Hello Everyone and welcome to my blog,

I am an innovative computer science doctoral student at Colorado Technical University #CTUSTRONG and I have a passion for working to achieve digital equity in marginalized and small cities and towns in the Southeastern United States.

I believe that the electric utilities, both small and large have a significant role to play in my focused communities to achieve digital equity. There is a lot of focus on providing Internet access across the US. However, having access as defined by the Federal Communications Commission (25MBs up and down) and having access that grows as your familiarity and experience with what the Internet allows are two very different things.

Most recently, I was pleased to note that Starlink, Elon Msk's proposal to provide Internet was rejected as insufficient and filled with undelivered promises (Fitzgerald, 2022). 

My hypothesis is that we need innovative methods to deliver Fiber to the Customer (FTTC) to every residence and business int he United States. The only industry that has direct access and connectivity to every residence and business within the United States are electric utilities. As such, it should be an easy thing to work with the electric industry as happened in the 1930's through the 1950's (McBride, 2017) during the electrification of the US to meet and close the digital equity gap. 

An idea I have involves how to lower the cost of the fiber optic lasers that drive FTTC. I am tossing out this hypothesis to see if there are innovative and creative minds out here that will join me in this quest for innovation.

I am  new to blogging, so go easy on me if I appear to be a novice, because I am.

References

Fitzgerald, D. (2o22).  Wall Street Journal: Elon Musk's SpaceX Loses Starlink Rural Broadband  Subsidies. https://www.wsj.com/articles/elon-musks-spacex-denied-bid-for-starlink-rural-broadband-subsidies-11660162973

McBride, B. (2017). Celebrating the 80th Anniversary of the Rural Electrification Administration. US Department of Agriculture. https://www.usda.gov/media/blog/2016/05/20/celebrating-80th-anniversary-rural-electrification-administration