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Connected Nation
This is Connected Nation – an award-winning podcast focused on all things broadband. From closing the Digital Divide to simply improving your internet speeds, we talk technology topics that impact all of us, our families, and our communities.
The podcast was honored in 2024 with an Award of Excellence for Podcast Series - Technology. This is the highest honor given by the Communicator Awards. More recently, the podcast received an Award of Distinction in 2025. It received the same honor in 2023 and 2022.
Learn more about the national nonprofit behind this podcast at connectednation.org.
Connected Nation
"It's as fast as it can get." How Kentucky is becoming one of the best connected states in the country
On this episode of Connected Nation, we talk with those behind Accelecom – a company created specifically to manage commercial access to Kentucky’s newly created state-owned, fiber optic network.
We ask how the company is helping private and nonprofit organizations tap into the new, high-speed network, why it’s a good business model, and what mistakes - and victories - were made along the way that other states can learn from.
Related links:
Company website: https://accelecom.net/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/accelecom/
NOTE: In the podcast, we discuss the founder of Connected Nation but did not name the professor. In 2001, Dr. Linda Ellis Johnson joined the staff of the Kentucky Governor’s office as Chief IT Strategist in the Office for the New Economy and simultaneously started a non-profit corporation committed to building technology public-private partnerships.
Dr. Johnson began her career as an academic at Western Kentucky University where in 1991 she joined the faculty as a Professor of Information Systems in the Gordon Ford College of Business. She became Chair of the Department in 1996 providing leadership for the unit until 2001.
