Comcast brings low-income Internet access to 41,000 families in U.S., but only 463 locally

Five months after Comcast was mandated by a federal agency to institute a sweeping program to substantially improve Internet adoption rates for low income families, only 463 Philadelphia families have activated the service in the cable giant’s hometown, where more than 150,000 families are eligible.

A screen capture of the Internet Essentials report showing activations in top regions.

An internal report on Comcast’s Internet Essentials program issued last week shows 41,000 total activations across the U.S. from Aug. 16 to Dec. 22. The program, which launched in September, resulted from a mandate by the Federal Communications Commission as part of the company’s deal to acquire NBC.

Yet in Philadelphia, where 41 percent of citizens do not have access to the Internet at home — according to a 2008 report from the Knight Foundation — advocates are concerned about the program’s progress, and some experts say that a lack of support by the School District of Philadelphia is slowing its potential.

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What’s Poppyn: online youth media news show covers good stories from Philly’s teenagers

As you might guess, most teenagers in Philadelphia are, quite simply, not violent, flash mobbing ne’er-do-wells.

Like their counterparts elsewhere, they’re students, who like clothes and sports and friends. And they care a lot about how others see them.

So it might make sense that when organizers of the University Community Collaborative of Philadelphia, a youth leadership nonprofit housed at Temple University, were looking for a new outlet for the nearly 15-year-old group that its students wanted to create a news program to fight negative perceptions of themselves.

Not enough positive youth voices are being heard above the din of violent exceptions, the group argues.

Meet What’s POPPYN, a quarterly, half-hour online news show about teenage issues in Philadelphia: produced, starring and featuring the group’s participants. This month, the show’s sixth episode launched, focusing on global issues and how local kids are getting involved, and shorter segments are being produced every couple weeks.

“We highlight how young people are positively contributing to their schools, communities and organizations and their voices on local and national issues,” said Natalia Smirnov, the initiative’s media productions and communications manager. “Ultimately, we hope that POPPYN helps to change the perception of young people in the city as criminals, drop-outs, violent flash mobbers, poorly educated.”

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Action United survey cites barriers to Comcast Internet Essentials digital access program

A Pennsylvania advocacy group that fights for economic justice for low income and working families says that Comcast’s new, federally-mandated digital access program has too many barriers to entry.

Action United, the group which was formed in the state by former members of PA ACORN, cited in an email an informal survey intended to measure the application process of Comcast’s Internet Essentials program:

Applicants found a lengthy application process and disqualification for a number of reasons not clear at the outset. ACTION United’s survey of the program rolled out in Philadelphia in August of this year found either 1 or none of the roughly 150 parents polled have had success in accessing the program, despite initial press by Comcast estimating that 150,000 Philadelphia Children and 2.5 million nationally would be eligible.

Internet Essentials provides Internet access at $9.95 per month to families that qualify for the National School Lunch Program, as part of an agreement with the Federal Communications Commission to provide affordable Internet options, a mandate that resulted from Comcast’s deal to acquire NBC. We covered the launch of that program, which also provides affordable hardware and training opportunities, this September.

According to Action United program coordinator Elly Porter-Webb, of a phone survey of 100 parents in Philadelphia who met basic eligibility for the program, 62 percent had not heard about the program though 73 percent were interested in signing up.

Porter-Webb said that in one example, a parent who was eligible for the program had signed up for Comcast’s Internet service, but didn’t know about Internet Essentials. Porter-Webb suggested that the parent should have been screened by Comcast for the more affordable offering.

“It was an informal survey, but it demonstrates the problem,” Porter-Webb says.

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Youth Empowerment Station: small Strawberry Mansion computer lab gives access to North Philadelphia community

Evettia Harden took advantage of the computer access available thanks to the YES program.

From PhiladelphiaNeighborhoods.com:

The Strawberry Mansion Neighborhood Action Center helps more than just the community. It also has a positive impact on the individuals who walk through the door. The YES program, also known as the Youth Empowerment Station, located in the center at 2829 Diamond St., offers computers to all residents who do not have one of their own. There are currently six computers available for use.

