US Broadband Access

The United States isn't even in the top 20 for in-home broadband use, even though we are the second highest user of the internet behind China. Ten percent of Americans don't even have an option for broadband access. This is primarily in rural areas. It's been a long time since I had dial-up access, and I would be sad if this was my only option. This will hopefully be changed by the use of the white spaces opened up by the television frequencies that were auctioned off earlier this year.

Unfortunately, the FCC cancelled their recent meeting that was to be devoted to discussions about the wireless broadband movement in America. The reason it was cancelled: more planning was required for the digital television transition scheduled for February 17, 2009. (Good luck getting a converter box coupon here - they're almost out of money, and there's at least a 60 day waiting list)

University of Michigan Law Professor Susan Crawford likens broadband internet access to other utilities such as water or electricity as a necessary commodity for surviving and thriving in this world. Susan Crawford spoke at the Tech Policy Summit in Los Angeles and is advising the Obama/Biden transition team regarding the FCC.

What we need here: More broadband internet companies. It's hurting us to have so few options. The satellite dish options are fairly expensive, leaving just two options for most - their local cable and phone company. Other world countries have many more competitors, which increases the offerings and decreases the prices.



Bush administration opposes Free Broadband

Tell Cable to Shove it!

I have finally officially said "screw you" to Charter cable in Kalamazoo. I have wanted to do this for a while, I just couldn't bring myself to give up my college football games, and DVR. After a year of debating, I finally canceled my service, and ordered a 768K DSL line from AT&T for $20/month without a home phone. I am very happy with the cost - VERY happy. I was paying nearly $100 for Charter's internet (5MB) and basic digital service (under 100 crappy reception channels) with one DVR - and that was a promo price! The DSL line is definitely slower than the cable, but I barely notice it when I am trying to stream off sites like hulu.com. Every once in a while, I have to pause for a few seconds and resume the program. But for savings of $80/month - I'll deal with that! I can watch most of what I watched before on cable via the internet or over the air on the TV. With AT&T, you can even stream many of the ESPN sports events to your computer. iTunes also has a lot of free programming.

I can even watch it all on the TV! Both of our laptops have S-Video outs and I run stereo sound to the TV via the headphone or SPDIF jack and an RCA Y-connector.

More people need to start doing this and tell big cable to shove it. We all could use a little more money in our pockets (and a little more time for reading).

So here it is: Screw you Charter! Get with the times, lower your prices, and start offering better quality digital and high-def feeds or you will lose many more customers. AT&T's U-verse is going to be your demise. Good-bye!

Charter Cable and the Big Ten Network

Finally, Charter has negotiated with the Big Ten Network to give me my non-stop college football action. This is really the only reason I have cable TV anyway. I really enjoy watching college football. In 2006, the BTN came out, and stole a bunch of the good games. Cable couldn't get their heads out of their arses and pay BTN the $1 per subscriber they wanted. According to mlive, Charter finally got their act together, and I will have the BTN as early as this Saturday at noon. This weekend's MSU and U of M games aren't on the BTN this week; so, if Charter doesn't make the updates by gametime this weekend (I wouldn't be surprised) I won't be out of luck.

The BTN is the result of a 20-year partnership between the Big Ten (eleven) and Fox. It's been on the dishes since the start, but cable was slow to adopt, apparently holding out for a good deal, completely disregarding their customers. Personally, I nearly left cable like many others because of this issue.