This post is guest blogged by Alex Kellner, a former IPDI Research Assistant. Speedmatters.org is a client of Blue State Digital, where Alex is currently employed.

Wondering how your Internet speed compares to other people in your town? State? Or the rest of the country?

Well, a new report published by speedmatters.org, a project of the Communication Workers of America, can answer that question for you. The second annual report, shows that the United States has a long way to go to catch up with the rest of the world when it comes to Internet download speeds.

The average U.S. Internet speed was 2.3 megabits per second (mbps), an increase of only 0.4 mbps from last year’s average speed. In comparison, Japan’s average speed is estimated at 63 mbps. Our fastest state - Rhode Island with a 6.8 mbps average - is still slower than the average speed in Canada (7.6 mbps).

CWA President Larry Cohen explains why America’s lagging speeds represent a major concern for our place in the global economy:

“This isn’t about how fast someone can download a full-length movie. Speed matters to our economy and our ability to remain competitive in a global marketplace. Rural development, telemedicine and distance learning all rely on truly high-speed, universal networks.”

This report is more evidence for the necessity of a national broadband policy. The fact that the United States is ranked 15th in Internet connection speeds despite being the country that invented the Internet is unforgivable.

Last week when Charles Ellison (an IPDI Fellow this year) blogged

In examining the intersection of technology, public policy and politics, I’ve thought, or perhaps, worried a bit about how that links into our national imagination and sense of purpose.  Does the proliferation of information technology actually contribute in fulfilling and long term ways to the common good?

He managed to strike at an issue I’ve been grappling with, mostly in private conversations, for the last few months.

For the past six years (and mostly during the early part of the past six years), the Internet-politics world seemed to embrace a common theme: the present, with the rise of citizen journalism and individual access to information on the Internet, is much like the rise of the printing press during the 15^th Century, during an era in which religion wove deeply into the daily lives, government, war-making, and commerce. Just as the printing press gave people access for the first time to the religious writings that were previously interpreted for them by the church, so the people of the 21^st century can access – and participate in – the flow of information about politics, current events, international relations, sports, and thousands of other issues. As many people in Europe turned away from the intermediary between humanity and the divine that was the Catholic Church, so people in the 21^st century will turn away from the intermediaries of mainstream journalism, the political establishment, and even the travel industry.

There was so much promise in this metaphor. The printing press started something. The era following its creation and the rise of what we now call Enlightenment thought carried with it so much activity, energy, invention, curiosity – all directed toward finding, building collecting, and, to some degree, improving society. The era we now call the Enlightenment wasn’t perfect. I’m certainly not trying to idealize it (although I am a tremendous fan of the System of the World), nor defend some of its negative consequences.

At the same time, I envy it.

I envy all the activity and energy, the invention, the focus on human potential to create a better government, city, way of viewing the world. I feel somewhat suffocated by the lack of creation in the name of the public good.

What does all the “stuff” we embrace – social media, twitter, widgets, online fundraising – actually do for society?

People build online communities and sites and sell them to the highest bidder. Beyond the sheer giddiness that must inevitably follow after becoming an insta-billionaire, what legacy does any of the things leave on society?

Perhaps the legacy is one of “access?” Greater access for the greater good? If this is the case, then we are certainly failing. Broadband penetration in some of the poorest, most rural parts of the country remains low. If access is our goal, then we are doing a terrible job of it.

Or is the legacy one of success for the few, but not the many? A few weeks ago, I saw a (somewhat) old program on PBS called Buffett & Gates Go Back to School. Warren Buffett and Bill Gates hold an open question-and-answer session for students at the University of Nebraska. One of the students asks Buffett what public good comes from companies like theirs. Buffet turns to Gates, then turns back to the student, and answers that the public good from their companies and the things they create mostly comes from their ability to give money philanthropically as private individuals.

Perhaps I am interpreting Buffett incorrectly, but is the only public good from the Internet boom meant to be the private philanthropic endeavors of its golden heroes – the pet projects they get to pick and choose?

How can we invest more money in building the kind of country that uses all the marvelous gadgets, widgets, social tools, and broadband access to continue the tradition of innovation and invention – not just to make a few billion bucks but to solve local problems and engage the citizens and residents of this country in new ways?

What kind of environment must we create to encourage the current and future generations of Americans to use technology for the greater good? More investments in education? Better rewards for applying technological skills and aptitude in the public arena? Leadership that values and fosters the entrepreneurial spirit?

I loathe to think that all of the potential good of our era (and its technological advances) devolves into frivolity or meaninglessness. Or perhaps we must wait a few more centuries to see this greater good?