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Grow black entrepreneurship: better education, more opportunity and higher profile role models to make technology scene look more like Philly

Bruce Marable is the co-founder and chief marketing officer of Defined Clarity. Photo by Brian Dzenis

When TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington told CNN’s Soledad O’Brien ‘I don’t know a single black entrepreneur,’ the snippet of the fourth installment O’Brien’s “Black in America” documentary set off a firestorm of debate about race in the cradle of America’s tech community, Silicon Valley.

In Philadelphia, among some black entrepreneurs in and around technology, Arrington’s comments were not a surprise.

“Something could be so normal or commonplace that you don’t even know something is wrong,” said Tayyib Smith, the founder of two.one.five magazine and Little Giant Media. “I don’t begrudge him for saying that because that’s how he feels, it just proves the lay of the land in Silicon Valley, so it was a good thing and it got people talking.”

The documentary, which originally aired on Nov. 13 and was screened locally soon after, followed eight black entrepreneurs: their struggles and perspectives in developing investment and user interest in the competitive world of high technology.

“Personally, I think it’s an accurate depiction of what the technology scene looks like, especially here in Philadelphia,” said Bruce Marable, the co-founder and chief marketing officer for Northern Liberties web development shop Defined Clarity. “When I go to any local organization meetings, happy hours or anything going on within the technology community, it’s primarily young Caucasians, some Asians and maybe an Indian person. There’s hardly any African Americans.”

“There’s a lot of times when I’m the only African American around,” he added.

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Brigitte Daniel, Wilco Electronic Systems: executive vice president of black-owned cable operator talks about digital divide, Comcast [Q&A]

Will Daniel had two babies in 1977.

One was launching Wilco Electronic Systems, the now Fort Washington-based, black-owned cable operator that focuses on serving low income Philadelphians. The other, of course, was his daughter Brigitte Daniel.

Though Will remains president and chairman of the company, it’s been Brigitte, 34, officially the company’s executive vice president, who has taken up much of the company’s vision and regulatory affairs — heavy lifting in the regulation-crazed cable industry. Recently named to an FCC committee on digital diversity, Daniel is hungrily taking on the digital divide and couching that as a fundamental of the company’s future.

Since 2001, Wilco, which employs about 45 people, has been the primary cable and internet provider for Philadelphia Housing Authority projects, while it continues to offer mainstream offerings at more affordable costs for low income Philadelphians in other ways. Brigitte was one of the driving forces in bringing together the Freedom Rings partnership that won federal broadband stimulus funding to trial ways at increasing broadband access and awareness in poorer communities.

“Wilco helped frame the conversation,” Brigitte said. “The city put together the [new computer] centers, we did the infrastructure. It was important to have the partnership. It isn’t easy to get everyone to play together in the sandbox.”

Brigitte seems the perfect heir for her father’s business, perhaps even more so when she mentions she hadn’t planned on ever joining the company while growing up in Abington. An alumnus of Spellman College and Georgetown’s law school, she found herself gravitating to the impact telecom has on communities while in school. After graduating from Georgetown in 2002, she did policy work for USAID in Ghana, West Africa, where mobile technology conversations were already stirring. She was hooked.

Now living in Fairmount, Brigitte is currently on leave from her role in the day-to-day management of Wilco, as she serves in the prestigious Eisenhower Fellowship program. Traveling to learn about how the digital divide is being handled in south Asia, Daniel landed in New Delhi in late October, traveled elsewhere in India, including Hyderabad, then Sri Lanka, Singapore and will move on to Malaysia before returning in mid December. (See her blog on her travels here.)

In a phone call from Mumbai earlier this month, Daniel talked to Technically Philly about Wilco’s relationship with Comcast, what’s the future of Freedom Rings and more.

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Maria Quiñones Sanchez: Q&A with councilwoman on tax reform, digital divide and redistricting [VIDEO]

Two and a half weeks before Election Day, freshman Councilwoman Maria Quiñones Sanchez has effectively already earned a second term.

After soundly beating challenger Dan Savage, who held the seat and lost it to Sanchez,  in an at times bitter primary, the Inquirer-endorsed Sanchez is running unopposed in the general campaign for the seventh council district.

So now she can focus a bit more on her legislative work.

Representing largely poor and blighted neighborhoods like Kensington and portions of North Philadelphia up to Frankford at the foothills of the Northeast, Quiñones Sanchez has taken an interest in digital divide issues and tax reform policy to try to retain what manufacturing remains in the broken heart of the Workshop of the World.

