Fred Pilot
My blogs
| Gender | Male |
|---|---|
| Industry | Telecommunications |
| Location | United States |
| Introduction | In the early 1990s as digital, Internet protocol-based telecommunications emerged, it became clear that fiber optic technology would replace copper telephone lines of the analog pre-Internet era. But the transition from copper to fiber that should have been largely completed by the start of the second decade of the 21st century has been painfully slow and incremental. That has brought about a crisis of deficient telecommunications landline infrastructure in most of the nation. Public policymakers dither and engage in wishful thinking that wireless and satellite technologies will solve the problem. The crisis deepened in 2020 with the emergence of pandemic contagion and public health measures that increased the need for robust and affordable IP-based telecommunications to support virtual work, education and telemedicine. The Merriam Webster dictionary defines a crisis as a “decisive moment,” “an unstable or crucial time or state of affairs in which a decisive change is impending,” and “a situation that has reached a critical phase.” The state of American telecommunications infrastructure and policy is precisely at that point. |