A final note: If you have stories that conflict with my doom and gloom, then please send them my way. I’m desperate to collect them.

“The Long Game” is the title of the third episode of the new Doctor Who Series 1. In that episode, the Ninth Doctor, his assistant, Rose, and some random guy arrive on a space station floating somewhere above the earth. It’s centuries in the future, and the earth is experiencing a new golden age, thanks largely to the space station.

This satellite, floating somewhere in the sky, is much like Google: all of the world’s information is stored and sorted and rebroadcast on thousands of channels back down to the earth. Desktop computers are somewhat obsolete, since the “reporters” on board the satellite have the most interesting gadgets that open up their foreheads and send a steady stream of information directly into their brains.

This is my favorite episode. But what happens when nefarious forces start to control the information? If all of the world’s information is sorted and stored and rebroadcast from one entity, what happens when some kind of intergalactic bad guy decides to control the flow of information?

Questions like these are precisely why I kept my mouth shut today during New American Foundation’s event, Google UnWired, with Larry Page (co-founder of Google and President, Products) and Michael Calabrese (Director of the Wireless Future Program at New America Foundation).

Page was in DC to talk about broadband access, which he described as a human right. It’s also an issue that we have started to investigate, and one on which we have held discussions in the past. This event looked at what Calabrese described as pervasive connectivity: wireless access anytime, from anywhere, through ubiquitous networks.

Page read his read a few notes off his Blackberry before looking up at the room:

It doesn’t make sense to have Google if you don’t use it.

According to Page, Americans use only 3-5% of the total spectrum at any given time. “Spectrum’s not like water in the sense that by not using it, you’re not storing it up somewhere for future use,” he said.

There are philanthropic reasons to improve access. Page described a recent trip to Uganda, when he visited students in a trigonometry class. When he asked them if they used mobile phones, a third of their hands went up. But when he asked them how many used the Internet, the translator couldn’t even think of a word for it. They had no word for Internet.

Or, for example, the opportunity to build something distributed and decentralized to store information. Page discussed the state of phone records after Hurricane Katrina that were centralized and underwater on somebody’s ruined desktop computer. Distributed networks, by comparison, are more resilient.

There are benefits for consumers and business, including what Page described as Wi-Fi on steroids with greater range, increased speed, and open innovation.

And then there are selfish reasons to improve access. Increasing access means more people using Google.

Organizing the world’s information is a big task, but if no one is providing access, then we will step up and do it because it doesn’t make sense to organize information without access.

And this is what made me think of Dr. Who, the satellite, and organizing all of the world’s information. What’s worse than living in a world in which all the information is controlled by some alien with a hateful streak? Living in a country that is quite possibly slipping backwards in time. In recent years, the United States fell from 3rd to 15th place in the OECD’s broadband rankings.

The U.S. is eclipsed by the UK now in terms of business, and that’s probably because of broadband. They are doing a better job. No where else in the US (outside of major cities like DC) can you get a 100MB connection. Our own employees only have 1MB service. Our employees can’t build 100MB services if they only have a 1MB connection.

And it’s not just a matter of increased access. It’s also a matter of openness

We feel strongly about openness because we lived in a closed world and we didn’t like it very much as computer scientists.

What’s holding them back? Not the technology. Rather, Page suggests that regulatory issues are mostly to blame.

We can get more done by thinking about how we want to regulate it. (Page offered several solutions. You can watch them all on the event page.)

And more people will lobby to change regulation once we start purchasing better devices.

Remember the “random guy” who landed on the satellite with the Doctor and Rose? He got a better device. He had a gadget implanted in his forehead. A click of the fingers opened his mind and allowed all of the information in the world to flow in. Imagine coming back to the present day and having your brain fly open every time some clicks her fingers.

It’s 2008. We call this the digital era. Yet, in the United States we seem to lack political leaders with a vision for technology, much less an interest in the ways technology can make all levels of government services more efficient, effective, and accessible to regular voters.

Yes, indeed, the rumblings are starting to get a little louder – snuggled, as they currently are, within our niche community of tech-savvy politicos and politics-friendly techies. Is a technology transformation upon us?

For some, the transformation begins when elected officials use technology to listen. There’s a word – listening. In the middle of an election season that has seen a glut of staged conversations, online and offline. Andrew Feinberg rants about some of these so-called listening exercises today at Capitol Valley. There’s a difference between talker at voters and listening to them.

Talkers get headlines. Listeners get things done.

Like fixing potholes and handling case work, increasing the efficiency and efficacy of government programs. A year ago, IPDI published Constituent Relationship Management: The New Little Black Book of Politics, which looks how political campaigns and elected office can use online and offline feedback loops to run case management and constituent communications. Many elected officials and political candidates already use database platforms to help this process.

