Monthly Archives: February 2016

A Fresh Look at Public-Private Partnership in Broadband

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Business people shaking hands in the office after succesful meeting. Three persons

Lately, the phrase “public-private partnership” has been thrown around a lot in the context of improving and expanding broadband Internet access in Maine.  For many of the broadband projects that have used that terminology, the meaning of public-private partnership has been that the private entity provided the expertise and the public entity, such as a municipality, has provided the majority of the capital. The presumption is that private companies are unwilling or unable to invest in… Read more »

Digital Literacy: Who’s Responsible?

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Digital Literacy: Who is responsible for sharing all the advantages of broadband?

Before we answer the Digital Literacy question, lets take a little refresher course in Economics, remember widgets? Economics 101 taught us that if you develop a widget, in order to profit from it, you need a market in which to sell it. Therefore, if your widget is a hat that keeps your entire body warm with some edgy thermal-technology, you target your market and sell your product in really cold places where buyers should be… Read more »

Broadband Access Improves Quality of Place

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Broadband access is playing a larger role in our lives every day.  No wonder; broadband offers significant benefits to both quality of life and quality of place. When we speak of benefits to quality of life, we’re really talking about how broadband Internet benefits the individual, a topic we wrote about last week. These benefits include things like education, healthcare, aging in place and telecommuting. Although each of these offer distinct benefits to the individual,… Read more »

How Broadband Internet Improves Quality of Life

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People are using broadband all across the world.

Broadband Internet access is becoming more and more important to the lives of people all over the world.  As of August, 2015 there were over 3,179,035,200 Internet users in 190 countries accessing the world wide web for a number of reasons, providing entertainment, communication, access to vital services, and education for users everywhere.  The Internet’s increasing importance in our daily lives has led many to believe that Broadband Internet is a utility as vital to public… Read more »