Getting Internet to Your Business in the Boondocks - 11/14/2006

Rural Broadband - The realities and tricks of getting your business connected to the internet outside of major cities.

Getting Internet to Your Business in the Boondocks - 11/09/2006

Information Week just published an article that covers a lot of these issues and options. Along with the analysis of current options, they provide their opinions of the future. http://www.informationweek.com/shared/printableArticle.jhtml?articleID=193600375 - Daniel

Getting Internet to Your Business in the Boondocks - 10/31/2006

Shara, Thanks for spotting that! I missed it. I'm truly honored to be on any blog or blog entry related to Om Malik and Jackson West. - Daniel

Getting Internet to Your Business in the Boondocks - 10/26/2006

PS... No I do *not* think everywhere will eventually be covered by the incumbent telephone, cable, etc. companies. They are all beholden to their investors and investors aren't into extra long term investments and or charity. I believe the rural areas will eventually be wired (or unwired) by cooperatives and municipalities just like our country's electric cooperatives wired rural America for power. - Daniel

Getting Internet to Your Business in the Boondocks - 10/26/2006

Scott, It's a tough call. The costs of providing service in non-dense rural areas can be quit high. Most folks don't want to overcharge their customers... so that limits profit potential in many circumstances. The best implementations I have personally seen run as non-profits or not-for-profit/break even cooperatives. The big "if" items in the equation are: 1) Cost of the T1 or other bandwidth back-haul, 2) Whether you have easy line of sight to everyone you want to serve or if instead you need to build a tall antenna, and 3) the willingness of customers to actually pay for the service. I recommend anyone contemplating starting a rural wireless ISP or cooperative do the math on the situation very carefully. It's easy to come out upside down. - Daniel

Getting Internet to Your Business in the Boondocks - 10/23/2006

Shara, in a developing country, yes the idea is the same, however, the implementation may differ due to the fact that land based connections to the internet backbone are often not available. In many developing countries the only access method that is readily available is satellite. The biggest issue there is cost and speed. The cost is very high and the speed pretty low unless you spend big money. When there are land based options available, they are generally provided by an incumbent monopoly telephone company and the service may not perform well or may be priced outside of the range a small start-up could afford. Also of note, outside the US, what we call a T1 is known as an E1 or "leased line". They have a slightly different connection format than US T1s but perform the same function. - Daniel