The next step? Government institutions that employ tech-enabled feedback loops to deliver better goods and services.

In their Politico column, Andrew Rasiej and Micah Sifry write about some of the ways in which foreign citizens and governments are using technology to listen and act, including e-petitions in the United Kingdom and the government of New Zealand’s wiki for a new Policing Act. As Rasiej and Sifry put it, you can use the Internet to file your taxes, but you can’t use it to make suggestions on how your tax dollars ought to be spent:

Imagine then, that the next time you file your taxes online, your government asks for your feedback on how those tax dollars are being spent. Or it takes your suggestions on how to make a law more understandable. Or it helps you find groups near you that are doing things that benefit your community. It may sound mundane, but today in America, it would be the equivalent of a revolution. How much longer do we have to wait to bridge yet another digital divide?

What about tech policy?

At the Information Technology & Innovation Foundation, Robert D. Atkinson writes,

we need a debate in America that focuses on the most important issues like to get fast broadband networks to all Americans; how to use IT to transform our health care system, transportation system, education system, and government; and how to encourage all organizations to become digital, thereby driving productivity and income growth and a better quality of life.

Atkinson thinks that better private-public partnerships can help create an environment of “digital transformation.”

Over at Open Left, Matt Stoller blogs about the successful efforts of blogger and member of the California Democratic Party platform committee, Dante Atkins, to get Net Neutrality in the party platform:

California Democrats, in order to promote vigorous free speech, a vibrant business community, and unfettered access to all information on the Internet, support policies to preserve an open, neutral and interconnected Internet. California Democrats strongly agree with recent rulings by the Federal Election Commission that political communications, including blogging, which take place independent of a political party, committee or candidate, receive a media exemption from campaign finance regulations. California Democrats further reaffirm their support of the right to free speech as expressed in the First Amendment, including the right to critique any elected official or comment on any and all public policy, whether during war or peace, without fear of reprisal.

 Perhaps it is time that we — voters that we are — begin to expect more from our elected officials and encourage digital leadership on our blogs as well as in our voting booths.

This post is guest blogged by Drew Clark.

Most Americans who have high-speed Internet can’t imagine life without broadband. How could you connect to the Internet of today without it? In today’s world, broadband is as basic as running water and electricity. And yet the U.S. is falling behind globally.

What can be done to Build a Broadband Strategy for America? That’s what we’ll be talking about on Tuesday, March 4, during the Keynote Luncheon at the Institute for Politics, Democracy and the Internet’s 2008 Politics Online conference. Read about the star-studded panel that I’ll be moderating. You can also read my previous blog post on why divergent parties do seem to be coalescing around a National Broadband Strategy.

As a technology reporter, I’ve been writing about the battles over broadband for nearly a decade here in Washington. There is one fact about which nearly everyone seems to be in agreement: if America wants better broadband, America need better broadband data. That’s why I’ve recently started a new venture to collect this broadband data, and to make the data available for all on the Web at BroadbandCensus.com.

Take the Broadband Census!

BroadbandCensus.com is designed to help Internet users measure and understand information about the availability, competition, speeds and prices of broadband within their areas.

When you go the BroadbandCensus.com Web site, you’ll type in your ZIP code. You’ll find out how many broadband providers the Federal Communications Commission says are available in your area. You can compare that number to your own sense of the competitive landscape. And now, with BroadbandCensus.com, you can help others understand the true state of broadband competition.

You can Take the Broadband Census by answering a short questionnaire on the site. Your answers will create linkages between a broadband provider and the ZIP codes in which they offer service. You can compare your notes about your service with the experience of other Internet users in your neighborhood.

This idea is by no means original. In recent years, more and more people have been urging the FCC to collect more detailed information about broadband – and to make more of that information publicly available.

Consider several pieces of legislation in Congress. Rep. Ed Markey, D-Mass., Chairman of the House Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet, has introduced legislation that would provide the public with better broadband information. Markey’s “Broadband Census of America Act,” H.R. 3919, has passed the House of Representatives and is now before the Senate.

In addition to providing money for state initiatives to map out broadband, the Broadband Census of America Act also calls for the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) to create publicly-available map of broadband deployment. The map would feature not only broadband availability, but “each commercial provider or public provider of broadband service capability.”

In the Senate, the current version of the farm bill, H.R. 4212, includes Illinois Democratic Sen. Richard Durbin’s “Connect the Nation Act,” S. 1190. Durbin’s bill would authorize $40 million a year, for five years, to state efforts to map out broadband inventory on the census block level. The “Broadband Data Improvement Act,” S. 1492, by Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Daniel Inouye, D-Hawaii, takes a similar approach. The goal is, in the identical language of both bills, to “identify and track the availability and adoption of broadband services within each State.”

