FCC Chairman Brendan Carr is proposing (PDF) to roll back key Biden-era broadband policies, scrapping the long-term gigabit speed goal, halting analysis of broadband affordability, and reinterpreting deployment standards in a way that favors industry metrics over consumer access. The proposal, which is scheduled for a vote on August 7, narrows the scope of Section 706 evaluations to focus on whether broadband is being deployed rather than whether it's affordable or universally accessible. Ars Technica reports: The changes will make it easier for the FCC to give the broadband industry a passing grade in an annual progress report. FCC Chairman Brendan Carr's proposal would give the industry a thumbs-up even if it falls short of 100 percent deployment, eliminate a long-term goal of gigabit broadband speeds, and abandon a new effort to track the affordability of broadband.

Section 706 of the Telecommunications Act requires the FCC to determine whether broadband is being deployed "on a reasonable and timely basis" to all Americans. If the answer is no, the US law says the FCC must "take immediate action to accelerate deployment of such capability by removing barriers to infrastructure investment and by promoting competition in the telecommunications market."

Generally, Democratic-led commissions have found that the industry isn't doing enough to make broadband universally available, while Republican-led commissions have found the opposite. Democratic-led commissions have also periodically increased the speeds used to determine whether advanced telecommunications capabilities are widely available, while Republican-led commissioners have kept the speed standards the same.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://tech.slashdot.org/story/25/07/21/2044200/fcc-to-eliminate-gigabit-speed-goal-scrap-analysis-of-broadband-prices?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.

The $500 billion Stargate AI project announced by SoftBank and OpenAI at the White House six months ago has failed to complete a single data center deal and sharply scaled back its near-term plans. The venture, which originally pledged to invest $100 billion "immediately," now aims to build one small data center by year-end, likely in Ohio, according to WSJ. SoftBank and OpenAI have disagreed over crucial partnership terms, including site locations.

OpenAI has proceeded independently, signing a deal with Oracle worth more than $30 billion annually starting within three years. That agreement totals 4.5 gigawatts of capacity and would consume power equivalent to more than two Hoover Dams. Combined with a smaller CoreWeave deal, OpenAI has secured nearly as much data center capacity as Stargate promised for this year. SoftBank invested $30 billion in OpenAI earlier this year as part of the infrastructure partnership plans.

[ Read more of this story ]( https://slashdot.org/story/25/07/21/220229/softbank-and-open-ais-500-billion-ai-project-struggles-to-get-off-ground?utm_source=atom1.0moreanon&utm_medium=feed ) at Slashdot.