Worrying signs from the UK’s broadband laboratory. It was always a concern that the coalition government’s policy response to a potential digital divide was to sponsor ‘superfast’ broadband trials in some rural communities dominated by sheep. How would this help?
Well, a pivotal objective would be to see whether these islands of public sector investment could create a sustainable business model, i.e. one that is not dependent on ongoing subsidy. And it appears that BDUK, the agency responsible for deploying broadband subsidies is indeed in search of a framework ‘for monitoring the progress and benefits of these pilots and subsequent broadband projects in order to inform the approach to wider roll-out of super-fast broadband’. Sadly, however, the framework appears to have taken on additional baggage. For instance, it now seems that a core objective of the pilots is ’to understand more specifically the associated economic, practical and regulatory challenges and constraints and help refine and inform future approaches to deploying super-fast broadband’. Baa!
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