

Show HN: Finally a legit way to search for broadband providers by zip. - nickreese
http://broadbandnow.com/

======
nickreese
Here are some fun stats from crunching 184 million rows of NTIA and State
Broadband data.

* There are 3,413 individual broadband providers in the US.

* There are 39.3 million Americans underserved (only one or zero wired providers)

* Fiber penetration isn't nearly as bad in some states as it is in others. ([http://broadbandnow.com/fiber](http://broadbandnow.com/fiber))

* Verizon wireless does indeed have the largest coverage in the US out of mobile phone providers ([http://broadbandnow.com/mobile](http://broadbandnow.com/mobile))

Let me know if anyone has questions about how we crunched, cleaned, or
collected all of this data.

We're happy to share our experiences (and nightmares) of working with more
than 50+ different governmental organization's data.

I can also pull my business partner the DB engineer in if there are more
technical questions.

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blakerson
Excitedly tried it but it seems like you've falsely assumed I'm at home when
checking.

After entering my ZIP I'm prompted with: "Your internet provider is Time
Warner Cable, would you recommend their service to a friend?"

True, Time Warner is my _employer 's_ Internet provider, but not mine. Also,
because this is a modal, I'm forced to pass judgment on a provider that isn't
mine.

(edit: My bad; I can close the modal. Still, it isn't the most logical user
action if I happen to be at work.)

I look forward to improvements. I'm not sure I'll get a lot of options in
suburban Texas, but I'd like to see options anyway.

~~~
nickreese
Blake -- great point, we're going to be testing different modal designs, but
our goal was to get users to rate their provider when they aren't angry at
them.

Most of the reviews of providers are full of negativity because of a recent
bad experience... to counteract this our goal is to get users to rate their
experience when they aren't having problems so we get a more unbiased review.

~~~
blakerson
I like the spirit there. I hope it works!

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JimWillTri
Great information. You may want to be more specific and use a physical
address. My zip provides many carriers that I am unable to get - for instance
it provides two different cable companies.

~~~
nickreese
Jim -- What zip code?

Because of the way the government collects the data (census based) zipcode is
the easiest for the consumer to understand and is only a little less accurate
(except in really big zip codes).

We're in this for the long haul, so in the future we'd love to hook into the
main lookups for the big companies and find the REAL data instead of just
using governmental data. We'll see if that happens. ;)

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jlgaddis
I punched in the zip code of my very small (pop. ~4500) rural home town and
was told there are "17 broadband providers" there.

That is _waaaaay_ off.

~~~
mvelie
I had a similar issue, typed in my zip code (32773) and it listed Summit
Broadband with a 100mbps fiber connection. Looked at their site, they're close
by (a couple cities over), but not in my area. Couldn't find anywhere to
report the issue.

~~~
nickreese
Mvelie -- you can drop it in the "improve this data" and we'll address it.
(I've added it to our list of things to check into.)

------
jlgaddis
National broadband map: [http://broadbandmap.gov/](http://broadbandmap.gov/)

~~~
nickreese
Have you used the government's website? It is full of bugs, non-indexable, and
doesn't do it's job efficiently.

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scottwyden
This is going to be so useful for when people ask me for advice. Great work,
Nick!

