Is Telecom Infrastructure Peaking?

In Washington, things may finally be starting to happen that will affect the creation of advanced information infrastructure. This follows a year of mostly words, minor symbolic actions, and procedural walkabouts. A paltry one per cent of the federal economic stimulus money had been allocated to broadband communications. Of this, a year later, the first small grants are now trickling out, just as the economic crisis has hopefully turned the corner. But a second concrete activity is approaching — a plan by the Federal Communications Commission on how to fill in the white spots on the geographic and social maps of broadband penetration.