete with each other. They are protected by a moat made up of advantages over potential competitors that includes vast economies of scale allowing them to pay less for advertising, content, and equipment; large existing networks already amortized; vast capacity for predatory pricing by cross-subsidizing from non-competitive areas; and much more. So if you are an investor with $20 million in cash lying around, why would you ever want to bet against Comcast - especially by investing in an unknown entity that cannot withstand a multi-year price war? You wouldn't and they generally don't.
Read More

Big City Community Networks: Lessons from Seattle and Gigabit Squared

By on
A few weeks ago, a Geekwire interview with outgoing Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn announced that the Gigabit Squared project there was in jeopardy. Gigabit Squared has had difficulty raising all the necessary capital for its project, building Fiber-to-the-Home to several neighborhoods in part by using City owned fiber to reduce the cost of building its trunk lines. There are a number of important lessons, none of them new, that we should take away from this disappointing news. This is the first of a series of posts on the subject. But first, some facts. Gigabit Squared is continuing to work on projects in Chicago and Gainsville, Florida. There has been a shake-up at the company among founders and it is not clear what it will do next. Gigabit Squared was not the only vendor responding to Seattle's RFP, just the highest profile one. Gigabit Squared hoped to raise some $20 million for its Seattle project (for which the website is still live). The original announcement suggested twelve neighborhoods with at least 50,000 households and businesses would be connected. The project is not officially dead, but few have high hopes for it given the change in mayor and many challenges thus far. The first lesson to draw from this is what we say repeatedly: the broadband market is seriously broken and there is no panacea to fix it. The big cable firms, while beating up on DSL, refuse to compete with each other. They are protected by a moat made up of advantages over potential competitors that includes vast economies of scale allowing them to pay less for advertising, content, and equipment; large existing networks already amortized; vast capacity for predatory pricing by cross-subsidizing from non-competitive areas; and much more. So if you are an investor with $20 million in cash lying around, why would you ever want to bet against Comcast - especially by investing in an unknown entity that cannot withstand a multi-year price war? You wouldn't and they generally don't.
Read More

Big City Community Networks: Lessons from Seattle and Gigabit Squared

By on
A few weeks ago, a Geekwire interview with outgoing Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn announced that the Gigabit Squared project there was in jeopardy. Gigabit Squared has had difficulty raising all the necessary capital for its project, building Fiber-to-the-Home to several neighborhoods in part by using City owned fiber to reduce the cost of building its trunk lines. There are a number of important lessons, none of them new, that we should take away from this disappointing news. This is the first of a series of posts on the subject. But first, some facts. Gigabit Squared is continuing to work on projects in Chicago and Gainsville, Florida. There has been a shake-up at the company among founders and it is not clear what it will do next. Gigabit Squared was not the only vendor responding to Seattle's RFP, just the highest profile one. Gigabit Squared hoped to raise some $20 million for its Seattle project (for which the website is still live). The original announcement suggested twelve neighborhoods with at least 50,000 households and businesses would be connected. The project is not officially dead, but few have high hopes for it given the change in mayor and many challenges thus far. The first lesson to draw from this is what we say repeatedly: the broadband market is seriously broken and there is no panacea to fix it. The big cable firms, while beating up on DSL, refuse to compete with each other. They are protected by a moat made up of advantages over potential competitors that includes vast economies of scale allowing them to pay less for advertising, content, and equipment; large existing networks already amortized; vast capacity for predatory pricing by cross-subsidizing from non-competitive areas; and much more. So if you are an investor with $20 million in cash lying around, why would you ever want to bet against Comcast - especially by investing in an unknown entity that cannot withstand a multi-year price war? You wouldn't and they generally don't.
Read More
Subscribe to Digital Subscriber Line Networks