Businesses: April 8 Deadline for Free Broadband Connection
By Rossland Telegraph
Rossland businesses within the “eligible area” have until April 8, 2016, to sign up for one year with an internet service provider in order to receive the benefit of a free connection to the broadband service.
At a presentation and demonstration at the Rossland Public Library on March 23, a crowd of people gathered to learn more about broadband and its benefits.
Those benefits include enabling businesses to remain competitive in a global economy by boosting productivity, offering new services and expanding on-line capability, supporting education, attracting and retaining youth and enabling “remote” workers to live where they want.
Broadband is finally in Rossland, after efforts that began in 2011. As Mayor Kathy Moore explained, Rossland was keen to have broadband, but could not afford to build the infrastructure for it. Rossland’s Broadband Task Force worked for years with a frustrating lack of progress, until recently. Rossland has finally entered the 21st century — thanks to our Task Force and Columbia Basin Trust (CBT) and its wholly-owned subsidary, Columbia Basin Broadband Corporation (CBBC), which owns the broadband “assets.” CBBC is working to improve connectivity throughout the Basin, with a region-wide fibre-optic network.
Gord deRosa, a director of CBT, and Amee Ambrosone, the Chief Operating Officer of CBBC, spoke to the gathering and provided a demonstration of the speed of our new fibre-optic broadband.
Why fibre-optic? Traditional “lines” or cables made of copper carry data as electrical impulses. Fibre-optic cable carries data as light impulses, travelling at the speed of light, and enables more users to access the Internet at one time.
One caution: that blinding and gratifying speed may not always be apparent. It may depend on the capacity of the service on the other end of the line of communication. If a business is sending data to someone whose internet service is slower, then the data cannot get there any faster than the recipient’s service allows. If an organization is sending data to someone else who has fibre-optic broadband service, then the speed of transmission will be wonderfully fast.
By signing on for broadband service now, businesses and organizations in Rossland can be assured that if there is fast service elsewhere, our service won’t cause slow-poke transmission or reception of data. Fibre-optic speed is rapidly becoming a basic business necessity for those who must transmit large volumes of data.
There are three internet service providers available to handle enquiries about the cost of service, and to arrange that free connection for those who sign up:
Columbia Networks; phone 1-888-527-0540, or e-mail sales@columbianetworks.ca
Columbia Wireless; phone 1-250-505-4041, or e-mail inquiries@columbiawireless.ca
Secure By Design; phone 1-877-373-6121, or e-mail sales@secure-by-design.com
For more information, including a map of the Rossland broadband service area, go to this link: http://www.cbt.org/Initiatives/Broadband/?Rossland_Broadband
