FCC Chairman - another Czar-fail
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Hearing this from a friend of a friend (who is rural) that the main problem is the "last mile". He said there has been work to lay broadband cable along the main highway/roads, but the difficulty is going from that road to the individual houses.
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Hearing this from a friend of a friend (who is rural) that the main problem is the "last mile". He said there has been work to lay broadband cable along the main highway/roads, but the difficulty is going from that road to the individual houses.
@taiwan_girl said in FCC Chairman - another Czar-fail:
Hearing this from a friend of a friend (who is rural) that the main problem is the "last mile". He said there has been work to lay broadband cable along the main highway/roads, but the difficulty is going from that road to the individual houses.
This is a Yoda problem.
Do, or do not. There is no try.
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Hearing this from a friend of a friend (who is rural) that the main problem is the "last mile". He said there has been work to lay broadband cable along the main highway/roads, but the difficulty is going from that road to the individual houses.
@taiwan_girl said in FCC Chairman - another Czar-fail:
Hearing this from a friend of a friend (who is rural) that the main problem is the "last mile". He said there has been work to lay broadband cable along the main highway/roads, but the difficulty is going from that road to the individual houses.
That's been a known issue forever. If Larry were here you could ask him.
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@Axtremus said in FCC Chairman - another Czar-fail:
Wait a bit for "the other side of the story" before judging.
They've had 3 ½ years to get the other side of this story out.
The FCC commissioner says it's a typical government cluster.
@taiwan_girl said:
the main problem is the "last mile"
Yes. There are, as I said in the original post, other solutions.
Just checked: Accordion to ChatGPT, 7% of US households do not have broadband. That's almost 9 million households.
The cost, so far, has been $4.6K PER HOUSEHOLD.
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@Axtremus said in FCC Chairman - another Czar-fail:
Wait a bit for "the other side of the story" before judging.
They've had 3 ½ years to get the other side of this story out.
The FCC commissioner says it's a typical government cluster.
@taiwan_girl said:
the main problem is the "last mile"
Yes. There are, as I said in the original post, other solutions.
Just checked: Accordion to ChatGPT, 7% of US households do not have broadband. That's almost 9 million households.
The cost, so far, has been $4.6K PER HOUSEHOLD.
@George-K said in FCC Chairman - another Czar-fail:
Accordion to ChatGPT, 7% of US households do not have broadband.
I would have thought it would be higher than that.
(No facts or research for saying that - just that the US is quite big with a lot of spread out houses and towns)
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@George-K said in FCC Chairman - another Czar-fail:
Accordion to ChatGPT, 7% of US households do not have broadband.
I would have thought it would be higher than that.
(No facts or research for saying that - just that the US is quite big with a lot of spread out houses and towns)
@taiwan_girl said in FCC Chairman - another Czar-fail:
(No facts or research for saying that - just that the US is quite big with a lot of spread out houses and towns)
If only there were a solution for that...
"Now look here, you Baltic gas passer... " - Mik, 6/14/08
The saying, "Lite is just one damn thing after another," is a gross understatement. The damn things overlap.
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I don't think that StarLink has enough capacity. At least right now, I do not think it is the answer.
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I don't think that StarLink has enough capacity. At least right now, I do not think it is the answer.
@taiwan_girl said in FCC Chairman - another Czar-fail:
don't think that StarLink has enough capacity.
Possible.
Yet they offer internet access to countries like Brazil and others.
I would guess that adding 9 million accounts would be not that big of a deal. Especially in the US.
As an aside, when we had the Cheddarshack
, we only had dialup for a while. DSL was amazing (for the time. At the time, I looked at Hughes satellite internet connectivity. There were a couple of big problems.First of all was cost - iirc, it was a couple of hundred a month, back in the late 1990s.
Secondly was latency. Hughes uses (used?) geostationary satellites. These are 23000 miles up. So, for you to click on a link, your signal would travel 23000 miles up, it would be acknowledged with another 23K miles. Then, the satellite would send a signal 23K miles down to the website, which would travel 23K miles back to the satellite. Then...
Well you get the picture. I just cited about 100,000 miles of signal travel. At the speed of light that's about half a second. Add all the other "cruft" of data, and you're looking at significant delays in loading web pages. Remember, I just calculated a simple "ping" for a signal. Add all the other data that's required, and it's slow, slow, slow.
