Instead of using the usual broadband per capita the Phoenix Center announced the Broadband Adoption Index on 15th July, which it advised allows for an improved basis for comparing worldwide broadband adoption rates.
In order to strengthen the argument by the Hill and agency Democrats that the US is lagging behind a number of other countries in terms of adoption the per capita metric is often used by the ITU and the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development. This has, however, been claimed to be “misleading and incomplete” by the Phoenix Center.
The centre offered the BAI describing it as “a value-based index of broadband adoption that accounts for both the benefits and costs of adoption and deployment and which also recognizes that these benefits and costs may differ, sometimes substantially, both within and across countries,” advising that the connections per capita was a measure that was considered to be “conceptually defective”.
An increase in data collected by the government regarding broadband speeds, price and subscriptions, which is something that most countries do not do, is something that the centre understands is required by the index.
When it comes to deciding which of the statistics to focus on, Phoenix hopes that the huge challenges that are posed by the BAI will mean that at the very least policymakers will consider some of the approaches made by the BAI.
During the unveiling of the BAI the FCC Commissioner Robert McDowell advised that it “could not have come at a better time,” whilst giving a talk at the centre.
Relying on the use of a limited number of rankings or studies in order to obtain accurate broadband adoption information was something that he had raised concerns over for quite a long time.
Source – www.multichannel.com