$Multi-billion Broadband stimulus decisions imminent

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

"The team is mostly policy people and extraordinarily capable but  
mostly non-technical."  WHY?? The best way of solving this is to have  
highly technical people included who can say, as I said often at the  
FCC, as Chief Technologist,   to pleadings by companies to the  
Chairman,  "you are not telling it correctly? "

Dave Farber


Begin forwarded message:

From: Dave Burstein <daveb () dslprime com>
Date: December 30, 2008 5:19:16 PM EST
To: dave () farber net, <xyzzy () warpspeed com>
Subject: $Multi-billion Broadband stimulus decisions imminent

Folks

      Broadband decisions involving literally $tens of billions will  
be mde in the next three weeks, possibly the most important  
opportunity in the next decade. One of the fiber groups was told to  
get everything in by next Monday.

    If you have important, well researched data do send it over to  
them ASAP.  I verified to my satisfaction a study from CTIA that  
estimates $20B would provide near-ubiquitous 3G/4G wireless, including  
nearly all the 6-8M homes who can't get service today. Since the  
companies have some of that in their budget already, even a 25%  
subsidy would be well under $5B and perhaps a good place to put the  
money. On the other hand, I evaluated how much deployments of DSL,  
cable and fiber could be increased in 6 and 18 months.  I also  
prepared well-sourced estimates of how much the carriers would build  
with and without the stimulus. This is particularly important because  
many of the tax credit etc. proposals might give most of the money to  
companies for deployments already budgeted and underway.  No one wants  
this, but what I hear about the House Finance committee proposal would  
do just that.

   The beggars in business suits are swarming like never before, and  
what they are telling the decisionmakers is wildly contradictory and  
often absolutely false.  The team is mostly policy people and  
extraordinarily capable but mostly non-technical. On policy, they  
understand the issues better than almost anyone else; think many times  
before sending them opinion they probably heard before.

    But if you have solid technical or financial data that applies, I  
think they'd be glad to receive it. Emphasize the data, and get what's  
crucial in the first paragraph in terms clear to a very busy person.

    I'm happy to share what I know and point people in the right  
direction if you're not familiar with the process.  Several have  
current emails on their sites.
The corporate lobbying on this is massive, and public spirited  
comments I hope can counter some of that.

Dave Burstein
Editor, DSL Prime, DOCSIS Report, & Fiber News
Author, with Jennie Bourne Web Video: Making It Great, Getting It  
Noticed (Peachpit, 2008) and DSL, A Tech Brief (Wiley, 2002)





-------------------------------------------
Archives: https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/247/=now
RSS Feed: https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/247/
Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com