Excerpt:

Cherry Capital Connection needs your participation to complete our efforts to bring High Speed Internet Access to all households in Antrim County.

The current network neighborhoods being worked on are:

Atwood, East Jordan, Cedar, Glen Arbor, Maple City, Northport, Boyne City, Hayes Township, Mackinaw City, Cross Village, Boyne Highlands, Cheboygan and Gaylord areas

Have you called? 855-674-4159

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Antrim County to be Awarded Certification as a Connected Community

 Bellaire, MI – On Thursday, April 18, Antrim County will be certified as a “Connected” community. County representatives will release a Technology Action Plan that will include results of a months-long assessment undertaken by the Antrim County Community Engagement Team.

The Antrim County Technology Action Plan contains specific recommendations of projects to expand digital literacy, build awareness for the benefits of broadband, and assistbusinesses with websites and social media, and improving the online presence of local governments, among others. Achieving status of Connected certification affords a community an avenue to discuss its success and pursue opportunities as a recognized, technologically advanced community.

Who

• Michigan Public Service Commission (MPSC) Robin Ancona, director, Telecommunications Division
• Antrim County Community Engagement Team
• Connect Michigan

What
Connected Community certification and Technology Action Plan release

When/Where
Wednesday, April 18, 2013, 10 AM
Antrim County Building, Commission Chambers

205 East Cayuga Street
Bellaire, MI 49615

EXCERPT

Cherry Capital Connection specializes in delivering cost effective High Speed Internet to rural areas. Robust Internet is an economic enabler. Consumers can access the web, receive cost effect telephone service (VoIP), receive video content (movies) and even improve cellular phone service. Cherry Capital Connection deploys the newest 5G “fixed point wireless” and GIG fiber providing the greatest available throughput for supporting your telecommunications needs. We invite you to learn more about our network neighborhood deployment and funding model. Please visit our web site at http://cherrycapitalconnection.com.

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BARCELONA, Spain (AP) — A car that tells your insurance company how you’re driving. A bathroom scale that lets you chart your weight on the Web. And a meter that warns your air conditioner when electricity gets more expensive.

Welcome to the next phase of the wireless revolution.

The first wave of wireless was all about getting people to talk to each other on cellphones. The second will be getting things to talk to each other, with no humans in between. So-called machine-to-machine communication is getting a lot of buzz at this year’s wireless trade show. Some experts believe these connections will outgrow the traditional phone business in less than a decade.

“I see a whole set of industries, from energy to cars to health to logistics and transportation, being totally redesigned,” said Vittorio Colao, the CEO of Vodafone Group PLC, in a keynote speech at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain. The British cellphone company has vast international interests, including its 45 percent ownership stake in Verizon Wireless…

– Jack Unger – President, Ask-Wi.Com, Inc. Author (2003) – “Deploying License-Free Wireless Wide-Area Networks” Serving the WISP Community since 1993 www.ask-wi.com 760-678-5033 junger@ask-wi.com

Sources: Email from Tim Maylone, President of Cherry Capital Connection, and Manufacturing.net News

Bellaire, MI – On Wednesday, January 30, Antrim County will be certified as a “Connected” community. County representatives will release a Technology Action Plan that will include results of a months-long assessment undertaken by the Antrim County Community Engagement Team.

The Antrim County Technology Action Plan contains specific recommendations of projects to expand digital literacy, build awareness for the benefits of broadband, and assistbusinesses with websites and social media, and improving the online presence of local governments, among others. Achieving status of Connected certification affords a community an avenue to discuss its success and pursue opportunities as a recognized, technologically advanced community.

Who:

• Michigan Public Service Commission (MPSC) Chairman John D. Quackenbush
• Antrim County Community Engagement Team
• Connect Michigan

What:

Connected Community certification and Technology Action Plan release

When/Where: Wednesday, January 30, 2013, 3 PM

Antrim County Building, Commission Chambers
205 East Cayuga Street
Bellaire 

The Connected Community Engagement Program, facilitated by Connect Michigan, supports thedevelopment of a comprehensive strategy for building a “connected” community by reviewing the technology landscape, developing regional partnerships, establishing local teams, and conducting a thorough community assessment ofbroadband access, adoption, and use.