Going Beyond Broadband Availability – to Broadband Competition, Speeds and Prices

These broadband data bills have been inspired by a growing movement in the states to map out broadband availability within their territories. This effort began with Connect Kentucky, a non-profit initiative designed to compile statistics about regional broadband deployment. In partnership with Bell companies and cable operators, Connect Kentucky identified gaps in coverage and underserved areas. Read about how the group has created a detailed map of broadband availability. It is now replicating its efforts in Ohio, Tennessee and West Virginia.

Connect Kentucky has spawned an entire movement – Connected Nation – which aims to map out broadband availability. Other groups unconnected to Connected Nation are engaged in similar mapping efforts, including the California Broadband Initiative and Massachusetts Broadband Initiative.

Knowing where broadband is and isn’t available is, indeed, the first step toward making sure that broadband truly is accessible to all Americans. But the next steps are broadband competition, broadband speeds and broadband prices. Filling out the rest of this picture is the goal of BroadbandCensus.com.

BroadbandCensus.com includes the names of the carriers offering service in each local area. Using the carrier name as a key, a consumer can rate and rank her broadband providers based on speeds and service. (We’ll be including pricing information in the future, too.) By rating their service quality, Broadband Census Takers and Broadband Census Users will be able to make true head-to-head comparisons. BroadbandCensus.com believes that meaningful information about customer service plans is an essential part of understanding broadband.

And judging by last week’s hearing of the Federal Communications Commission in Cambridge, Mass., it looks like this is principle with which everyone can agree. FCC Chairman Kevin Martin said that broadband providers needed to be transparent with their customers about the speeds, prices and terms of service at which they offer broadband. Speaking at the hearing, Professor Tim Wu (a panelist at Tuesday’s keynote discussion), Professor Christopher Yoo, and Verizon Communications Executive Vice President Tom Tauke all agreed.

Keeping Tabs on Broadband Speeds and Service Plan Information

At BroadbandCensus.com, we’re going forward with the next step: last week we launched a beta version of an Internet speed test. It is called the NDT, or the Network Diagnostic Tool. The NDT is under active development by the Internet2 community, an advanced networking consortium led by the research and education community. The NDT has been used by other broadband mapping endeavors, including the eCorridors Program at Virginia Tech, which is working to collect data of residential and small business broadband trends throughout the state of Virginia.

Additionally, the Pew Internet & American Life Project has contracted with BroadbandCensus.com to gather anonymized information about users’ broadband experiences on the web site, and to incorporate those findings into Pew’s 2008 annual broadband report. BroadbandCensus.com is made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial License. That means that the content on the site is available for all to view, copy, redistribute and reuse for free, providing that attribution is provided to BroadbandCensus.com, and that such use is done for non-commercial purposes.

But the Broadband Census will only succeed if you and I go online and Take the Broadband Census! And don’t be shy in letting me know what you think! You can e-mail me at: drew at broadbandcensus.com.

Amid all the excitement around Iowa and the upcoming New Hampshire Primaries, we want to step back, take a breath, and look at what happens when all the excitement is over and Election Day is yesterday’s headline.

In 2007, we saw (to some degree) that politicians are, in fact, interested in obscure-sounding things like “interactivity” and “online communications channels” and “technology-infused conversation” – especially when reaching people online increases fundraising dollars and votes (and who can blame them, really?).

Then what? Do we expect our elected officials to chuck their techno-powered promises of creating conversations and communicating at the podium after their acceptance speeches? What responsibilities do elected officials have to continue using technology in a democratic way? What about the issue of access?

I am inclined to think that the role of digital leadership should receive increased emphasis over the course of the next few years. How does one lead, govern, and create policy in an Internet era?

Steve Clift has a few things to say about what technology-powered politics should look like after the confetti drops:

Information access, considered the safe starting point for government accountability online now mostly presents the public a daunting needle in a huge haystack. This system is so complicated that the valuable and substantive information that government produces is often ignored in the increasingly interactive public lives of active citizens. . The lack of real and effective online access to governance will substantially increase cynicism about and distrust in government among a public that demands a more participatory representative democracy.

This quote is taken from Clift’s essay, Join the Evolution – Ten Practical Online Steps for Government Support of Democracy. Clift is coming to DC to lead a discussion we are hosting on January 9^th called Great Expectations: After the vote – citizens online, e-democracy in governance, and White House 2.0. Register by Wiki at http://pages.e-democracy.org/Great_Expectations.

