AgWired

With the new leadership in Washington, DC getting ready to take over I’d love to see the list of who wants a handout, bailout or whatever you want to call it. It seems like every group or industry is positioning themselves to get something out of whatever economic stimulus package we get. I just wonder where all this money is supposed to come from when we’re also seeing stories of record government debt at the state and national level. Can you say, “print me the money?”

A story in Business Week talks about those who aren’t happy with the $6 billion in the House Democrats bill slated for broadband development.

“I was incredibly impressed how quickly the House moved,” says Shirley Bloomfield, senior vice-president for federal relations at Qwest Communications (Q), a Denver-based communications provider that serves 14 Western states. “They’ve got some good concepts. But $6 billion is not going to get you to ubiquitous broadband.”

It seems like almost 8 times that is “required.” How about just getting started with what you get and see how it goes? One thing seems to be certain though and that is that we’re going to see continued efforts to develop rural broadband.

There’s an interesting new report out from the PEW folks. This time on a comparison of young and old users of social networking sites. The bold sections are added by me.

The share of adult internet users who have a profile on an online social network site has more than quadrupled in the past four years — from 8% in 2005 to 35% now, according to the Pew Internet & American Life Project’s December 2008 tracking survey.

While media coverage and policy attention focus heavily on how children and young adults use social network sites, adults still make up the bulk of the users of these websites. Adults make up a larger portion of the US population than teens, which is why the 35% number represents a larger number of users than the 65% of online teens who also use online social networks.

You should read the whole thing to get the complete perspective. While I’m at it I had to post this excerpt from a recent post on “The View From The Tractor.”

I have spent an inordinate amount of time alone. I farm around 4000 acres by myself, so I spend a lot of time alone. Most of that time is with an ipod or talk radio sending me good vibrations. But now, with a blackberry, facebook, twitter, blogs, and a computer, the world has shrunk. Frankly, I love it. I test as an introvert, but I live as an extrovert. I know, it doesn’t make sense.