FCC: Openness, Video Access, Important To Rural Broadband [Multichannel News]
As part of the 2008 Farm Bill, the Congress had directed the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to report on broadband in rural America. Yesterday, acting FCC Chairman Michael Copps released the FCC's findings. The report indicated that it would be a building block in the larger national broadband strategy that the FCC is currently working on, and that Congress has directed that the FCC report on next February.
The report details the current state of broadband infrastructure in rural areas of the country and outlines a number of issues that the Commission believes are critical to building out that infrastructure to serve more areas that are currently unserved and to increase the adoption of broadband by customers across rural America.
Chairman Copps' report stresses the need for network openness and the adoption of a fifth "network nondiscrimination principle." He would add this to the four principles announced four years ago. They were:
(1) consumers are entitled to access the lawful
Internet content of their choice; (2) consumers are entitled to run applications and services of their choice, subject to the needs of law enforcement;
(3) consumers are entitled to connect their choice of legal devices that do not harm the network; and
(4) consumers are entitled to competition among network providers, application and service providers, and content providers.
Copps cited the fact that many rural broadband users have the choice of only one provider, thus increasing the need for net neutrality, in his view. The fifth network nondiscrimination principle policy has been a goal of Copps for some time. It would add to the enforcement powers of the FCC when it comes to the existing four net neutrality principles that the Commission has already adopted.
The report also stressed the delivery of video services along with broadband as a key factor in rural broadband deployment and adoption. Providers have an incentive to build out their network further into rural areas when they can provide services in addition to broadband, like video and phone. And customers are more likely to subscribe to broadband if it is packaged with video service.
According to the report, the Commission believes that the $7.2 billion that the Obama administration and Congress allocated toward broadband deployment in the economic stimulus act is a down-payment on the larger Commission goal of universal access to broadband across America. The report indicates that the larger national broadband policy report that the FCC will issue next year will further address this issue.
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