If you’ve been following this sector at all for the last decade, you’ll note that the broadband industry has had a hard time even accurately defining what broadband is, much less how we should forge a national policy. The FCC has traditionally defined broadband as anything faster than 200kbps, only recently upgrading that definition to 768kbps downstream and 200kbps upstream. But the bill calling for a national broadband strategy doesn’t actually bother to define what broadband is. Therefore, the FCC this week put out a public notice (pdf) looking for a more accurate definition.

Should we measure advertised speed or actual throughput? Where should the speed measurement occur? How do you factor in latency, reliability, and mobility? Should different definitions apply to different technologies (for instance, landlines versus wireless connections)? How do usage caps and meters impact the quality of bandwidth delivered and its measurement? Over at the new FCC blog, the agency’s Carlos Kirjner puts it this way:

The problem in the past has been that different carriers want different minimum definitions, depending on the capabilities of their networks. For instance, many DSL carriers want the definition somewhere between 768kbps and 1.5Mbps, since that’s the fastest speed many of their customers can get. Providers with deeper pockets who’ve upgraded to DOCSIS 3.0 or FTTH obviously want this definition higher, as it highlights the shortcomings of ISP’s who’ve skimped on infrastructure, either because they’re cheapskates — or they really lack the funds.

As such, carriers who don’t want to be seen as having failed in terms of deployment or product quality (even if they have), have been lobbying hard for years to keep the definition of broadband fairly wimpy. Even efforts to make 1Mbps the standard definition have been squashed for this reason. This latest effort to define broadband will be yet another in a long line of summer and fall litmus tests for the FCC to determine just how well they hold up under telecom lobbyist pressure.

Users with something to say can make a comment here after selecting “National Broadband Plan Notice of Inquiry Docket 09-51,” or submit a document adhering to the FCC format here. Hopefully the nation can bang out a set of definitions fairly quickly, given there’s just 180 days left before our first national broadband plan is scheduled to be unveiled.
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