Every community in the UK will gain access to super-fast broadband by 2015 under plans outlined today.The private sector is to deliver broadband to two thirds of the UK. Other, mainly rural, areas will receive public funds to build a “digital hub” with a fibre optic internet connection.Ministers say they aim for the UK to have Europe’s best broadband network.To read this BBC News report in full, see:
www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-11922424Also see:Time for Jeremy Hunt to decide: does he want a BT monopoly, or fibre everywhere?
What a honking mess Britain’s policies on trying to get fibre-optic broadband to our homes are turning out to be. Successive governments have now wrestled with it, and so far haven’t come up with anything that has people in the industry doing anything but shake their heads – unless, that is, the people are working for BT, in which case they’re quietly satisfied at seeing the arc of this particular story heading right their way.Thus the secretary of state at the DCMS, Jeremy Hunt, is today announcing a further £50m of funding for projects intended to get rural areas linked up with “Fibre to the cabinet” (FTTC) connections – although for reasons best known to himself and his advisors they’re calling it “a digital hub in every community”. Perhaps “digital hubs” sound cooler or something, like a modern form of the parish pump.
www.guardian.co.uk/technology/blog/2010/dec/06/broadband-jeremy-hunt-strategy-failure
UK government reveals super-fast broadband plans
Every community in the UK will gain access to super-fast broadband by 2015 under plans outlined today.