IoT, E-Commerce Do Seem to Correlate with Higher U.S. Farm Yields, at Lower Cost

Virtually everyone believes that broadband--enabling access to e-commerce, better weather information and precision agriculture using internet of things sensors and analytics--will boost agricultural productivity. A new study by the Federal Communications Commission supports the thesis. 

Precision agriculture using internet of things sensors and analytics, as well as e-commerce enabled by broadband internet access might be responsible for higher U.S. farmer crop yields, researcher Katherine LoPiccalo finds. “Corn, cotton, hay, soybeans and wheat yields are all positively and significantly correlated with increased 25+/3+ broadband penetration rates,” LoPiccalo says. 

“A one-percent increase in the number of 10+/0.768+ connections per 1,000 households is associated with an approximately 6.5 percent decline in fertilizer expenses per operation and a 3.4 percent decrease in seed and plants expenses per operation,” she notes. 

An analysis of farm yields and broadband finds that a one-percent increase in the number of 25 Mbps/3 Mbps or better broadband connections per 1,000 households is associated with a 3.6 percent increase in corn yields, as measured in bushels per acre, the Federal Communications Commission’s Office of Economics and Analytics finds. 

It is not possible to conclusively prove whether e-commerce or IoT are responsible for the improvements. It seems logical enough that e-commerce leads to  loweri input or other supply costs, in part because farmers are able to comparison shop and therefore buy inputs at lower prices. 

As always, correlation is not necessarily causation, but LoPiccalo suggests some logical ways correlation might be causation, and “may influence farm outcomes.” In addition to e-commerce that might “impact farm profitability by directly lowering input or other supply costs,” 

An improved bargaining position might include the ability to negotiate with their traditional suppliers for better prices, as farmers are no longer locked into offered rates from the local farm store or co-operative,” she says. 

“A more salient mechanism derives from the use of Internet connectivity to extract real time, accurate data on crop yields, soil moisture levels, plant health, and equipment conditions,” a direct result of the use of internet of things sensors and analytics. 

5G, Wi-Fi 6 and Advanced Technology Myths and Realities

Every year I seemingly are caught by surpirse that the PTC annual conference is upon us. This year's edition will be a first--and hopefully a "last"--because of the Covid-19 travel restrictions we all seem to face. The platform is new. 

 
As some know, as a non-profit organization founded more than 40 years ago by academics, PTC continues to feature--unusually--content delivered by researchers. A new focus is to expand the range of knowledge transfer by including, on a regular basis--researchers from other sectors of the industry (consultants, think tanks, research firms). Here is one example. 

5G, WI-FI 6, AND ADVANCED TECHNOLOGY: MYTHS, MISCONCEPTIONS, AND MISUNDERSTANDINGS

Matt Bramson, Founder & Managing Partner, Cloud Strategy Solutions, USA (PANELIST)

Benoît Felten, CEO & Founder, Diffraction Analysis, Hong Kong SAR China (PANELIST)

Daniel Hays, Principal, Strategy&, USA (PANELIST)

Mark Lutkowitz, Principal, FibeReality, LLC, USA (PANELIST)

Gary Kim, Consultant, IP Carrier, USA (MODERATOR)

You can sign up, at a reduced rate, through December 2020. Register here. 

REGISTER | FEATURED PARTICIPANTS | COMPLETE PROGRAM | SPONSOR | ADVERTISE | EXHIBIT | NETWORK EARLY BIRD ENDS 31 DECEMBER! Just two weeks left to register for PTC’21: New Realities at a reduced rate. Don’t miss out on your chance to be a PTC’21 Sponsor or showcase your brand to a global audience through PTC’21 Advertising. Want to connect with attendees a little more? Consider exhibiting or hosting a networking lounge. Join industry leaders from Facebook, Intel Corporation, Stanford University, Verizon, and many more Featured Participants for exhilarating sessions throughout the conference. How will you participate in the Pacific Rim’s premier telecommunications event? PTC€™21 FEATURED PARTICIPANTS MATT BRAMSON Founder & Managing Partner Cloud Strategy Solutions DAN CARUSO Co-Founder Zayo Group ERIC CRABTREE Chief Investment Officer IFC RAUL MARTYNEK Chief Executive Officer DataBank NICK MCKEOWN Professor of Electrical Engineering & Computer Science Stanford University AHMED MEKKY Chairman & CEO Benya Capital NICOLA PALMER Chief Product Development Officer Verizon Partner Solutions AVNER PAPOUCHADO Chief Executive Officer Serverfarm ROBERT PEPPER Head of Global Connectivity Policy and Planning Facebook DOUG RECKER CEO & Founder EdgePresence GIL SANTALIZ Founder & CEO NJFX CAROL TATE Associate General Counsel & Director of Ethics and Legal Compliance Intel Corporation WANT TO KNOW MORE? ABOUT PTC'21 REGISTRATION COSTS PTC'20 COMPANY ATTENDEES REGISTER NOW Registration questions? Email ptcreg@ptc.org. PLATINUM SPONSORS GOLD SPONSORS SILVER SPONSORS À LA CARTE SPONSORS 914 Coolidge Street Honolulu, HI 96826-3085 PTC.ORG ptc21@ptc.org +1.808.941.3789 +1.833.944.0749

Is Google a Natural Monopoly?

