Policy for the CIS sector would play across the landscape of federal, state and local arenas of telecommunications, community and economic development, and research. Agencies range from muncipal planners, to state public utilities commissions, to the FCC.
The Brookings Institution
The Brookings InstitutionThe Telecommunications Crash: What To Do Now? by Robert E. Litan December 2002 .
TIFB Home Page Broadband Access & Network Backbone Scoping Study Executive Summary and Powerpoint presentation. In October, 2002, the Telecommunications Infrastructure Fund Board (TIFB) commissioned a study by Texas A&M (TAMU) University and The University of Texas at Austin (UT) to “identify the elements and issues to be addressed by a major, forthcoming follow-on study for a statewide infrastructure to serve the long-term (15-20) years) telecommunications needs of Texas.” The TAMU-UT “Scoping Study” had two major foci: articulating the need for a backbone network to serve the TIFB constituencies – public (K12) education, higher education, libraries, (non-profit) health care, including academic medical centers, and community networks – and assessing prospects for universal access to “consumer broadband” telecommunications services.
Relating to advanced community information systems, including but not limited to dispatching subsystems for smart jitneys; appropriating money; limiting expenditures; and declaring an emergency. Be It Enacted by the People of the State of Oregon: SECTION 1. { (1) The Legislative Assembly finds that: (a) The development of smart jitney and advanced community information systems in this state will create jobs and further economic development
Technology and Social Inclusion - The MIT Press
February, 2003Technology and Social Inclusion - The MIT Press Technology and Social Inclusion: Rethinking the Digital Divide. By Mark Warschauer
Much of the discussion about new technologies and social equality has focused on the oversimplified notion of a "digital divide." in today's society, the ability to access, adapt, and create knowledge using information and communication technologies is critical to social inclusion. This focus on social inclusion shifts the discussion of the "digital divide" from gaps to be overcome by providing equipment to social development challenges to be addressed through the effective integration of technology into communities, institutions, and societies. What is most important is not so much the physical availability of computers and the Internet but rather people's ability to make use of those technologies to engage in meaningful social practices.
Digital Divide Myth
TechTV | The Digital Divide Myth. We should be skeptical of government-led efforts to fill the digital divide. By Adam Thierer, director of telecommunications studies at the Cato Institute
Motherjones.com -- Web Exclusives Winning Elections ... and T-Shirts How the Republican Party is harnessing the Internet to energize its activists -- and reward them with nifty prizes!
"If you want to tell people the truth you better make them laugh, or they'll kill you."
Oscar Wilde
"The meek shall inherit the earth, but not the mineral rights."
J. Paul Getty
Harry Roesch, HHS Joint Working Group on Telemedicine Appalachian Regional Commission "Health is one way to drive rural demand for broad band."
UNDERSTANDING BROADBAND DEMAND: A Review of Critical Issues
UNDERSTANDING BROADBAND DEMAND: A Review of Critical Issues The following analysis examines the state of broadband demand and usage in the United States, identifying successes, challenges and actions to promote more aggressive uptake.
"We must be aggressive about the deployment of broadband.” - President George W. Bush, June 13, 2002
Kofi Annan's IT challenge to Silicon Valley
Kofi Annan's IT challenge to Silicon Valley | CNET News.com November 5, 2002 - "The new information and communications technologies are among the driving forces of globalization. They are bringing people together, and bringing decision makers unprecedented new tools for development. At the same time, however, the gap between information 'haves' and 'have-nots' is widening, and there is a real danger that the world's poor will be excluded from the emerging knowledge-based global economy."
McAdams on telco and fiber
Cornell News: McAdams on telco and fiber ITHACA, N.Y. -- Kevin Martin, a member of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), is "an unlikely hero" for opposing changes in the regulation of local phone companies, according to Cornell University economist Alan McAdams.
Changes proposed by FCC chairman Michael Powell could create regional monopolies that would stifle innovation and growth of open broadband telecommunications, making such networks more costly, less flexible and less versatile, McAdams says. "Kevin Martin has unintentionally emerged as an unlikely hero protecting the nation from a return to ironclad monopolization by incumbent local exchange carriers," he says.
The Boston Foundation - Indicators Project
The Boston Foundation - Indicators Project The Indicators Report provides high quality data and information about Boston by engaging hundreds of participants and experts in presenting data in 10 categories, drawn from the wealth of research and information generated by public agencies, civic institutions, researchers, think tanks and community-based organizations.
Morino Institute: From Access to Outcomes
Digital Divide Report and Dialogue: Dialogue Morino Institute: From Access to Outcomes: Digital Divide Report and Dialogue: DialogueFrom Access to Outcomes makes the case that technology must not be seen as an end in itself. Although most initiatives aimed at closing the digital divide have focused on expanding access to new technologies, the report concludes that providing access alone is rarely as effective as it is well-meaning. The report finds that initiatives in and by low-income communities are far better at producing meaningful change when people apply technology with tangible economic, educational, and social end results – or "outcomes" – in mind.
Telecom undone?a cautionary tale
January 2003
By Peter Huber
Telecom undone—a cautionary tale. The demise of the telecommunications industry can be traced to a single source—the FCC's own implementation of the Telecommunications Act of 1996. Huber examines how utopianism and meddlesome arrogance on the part of the government have resulted in the near-total collapse of the telecommunications industry.
SELDOM has a chairman of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) been heard to anticipate the demise of the most important sector of the industry he regulates. Yet in a speech to a Wall Street gathering in October, Michael Powell, chairman of the FCC (and son of the Secretary of State), summed up his view of the state of the nation's telecommunications companies as follows: "Few are prospering. Few are growing. Few are spending. Few are investing. The status quo is certain death."
New landscape for telco policy
Feds mull broadband market shake-up - Tech News - CNET.com
U.S. regulators plan to unveil a major overhaul in telecommunications policy in the coming weeks that could strengthen the hand of local phone monopolies in a number of key areas, including high-speed Internet access.
No decision has yet been publicly announced, although FCC officials have said they hope to complete the process by late February. Meanwhile, companies whose plans rely on access to local phone networks are bracing for a sea change that they say could have sweeping effects on competition and customers' Internet choices. Small companies are worried about being driven out of business, companies as large as AT&T are concerned about losing access to local phone networks, and the big local phone companies scent a policy victory they've sought for years.
The Telecommunications Crash: What To Do Now?
Brookings Institution policy brief dated December 2002. A good (and complex) overview of the current state of play.
The Telecommunications Crash: What To Do Now?
The Telecommunications Crash: What To Do Now?
Policy Brief #112 — December 2002
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