Broadband Data Improvement Act Clears Committee

MBCook writes "Ars Technica is reporting that the Broadband Data Improvement Act has left committee with a unanimous vote. Among the changes proposed are requiring the definition of 'second generation broadband' (enough to carry HDTV) instead of the current definition of broadband as 200Kbps, and aggregating the data by ZIP+4 instead of just the full ZIP code. The act can now move to the full Senate."

Par for the course.

[140Mandak262Jamuna]

Free Press policy director Ben Scott said, "For too long, policymakers have been forced to operate in the dark, relying on misleading and sometimes inaccurate information about the U.S. broadband market. By providing detailed information about the deployment, availability and use of broadband services in this country, the Broadband Data Improvement Act promises to bring us one step closer to our shared goal of universal, affordable broadband."

Isn't this par for the course in almost all fields, not just broadband market? In almost every thing the Congress does there is an interest group that funds studies, think tanks, policy white papers all designed to muddy the waters. Everywhere, ODF adoption, credit report freeze, bankruptcy reform, S-Chip, ID vs Evolution ... There is this huge industry whose sole purpose is to force the lawmakers and the public to act in the dark and providing inaccurate and misleading information. Why single out broadband alone?

24Mbps down/1Mbps up in Socialist France

[Nicolas MONNET]

29.99 [adsl.free.fr], ADSL2+, includes TV and free international calls (VoIP). Free modem and HDTV PVR set top box provided.

All that in socialist France. The only gov't improvement is in aggressively enforcing competition. You know, the real free market thing, not that corrupt semi-fascist oligarchy you have in the US.

There is NO free market in the US

[Nicolas MONNET]

"This bill was written solely to upset the current relatively free market of broadband. "

Because we have an aggressively pro-competition regulating agency in France, you have a dozen way to get broadband in most cities. And you basically can't get anything below ADSL2+ those days.

At the moment I pay 29 euros a month for 24/1Mbps, HDTV service, and free international phone (analog and voip). They also provide [adsl.free.fr] me with a free router, Wifi AP, HDTV PVR set top box and analog telephone adaptor.

No cap on data, no filtering whatsoever, no shaping. Quality of service is good, and has been improving steadily. You have the occasional day long outage (two last years, none this year so far), but other than that downloading speeds are stable and pretty much max out my line 24/7.

And the reason for this is that ARCEPT [art-telecom.fr] has been given a lot of power to enforce competition in the broadcast market. None of those services are subsidised. They haven't been so successful with cellphone, OTOH. But they're working on it.

Re:ZIP+4

[ZachPruckowski]

ZIP+4 is one of the best changes in the bill. My ZIP code (20180) "has" cable, but it's only available in the town 3 miles away from me. Geographically, 95% of my ZIP code (and probably 60-70% population-wise) have no broadband, yet we're listed as having access to broadband. This bill is designed to stop the cable/phone Companies from telling the government and media that they've fulfilled their promise to bring "broadband to the masses" by redefining broadband to 2 Mb/s of theoretical speed (not even actual speed) and making them show penetration with better granularity.

Re:"An America without broadband..."

[Anonymous Coward]

What Stevens isn't getting (or is purposefully avoiding saying) is that a greater broadband connection, plus compression technologies, would allow for even more use within that broadband channel. That allows for further development of new uses and technologies.

To put it in words he would understand:
"If you give everyone a bigger tube, and then someone comes along and tells you how to pack your internets into a smaller email, then you can email even more internets without clogging your tube! Everyone wins!"