All perfectly good information, but nothing new.
Surely you have been in contact with M. Lefebvre, researched the matter, and can tell us when the…
15 hours ago by zdnetukuser on Linux Mint 13 release candidate arrives
All perfectly good information, but nothing new.
Surely you have been in contact with M. Lefebvre, researched the matter, and can tell us when the…
15 hours ago by zdnetukuser on Linux Mint 13 release candidate arrives
Rutland County Council has selected BT to roll out fibre to 90% of residents by the end of 2013 in a project that is set to cost £3 million.
Some 17,000 homes and businesses will benefit from a network that will largely use fibre-to-the-cabinet (FTTC) technology, which can achieve downstream speeds of up to 80Mbps. The average downstream speed in the rural East Midlands town is currently 6Mbps.
Rutland is hoping to increase the coverage of the project to 97% of residents, within the same timescale, but would need to secure additional funding and it is likely that this will run under a separate procurement.
BT is contributing £800,000 to the project, with £2.2 million coming from Rutland Country Council and an additional £710,000 coming from Broadband Delivery UK, the government body charged with allocating public sector funds to the national fibre rollout.
“Rutland is a sparse, rural area and getting high-speed affordable broadband to 97% of the county will make a huge different to the long-term prospects of the area and quality of life for all,” said Terry King, deputy leader for Rutland County Council.
“Broadband coverage in Rutland is poor and in some areas very poor, which is why we need a solution like this for the whole county addressing ‘not spots’ and areas the market will not penetrate.”
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King added that the deployment would bring benefits to the wider community by enabling education through technology, as well as giving residents access to new models of care and social interaction.
Rutland and BT also plan to use ‘alternative broadband technologies’ in a small percentage of areas that are harder to reach with a fixed fibre line. It is likely that these technologies could include satellite broadband or white spaces, but assessment will be made on a case-by-case basis.
The government has committed a minimum of £730m up until 2015 to support the rollout of next generation broadband networks across the UK, in a bid to meet Chancellor George Osborne’s aim of creating the best superfast network in Europe by then.
DUBLIN–(BUSINESS WIRE)–
Research and Markets (http://www.researchandmarkets.com/research/jp7nnz/all_about_cable_an)
has announced the addition of the “All
About Cable Broadband” subscription to their offering.
All About Cable and Broadband (formerly All About Cable) is a
forward-looking, comprehensive survey of the law at every level as it
applies to cable networks and their television systems, to cable’s
satellite competitors, and to the convergence of these technologies with
the broadband Internet and digital telephony.
Cited by the Supreme Court in Turner Broadcasting v. Federal
Communications Commission, All About Cable and Broadband provides a
comprehensive guide for entrepreneurs and attorneys on a broad range of
topics, including: content regulation; horizontal and vertical
ownership; interactive television; franchise transfer; pole attachments
for information services; rate regulation; access to multiple-dwelling
units; broadcast signal carriage; effective competition; subscriber
privacy rights; access channels; theft of service; copyright;
preemption; and conflict law. Additionally, the treatise addresses the
new universe of questions raised by the proliferation of wireless
devices.
