Well written story about British village getting Broadband

vinnyfitz

From Today's Financial Times (This report is useful because it explains the hoops a gang of villagers had to go through). Handy to print out and stick in front of policy people who don't understand the problem.

"The picturesque village of Blewbury, tucked at the foot of the Chiltern Hills in Oxfordshire, will soon be plugged into the information superhighway.

After months of campaigning, Blewbury will be provided with a low-cost broadband connection to the internet by September, putting it at the leading edge of rural communications...."

Link to full story: http://search.ft.com/search/article.html?id=030610000039&query=blewbury&vsc_appId=totalSearch&state=Form

De Rebel

Should be compulsory reading for all politicians, civil servants and other decision makers as an introduction to the issues.

Could/Should it be copied to the IOFFL website, somewhere in with the case studies?

spongebob

Milton Keynes found that their cables were made of aluminium rather than copper. The Council, again with assistance from the South Eastern Development authority mentioned in the FT article above, decided to do something about it as well.

Story on The Reg

SkepticOne

Originally posted by Muck
Milton Keynes found that their cables were made of aluminium rather than copper. The Council, again with assistance from the South Eastern Development authority mentioned in the FT article above, decided to do something about it as well.

Story on The Reg

Interesting bit about the cable infrastructure:

The irony is that despite its reputation as one of the UK's leading 'new cities' - site of the UK's first multiplex cinema, once home of Europe's largest covered shopping zone - Milton Keynes is cursed with a remarkably old-fashioned communications infrastructure. Its cable television networks, for example, laid down in a pre-satellite era, is first-generation infrastructure designed for the needs of analog signals not digital broadband services. According to Jewell, the area's cableco, NTL, isn't keen on making the significant investment necessary to bring the cable network up to date.

Sounds familiar.

ednwireland

surely this is possible down to a number of factors proper regulation in terms of llu , probably low cost of backhaul
giving a competitive entrepreneurial environment which allows this sort
all the things we don't have due to succesive govs who are more interested in giving their mates contracts rather than trying to run the country