This final issue of the year opens and closes with stories about WiMAX — wireless bookends if you will.

The opening spread — that's publishing speak for “first article” — by Kevin Fitchard shows how Wisconsin's Chibardun Telephone Cooperative is taking advantage of the 700 MHz spectrum it acquired in the last auction to create a WiMAX-like service, which illustrates why rural telcos should perhaps not let the next auction in January slip by.

The closing feature — that's publishing speak for “last article” — on page 26 by Carol Wilson starts off with a bang, literally. She describes the crash of the big-city municipal Wi-Fi market, while offering, by way of family ties between Wi-Fi and WiMAX, several examples of these technologies working in Tier 2 and Tier 3 markets.

And there is plenty more between these wireless bookends. If all your bookmarks are stuck between the pages of Harry Potter's last adventure or your misplaced copy of The Purpose Driven Life, you might want to dog-ear the following pages.

Like the WiMAX bookends, there are two stories from the Bluegrass State. Sarah Reedy's cover story on page 18 about the Mountain Rural Telephone Cooperative introduces a company determined to provide Kentuckians with everything they need from a communications standpoint to compete in the worldwide job market; company leader Allen Gillum is revamping his entire network to do so. In the central part of the state, Bluegrass Cellular (page 10) is turning the bluegrass capital of the world into an electronic karaoke bar as it becomes the first U.S. operator to offer Karaoke Tones, a ringback tone that monetizes our most popular national nightmare: people who think they can sing.

We would be remiss if we didn't touch upon the Universal Service Fund. So we did on page 12 with Kelly Bono's address to Congress. But check out reactions to last week's FCC announcement on our Web site.

We also bring you a conversation with the newly appointed executive director of the Independent Telephone and Telecommunications Alliance: Curt Stamp. Check page 14 to see how Stamp plans to put his stamp on Washington.

And who said provider backbone transport was dead? Ed Gubbins shows on page 11 that there are still pioneer opportunities in this Ethernet-based transport. Just ask the folks at the Dakota Carrier Network and Frontier.

If you've ever wanted to ask about IPTV picture quality but were afraid, read the article on page 8 and see how SureWest Communications is turning the tables on content providers to ensure video channels are high-quality before they hit SureWest's network. And if you simply want to ask, “What the heck is IPTV?” read Ken Pyle's column on the back page — that's publishing speak for “back page.”