After I sent out some "tweets" from the California Opportunity Online Broadband Summit yesterday I had several requests to "translate into English"...so here is my attempt to do so!
As this Wikipedia article states, the term "broadband" refers to high-speed Internet access, but to really understand what what broadband is and why it is important you need to understand what the Internet is, and how it is evolving. The story (and I apologize in advance for any technical inaccuracies, but I think the broad strokes are correct) is as follows.
The Internet has its roots back in the days when computers were large, extremely expensive machines located primarily in universities, research centers, government agencies, and large corporations. In the late 1960s scientists devised a way to transmit information between these geographically dispersed "mainframe" computers using networks of copper cable that were in essence telephone lines used to transmit bits of data instead of, or more commonly in addition to, voices.
During the 1970s and 1980s computer processing technology became smaller, cheaper and more widespread. Many businesses and government agencies began to use computers for data- and computation-intensive activities like processing large payrolls, inventory management, and controlling manufacturing processes and equipment. These computers were also networked together so that, for instance, inventory information could be collected at a warehouse location and transmitted to a central computer facility at a corporate headquarters. The means of transmitting these bits of data continued to be networks of copper cable...still essentially telephone lines.
The late 1970s and early 1980s saw the first "desktop" computers, and by the mid 1980s most office workers had a computer on their desk. These desktop computers began to be networked into "local area networks" so that information could be transmitted between them within a single location; and also connected to "wide area networks" to enable data transmission between geographically dispersed locations.
Until the early-mid 1990s these computer networks were largely proprietary - that is they were owned, operated and dedicated to a single organization (corporation, university, public agency, etc.) or in some cases an association or coalition of organizations.
By the early 1980s the nature of networks began to change with the emergence of "dial up" computer networks that allowed anyone with a computer, a telephone, a device called a modem, and the codes needed to access one of these networks to connect with other members of the network.
Back when I was in library school in the mid-1980s connecting to a dial up network entailed connecting your computer to a telephone line by literally inserting the telephone headset into a sort of cradle, dialing the telephone number of the network, listening to the phone "ring" at the other end, waiting for the computer at the other end to answer as signified by a high-pitched tone, and then using the computer keyboard to type messages and instructions into the network.
By the late 1980s this process had been simplified a bit by installing modems with telephone jacks into computers and then using a standard telephone cable to connect the computer to the phone jack in the wall. This eliminated the need to insert the telephone headset into the modem, but otherwise the process was the same. In either case if you could not use the telephone line for phone calls while it was connected to the computer network, or vice versa, so many people installed separate telephone lines dedicated to computer use.
Once connected to the computer network people could send messages to one another using rudimentary email systems, interact by sending and receiving messages on message boards or forums, play rudimentary computer games, and access repositories of digital information. All of this activity was text-based.
With the emergence of dial-up networks also came the emergence of commercial enterprises ranging from subscription computer networks (this is when America Online started) to commercial databases that collected and organized digital information such as indexes and abstracts of journal articles or the texts of legal cases and made these available for a fee.
Computer technology continued to become cheaper and smaller and as it did more and more people had computers at home as well as at work and more and more people began connecting to the dial-up computer networks that, as they grew larger and more inter-connected became known as the Internet.
As computer memory and processing capacity has continued to increase in capacity and decrease in cost,and as more and more people connect to the Internet, the ways in which people are using computer technology and the vast information highway of the Internet are being transformed. Text-based information is now full-text and in many cases graphically equivalent to its physical counterparts. No longer limited to text, people are using computers to store, edit and transmit photos, videos, and music. "Voice Over Internet" technology allows people to use the Internet as a replacement for the traditional telephone system, but with the addition of videoconferencing capabilities. Online shopping is overtaking going to physical stores. Distance learning programs are bringing together students from around the world to learn together in vitual classrooms. Telemedicine is enabling doctors at major research hospitals to perform surgery in remote locations by using the Internet to control robotic surgical devices from a distance. "Smart phones" enable people to use their mobile phones to capture and transmit photos and videos, navigate using Global Positioning and image recognition systems, access the Internet, download and read digital magazines, newspapers, and books....and the changes just keep coming.
In a world where most employers require online job applications, governments at all levels are relying on the Internet to deliver information to the public and carry out basic activities from business license processing to unemployment benefit applications, e-learning is increasingly a part of the education process from elementary school onward, and for many people online programs are the only practical and affordable means of obtaining post-secondary qualifications access to the Internet has moved from a "nice to have" to a necessity and the ability to transmit vast quantities of data is essential.
