The Blog

Yes, it’s the health care week, the financial reform week, the Rielle-in-GQ week, the embassy-employee-slayings-in-Mexico week, the U.S.-Israel crisis week, the education reform week, and the slow-judicial-appointments week – but it’s also the high-speed Internet access week.  Let’s hope the issue gets the attention it deserves.

The executive summary of the FCC’s National Broadband Plan pulls together all the announcements the agency has been rolling out.

It’s a plan in beta. The idea is that this is a start.  There’s a tremendous amount of work to do and it will take a long time.  We’ve got big problems in coverage, adoption, speed, and prices.

What about competition? The Commission wants to start by collecting and publishing information on high-speed Internet access pricing and competition.  They’re interested in doing a “comprehensive review of wholesale competition rules.” NPR has a good, swift story today about the reaction to the exhaustive Berkman study of how other countries have worked this issue.

Spectrum is key. Broadcasters are already alarmed – and the plan isn’t even out yet. (Didn’t they notice the sentence that said “For example, [incentive auctions] would allow the FCC to share auction proceeds with broadcasters who voluntarily agree to use technology to continue traditional broadcast services with less spectrum”?)  The Commission’s idea is that the overall plan will be revenue neutral because of revenue reaped from spectrum auctions.  There’s a focus on “opportunistic and unlicensed use of spectrum and increasing research into new spectrum technologies,” and the hope that wireless access will fill gaps that expensive wires can’t.

It’s good to have a focus on high-speed Internet access, and great that a plan is rolling out.