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dougdawsonccg.bsky.social
Doug Dawson
@dougdawsonccg.bsky.social
220 followers 180 following 220 posts
Broadband consultant and author of daily blog PotsandPansbyCCG. Hanging in Asheville and loving life. Lifelong deadhead.
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dougdawsonccg.bsky.social
Doug Dawson @dougdawsonccg.bsky.social · 2d
potsandpansbyccg.com/2025/10/10/f...
Forcing Connectivity
In August, FEMA changed its disaster policy, and everybody who receives federal aid from the agency must now have an email address and must register and deal with disaster-related issues through a …
potsandpansbyccg.com
dougdawsonccg.bsky.social
Doug Dawson @dougdawsonccg.bsky.social · 3d
potsandpansbyccg.com/2025/10/09/a...
A New Security Risk
A new security risk has recently been brought to my attention. I was on a Teams call that included an attorney who would not let the call continue while an AI notetaker was present. His comment was…
potsandpansbyccg.com
dougdawsonccg.bsky.social
Doug Dawson @dougdawsonccg.bsky.social · 4d
potsandpansbyccg.com/2025/10/08/f...
FCC to Review State AI Regulation
FCC Chairman Brendan Carr announced that the FCC will pursue the directive from the White House to review and possibly block state regulations related to artificial intelligence (AI). At an industr…
potsandpansbyccg.com
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dougdawsonccg.bsky.social
Doug Dawson @dougdawsonccg.bsky.social · 5d
potsandpansbyccg.com/2025/10/07/l...
Limiting Large Network Outages
Ookla recently published an interesting article that emphasizes what I have been telling folks for a long time. Not that many years ago, telephone and broadband networks were structured in such a w…
potsandpansbyccg.com
dougdawsonccg.bsky.social
Doug Dawson @dougdawsonccg.bsky.social · 5d
potsandpansbyccg.com/2025/10/06/n...
NTIA’s BEAD Role
At the SCTE Tech Expo in Washington, DC, Arielle Roth, the newly seated head of NTIA, was quoted by several sources as saying, “Our role is to be good stewards of the money . . . We wouldn’t be doi…
potsandpansbyccg.com
dougdawsonccg.bsky.social
Doug Dawson @dougdawsonccg.bsky.social · 9d
potsandpansbyccg.com/2025/10/03/b...
Broadband in a Hurry
There is an interesting new twist on wireless backhaul. The Swedish company TERASi has developed a wireless backhaul technology that enables networks to be configured on the fly. The company has de…
potsandpansbyccg.com
dougdawsonccg.bsky.social
Doug Dawson @dougdawsonccg.bsky.social · 10d
potsandpansbyccg.com/2025/10/02/e...
Easing Tower Placement
Communities need to be on the alert because the FCC has opened a new proceeding that will make it easier for carriers to deploy towers and other wireless infrastructure. On September 9, the FCC app…
potsandpansbyccg.com
dougdawsonccg.bsky.social
Doug Dawson @dougdawsonccg.bsky.social · 11d
potsandpansbyccg.com/2025/10/01/h...
Highlighting Cable One
Today’s blog looks at the market performance of Cable One. Cable One is a traditional cable company that markets under the name Sparklight. The company has over one million broadband customers. I’v…
potsandpansbyccg.com
dougdawsonccg.bsky.social
Doug Dawson @dougdawsonccg.bsky.social · 12d
potsandpansbyccg.com/2025/09/30/u...
Urban WISPs
When Tarana released the new G2 generation of radios, one of the claims the company made was that the radios are powerful enough for ISPs to bring point-to-multipoint broadband to metropolitan area…
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dougdawsonccg.bsky.social
Doug Dawson @dougdawsonccg.bsky.social · 13d
potsandpansbyccg.com/2025/09/29/b...
BEAD Cost Caps
Most States have now sent final BEAD proposals to NTIA with a list of the proposed ISPs to win BEAD funding for every eligible location. The next step is for NTIA to review grant applications, whic…
potsandpansbyccg.com
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dougdawsonccg.bsky.social
Doug Dawson @dougdawsonccg.bsky.social · 16d
potsandpansbyccg.com/2025/09/26/a...
A New Major Telecom Vendor
Many folks in the industry will already recognize Amphenol, the company that is poised to become one of the major new vendors in the industry. The company has decided to grow quickly by acquisition…
potsandpansbyccg.com
dougdawsonccg.bsky.social
Doug Dawson @dougdawsonccg.bsky.social · 17d
potsandpansbyccg.com/2025/09/25/b...
BEAD Awards and Satellite
North Carolina, where I live, recently announced its preliminary awards for BEAD. The State has allocated $408.5 million for preliminary BEAD awards out of an allocation of BEAD money to the State …
potsandpansbyccg.com
dougdawsonccg.bsky.social
Doug Dawson @dougdawsonccg.bsky.social · 18d
potsandpansbyccg.com/2025/09/24/s...
