Deborah Collier

When he signed the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA) or stimulus, President Obama promised that the $862 billion expenditure of taxpayer dollars would provide jobs and improve the economy. Everyone has heard about the “shovel-ready jobs,” and seen signs along the highway touting the use of ARRA funds for improvements, but beyond roadwork loans to failing solar companies like Solyndra, there were many other outlets for stimulus funds.

An op-ed by Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Chairman Julius Genachowski was published on September 16, 2012 in TechCrunch.com, explaining why additional spectrum is so critical to the economy. Highlighting the job creation impact of improved mobile broadband capabilities in the U.S., and citing the growing “apps economy,” which alone has created nearly 500,000 jobs, Chairman Genachowski estimated that nearly 1.6 million U.S. jobs have been created over the past five years due to innovations in mobile technology.

On August 21, 2012, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) issued its eighth annual report on advanced communications capability in America, pursuant to section 706 of the Telecommunications Act of 1996. Using the information in this report, the FCC concluded that despite continued investments by the private sector, as well as grants and funding from the universal service fund (USF), there are still 19 million Americans living in 7 million households without fixed broadband capabilities. While that means 95 percent of Americans now have access to broadband, the FCC has determined that “implementation work is far from complete.”

Even as the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia has yet to weigh in on the Verizon case against the Federal Communications Commission’s (FCCs) net neutrality 2010 Report and Order on Preserving the Open Internet (FCC 10-210), proponents are beginning to formulate the next round of debate on the issue. On April 26, 2012, Susan Crawford, a former advisor to the Obama transition team, wrote a commentary for Wired on what she termed the “cable-ization” of the Internet. In her article, Ms. Crawford likened the cable industry to an airline employee who refused to let her take her viola on an airplane, stating that, like this airline employee, the cable industry acts as a “gate keeping” monopoly that refuses to provide users with access to the full extent of broadband Internet capabilities under all circumstances.

As government agencies at all levels continue to face tremendous pressure to do more with less, the use of cloud computing tools to reduce the cost of information technology (IT) infrastructure is particularly enticing as an opportunity to save taxpayer dollars. Cloud computing products can be an effective tool to reduce the total cost of […]

As the use of online services increases, reports about the tracking and monitoring of consumers’ online use by government and corporations are on the rise.

The Lifeline program is part of the Universal Service Fund’s (USF) low-income support services, providing subsidized telephone services to low-income households. The low-income support program also includes the Link-Up program, which provides a discount off the initial installation fee for one traditional, wire line telephone service at a primary residence, or the activation fee for one wireless telephone. The Link-Up program also allows subscribers to pay the remaining amount they owe for their connection on a deferred schedule, interest-free.