SpaceX satellites are much lower - so that's not as much of an issue.
Regardless, the government has spent about $4000 per household for internet access and has connected not a single one. Not one.
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@taiwan_girl said in FCC Chairman - another Czar-fail:
don't think that StarLink has enough capacity.
Possible.
Yet they offer internet access to countries like Brazil and others.
I would guess that adding 9 million accounts would be not that big of a deal. Especially in the US.
As an aside, when we had the Cheddarshack
, we only had dialup for a while. DSL was amazing (for the time. At the time, I looked at Hughes satellite internet connectivity. There were a couple of big problems.First of all was cost - iirc, it was a couple of hundred a month, back in the late 1990s.
Secondly was latency. Hughes uses (used?) geostationary satellites. These are 23000 miles up. So, for you to click on a link, your signal would travel 23000 miles up, it would be acknowledged with another 23K miles. Then, the satellite would send a signal 23K miles down to the website, which would travel 23K miles back to the satellite. Then...
Well you get the picture. I just cited about 100,000 miles of signal travel. At the speed of light that's about half a second. Add all the other "cruft" of data, and you're looking at significant delays in loading web pages. Remember, I just calculated a simple "ping" for a signal. Add all the other data that's required, and it's slow, slow, slow.
SpaceX satellites are much lower - so that's not as much of an issue.
Regardless, the government has spent about $4000 per household for internet access and has connected not a single one. Not one.
@George-K said in FCC Chairman - another Czar-fail:
Possible.
Yet they offer internet access to countries like Brazil and others.
I think they have something like 2.5MM people around the world, and I think that 50-60% are in the US (so about 1.5MM). I think that part of the problem is that the satellites have to be positioned above the country they are used. So, adding more satellites above Brazil does not help the US.
But, your point is interesting (and a sad comment about efficiency) about not connecting anyone.
Has the money been spent or just allocated? If it has been spent, where does it go to?
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I was listening to a story on this recently. That last mile business is the problem. It is mind numbingly expensive to bring cable that last mile. If I remember correctly, bringing fiber optic cable out to rural areas can run $15,000 to over $40,000 per mile. Another issue I vaguely remember was some pushback from industry who likes to not have competition from government entities - subsidies are accepted - thank you! And lastly, there's the old politics thing - that if political party A wishes to give everyone magic beans, party B will do everything possible to oppose that.
Kind of like -- want high speed trains?? Move to China.
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I was listening to a story on this recently. That last mile business is the problem. It is mind numbingly expensive to bring cable that last mile. If I remember correctly, bringing fiber optic cable out to rural areas can run $15,000 to over $40,000 per mile. Another issue I vaguely remember was some pushback from industry who likes to not have competition from government entities - subsidies are accepted - thank you! And lastly, there's the old politics thing - that if political party A wishes to give everyone magic beans, party B will do everything possible to oppose that.
Kind of like -- want high speed trains?? Move to China.
@kluurs said in FCC Chairman - another Czar-fail:
If I remember correctly, bringing fiber optic cable out to rural areas can run $15,000 to over $40,000 per mile.
Wow, I don't doubt it, But I'm surprised at how big it is.
some pushback from industry who likes to not have competition from government entities
Heh. Ya think?
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@taiwan_girl said in FCC Chairman - another Czar-fail:
(No facts or research for saying that - just that the US is quite big with a lot of spread out houses and towns)
If only there were a solution for that...
@George-K said in FCC Chairman - another Czar-fail:
If only there were a solution for that...
Having a technological solution is one thing.
Having a scalable solution is another.
Having an affordable solution is yet another.
Having a quickly implementable solution is another still.We have more technological solutions for building walls than we do for connecting people to broadband. And you saw what happened to the last administration's aspiration to build a wall.
Last I looked, the FCC just came up with accountability and reporting rules about using the funds for expanding rural broadband access, and that was around the middle of this year. Give it another year and you'll see reports rolling in that tell you where, how much, and on what the money is spent.
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@George-K said in FCC Chairman - another Czar-fail:
If only there were a solution for that...
Having a technological solution is one thing.
Having a scalable solution is another.