Space Shorts September 2025
Space has been a part of the communications networks since the communications satellite Telstar was first put into orbit in 1962. I remember as a kid tracking Telstar across the sky. Space today is…
potsandpansbyccg.com
dougdawsonccg.bsky.social
Doug Dawson @dougdawsonccg.bsky.social · 19d
potsandpansbyccg.com/2025/09/23/f...
FCC Killing USF WiFi Hotspots
After a prompt from Senator Ted Cruz, the FCC will be voting to ban using the Universal Service Fund to buy hotspots that can be lent to the public from libraries. This follows a similar action ear…
potsandpansbyccg.com
dougdawsonccg.bsky.social
Doug Dawson @dougdawsonccg.bsky.social · 20d
potsandpansbyccg.com/2025/09/22/f...
FCC to Ease Copper Retirement
At the end of August, the FCC issued a new Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) that would make it even easier for telephone companies to tear down copper networks. The Rulemaking proposes to chang…
potsandpansbyccg.com
dougdawsonccg.bsky.social
Doug Dawson @dougdawsonccg.bsky.social · 23d
potsandpansbyccg.com/2025/09/19/b...
Broadband Shorts September 2025
The following topics are interesting, just too short of a topic for a full blog. Criminal Damage to Undersea Fibers. Finland filed criminal charges against the top officers of an oil tanker in conn…
potsandpansbyccg.com
dougdawsonccg.bsky.social
Doug Dawson @dougdawsonccg.bsky.social · 24d
potsandpansbyccg.com/2025/09/18/a...
A School Without WiFi
There was an interesting article in the Washington Post that talked about an elementary/middle school in West Virginia that is finally going to get WiFi for students. The Green-Bank Elementary-Midd…
potsandpansbyccg.com
dougdawsonccg.bsky.social
Doug Dawson @dougdawsonccg.bsky.social · 25d
potsandpansbyccg.com/2025/09/17/b...
Big Changes in Federal Grants
There was an Executive Order (EO) in August from the White House that made some fundamental changes to the way that federal grants work – some positive and some negative. The EO is titled Improving…
potsandpansbyccg.com
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dougdawsonccg.bsky.social
Doug Dawson @dougdawsonccg.bsky.social · 25d
potsandpansbyccg.com/2025/09/16/b...
Broadband Technology Improving
As has happened continuously since the introduction of DSL and 1 Mbps cable modems, the major broadband technologies continue to evolve and get faster. Cable HFC technology is getting faster. Harmo…
potsandpansbyccg.com
dougdawsonccg.bsky.social
Doug Dawson @dougdawsonccg.bsky.social · 26d
potsandpansbyccg.com/2025/09/16/m...
My USF Comments to Congress
A bipartisan group in Congress is tackling the topic of USF reform. They created a portal to solicit comments, which are not being made available to the public. I provided comments to the group on …
potsandpansbyccg.com
dougdawsonccg.bsky.social
Doug Dawson @dougdawsonccg.bsky.social · 27d
potsandpansbyccg.com/2025/09/15/h...
Here We Go Again
It looks to me like history is repeating itself. We’re seeing the same hype cycle for 6G that we saw for 5G. The big push for 5G was mounted on several fronts. Telecom vendors preached the wonderfu…
potsandpansbyccg.com
dougdawsonccg.bsky.social
Doug Dawson @dougdawsonccg.bsky.social · Sep 12
potsandpansbyccg.com/2025/09/12/g...
Going, Going, Gone?
We now know the next BEAD fight, and it might be the biggest fight yet. On September 5, NTIA issued a press release talking about the progress of the Benefit of the Bargain round for States to awar…
potsandpansbyccg.com
dougdawsonccg.bsky.social
Doug Dawson @dougdawsonccg.bsky.social · Sep 11
potsandpansbyccg.com/2025/09/11/c...
Canada Finally Orders Open-Access
The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) ordered, in August 2024, that all broadband providers in the country open their networks to competitors on a wholesale open-ac…
potsandpansbyccg.com
dougdawsonccg.bsky.social
Doug Dawson @dougdawsonccg.bsky.social · Sep 10
potsandpansbyccg.com/2025/09/10/t...
The Golden Dome and Spectrum
The recent H.R. 1 legislation included $24.5 billion for fiscal year 2025 spending to fund an integrated nationwide air and missile defense system. Although the term isn’t used in the legislation, …
potsandpansbyccg.com
dougdawsonccg.bsky.social
Doug Dawson @dougdawsonccg.bsky.social · Sep 9
potsandpansbyccg.com/2025/09/09/d...
Death of the Fourth Cellular Carrier
The press has been full of recent headlines saying that EchoStar is finished as the fourth facility-based cellular network. EchoStar announced that it is selling 50 MHz of low and midspan spectrum …
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