Key Topics Covered:
CHAPTER 1
A Brief History of Cable Television in the United States
CHAPTER 2
Federal Regulation of Cable Television
CHAPTER 3
State and Local Regulation of Cable Television (Except Franchising)
CHAPTER 4
Franchising: Defining the Local Market
CHAPTER 5
Competition in the Subscription Video Market: Issues and Trends
CHAPTER 6
[...] Continue Reading…
Article source: http://finance.yahoo.com/news/research-markets-cable-broadband-151900809.html
Steering its broadband Internet access business away from a one-size-fits-all model, Comcast said Thursday that it would test sales of Internet service based on use, with potentially higher costs for customers who use the most.The tests will start taking place in unspecified Comcast markets in the next several months, the company said. The approach could be rolled out later in Comcast’s other markets.By experimenting with use-based pricing, Comcast, which has roughly 15 million Internet customers, is moving away from a four-year-old policy that capped monthly Internet use at 250 gigabytes each month.David L. Cohen, Comcast’s executive vice president, said the market had “clearly evolved” since that cap was put in place. “Even today, only a very small number of our customers have ever even come close to the cap,” he said in a conference call with reporters Thursday afternoon. Nonetheless, it is preferable, he said, to have a flexible approach toward the amount of data that customers can download and upload.Going forward, the effective cap on monthly use will be 300 gigabytes. In the markets where the use-based pricing tests are not taking place, Comcast says it will stop enforcing the monthly cap, though it will continue to contact the customers it deems “excessive users.” Some such users are suspected of swapping illegal files; others are possibly infected by computer viruses. Right now the median customer uses eight to 10 gigabytes a month, according to the company.In the test markets, 300 gigabytes will be the monthly allotment of data for a basic broadband Internet customer. From there, Comcast will try charging a premium for additional data. In one of the tests, customers will be able to buy more data access in what Comcast calls “increments” or “blocks”: for instance, $10 for 50 gigabytes.In the other, more complicated test, the customers who already pay more for faster Internet speeds — what Comcast calls its “blast” and “extreme” speeds — will start off with somewhat more than 300 gigabytes a month, reflecting the fact that with the higher speeds, they might be using more data each month in the future. As in the other test, customers who exceed the monthly allotment will be able to buy more access.Mr. Cohen said the tests were part of “an improved data usage management approach that is pro-consumer, pro-innovation and will provide customers with more choice and flexibility in this dynamic and evolving marketplace.”In explaining the need for changes to its data pricing, Mr. Cohen said, “Our network is not an infinite resource, and it is expensive to expand it.”Near the end of the conference call, Mr. Cohen said: “The headline today should be that there isn’t a cap anymore. We’re out of the cap business.” He declined to say when the use-based pricing setup could be expanded nationwide.In a blog post on Thursday, a Comcast executive who oversees communications and data services, Cathy Avgiris, said the company would provide more information about the tests in the coming months.“At all times, including during our pilot [...] Continue Reading…
Article source: http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/05/17/comcast-to-test-broadband-pricing-tied-to-use/
Steering its broadband Internet access business away from a one-size-fits-all model, Comcast said Thursday that it would test sales of Internet service based on use, with potentially higher costs for customers who use the most.
The tests will start taking place in unspecified Comcast markets in the next several months, the company said. The approach could be rolled out later in Comcast’s other markets.
By experimenting with use-based pricing, Comcast, which has roughly 15 million Internet customers, is moving away from a four-year-old policy that capped monthly Internet use at 250 gigabytes each month.
David L. Cohen, Comcast’s executive vice president, said the market had “clearly evolved” since that cap was put in place. “Even today, only a very small number of our customers have ever even come close to the cap,” he said in a conference call with reporters Thursday afternoon. Nonetheless, it is preferable, he said, to have a flexible approach toward the amount of data that customers can download and upload.
Going forward, the effective cap on monthly use will be 300 gigabytes. In the markets where the use-based pricing tests are not taking place, Comcast says it will stop enforcing the monthly cap, though it will continue to contact the customers it deems “excessive users.” Some such users are suspected of swapping illegal files; others are possibly infected by computer viruses. Right now the median customer uses eight to 10 gigabytes a month, according to the company.
In the test markets, 300 gigabytes will be the monthly allotment of data for a basic broadband Internet customer. From there, Comcast will try charging a premium for additional data. In one of the tests, customers will be able to buy more data access in what Comcast calls “increments” or “blocks”: for instance, $10 for 50 gigabytes.
In the other, more complicated test, the customers who already pay more for faster Internet speeds — what Comcast calls its “blast” and “extreme” speeds — will start off with somewhat more than 300 gigabytes a month, reflecting the fact that with the higher speeds, they might be using more data each month in the future. As in the other test, customers who exceed the monthly allotment will be able to buy more access.
Mr. Cohen said the tests were part of “an improved data usage management approach that is pro-consumer, pro-innovation and will provide customers with more choice and flexibility in this dynamic and evolving marketplace.”