Contact: Jessica Ditto of Connected Nation at (202) 251-4749 or jditto@connectednation.org

About Connect Michigan:  As the designated entity for broadband mapping and planning in the state of Michigan, Connect Michigan is a public-private partnership between the Michigan Public Service Commission and Connected Nation to work with local governments, businesses, and citizens in the goal of increasing broadband service in the state’s underserved areas. For more information about what Connect Michigan is doing to accelerate technology in Michigan’s communities, visit www.connectmi.org.

Follow Connect Michigan on Facebook or Twitter.

Connected Nation developed theConnected Community Engagement Program to help guide a community through anassessment of its overall broadband and technology status. Connected Certified Communities have measurably demonstrated their proficiency for effective Access, Adoption, and Use of broadband supported technologies. Connected Nation through its partners provides a national platform for recognizing those communities that excel across these important benchmarks. Funded by the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA), this effort is part of the State Broadband Initiative. http://www.connectednation.org/get-connected

Date: Sun, 20 Jan 2013 09:36:16 -0500

The FCC wants gigabit (1,000 Megabit) broadband is all 50 states by 2015.     CNET

I asked Tim Maylone of Cherry Capital Connection, an Internet provider in Elk Rapids, to comment, both on availability and costs:

Availability

What is interesting is that here in Northern Michigan Cherry Capital Connection has Gigabit fiber already active in Elk Rapids, Suttons Bay, Charlevoix, Mackinaw City, Grayling, East Jordan and New Era. We can easily activate gigabit fiber in almost every major city in our service region. The road block is demand based on cost. Point to Point gigabit fiber between two communities with no services costs $5-8 per meg (1000 meg required) per month. Gigabit fiber with internet service provided costs $20-25 per meg (1000 meg required) per month. The Google fiber is working because Google is losing significant dollars on the fiber project but is writing it off. Most cannot afford to write off great losses.

So let us focus on that we can accomplish by 2014-2015. We can promote that every community has Gigabit fiber available. In some communities from multiple private companies. We can deliver 100m two way communications to most households in our communities and the surrounding rural areas cost effectively. We can connect these 100m connection to the existing / available 1000m connections. We can transport these interconnected 1000m point to point networks (gigabit p2p) to a 1000m plus (gigabit internet) pipe to the internet through multiple existing providers. In fact this has been available to our communities for many years.

Northern Michigan does not need to be left behind. We do not need to accept a lower standard. We can if we work together lead the way in rural development. Leading the way will change our economic climate. This is most exciting.

Cost – still a challenge in rural America

It is good that people are beginning to discuss cost.  It is our experience that when we try to add the discussion of cost we are no longer invited or encouraged to participate.  Most want to discuss new availability with the assumption that cost is not relevant.

Simple Internet bandwidth costs (which includes interconnection) is in the range of $15-25 per month per meg.  A gig to the internet is $15,000 to $25,000 per month.  100 meg to the internet range is much greater $2,800 (charter) to $9,000 (others) per month.  These are costs for rural America numbers.

Let us say Google delivering 100 meg at $300 per month is absorbing losses.  Even Google pays $6 per meg (huge Volumes) with is $6,000 per month for a Gig.  So something must be shared.  Then there is the interconnect equipment at each home.  True Gig Fiber routers are a $1,200 per home pass off and requires 2 hours labor per location just to splice the connection (labor is not generally available – with this skill set).   If the pass off is glass to glass rather than glass to gig Ethernet you have a consumer purchasing $400-$500 routers.  This cost is down considerably.  Just 24 months ago the cheapest router was $1,800-$3,000.

Note that a simple router such as Netgear or Belkin cannot do more than 30M on the Ethernet no matter what they claim.  The $400-$500 dollar router needs to stay current and would be replaced every 3-5 years.

The issue is volume, Northern Michigan cannot obtain the numbers to drive down the consumer equipment costs.

