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FCC commissioner: Focus on broadband

By Jeff Smith, Rocky Mountain News (Contact)

Published February 11, 2008 at 8 a.m.
Updated February 11, 2008 at 8 a.m.

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BOULDER — A federal regulator said Sunday the country needs to put more focus on developing high-speed Internet throughout the United States.

Jonathan Adelstein, a commissioner at the Federal Communications Commission, also reiterated previous calls for a national broadband summit.

He said the government's current broadband definition of 200 kilobits a second – just a few times faster than dial-up – is “kind of a joke” because it isn’t even fast enough to support basic applications.

“I just believe a (broadband policy) needs to be a higher national priority than it is,” Adelstein said at the annual winter Silicon Flatirons communications conference at the University of Colorado law school.

Adelstein said the problem is that the U.S. continues to fall behind other countries in broadband adoption rates, and that the marketplace alone might not be enough to close the gap. He said currently about 90 percent of the market is dominated by DSL and cable modem service.

He said better broadband is essential to the U.S. maintaining its position as a world economic leader. There are economic-development benefits, he said, as well as benefits to rural areas, public safety, health care through remote diagnostics, and education through distance learning.

The Bush administration recently released a report trumpeting the successes in broadband Internet adoption in the U.S., but critics say consumers in many areas of the country still have only one choice if any.

It’s unclear, Adelstein said, whether the current FCC wireless spectrum auction will produce a third nationwide provider.

Jon Leibowitz, a commissioner at the Federal Trade Commission, concurred with Adelstein, saying “we’ve had a lot of third pipe possibilities . . and they haven’t exactly panned out.”

In a press conference later in the day, Adelstein said a national broadband summit could be done before the fall election if there’s a will to do so.

Leibowitz said the next president also should make it an important focus.