Several years ago, Sharon Strover met with many local economic development people throughout various Texas towns. They all said, “I want this town to be attractive enough for my kids to come back here when they want to raise their families.” That was not going to...
read moreSharon Strover, Martin J. Riedl and Selena Dickey submitted a paper to TPRC47: Research Conference on Communications, Information and Internet Policy. The paper is an outgrowth of the TIPI's Facebook Community Networks project. The team will present on Friday,...
read moreA team of researchers under the supervision of professors Joseph Straubhaar and Sharon Strover conducted the Austin Digital Assessment Survey for the City of Austin to assess internet usage in Austin. The team sent 11,000 surveys to random Austin addresses and...
read moreAbstract: A great deal of scholarship on broadband deployment and federal policies has positioned rural America through a deficit framework: rural parts of the country have older populations (and therefore not tech savvy), are poor (and therefore justifiably ignored by the market), too remote (therefore outside of legitimate profit-making enterprise), and losing population (and therefore significance). This research examines rural Internet connectivity through the lens of local libraries lending hotspots for Internet connectivity. Qualitative data gathered in 24 rural communities in Kansas and Maine undercut simplistic notions regarding how communication systems operate in environments ignored by normative market operations. Financial precarity and pressures from social and economic institutions compel rurally based individuals and families to assemble piecemeal Internet presence and connectivity. The public library plays a crucial role in providing Internet resources and stands out in the rural environment as a site that straddles public trust and local.
read moreIn support of closing the rural connectivity gap in Texas, Glasshouse Policy partnered with AARP, the Texas State Library and Archives Commission (TSLAC), and the University of Texas Technology and Information Policy Institute to host a series of town halls and...
read moreThe term 'broadband' refers to an advanced telecommunication service that developed from a need for greater amounts of information to be transmitted across the Internet. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) defines broadband in terms of speed. The current...
read moreAUSTIN, Texas – Researchers with the University of Texas at Austin, in partnership with Florida State University, have received a $258,000 grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) to investigate how small and rural libraries contribute to...
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