White House: Here's $795M For Broadband; Congress: Wait, We Want $602M Of That For War
from the broadband-or-guns? dept
There's been plenty of coverage of the White House's announcement today that it's handing out $795 million in grants and loans to help establish broadband access in underserved parts of the country (mostly rural areas where it's been expensive to build infrastructure). I'm still not convinced this program is actually needed, but it's popular politically. However, as Broadband Reports notes, at the very same time the White House was talking up the importance of broadband investment, House Appropriations Chair David Obey was proposing an amendment to shift $602 million in broadband funding to paying for the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Obey apparently feels that broadband is an area "that no longer require[s] funding" and has "sufficient funds on hand."
Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
Reader Comments
Subscribe: RSS
View by: Time | Thread
Sigh
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Sigh
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Sigh
Just a great way to do business and a great way to have pride in your government.
I am sick of the Government !!! I love our Country !!!
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
JNOMICS
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
America was broke 4 years ago...since i don't believe the Fed government includes non-money and income-related assets in the budget, we've been broke since like 2002....
If you dont think 'America is literally going broke', why do you call $10 trillion deficit in the near future and over $50 trillion of unfunded liabilities in entitlement programs?
We don't need a "broadband stimulus package" and we dont need more government/FCC oversight of our network infrastructures unless it poses a risk to national security.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
The spread of broadband across this country has created untold jobs and brought new technologies and services to life that no one could even imagine 10 years ago with more progress to come as more people sign on and the broadband speeds increase.
The more people who have a chance to get their voices heard and their ideas off the ground the better off this country will be in the long run. The internet is where innovation happens, Afghanistan is where empires die.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
I have a few ideas that might help.
Perhaps wireless routers should have built in GPS capabilities and they can broadcast their location as part of their identification information (like how an IP address identifies routers and computers) to other wireless routers so that routers can better coordinate packet pathways. A public key perhaps could also be used to help identify routers, perhaps a combination of location + public key. This can help direct traffic in the right direction.
and to limit the packet overhead necessary to avoid packet collision perhaps routers should be allowed to distribute information to each other across different non overlapping channels.
So lets say that computer "a" wants to send a packet to computer "e" and computer a is behind wireless access point A and computer e is behind wireless access point E. Below, capital letters are wireless access points and lowercase letters are computers. a is wired to A, e is wired to E: A, B, C, D, and E all communicate with one another wirelessly and these routers are configured in a straight line (an oversimplification).
a - A - B - C - D - E - e
a forwards a packet to A which forwards it to B using frequency x. B forwards the same packet to C using frequency y. C forwards it to D using frequency z. D sends the packet to E using frequency x again. E sends the packet to e. Then the same packet - frequency configurations are used in reverse. e responds. It sends a packet to E. E sends the packet to D using frequency x. D sends the packet to C using frequency z. C sends the packet to B using frequency y. etc...
Frequencies x and z are far apart from each other so they don't collide. This method avoids collisions as much as possible and reduces the need for the overhead required to administer packet avoidance.
Of course this is an overly simplified model and in reality you will probably need at least 6 non overlapping channels for this to work efficiently. But still, I think it's a good idea and communicating via non overlapping channels can also introduce better non overlapping routing capabilities among wireless routers.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
In the above depiction, router A can communicate with laptops using non overlapping channel f, B can communicate with them using non overlapping channel g, C can use f again, D can use g again, etc... Again, probably a minimum of 3 non overlapping channels among laptops would be necessary to make this efficient.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
With all due respect, guys...
Could we not reinvent it here?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
-Make broadband, not war.-
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
great, here we go again
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
Corporation can be bad, but they do sometimes perform vital functions. Unlike killing thousands of Iraqi civilians because Bush didn't like their leader.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Remember this kids!
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
my plan for this money
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
I have FiOS and applaud them for me insanely solid and quick service but other companies will continue stretching out what they have WHILE charging more and lying about how upgraded their service is
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Contact your representative via email. it's easy.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Nation Building
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
i know
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Let me guess...
This Obey person already has access to broadband right?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]