Tbe New York Times reports that the FCC has sent its national broadband plan to Congress in an article here. The report recognizes that broadband Internet is becoming the common medium in the U.S., displacing broadcast television and the telephone. Broadcast television networks have resisted auctioning off some of their spectrum for mobile Internet use.
The government's plan also "seeks a 90 percent broadband adoption rate in the United States by 2020, up from roughly 65 percent."
This will create great competition among telecom and cable companies, as they rush to obtain new users and get government support for expansion to become first-movers in areas where residents simply do not have an inexpensive method for connecting to the Internet.
For instance, my parents live in rural Indiana, where cable lines doen't run. Sattelite access is available, but they considered it prohibitively expensive for their desired speed. They finally chose a wireless broadband plan from Verizon.
The CEO of Comcast actually praises the governnment plan, citing a "need for continued private investment in faster competitive broadband networks, and the importance of maintaining a regulatory environment to promote that investment."
Sounds like he expects some government money to help Comcast expand into new areas, or he might use the plan as evidence that regulators need to force broadcast television networks to auction off part of their spectrum for mobile Internet. This would give Comcast the opportunity to compete with Verizon and others in that space.
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