A newly released “Chairman’s Draft Broadband Progress Report” from Tom Wheeler of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is being shared with commission members ahead of a meeting on Jan. 28.
But why should you care about the FCC and broadband progress?
With publishing’s current emphasis on digital and mobile distribution, the relevance for authors isn’t unlike that of assessments of literacy levels in the population. If consumers can’t access your work, they can’t buy or read it. And Wheeler’s report delivers the main message that “advanced telecommunications capability is not being deployed in a reasonable and timely fashion to all Americans.”
Here are a few particulars, quoting the FCC. Note especially the figures for schools, where, of course, a life of reading normally is cultivated:
- Approximately 34 million Americans still lack access to fixed broadband at the FCC’s benchmark speed of 25 Mbps for downloads, 3 Mbps for uploads
- A persistent urban-rural digital divide has left 39 percent of the rural population without access to fixed broadband
- By comparison, only 4 percent living in urban areas lack access
- 10 percent lack access nationwide
- 41 percent of Tribal Lands residents lack access
- 41 percent of schools have not met the Commission’s short-term goal of 100 Mbps per 1,000 students/staff
- These schools educate 47 percent of the nation’s students
- Only 9 percent of schools have fiber connections capable of meeting the FCC’s long-term goal of 1 Gbps per 1,000 students
- Internationally, the U.S. continues to lag behind a number of other developed nations, ranking 16th out of 34 countries
The report indicates the FCC is placing special emphasis on the importance of both “fixed and mobile broadband”—the first handles high-speed (i.e. streaming) uses, while the second is for moving around and two-way interactions. With no current mobile speed benchmark, however, the report doesn’t have an assessment of progress in mobile broadband.
Bottom line: With about half the developed nations ranking ahead of it, the U.S. isn’t where it needs to be in terms of broadband access. Almost half of the country’s students are in schools without what the FCC considers adequate. We’ll be keeping an eye on new reports. On page two of the current report, you’ll find an interesting chart showing the falling percentages of Americans who lack access to fixed broadband since 2012.
Jane Friedman has spent her entire career working in the publishing industry, with a focus on business reporting and author education. Established in 2015, her newsletter The Bottom Line provides nuanced market intelligence to thousands of authors and industry professionals; in 2023, she was named Publishing Commentator of the Year by Digital Book World.
Jane’s expertise regularly features in major media outlets such as The New York Times, The Atlantic, NPR, The Today Show, Wired, The Guardian, Fox News, and BBC. Her book, The Business of Being a Writer, Second Edition (The University of Chicago Press), is used as a classroom text by many writing and publishing degree programs. She reaches thousands through speaking engagements and workshops at diverse venues worldwide, including NYU’s Advanced Publishing Institute, Frankfurt Book Fair, and numerous MFA programs.