Is Google’s crawler a natural monopoly? A natural monopoly that exists due to the high fixed or start-up costs of conducting a business in a specific industry. Think about electricity firms, natural gas or water and sewer service. So is Google "like" those other examples?

Those of you with long memories (or simply old enough to remember) will recall that telecommunications itself was once deemed to be a natural monopoly. These days, telecom is viewed as an oligopoly, with a few providers possible, but not a "natural monopoly."

That does not mean it is easy to compete with the leaders of the telecom business, just that it is difficult.

And while some argue high fixed costs create an insurmountable barrier to competitors, that same argument was made about telecom competition as well. To be sure, it has not proven easy to avoid an oligopoly in the mass market telecom business. But telecom has proven not be a "natural monopoly."

Some focus on the function of web crawling to make the analogy. Additionally, content creators have financial incentives to restrict the number of web crawlers indexing their content, says the Knuckleheads Club, which has been researching the economics of web content indexing. 

Some argue Google needs to be regulated as essential facility.  Some might argue that applying the essential facilities doctrine successfully will be difficult. 

The reason, some argue, is that Google is not an essential facility any more than Walmart is an essential facility.

Net-Zero Carbon at Costs Comparable to Present Spending?

This is the sort of thing a prudent economist or advocate looks for: ways to solve a pressing problem without sacrificing economic growth, firm profitability or consumer welfare. If you have ever modeled your own personal carbon footprint, you realize how difficult a task that is, and the sacrifices that--with present technology--must be made to reduce a footprint by just 30 percent. 

Long story made short, I found I could only hope to achieve a 30-percent carbon footprint reduction by completely avoiding use of an automobile or flying on airplanes. The former would significantly affect daily life, as I live out in the American West, with lowish density and longish distances.

The latter would severely limit my business functions. 

What we need are ways to reduce carbon output without crashing the economy, whole industries and individual firms. 

We also cannot tell people to be cold in the winder, hot in the summer and to avoid many conveniences of modern life. Sure, there are spiritual values to be reaped by reducing much of our consumption. But that has to be voluntary: cheerfully undertaken and not experienced as an imposition.

This is helpful in all those respects, it seems. 

Tier-One Telco Non-Core Revenue Averages 20%

Unless a tier-one telco serving consumers and businesses believes it can grow its business on the basis of connectivity services alone, new services and products beyond core communications must be found. 

GSMA Intelligence suggests services beyond the communications core account for between 10 percent and 40 percent of total retail service provider revenues, and just over 20 percent, on average, for many tier-one providers. That is up from 17 percent in 2017, GSMA Intelligence says. 

source: GSMA Intelligence

Artificial Intelligence Helps Researchers Sort Through Photos, Identify Wildlife in Australia

Over the next six months, more than 600 sensor cameras will be deployed in bushfire-affected areas across Australia, monitoring and evaluating the surviving wildlife populations. 

This nationwide effort is part of An Eye on Recovery, a camera sensor project run by the World Wide Fund for Nature and Conservation International,.

Using Wildlife Insights, a platform powered by Google’s Artificial Intelligence technology, researchers across the country will upload and share sensor camera photos to give a clearer picture of how Australian wildlife is coping after the devastating bushfires in the past year.

The Wildlife Insights platform can now identify over 700 species of wildlife in seconds and quickly discard empty images. 

Gig Economy is Part of a Long-Term Trend

The gig economy actually is not new. In recent years we have called them contingent workers. Nor is the use of  freelancers or independent contractors new. What arguably is new is the percentage and number of workers doing so full time by choice 

source: Brookings 

In 1989 some 17 percent of the U.S. workforce worked as independent contractors. By 2020 some 43 percent of U.S. workers were contingent. 

Since the official end of the 2008 Great Recession, the number of  temporary or contingent 

workers has substantially risen by more than 50 percent to 2.7 million, according to the U.S. Federal Reserve That is the biggest increase since the government began to record these figures in 1990. But the trend has been in place since before 1990. 

source: Intuit 

In 2020 about 40 percent of U.K. workers were contingent rather than employees.