In explaining the need for changes to its data pricing, Mr. Cohen said, “Our network is not an infinite resource, and it is expensive to expand it.”
Near the end of the conference call, Mr. Cohen said: “The headline today should be that there isn’t a cap anymore. We’re out of the cap business.” He declined to say when the use-based pricing setup could be expanded nationwide.
In a blog post on Thursday, a Comcast executive who oversees communications and data services, Cathy Avgiris, said the company would provide more information about the tests in the coming months.
“At all times, including during our pilot [...] Continue Reading…
Article source: http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/05/17/comcast-to-test-broadband-pricing-tied-to-use/?partner=rss&emc=rss
SCHAUMBURG, IL and INDIANAPOLIS, IN–(Marketwire -05/17/12)-
Cambium Networks™, a leading provider of wireless broadband solutions for reliable connectivity in any environment, and Broadband Antenna Tracking Systems (BATS Wireless), one of the world’s leading innovators of advanced wireless wide area network (WWAN) provisioning systems, today announced their enhanced wireless point-to-point (PTP) radio and antenna tracking solution is being incorporated as part of a mobile communications networking project being led by Oceus Networks. The systems will be piloted by the U.S. Navy, providing onboard and ship-to-ship broadband data and communications. The project is the first U.S. Department of Defense operational deployment of Fourth Generation Long-Term Evolution (4G LTE) and is based on Oceus Networks’ Xiphos™ family of mobile 4G LTE network solutions.
In providing a combined PTP and WWAN provisioning solution, Cambium and BATS Wireless deliver customers a fully ruggedized wireless network solution that can be used for a number of ship-to-shore, inter-ship or intra-ship broadband applications, from defense deployments to oil and gas industry communications needs. Without the use of this enhanced PTP solution, implementations such as the Navy’s would be dependent on satellite coverage for broadband communications — an expensive and less capable alternative. For the Oceus implementation, ruggedized self-optimizing network nodes can be placed aboard ships, installed in tactical warfighter vehicles, or mounted on aerial platforms to be used wherever secure and quickly provisioning high-speed voice, video and data communications are needed.
“By incorporating BATS antenna tracking capabilities and Cambium’s strong and reliable PTP system into our Xiphos™-based solution, we’re able to offer defense customers a broadband solution that will allow ships to communicate with each other even in the harshest ocean conditions,” said Cal Shintani, Chief Growth Officer, Oceus Networks.
“Organizations from the military to public safety networks are looking for complete wireless solutions to help boost their infrastructures,” said Phil Cramer, senior VP of sales and marketing, BATS Wireless. “This important deployment for the Navy exemplifies the symbiotic relationship we have with Cambium Networks, one that facilitates technical collaboration to solve a customer’s problem.”
Indicative of this symbiotic relationship, the industry-first BATS BTS and AMATS suites are deeply integrated with a near universal list of Cambium’s tested broadband PTP radio and antenna configurations. The combined system can be utilized in numerous applications to provide a truly universal WWAN solution that offers the speed and capacity of a directional system, with the flexibility and mobility of a sector-based or omni-direction array. The systems also allow for a number of mobility scenarios, including fixed (tower to tower, building to building), fixed to mobile (ship to shore, air to ground), and fully mobile deployments (ship to ship, air to mobile command). Used as part of the Navy deployment, Cambium’s PTP 45600 product is DISA UC APL (Defense Information Systems Agency Unified Capabilities Approved Products List) certified to meet specifications required for military and federal applications and is considered the primary wireless transport solution for many theatre-deployed situation awareness programs for the U.S. ARMY and U.S. Marine Corps, in addition to the Navy.