So when you ask price, there are many variables that need to be considered.  That is more than likely why such efforts as Connect-MI do not want to discuss this side of the issue.     Tim is at tim@cherrycapitalconnection.com

Recently I sent Tim an article about Chattanooga fiber and the 200 metro areas in the USA that are getting fiber. Link to the article:    Friedman in NYT

Here is Tim’s response:

If fiber was a viable business then government assistance would not be required. As the articles states the reality is only the top 200 metro areas can even justify, with government assistance, a fiber build-out. The good news is fiber and massive towers are not the only solution. The challenge is getting smaller communities to address the real issue and put into place financially viable solutions that enable participation in the global economy. This requires promoting and encouraging the use of established assets.

Fortunately, we have much of the required talent and infrastructure in our rural area to address this need. It is time to stop looking outside and embrace our reality to get the economy moving without waiting on Washington or the New York Times. The real question is are we bold enough to take the next step? Based on my recent discussions with the Elk Rapids Area Chamber of Commerce and the Village Downtown Development Association (DDA), maybe we are ready to take that bold next step in getting our local economy moving upward.

Given all the news recently about the anti-Muslim movie trailer and its impact on the Muslim world and U.S. embassies, I watched Innocence of Muslims (the trailer) this morning. Note that it’s still available online, but it is tagged now as having objectionable content.

Here are my initial reactions followed by a few comments and some additional info:

1. In style, it resembled several other zealously religious films I have seen over the years — with exaggerated scowls and menacing glances that come with stark non-nuanced portrayals of good and evil. No sophistication whatsoever.
2. It reminded me of those awful movies I saw as a kid, complete with bad acting, horrible make up and cheap sets. If I were watching this prior to all the subsequent violence, I would be laughing (at the movie production not at Muslims) all the way through the trailer. It’s that bad.
3. It certainly is an unflattering portrayal of Muhammed, and I can appreciate why Muslims and many non-Muslims are outraged. But it’s difficult to understand how such a ridiculous and lousy trailer would spawn the violence that has resulted.

The trailer posting also gives viewing statistics, which are more interesting than the trailer itself. Initially posted in July, the video got almost no viewings until very recently, then there was an enormous spike in views — primarily in the Middle East. It went viral in the Muslim world.

I have a new appreciation of the power of film to have a major impact in the world as well as the ability of the Web to provide worldwide access to all sorts of published content. As for the religious matter at hand, I think that modernity and world citizensip require a certain tolerance of opposing and even offensive content but certainly not approval of it.

YouTube has recently restricted access to this trailer by some Muslim countries, which is an interesting aspect of Web/media distribution that bears watching.

As for breaking news (other than the spreading violence), there have been reports of upcoming screenings of the actual movie in Toronto and also somewhere by a Hindu zealot.

I’m only beginning to reflect on this entire matter and events are still unfolding, so I’m sure I’ll have more to offer later.

We’ll see how this plays out over the next few months. For now, violence is spreading and news reports are proliferating.

I’m interested in your comments and views on all this. As a side comment, the Google ad that displayed in the sidebar of Elk Rapids Live was about Islamic marriage as soon as I posted this article. And Arabic Dish TV came up the next time I looked. Targeted advertising indeed.

The Web Index is a unique annual ranking of countries on the progress and social utility of the Web. Combining over 80 indicators to evaluate access, affordability, institutional and policy environment and social and economic utility, it will provide an evidence-based tool for national and regional advocacy, intervention, and strategy to strengthen the Web. The 2012 Web Index was published on September 5, 2012.

Access to the Internet via broadband has now spread to 94 percent of Americans, a jump of two percentage points over last year and a huge leap from the 15 percent who had such access just a decade ago.

The steady expansion of the broadband Internet infrastructure has come about as a result of both government backing and private investment, according to the Broadband Progress Report by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) released Aug. 21. Broadband encompasses various technologies – cable, DSL, fiber optic cables – that allow people to connect to the Internet at higher speeds and download data at faster rates.

The FCC annual report commended private-sector companies for continuing to expand into ever-more remote areas, even during the recent years when the economy has struggled.      CSM