The industry spends a lot of time focusing on potential federal broadband regulation, and bills introduced in Congress get a lot of press. It’s easy to forget that a lot of broadband legislation happens at the State level, NCSL (the National Conference of State Legislators) tracks state legislation across the country and wrote an article…

WASHINGTON Jan. 12, 2026 – The Attorney Grievance Commission of Maryland rejected a complaint filed by the Campaign for Accountability, or CfA, against FCC Chairman Brendan Carr on Thursday, citing a state bar rule that allows for dismissal without first-hand knowledge of misconduct. 

The complaint, filed in the District of Columbia and Maryland on Sept. 23, 2025 by Michelle Cuppersmith, executive director of the CfA, highlights recent public comments made by Carr against Jimmy Kimmel in which Carr “invoke(d) his regulatory authority to publicly demand ABC/Disney terminate late night host Jimmy Kimmel for his commentary, threatening to investigate broadcasters that air political content with which Mr. Carr disagrees.” 

WASHINGTON, Jan. 12, 2026 – USTelecom President and CEO Jonathan Spalter urged less red tape, retirement of copper networks and more fiber to rural areas in a New Year’s note to stakeholders of the telecom industry lobbying group.

Spalter began by calling for “more green lights and less red tape” regarding state permitting. As previously outlined by USTelecom in November 2025, “red tape” deployment of broadband networks through excessive permitting and fees delay BEAD funds from reaching dependent underserved communities. 

By mid-2024, Denmark had spent only about 1 percent of the $224 million in pledged funds.

The current tensions surrounding Greenland are not about a realistic risk of U.S. invasion. They are about something far more uncomfortable for Europe: Credibility. 

Specifically, they expose the gap between what NATO allies—Denmark included—promise on security, and what they actually deliver. That gap matters not only for Arctic defense, but increasingly for telecommunications infrastructure, vendor risk, and the future shape of global networks.

Greenland has become a strategic test case. Not of American imperial ambition, but of whether European allies can be trusted to follow through on commitments in regions that are militarily, economically, and technologically critical.

An undersea fiber break was repaired in Alaska, pointing to concerns over GCI outages and subsea connectivity.

One of the weird tasks I had as a librarian was writing a disaster recovery (aka continuity) plan for the collection. So, I always think a little bit about recovery. We are so reliant on broadband, I found the following video from NCTA interesting… https://youtu.be/32pCPoRUBmk?si=K5f02Xvu5rAr0HdL Description from NCTA When natural disasters strike, the connections communities…

Four million Americans live within 1 mile of a data center. The communities closest to them are “overwhelmingly” non-white.

In December, on a two-lane road not far from the ACE Basin, a protected ecosystem and wildlife refuge in South Carolina, Paul Black drove past St. Paul AME Church and the cemetery where his wife’s grandfather, great-grandfather, and great-grandmother are buried, then slowed as the trees opened onto the piney tract.

Black is an environmental activist who has spent years fighting polluting projects across the South. But now he and Black residents in the rural South Carolina community are bracing for a new fight: to stop a proposed data center complex the size of 1,200 football fields.

• Across Las Vegas this week, tech companies used the CES trade show to reveal their visions of a future filled with physical artificial intelligence.
• Nvidia, AMD and Qualcomm made splashy robot-related announcements, and Google’s DeepMind said it would work with Boston Dynamics, to develop new AI models for its Atlas robot.
• “The humanoid industry is riding on the work of the AI factories we’re building for other AI stuff,” Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said at a news conference.

It’s the week Sin City turned sci-fi.

Humanoid robots shadowboxed, danced and pretended to run small shops. Singapore-based Sharpa displayed a robotic hand playing table tennis and dealing blackjack hands.

Across Las Vegas, technology companies used the annual CES trade show to reveal their visions of the future and to loudly proclaim that physical artificial intelligence is poised for a breakout year.

“The humanoid industry is riding on the work of the AI factories we’re building for other AI stuff,” Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said at a news conference on Tuesday.

The move comes after governments and regulators from Europe to Asia have condemned and some have opened inquiries into sexualized content on the app.

The government is urging Ofcom to use all its powers – up to and including an effective ban – against X.

Nvidia and various auto suppliers are forming strategic partnerships to overcome challenges and accelerate the development of self-driving vehicles, amid skepticism from established automakers regarding fully autonomous technology.

The role of AI and evolving partnerships aims to reshape the autonomous driving landscape.

WASHINGTON, Jan. 6, 2025 – Rural wireless carriers and consumer advocates want federal regulators to reconsider the approval of a $1 billion spectrum sale from Array Digital Infrastructure to AT&T.

Groups argued cable wasn’t a meaningful competitive constraint in the wireless industry.

The Federal Communications Commission’s December order approving the deal “is in conflict with established law and is based on numerous erroneous findings with respect to important and material questions of fact,” the groups wrote in a Monday application for review. “Accordingly, review of the Order by the full Commission is warranted.”

WASHINGTON, Jan. 6, 2025 – A Maine legislative committee voted Tuesday to advance a revised version of a bill that initially sought to eliminate the state’s broadband authority.

The state’s Energy, Utilities and Technology committee considered LD 1975, sponsored by Rep. Jack Ducharme, R-Madison, which as introduced would phase out the Maine Connect Authority and the ConnectMaine Fund. Instead, the committee moved forward with a “strike-and-replace” version requiring additional planning, reports and recommendations before any such action could take effect.

At the heart of the debate are two modest communications surcharges that fund the ConnectMaine Fund, the state’s primary source of support for broadband planning, rural deployment, and digital literacy and device access initiatives.

Jan. 12, 2026 – Charter Communications has launched Spectrum broadband service to 20,110 homes and businesses in rural North Carolina as part of its multi-state rural expansion efforts.

The deployments, announced over the past several weeks, are supported by federal grant funding through the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (RDOF) and the American Rescue Plan (ARP).

The North Carolina builds are part of Charter’s broader, $7 billion investment in rural broadband infrastructure across multiple states.

The calendar reads June 13, 2025, but I'm getting flashbacks to December 1977. As Israeli fighter jets strike Iranian nuclear facilities and President Trump calls Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell a "$600 billion numbskull," we're witnessing a dangerous historical parallel to the Carter-Burns-Miller transition that helped create the Great Inflation. Yet today's constraints—with federal debt…

Less than a month after defending his record before the Senate, FCC Chairman Brendan Carr is heading back to Capitol Hill.

Carr will appear before the House Energy and Commerce Committee for another round of oversight next week.

The hearing, scheduled for the morning of January 14, will feature testimony from Carr alongside Commissioners Anna Gomez and Olivia Trusty. Committee Chairman Brett Guthrie (R-KY) and Subcommittee on Communications and Technology Chairman Richard Hudson (R-NC) said the session will focus on ensuring the Commission “remains focused on the issues that matter most to our constituents.”

Andreessen Horowitz said it raised more than $15 billion in new funds—over 18% of all U.S. venture capital allocated in 2025—boosting assets under management past $90 billion as it doubles down on defense, artificial intelligence and its "American Dynamism" strategy.

Senators from Oregon, Massachusetts and New Mexico urged Apple and Google to suspend X and Grok until Elon Musk curbs AI-generated sexualized images of kids.

OpenAI and SoftBank agreed to invest $1 billion into a SoftBank-backed energy provider as the companies prepare for a massive buildout of AI data centers.

China can narrow its technological gap with the U.S. driven by growing risk-taking and innovation, though the lack of advanced chipmaking tools is hobbling the ​sector, the country's leading artificial intelligence researchers said.