A significant percentage of American consumers have no wired broadband connection at home, relying instead on smartphones to connect to the Internet. If the trend continues, it heralds a substantial near-term change in Internet access patterns.

John Horrigan, a vice president at the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, says an estimated 7 percent of U.S. consumers already are dependent on smartphones for Internet access.

That number may not sound high, but if the growth at all parallels the shift from landline voice service to cellphones across American households, the access market could be on the cusp of radical change.

A report published by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services in December found that more than one-third of households were cellphone-only for voice service as of the first half of 2012, the latest period for which data are available.

Read more at SmartPlanet.

The Federal Communications Commission's Federal-State Joint Conference on Advanced Services, with the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA), held a Summit on February 7, 2013 to identify and discuss best practices learned from broadband adoption programs and academic studies/surveys, and how implementation of these best practices can close the broadband adoption gap among Americans – particularly low-income households, racial and ethnic minorities, seniors, rural residents, residents of Tribal lands and people with disabilities.

Vice President and Media and Technology Institute Director Dr. John Horrigan participated in the first of four panels at this event, entitled What Have We Learned from Academic Studies on How to Close the Broadband Adoption Gap. Dr. Horrigan discussed the four major lessons learned since the release of the National Broadband Plan.

Photos from this event can be found on the FCC Flickr stream.

As a prelude to the February 7, 2013, FCC/NTIA summit, Vice President and Media and Technology Institute Director Dr. John Horrigan has released a statement on broadband adoption knowledge since the release of the National Broadband Plan.

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In September 2009, the FCC’s Broadband Task Force, appointed by Chairman Genachowski and run by Blair Levin, made a lengthy presentation before the Commission to give an interim report on how development of the National Broadband Plan (NBP) was going. You can see all 168 slides here. I was privileged to be part of the FCC’s team that assembled the NBP. To prepare for my participation in the FCC’s February 2013 Broadband Summit, I went back and looked at the 2009 presentation which, at the time, represented the received wisdom about the state of broadband adoption. Below I discuss four lessons learned in light of what we thought we knew in 2009 and what we know today.

To summarize, we learned that:

1. The previous decade’s fast growth rates in broadband adoption was not sustainable into this decade;
2. Barriers to adoption are more complex than we thought;
3. The non-adoption problem is solvable. The research showed that non-adopters aren’t a hopeless group of (mostly old) people who dislike technology. The right kinds of programs can lure people to broadband;
4. Smartphones help close adoption gaps, but have limits as standalone access devices and are mostly used to add to users’ access means, not as a substitute for wireline.

The future challenge is how to sustain progress. To do that, I recommend:

• Developing a “best practice” tool-kit on broadband planning to help states and localities better engage with stakeholders to improve their broadband environment, and;
• Using reform of the Lifeline/Link-Up program to direct a portion of Lifeline funds to state and local planning and program activities to support broadband.

That is, the existing Lifeline model, which essentially is a “carrier to consumer” flow of funds, should be amended so it is a “community to consumer” model. Doing this will require legislative action.

Read the entire statement by clicking the icon below.

Craig Settles of Gigabit Nation interviews Vice President and MTI Director Dr. John Horrigan on the TechNet State-by-State Broadband Index, a report that ranks states in broadband adoption, network quality, and broadband-driven economic outcomes.

This video can be viewed at Gigabit Nation.

The Joint Center is pleased to see AT&T committing to significant new investments to improve the broadband ecosystem in the United States. The investment in building out the company's spectrum assets should help all Americans, especially African Americans, Hispanics, and other minorities that are such heavy users of Smartphones and other wireless devices. AT&T's announcement also sets off a much-needed dialogue on how the regulatory environment must evolve as telecommunications networks transition to an Internet Protocol environment. The Joint Center looks forward to working with all stakeholders to make sure this transition proceeds quickly and takes into account the needs of African Americans, Hispanics, and other people of color in the United States.

Download this press release by clicking the link below.
 

Although it has been in its new office location for nearly three weeks, The Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies continued with old business Monday afternoon with its “Broadband, the Economy, and Driving Adoption” panel discussion.

In collaboration with Comcast, the Joint Center’s event gathered a panel of broadband data experts and pragmatists to identify the factors impeding high broadband adoption rates in low adopting communities, share real-world examples of the effects of broadband in low-income and minority communities, as well as lessons learned in convincing the aforementioned communities to adopt broadband.

Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Chairman Julius Genachowski delivered remarks prior to the main discussion and emphasized the increase in prevalence of broadband across the country.

Read more at Politic365.

The Joint Center and Comcast Corporation held a Technology Policy Forum entitled Broadband, the Economy, and Driving Adoption on September 24, 2012.

In recent years, there have been two developments in technology adoption that are in tension with one another. On the one hand, home broadband adoption has increased only modestly since 2009. On the other, there has been a very rapid increase the adoption of Smartphones. This development presents questions for policymakers and stakeholders interested in the digital divide, namely: Does the leveling off of home broadband adoption and accompanying growth in Smartphone adoption represent a substitution effect? That is, are those without broadband at home simply turning to Smartphones instead and, if so, how does their Internet use relate to that of broadband users? Understanding the answers to these questions will be important to policymakers and those in the private sector interested in closing technology access gaps. To address the questions, this paper will rely on data drawn from a statewide telephone survey of Illinois residents fielded in February-March of 2012. The survey explored in detail how people get online (e.g., home broadband, tablets, Smartphones), what online activities they do (e.g., information searches, shopping, educational uses), and how they view the usefulness of different access means for carrying out tasks online.

FCC chairman Julius Genachowski praised Comcast Sept. 24 for a program that provided low-income Americans with discounted broadband service.

The program, Internet Essentials, originally targeted 2 million families that qualify for the free school lunch program to receive broadband service for $9.95 per month, $150 personal computers and digital literacy training. Early this year, Comcast expanded the program to 300,000 additional families that receive reduced price school lunches and doubled the speed of broadband service offered. Since launching the program in 2011, 400,000 families have taken advantage of Internet Essentials.

“I commend Comcast for stepping up its original commitment,” said Genachowski.

In remarks given at the Comcast Internet Essentials Event, Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, in Washington, D.C., the chairman said it is important for eligible families to sign up for programs like Internet Essentials because being online “is essential to full participation in our 21st century economy.”

Read more at Broadcast Engineering.