“Cambium [...] Continue Reading…
Article source: http://finance.yahoo.com/news/cambium-networks-tm-broadband-antenna-161500706.html
NEW YORK (CNNMoney) — Comcast on Thursday decided to get rid of its controversial 250 gigabyte-per-month cap for its broadband customers, replacing it with a usage-based billing system.The company put its current cap in place in 2008. The decision was aimed at a small number of Internet users who Comcast (CMCSA) felt were abusing their all-you-can-eat privileges by downloading a steady stream of HD movies from peer-to-peer networks. That heavy usage was limiting the bandwidth available for average customers.The 250 GB cap was designed to be a large one that the average consumer wouldn’t come close to hitting in a month. In four short years, it became a much tighter limit, thanks to customers gobbling up an ever-growing stream of data. Apple (AAPL, Fortune 500) iPads, Netflix (NFLX) and other online video services helped customers rack up those gigabytes.Video drove the majority of consumer Internet traffic for the first time in 2010, making up 53% of all uploads and downloads, according to the latest data from Cisco’s (CSCO, Fortune 500) Visual Networking index. By 2015, video traffic is on to track to more than quadruple, and industry forecasters predict that Internet traffic will be 90% video.As a result, Comcast said it would lift its cap and instead put in place a tiered system like the ones Verizon (VZ, Fortune 500) and ATT (T, Fortune 500) use for their wireless data services.Though Comcast, the country’s largest broadband provider, said it hasn’t reached a decision on how it will implement the tiers, it will be pilot-testing two possible solutions in yet-to-be-determined markets.The first program will set different allotments for different tiers of service, starting at 300 GB per month, and charge customers for additional blocks of usage when they go over. The example the company gave was $10 more for 50 GB of additional data.The second approach would give everyone 300 GB per month, and then charge for additional usage in blocks.”Our goal with this improved approach, these consumer trials, and our continued investment in our network is to create products that meet the needs of all of our residential customers (even the heaviest users) and provide everyone with a choice,” Cathy Avgiris, head of Comcast Cable, said in a blog post.As rivals’ content services have pushed customers up against their cap, Comcast has faced scrutiny for treating its own Xfinity services differently. For instance, video downloads from Xfinity’s Microsoft (MSFT, Fortune 500) Xbox app do not count against customers’ monthly data allotment.Netflix CEO Reed Hastings has complained that, in doing so, Comcast is violating net neutrality rules.The company referenced that gripe in its statement about its new broadband approach.”Some of the conversation around our new product introductions focused on our data usage threshold, rather than on the exciting opportunities we are offering our customers,” Avgiris wrote.Comcast will join Time Warner Cable (TWC, Fortune 500) and a handful of other service providers in switching to a usage-based pricing model.Just as mobile data is overloading wireless networks, fixed broadband [...] Continue Reading…
Article source: http://money.cnn.com/rssclick/2012/05/17/technology/comcast-broadband/index.htm?section=money_latest
NEW YORK (CNNMoney) — Comcast on Thursday decided to get rid of its controversial 250 gigabyte-per-month cap for its broadband customers, replacing it with a usage-based billing system.The company put its current cap in place in 2008. The decision was aimed at a small number of Internet users who Comcast (CMCSA) felt were abusing their all-you-can-eat privileges by downloading a steady stream of HD movies from peer-to-peer networks. That heavy usage was limiting the bandwidth available for average customers.The 250 GB cap was designed to be a large one that the average consumer wouldn’t come close to hitting in a month. In four short years, it became a much tighter limit, thanks to customers gobbling up an ever-growing stream of data. Apple (AAPL, Fortune 500) iPads, Netflix (NFLX) and other online video services helped customers rack up those gigabytes.Video drove the majority of consumer Internet traffic for the first time in 2010, making up 53% of all uploads and downloads, according to the latest data from Cisco’s (CSCO, Fortune 500) Visual Networking index. By 2015, video traffic is on to track to more than quadruple, and industry forecasters predict that Internet traffic will be 90% video.As a result, Comcast said it would lift its cap and instead put in place a tiered system like the ones Verizon (VZ, Fortune 500) and ATT (T, Fortune 500) use for their wireless data services.Though Comcast, the country’s largest broadband provider, said it hasn’t reached a decision on how it will implement the tiers, it will be pilot-testing two possible solutions in yet-to-be-determined markets.The first program will set different allotments for different tiers of service, starting at 300 GB per month, and charge customers for additional blocks of usage when they go over. The example the company gave was $10 more for 50 GB of additional data.The second approach would give everyone 300 GB per month, and then charge for additional usage in blocks.”Our goal with this improved approach, these consumer trials, and our continued investment in our network is to create products that meet the needs of all of our residential customers (even the heaviest users) and provide everyone with a choice,” Cathy Avgiris, head of Comcast Cable, said in a blog post.As rivals’ content services have pushed customers up against their cap, Comcast has faced scrutiny for treating its own Xfinity services differently. For instance, video downloads from Xfinity’s Microsoft (MSFT, Fortune 500) Xbox app do not count against customers’ monthly data allotment.Netflix CEO Reed Hastings has complained that, in doing so, Comcast is violating net neutrality rules.The company referenced that gripe in its statement about its new broadband approach.”Some of the conversation around our new product introductions focused on our data usage threshold, rather than on the exciting opportunities we are offering our customers,” Avgiris wrote.Comcast will join Time Warner Cable (TWC, Fortune 500) and a handful of other service providers in switching to a usage-based pricing model.Just as mobile data is overloading wireless networks, fixed broadband [...] Continue Reading…
Article source: http://money.cnn.com/rssclick/2012/05/17/technology/comcast-broadband/index.htm?section=money_technology
I think that this really shows that there is no change in the status quo.
