FCC Commissioner supports Muni Wireless
As
reported in CNET and picked up in the
Houston Chronicle, FCC commissioner Michael Copps thinks municipalities are part of a solution to help the US stop its worldwide slide in broadband deployment.
Copps describes the sorry state of US broadband deployment:
Well, if I was a consumer I would say, "Why in the hell is the United States No. 13 and heading south in broadband deployment? Why are folks in Korea and Japan maybe getting 10 times the capacity at a half or a third or a quarter of the price? I am paying for the slow setup I've got--that is called high-speed broadband?"
And he praises the innovative approaches cities and towns are taking to help close the gap:
I think we do a grave injustice in trying to hobble municipalities. That's an entrepreneurial approach, that's an innovative approach. Why don't we encourage that instead of having bills introduced--"Oh, you can't do this because it's interfering with somebody's idea of the functioning of the marketplace." And then the marketplace is not functioning in those places.
Posted by alevin at March 1, 2005 08:52 AM