The first Latina on council, Quiñones Sanchez, 42, was born in Puerto Rico but raised in Hunting Park and now lives in Norris Square with her husband and two sons. A Mastbaum High School and Lincoln University alumnae, she worked for council members, including former at-large Councilman Angel Ortiz, and is credited with having brought life back to Latino education-advocacy group Aspira, along with leading other Hispanic-focused community organizations.

In 1999, she lost to incumbent City Councilman Rick Mariano but after he went to federal prison in 2006 and Savage was chosen by ward leaders to replace him, she beat him in the 2007 primary. Full bio here [.doc].

Below, Technically Philly speaks to Quiñones Sanchez about taxes, computer literacy and how city data helped clean up her district.

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Freedom Rings Partnership: what it is and how public-private partnerships fuel its success [VIDEO]

Philadelphia residents prepare for a basic computing class at VICA Technologies LLC at 42nd Street and Lancaster Avenue in West Philadelphia.

The following is a report done in partnership with Temple University’s Philadelphia Neighborhoods program, the capstone class for the Temple’s Department of Journalism.

Elaine Skoczylas said she knows how to type. It’s just the other things that are tricky.

“I’ve never really learned Microsoft Office. I don’t have a computer at home, but I had one in my job that I was using, I really didn’t need to know that other stuff,” Skoczylas said. “I knew how to type on our own system, so I got let go and now I’m trying to apply for jobs and I haven’t applied for jobs in 39 years.”

She’s trying to find a job now and has realized that just knowing how to type isn’t going to be enough.

“That’s why I’m trying to learn this.” she added.

To try and rectify her situation, Skoczylas signed up for a free Microsoft Office training course at VICA Technologies LLC, which is located near 42nd Street and Lancaster Avenue. She was able to take part in the class thanks to the Freedom Rings Partnership, a collaboration between 16 different community organizations, nonprofits, universities and city government officials charged with the mission of giving Philadelphians access to computer technology and the Internet while also training them in its use.

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Can we tackle Philadelphia’s poverty problem with technology?: Guest Post

The First PHA Graduation Ceremony for the Freedom Rings Computer Training Program, held Aug. 11, 2011. Each graduate to complete the program walked home with a free Dell netbook computer. Courtesy of GPUAC.

Arun Prabhakaran is the Director of Government and Strategic Partnerships for the Greater Philadelphia Urban Affairs Coalition. The group has taken an active role in fighting digital divide issues in Philadelphia.

Our economy has taken a sustained pounding. Unemployment is out of control and the economic outlook for the next decade looks questionable, at best.

With a quarter of all Philadelphians living in poverty, many fear that we may be entering a new down-graded reality that is structural and permanent.  However, we can use technology and training to get us on the right track again.

We must address the major gap between the skills people have and the skills that the available jobs require.  Many of the jobs that are open now require at least functional literacy, a high school diploma or GED, and some training.  In an increasingly digital world, even the lowest skill, entry-level positions require a basic level of literacy and digital literacy. Even to apply for a job at McDonalds, you need to go online, which is a real challenge when 40 percent of households in Philadelphia are without internet access.

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40% of Philadelphia households without Internet access, says Mayor Nutter: what’s being done

Mayor Michael Nutter and Comcast's David L. Cohen tape an edition of NBC 10's @Issue with Steve Highsmith, discussing access to the internet in Philadelphia and the new 'Internet Essentials' program. Photo by Mitchell Leff for City of Philadelphia.

The following is a report done in partnership with Temple University’s Philadelphia Neighborhoods program, the capstone class for the Temple’s Department of Journalism.

Forty percent of, or at least 230,000, Philadelphia households are without Internet access, according to a speech Mayor Nutter gave last week, introducing the Comcast Internet Essentials low-cost web offer to the city.

That disparity is concentrated in very specific areas: for example, just 10 percent of Kensington homes have Internet access while in Society Hill, the number is beyond 90 percent, Nutter said.

When the majority of residents in a given area do not have Internet access, the entire community is at a disadvantage. Web-enabled computers are among the most overwhelmed resources at Free Library branches, as residents seek and apply for jobs, students research and do school work and everyone tries to keep up with normalizing communication patterns.

For years, this divide has been on the minds of both city government and businesses both local and national, and a variety of initiatives have taken root recently.

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