To date, every time Microsoft moves, people clamour about anti-trust,…
13 hours ago by BarryGill on Windows RT faces antitrust ‘vigilance’ in Europe
The Broadband Commission for Digital Development, in partnership with ITU, has released its first country case studies looking in-depth at the state of broadband development in four economies and examining links between broadband and the UN Millennium Development Goals.
The case studies, which cover the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Panama, the Philippines, and Romania, look at the effect of broadband connectivity on economic growth and access to basic services like education and health. They offer regulatory guidance and best practices, showcasing success stories and lessons learned.
Romania and TFYR Macedonia both provide strong examples of how adopting pro-ICT policies, establishing effective regulatory frameworks and developing strategic private and public partnerships can play a key role in boosting broadband access, affordability and demand.
A nation with a strong commitment to connectivity as a driver of national growth, TFYR Macedonia already boasts an impressive broadband penetration rate of 32%. Internet access in schools and Wi-Fi-based public Internet access points have been rolled out throughout the country, including remote areas. Schools now offer one Web-enabled computer for every 1.45 children, while university students and academics can freely access knowledge and research resources via the academic network MARnet.
Meanwhile, near-neighbour Romania ranks among the top countries in the world for broadband speed, and scores well for affordability too. The average cost of a baseline monthly broadband subscription represents less than 5% of average monthly income — well within the global targets established by the Broadband Commission last October. Public access is promoted through initiatives like ‘Biblionet’, which was launched in 2009 and which provides free library-based access through some 795 public libraries equipped with 3,318 computers.
Case studies on Panama and the Philippines, meanwhile, explore the impact of broadband on the economy and on job creation. Both studies evaluate the development of e-applications in the areas of education, public health, media and government services — all of which can help further stimulate broadband adoption.
In Panama, fixed broadband is having a significant economic impact. Analysis of a structural econometric model for the period 2000-2010 indicates that fixed broadband now contributes an annual 0.44% of GDP, with the indirect effects of fixed broadband use estimated to have contributed almost 9.6% of total national economic growth. Accelerating take-up means that this impact has now almost doubled to reach 0.82% of annual GDP, and contributed 11.3% of all economic growth over the decade.
In the Philippines’ case study, analysis over the same 10-year period indicates that mobile broadband adoption has contributed an annual 0.32% to GDP, representing 6.9% of total GDP growth for the economy over the past decade. Given the acceleration of mobile broadband penetration since 2005, this impact has also now almost doubled, reaching 0.61% of GDP, representing 7.3% of total economic growth over the decade.
Download the full set of case studies at:
www.broadbandcommission.org/work/documents/case-studies.aspx
By Paul Budde, Managing Director of Paul Budde Communication. Paul is also a contributor of the Paul Budde Communication blog located here. Related topics: Broadband, Mobile
Article source: http://www.circleid.com/posts/20120517_case_studies_from_the_un_broadband_commission/