Washington Post takes a look at the slow rollout of broadband in the rural America. It is a story you may have read many times before, but Alicia Stahl, who lives on a farm in Hughesville puts it best: “It just drives you absolutely crazy… That’s the main problem today in rural America: getting high-speed Internet access.” WP sums up, Thousands of people on the exurban periphery of the Washington region — just an hour away from the nation’s capital and one of the country’s hottest technology centers — have Internet access so slow that it is often nonfunctional. via
I feel the pain. I live in a rural area about 5 miles from a town of 5000 people. The town does have cable and dsl net access, but I see no hope for me or any of the farms that surround me getting broadband access.
I currently pay around $150/month for dual-channel ISDN access which equates to 128kbits/sec up and down…
One day I’ll learn to finish my thinking before I submit my comments….
Anyways, It’s hard to get any sort of community backing for rural broadband-ification projects because of the fact that if Farmer Joe doesn’t have broadband it’s going to be hard to convince him what it will do for him.
i think that is going to be an issue for everyone. if that town where you live in is close enough, you can set up your own direction wifi system – beaming broadband from the town to your home?
The problem with wi-fi links in my area of the country (60 miles south of St. Louis), is the terrain is just hilly and “treey” enough that even when placing access points on hills, you don’t get a lot of coverage.
A 5-miles WiFi link should normally be no problem, but after doing a GPS-assisted survey I’d need about 5 repeater points between me and somwhere in town because of the lack of line-of-sight.
oh… you are in a bit of a pickle then ..
What is to stop us from having Congress tack on legislation to the Universal Access Fund laws to also ensure a minimum level of broadband is deployed to the far edge as well?
You know i would gladly pay 25 cents a month if they can make that happen – broadband for every one. every single home in the country. not sure if there are others who would.