Countries around the world have recognized that high capacity "broadband" Internet access is essential to economic and social development and a source of competitive advantage. Unfortunately, as articles like this indicate, the U.S. has been slow to come to this realization and ranks somewhere around 20th in the world in broadband Internet penetration and as low as 29th in average broadband download speed. Contrast the current U.S. average download speed of 5.1 megabits per second with that of South Korea, which currently averages 20.4 megabits/second and has set a target of making 1 gigabyte/second Internet access available in its major cities (50-100 megabits/second in rural areas) by 2012.
The U.S. Federal Government has now recognized the importance of this issue by specifically including funding for expanded broadband access in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, and by intitiating a fast-track process to develop a national broadband plan. These efforts are being mirrored at a State level in California.
To explain the importance of high capacity broadbance access a presenter at the Broadband Summit used the analogy of a system of roads and highways. The immense processing and storage capacity of even a low end personal device like a basic desktop computer or smart phone are like having a 10 lane superhighway run right past your house, but the lcapacity of the network that connects your computing device to the Internet in many places is more like that of a two-lane road. You can imagine the traffic jam that occurs when ten lanes of fast-moving traffic try to merge into that two lane road.
To put the analogy in the context of hard numbers, the old "dial up" Internet access transmitted a maximum of about 56 kilobits/second and was functionally obsolete by the late 1990s. A dedicated copper cable called a "T1" line, which was the state of the art for business, government and non-profit organizations in the early 2000s, can transmit about 1.5 megabits/second - or nearly 30x as much as the old dial-up connection. The term "broadband" refers to bandwdiths of 1.5 megabits per second or above.
Today, 1.5 megabits is considered the bare minimum necessary for a multi-computer organization like a library, and here at the Palos Verdes Library District we consider 10 megabits/second just about adequate to meet the current needs of users of our public computers and wireless network at Peninsula Center Library, and we have an additional 10 megabits per second dedicated to staff use. As HD video and other data-intensive formats become more prevalent 10 megabits will no longer be adequate and we will be looking to at least double or triple our current bandwidth in the relatively near term.
For libraries the problem is particularly acute because we serve as a community hub for access to the Internet and millions of people rely on the library as their primary source of Internet access. Last year California public libraries recorded 39 million uses of their public computers...and that doesn't count the people who use their own laptops, netbooks, or smart phones to connect to our wireless networks. In many communities people stand in line to access library computers so they can search for and apply for jobs, do their homework, take a course by distance education or communicate with friends and family. All of this requires access to the Internet, which can be painfully slow if the library's connection to the Internet is not big enough. Adding more computers doesn't solve the problem because that is just like adding more lanes and more cars to the local superhighway and creates an even bigger traffic jam if the road that leads from the library to the Internet is not expanded.
In California today 56% of public libraries have bandwidth of 1.5 megabits/second or less. That means that for those libraries accessing the Internet is truly like merging from a ten lane superhighway to a 2 lane road. I already noted that PVLD currently has Internet bandwidth of 10 megabits per second for the public, and an additional 10 megabits per second for staff. Yesterday I received an email from Verizon promoting its FIOS fiber optic Internet access. The "bargain" level plan promises bandwidth of 15 megabits/second for downloading and 5 megabits/second for transmitting, and they offer higher capacity plans as well....and that is for home use. You can see that 1.5 megabits/second is inadequate for even a tiny library with a handful of computers.
The Broadband Summit that I attended in Sacramento was convened to begin to address the challenge of ensuring that all Californians have access to the Internet at an acceptable level via their local public library. That starts by getting the 12% of California libraries whose Internet connection is below 1.5 megabits/second up to at least this baseline broadband level, but needs to extend to ensuring that all public libraries have adequate Internet connection capacity (which is far more than 1.5 megabits per second even for the tiniest of libraries) both in the near- and long-term.
The Summit was organized and funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, which has long had a focus on supporting libraries as a place where all members of a community can come for free access to computers and the Internet. The Gates Foundation is providing grants to bring all California libraries up to the 1.5 megabits/second broadband threshold, and assisting the State Library in developing a statewide "sustainability plan" for broadband Internet access in libraries.
The Summit brought together Library Directors from across the State, community partners, State government officials, technology experts, and State Library staff to begin to develop the sustainability plan. We discussed the technical, financial, and political challenges and opportunities and affirmed our commitment to the implementation of a Statewide high-speed network connecting ALL California libraries to the Internet. The challenges are significant, but the Summit participants came up with many creative ideas for reallocating funds, partnering with other organizations and with the private sector.
Unlike many public libraries PVLD has so far been fortunate to have access to both the necessary fiber optic connections (which do not yet extend to all communities and neighborhoods in the State), the funds, and the technical staff to ensure we are at least providing an acceptable level of Internet connectivity...but even for us sustainablity in the long-term is an issue. It was exciting to see the Summit participants start to tackle this issue for ALL California public libraries!
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