FCC Readies Smartphone App for ‘Complex’ Mobile Measurement Program
As the FCC prepares its mobile measurement smartphone app for a March release, officials are optimistic about recruiting enough public volunteers for a large sample size and a “continuum” of reports that could include heat maps. This is a “much more complex project” than the FCC’s fixed broadband measurement program, said Walter Johnston, chief of the Electromagnetic Compatibility Division in the Office of Engineering and Technology. Unlike in the fixed context, where the researchers collected the data and released one major report, the mobile report won’t be a “single event” but rather “a continuum of trying to maximize the use of this data,” Johnston said. Although similar “at least philosophically” to the fixed broadband report, the mobile effort might “evolve towards different data products -- different reports, perhaps -- over time,” he said.
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U.K. measurement company SamKnows has completed internal testing on a beta version of the FCC’s smartphone app to measure mobile broadband stats, CEO Alex Salter told members of the measurement group at a meeting Wednesday. The company is contracted to work with the FCC through 2013. Now the FCC will have a go at testing the app, and then it will be pushed out to carriers so their employees can do “a bit more of an involved field test” before releasing it to customers, he said. Carriers will have until the end of February to sign off on the app, with a public release scheduled for March 15, officials said.
The fixed broadband speed test saw a “woefully pitiful outreach effort” by the FCC, yet netted 100,000 volunteers, Johnston said. He’s confident that consumers would be willing to volunteer to help measure “the health of the broadband nation.” With the mobile app being pushed by carriers and with a more targeted press push, “I guarantee you we could get a couple hundred thousand volunteers, and my expectation is we could do north of a million,” Johnston said. Meredith Whittaker of Google asked if consumers are being provided any incentives to participate. Salter said incentives don’t necessary help, with even iPad giveaways in its programs around the world failing to dramatically increase participation.
One possible reporting format is a heat map, Salter told the group. Salter expects a “willing audience” for this, with lots of downloads of the smartphone app, and a large sample size. But the agency and carriers may have to “push it” to get a minimum sample size in certain geographical areas if they want to make comparisons between urban and rural results, he said. David Young of Verizon recommended a “general outreach” to consumers, and then a “targeted top-off” where there are still holes. “Then you could have a more targeted strategy for how to fill in those holes,” he said. The FCC still needs to identify key individuals in each company that can help develop a deployment plan, and to come up with target goals, Johnston said.
Any heat map would be separate from the National Broadband Map, which is run by NTIA, said Eric Spry, FCC deputy geographic information officer. But because the reporting technologies are built on open APIs, anyone could build a “hybrid site” based on both sets of data, he said. The FCC plans to use only open-source tools, and make available any algorithms or code they develop, he said. “People can take it and do more interesting things than we can imagine, I'm sure.”