President Obama Praises National Broadband Plan

Says broadband plan will provide foundation for sustained prosperity

By John Eggerton -- Broadcasting & Cable, 3/16/2010 4:32:50 PM

FCC Broadband Plan: Complete Coverage

The FCC's official unveiling of its National Broadband Plan on March 16 produced yet another blizzard of reaction from industry players and politicians, which joined a chorus of feedback to the plan's details that began to trickle out on Monday.

The latest wave was led by the broadband Booster-In-Chief.

"America today is on the verge of a broadband-driven Internet era that will unleash innovation, create new jobs and industries, provide consumers with new powerful sources of information, enhance American safety and security, and connect communities in ways that strengthen our democracy," said President Barack Obama in a statement. "Just as past generations of Americans met the great infrastructure challenges of the day, such as building the Transcontinental railroad and the Interstate highways, so too must we harness the potential of the Internet. Expanding broadband across the nation will build a foundation of sustained economic growth and the widely shared prosperity we all seek.

"I commend Chairman Julius Genachowski, the Commissioners, and the FCC staff for their hard work in developing the National Broadband Plan.

"My Administration will build upon our efforts over the past year to make America's nationwide broadband infrastructure the world's most powerful platform for economic growth and prosperity, including improving access to mobile broadband, maximizing technology innovation, and supporting a nationwide, interoperable public safety wireless broadband network."

While the president praised the broad strokes, plenty of commenters found specifics to salute.

The New America Foundation liked the sound of the plan's proposal to find new spectrum for wireless broadband.

"We applaud the National Broadband Plan's emphasis on opening up vast tracts of underutilized spectrum, not only for licensing by auction, but also for shared and unlicensed use," said Michael Calabrese, director of the foundation's Wireless Future Program. "The Plan sets a very realistic goal of reallocating 500 MHz in additional spectrum capacity within 10 years for both licensed and unlicensed uses.

"It is notable that the Plan recommends the allocation of a new contiguous band of unlicensed spectrum, as well as the rapid implementation of unlicensed access to the unused TV channels known as 'white spaces."

And Microsoft joined the list of spectrum reclamation fans. "We commend the FCC on its push to find 500 MHz of wireless spectrum by 2020 for wireless broadband services, as well as its continued support of unlicensed spectrum and ‘white spaces,' which are increasingly vibrant sectors of the wireless marketplace," said Fred Humphries, Microsoft managing director of U.S. Government Affairs.

Computer companies have been among the groups pushing the FCC to open up the TV spectrum for other uses, and to reduce their allocation in favor of wireless broadband uses.

Praising the proposal of a trust fund for public media, not surprisingly, were the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and PBS.

"We appreciate the work of the National Broadband Taskforce in offering a comprehensive plan to ensure that every American has access to broadband capability," said CPB CEO Pat Harrison.

"In particular, we appreciate the Taskforce's recognition of public media's important role in serving our democracy, as well as our role in America's broadband future. We also appreciate the Taskforce's recognition that, if public media is to continue to fulfill our statutory responsibility to provide every American with free educational and cultural programming in the digital age, more funding will be necessary."

"As the plan recognizes, the continued development of a robust digital public media ecosystem would be enhanced by the creation of sustainable funding sources dedicated to this important work," said PBS in a statement.

Fair use supporters Public Knowledge praised the broadband plan's caveat on copyright protection. The plan says such protection "must not stifle innovation; overburden lawful uses of copyrighted works; or compromise consumers' privacy rights.'  

That, says Public Knowledge President Gigi Sohn, sounds like the commission will balance the interests of copyright owners and fair uses by the public.  

She said she hoped the commission would take the same stand on network neutrality, which it is addressing in a separate proceeding.  "As laudable a goal is cracking down on theft may be, that type of activity is not ‘reasonable network management' under the Net Neutrality proposed rule as Big Media companies and their supporters would like the Commission to believe."  

But the heads of one of those 'Big Media' companies, Warner Bros. Chairman & CEO Barry M. Meyer, read the plan's copyright language a little differently. "As the plan recognizes, respect for intellectual property online will foster the development of creative new ways for consumers to enjoy digitally distributed entertainment."

But not everyone was singing the plan's praises. While almost everyone supports broadband adoption and deployment, the Competitive Enterprise Institute saw a shower or two ahead for the broadband parade.

"The FCC deserves praise for acknowledging the importance of competition among technologies as a key ingredient for promoting a national broadband policy," said VP for policy Wayne Crews. "At the same time, unfortunately, the Commission's plan seeks new realms to rule even as the very need for regulation evaporates."