Selected Sources for Telecommunications
Jinfo Blog

By Adrian Janes

Abstract

DocuTicker editors contribute brief articles to FUMSI on conducting research with grey literature - reports from government agencies, think tanks, research institutes and public interest organisations.

Item

In my work as a contributing editor for DocuTicker, I research publicly available reports on a number of global topics. Here are some of my favourite resources for Telecommunications:


Telecommunications, in their various forms of fixed and mobile telephony, the Internet, etc, collectively make up the network that binds the modern world. Their consolidation in some regions, and rapid expansion in others, are now so fundamental to global economic, social and political affairs that information about them and the directions in which they are going is of ever-growing significance.

International organisations are thus both a logical outcome of the nature of telecommunications, and an important information source. Pre-eminent is the UN agency the International Telecommunications Union (ITU). Its site provides a valuable directory of Member States (i.e their relevant departments and ministries) and Sector members (e.g. telephone companies and broadcasters), with contact details and also links to websites where possible. It also has a useful page of ICT statistics, including ICT Eye, which currently gives key international figures for the period 1999-2009.

One of the ITU's key publications is ‘Measuring the Information Society'. The 2010 edition can be found here (NB Although very comprehensive, this lacks an annex on tariffs data which is only available with the purchased version.) Another important free publication is ‘Monitoring the WSIS Targets', which reports on the outcomes to date of the World Summit on the Information Society. This 2010 report has a particular significance, in that it comes mid-way between the WSIS of 2005 and the projected 2015 date to achieve the UN's Millenium Development Goals, for which the deployment of telecommunications (especially the Internet) is seen as integral.

The ITU can thus yield information on both the national and international levels. There are also organisations which operate at the regional or continental levels. Some examples of these, representing a mixture of governmental and private bodies, include:

• SATA (Southern Africa Telecommunications Association)
  
  
• WATRA (West Africa Telecommunications Regulators Association)
  
  
• APT (Asia-PacificTelecommunity)
  
  
• ETNO (European Telecommunications Network Operators' Association)
  
  
• NTIA (US National Telecommunications and Information Administration)
  
  
• Regulatel (Foro Latinoamericano de Entes Reguladores de Telecomunicaciones)
  
  
• SAMENA Telecommunications Council (Centred on the Middle East and North Africa, but with members in other regions as well)
  

All such sites offer, to varying degrees, a mixture of statistics, news and more detailed reports pertinent to their region. Their added advantage, as membership organisations, is that if you are seeking information on a more limited area or specific country there will be links and/or contact details for their constituent bodies.

Telecoms regulators, perhaps reflecting their own urgent need to keep abreast of their rapidly developing field, prove good sources of research data. The Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA), the Nigerian Communications Commission and the UK's Ofcom all exemplify this. Many more such bodies can be located via the websites noted against the bullet points above.

There are of course valuable non-governmental research sources as well. Deloitte publish their annual ‘Telecommunications Predictions". This 2010 edition is particularly concerned with mobile developments.

Internet World Stats draws upon such sources as the ITU and Nielsen to give global, regional and national figures for Internet usage and the proportion of users in the relevant population.

ResearchICTafrica.net is a more academic source, offering thorough reports and case studies for many African countries, as well as a database of ICT indicators.

Finally, the website of America's Telecommunications Industry Association (TIA) is key in several respects. It provides a search function for the technical standards that its members are involved in devising; legal background for measures relevant to the industry that are under discussion in the US Congress, through its Legislative Tracker and Regulatory Tracker;

free extracts from its important ‘ICT Market Review and Forecast'; a technical glossary; and a Member List which includes some of the major companies in telecommunications anywhere. (Unfortunately the hyperlinked version is only accessible to TIA members.)

One other feature is under the slightly misleading heading Industry Links. This is in fact a good directory of news publications relating to various aspects of the industry, both within America and internationally. It can be complemented by the comprehensive coverage given by Connect World. This title channels articles according to the major regions of the world; once a region has been selected it also then offers the related archive of articles. There is also a section of white papers from leading companies.

As the Internet and related technologies are now so important and so fast-changing, there are many organisations and other information sources concerned with them. This article can only point to some important examples, but it is as certain that others could be found as that more will emerge in the future.

« Blog