Next Generation Broadband in Montana

The fiber huts are a key part of the hyperfast Internet network that Google Fiber says it may begin building across the Portland area, perhaps as soon as next year.

City leaders in Boulder, Colo., are preparing to fight state restrictions that prevent the city from connecting citizens with 100 miles of municipal fiber.

We should worry about the digital divide caused by affordability and the lack of digital readiness more than any theoretical divide caused by new fiber options.

Montana ranks 47th in the nation on broadband speed, and Bozeman ranks 10th in the state.

The reasons vary by city, but in many cases, the reason you can’t get gigabit internet speeds–without the threat of that service being provided by a company that wants to discriminate against certain types of traffic–is because of the giant telecom businesses that want to kill net neutrality in the first place.

City innovation cannot be stifled by its inability to invest in 21st-century infrastructure.

The next time you’re sitting in slow traffic due to construction, you might want to focus on how the work could also be helping to potentially bring you faster internet.

The CEOs want the FCC to classify their companies under Title II of the Communications Act, which would subject the Comcasts and Verizons of the world to "common carrier" regulation, just like phone companies.

"Montana West is excited to have GCS as the first business in Missoula to adopt our new fiber optic gigabit Ethernet capability that we are bringing to Missoula and northwest Montana," said Montana West President Jerry Beeks.

When you remove satellite Internet services from the equation, Comcast actually has as much as 55 percent of all TV and broadband subscribers, according to the Economist, which also pointed out that three-quarters of households have no choice other than their local cable provider when it comes to Internet access. A combined Comcast-Time Warner, according to the publication, would control 20 of the top 25 cable markets.