I've blogged about the FCC's broadband map before. Last year the National Broadband Map was launched with more than 25 million records showing where broadband Internet service is available, the technology used to provide the service, the maximum advertised speeds of the service, and the names of the broadband providers.
The FCC has just released an interactive, web-based map illustrating the broadband deployment results reported in the FCC's Eighth Broadband Progress Report.
It shows census block areas of the United States with and without access to fixed broadband of 3 Mbps download and 768 kbps upload. You can zoom into the map or pan around and explore details of broadband availability in each county in the United States. These details include population and income numbers from the census, and the percentage of each county that has access to the major fixed technologies providing broadband service. Perhaps even more importantly, the map provides full access to anyone with a web browser to the raw data used in the map and the Report.
A few other important points about the map.
- Accessibility: no software barriers, terms of service, or other restrictions prohibit use
- Machine readable: the map data is stored in a SQLite file. SQLite is an open source project.
- Non-proprietary format: no other software is required to look at or analyze the data
- Open IP (License free): data is not subject to any further licensing restrictions.
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