We’ll continue the conversation during a plenary discussion at our 2008 Politics Online Conference, chaired by Ari Schwartz (Center for Democracy and Technology) and featuring Ellen Miller (Sunlight Foundation), Tom Steinberg (mySociety.org) and former congressman Rick White (Wood Bay Group). Details at http://polc.ipdi.org.

Not the American People It Seems.

A recent Government Accountability Office study concluded that the Federal Communication Commission and its staffers give advance warning of decisions and rulings to lobbyists so they can propose alternative solutions to benefit the industries and companies they represent. This report provides little comfort to those who believe that the FCC stands above politics and is trying to forge the best outcomes for the consumer at large.

The Center for Public Integrity has a wonderful project called “Well Connected” which tracks the relationship between lobbyists and the FCC. During the Commission’s deliberations over the 700MHz spectrum auction rules, Well Connected reports that over;

“100 companies, trade associations, and other parties (think tanks and public-interest groups, for example) had nearly 600 meetings or phone conversations with agency officials on proceedings related to the January 2008 auction —far more than any other pending matter”

CPI also reports that Rick Whitt, Google’s Chief Telecom Lobbyist (and recent IPDI Ideas Series Speaker) has had 11 meetings or phone calls with the five Commissioners of the FCC. Verizon met with the Commission or its staff 40 times while the Cellular Telecommunications & Internet Association met with them 43 times. Another group fighting for the wireless spectrum space, Frontline Wireless (whose partners include two former FCC Chairmen) received a record 70 meetings with Commission.

Of course anyone who works or lives in Washington knows lobbyists make the world go round and are very pleasant people but if the FCC is going to stay they are acting in the public’s best interests, can we cut back a bit on the lobbyist connections please…pretty please?

How far does will broadband access take you with the presidential campaigns? Not too far, according to a new report by Wireless Communications Association (WCA) – unless you live in a rural area.

A recent WCA survey points out that only six out of 17 presidential candidates have posted a broadband policy. Many candidates seem to agree that rural access, public security, and eGovernment are important broadband issues to consider, but the candidates mostly have very little to say about Net Neutrality and Internet economy.

WCA hosts a Thought Leaders Forum: U.S. Presidential Candidates Debate Broadband, a site about broadband policy and news. Particularly useful is a comparison of what the presidential candidates say about broadband (including web videos).

Last week in front of the Senate’s Small Business Committee, the two Democratic members of the Federal Communications Commission called for the creation of a national broadband strategy to help keep America competitive in the global economy.

Commissioner Michael J. Copps started he believed “broadband is this era’s bricks and mortar” for the American entrepreneur and that “greater broadband penetration would help….millions of other entrepreneurs who lack bricks and mortar stores.”

Copps did not propose however a massive new government program or regulations to achieve greater broadband access but rather a four step approach; 1) better data collection and definitions of broadband access, 2) the use of the FCC as a clearing house for experiments in broadband access from across the country, 3) change the FCC’s telecommunications
policies to make the market more competitive, and 4) commit the Universal Service Fund to be used to expand Broadband access in the U.S.

Commissioner Jonathan Adelstein echoed Coppes statements and said that the government must expand investment in broadband technologies to promote high-speed services. Commissioner Adelstein also cited the 700 MHz wireless spectrum auction taking place next year as critical to the development of a third “pipeline” of service (IPDI held a discussion on Google’s efforts to develop this spectrum space and a video of this will be available shortly on this website).

IPDI is pleased the announce the launch of the Autumn 2007 IPDI Ideas Series with our first event, 700MHz: A Discussion About the Future of Broadband Wireless Access With Google Inc.

Join IPDI and our discussants Rick Whitt, Washington Telecom and Media Counsel at Google Inc. and Professor Henry Farrell of the George Washington University as we examine issues such as:

• Is There Really a Lack Competition in the Broadband Markets?

• Will the FCC’s “Open Applications” and “Open Devices” Requirements have Any Major Impact on Broadband Access?

• Is a Third Broadband Pipeline Necessary?

• On What Basis did the FCC Accept Only Two of Google’s Four Proposed Spectrum Requirements?

• Is There A Better Way Beyond what Google is Suggesting to Ensure Greater Broadband Access?

Where do you stand in the discussion? Email the specific issues surrounding the 700MHz auction that you want our discussants to address to ipdi@ipdi.org. Let us know what your organization is doing — and blogging — about the issue, and we’ll include your work in the roundtable discussion.

Date : September 25 th , 2007 5:30pm-6:30pm

Location: The Elliott School of International Affairs Building, 1957 E Street, NW, Room 112

REGISTER NOW!