Having an affordable solution is yet another.
Having a quickly implementable solution is another still.We have more technological solutions for building walls than we do for connecting people to broadband. And you saw what happened to the last administration's aspiration to build a wall.
Last I looked, the FCC just came up with accountability and reporting rules about using the funds for expanding rural broadband access, and that was around the middle of this year. Give it another year and you'll see reports rolling in that tell you where, how much, and on what the money is spent.
@Axtremus said in FCC Chairman - another Czar-fail:
Having a technological solution is one thing.
Starlink exists
Having a scalable solution is another.
It covers the entire United States
Having an affordable solution is yet another.
It's about $400 to install (see above)
Having a quickly implementable solution is another still.
UPS/FEDEX etc can usually deliver in a matter of days.
We have more technological solutions for building walls than we do for connecting people to broadband. And you saw what happened to the last administration's aspiration to build a wall.
Not for lack of technology. Perhaps you can let the Lithuanians, Israelis, Indians, Saudis, Hungarians, Spaniards, Norwegians, Koreans, and Greeks know that building walls is a futile adventure.
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You know, we keep talking about Starlink. We're forgetting cell towers and cell phones, which cover a huge swath of the rural U.S.
What about 5G on the rural route?
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You know, we keep talking about Starlink. We're forgetting cell towers and cell phones, which cover a huge swath of the rural U.S.
What about 5G on the rural route?
@Jolly said in FCC Chairman - another Czar-fail:
What about 5G on the rural route?
As of 4 years ago, any cellular connectivity in the far reaches of the plains was non-existent. Montana, in particular was horrible. I doubt it's much better now.
Long stretches of northern North Dakota where's there's nothing as well.
5G is great, if you can get it. In my house, right now, I have 2 out 4 bars. I'm 0.57 mile from a tower, and my condo faces the tower. If you want speed, 5G is your answer. If you want distance, 4G LTE is the solution.
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Ok, real world 100Mbps speed for 4G. Doesn't that meet broadband definition?
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@Jolly said in FCC Chairman - another Czar-fail:
Ok, real world 100Mbps speed for 4G. Doesn't that meet broadband definition?
How far can 4G reach with internet?
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@Jolly said in FCC Chairman - another Czar-fail:
Ok, real world 100Mbps speed for 4G. Doesn't that meet broadband definition?
How far can 4G reach with internet?
@Jolly said in FCC Chairman - another Czar-fail:
@Jolly said in FCC Chairman - another Czar-fail:
Ok, real world 100Mbps speed for 4G. Doesn't that meet broadband definition?
How far can 4G reach with internet?
Let's ask AI:
The range of a 4G LTE signal depends on several factors, such as the environment, network configuration, and cell tower infrastructure. Typically:
Urban areas: The signal range is usually between 2 to 5 miles (3 to 8 kilometers) due to obstructions like buildings and other interference.
- Rural areas: The signal range can extend up to 10 to 15 miles (16 to 24 kilometers) due to fewer obstructions, although it varies based on terrain.
- However, obstacles like mountains, tall buildings, and dense forests can significantly reduce this range.
The range of 5G signals depends on the specific frequency band being used. There are three main types of 5G bands, and each has a different range:
- Low-band 5G (below 1 GHz):
Similar to 4G LTE in range, low-band 5G can reach up to 10 miles (16 km) or more. However, it offers only slightly faster speeds than 4G. - Mid-band 5G (1–6 GHz):
Mid-band 5G can cover distances of 1 to 5 miles (2 to 8 km). It provides a good balance between speed and range, offering significantly faster speeds than low-band but with reduced range. - High-band 5G (millimeter wave or mmWave, 24–100 GHz):
mmWave 5G has the shortest range, typically around 1,000 feet (300 meters) or less. It delivers extremely high speeds but is easily blocked by obstacles like walls and trees.
In practical deployment, a combination of these bands is used to balance speed and coverage.
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Some thoughts...
Broadband availability does a lot for rural folks, opening up remote learning and work opportunities. But as George pointed out, the no-signal spots range from small pockets to huge swaths of territory.
So maybe we need a different approach.
- Close up fiber optic dead zones where possible.
- Next, close up 4G dead zones.
- Satellite internet of some flavor for the big empties.
