**REMARKS**

**COMMISSIONER MICHAEL J. COPPS**

**THE CABLE CENTER, KEY ISSUES SERIES**

**DENVER COLORADO, OCTOBER 17, 2008**

  Thank you for your warm welcome and to Phil Weiser for inviting me to
address this prestigious group. And thanks to everyone here who has made
the past couple of days in Denver so informative and enjoyable.

It seems I missed an interesting few days in FCC world. First was the
meeting that never was in Nashville. I think there are still panelists
waiting to testify, thinking it's just another late-convening meeting.
Now I learn that I missed helping pick out the NASCAR driver who's going
to race the FCC around the DTV track. Let's hope he doesn't crash. That
would be an ominous omen.

Next up is our Commission meeting on Election Day, November 4. I can
hardly wait for that one. Let's see---for openers we have Universal
Service reform. Then the tangled web of Intercarrier Compensation. A
couple of little transactions involving Sprint-Clearwire and
Verizon-Alltel. And a non-controversial spectrum issue about something
called "white spaces." Talk about top-heavy! I've put in for my absentee
Presidential ballot for that day, as I think Commissioners will all be
trapped on the 8^th^ floor all day and night on the 3^rd^ and I frankly
wonder if we'll be able to convene on the 4^th^ before the polls close
in California.

Seriously, we're just beginning to see some of these items, they are
obviously deep in the weeds, and I don't think most of my colleagues
feel comfortable yet in saying much about them. In any event, they are
not what I came here to talk about today. Because big as these issues
are for our future, there are some deeper questions we need to be
asking, and dialogues we need to be opening, about larger changes taking
place that are transforming our communications environment.

Over the next several years---and it will take a while---our country's
communications environment will be profoundly transformed. The
implications of these changes are enormous---not only for our arts and
entertainment, but for our core American values such as preserving the
civic dialogue upon which our democracy depends, nourishing our cultural
and ethnic diversity, and for how we all relate to one another. A lot of
us have theories and conjectures about how technology is affecting and
will continue to affect our media---but I don't think there are many of
us who can claim to have much in the way of certainty.

Perhaps that's not surprising. It's not easy to focus on a target that
is constantly moving. On the flight out here, I was remembering back to
1970 when I first went to work in the United States Senate and how
communications were back then.  The fanciest piece of work-saving
equipment in the Fritz Hollings office was our robo-machine that cranked
out some really awful-looking mass mailings.  Everything else was typed
by hand and when IBM Selectric typewriters came along, we all fought
tooth-and-nail to be one of the lucky few to get one.  When Senator
Hollings dictated even a minor change to a speech draft, his poor
secretary had to retype the entire text---sometimes into the wee hours
of the morning before the speech.  When we needed to phone back to the
state, we had a WATS line, but initially the Senator had to share it
with a more senior colleague, the legendary Richard B. Russell from
Georgia, so when Senator Russell wanted to get on, freshman Senator
Hollings had to get off.  Saying that world was primitive doesn't get
close---it would be just plain unintelligible to the kids of the
Internet Generation. That was before the great technology flood and the
knowledge tools that have so dramatically transformed everything.   

But I'm not here to revisit the Ghosts of Communications Past. I'm here
more to talk about the future. Let me begin with four basic ideas about
how the Internet both ***is*** and ***is not*** going to change
everything.

Change Number One: The Internet ***is*** going to change the way media
is delivered---rather than learning about the world's great events
through big sheets of paper delivered to your door before dawn, or
waiting for the mailman to deliver your movie from Netflix, we will be
doing much of our reading and watching our entertainment on some sort of
device connected to the Net---a lot of it wirelessly.

Change Number Two: The Internet is going to change business
models---obviously for entertainment, but also for information and for
how people in media and journalism make their living. Indeed, the
current model of journalism that has too often crowded valuable
political coverage out of traditional media---covering city hall and the
state legislature, for example, or doing in-depth investigative
reporting---is ripe for re-invention in the Internet Age. We can do that
right or do it wrong.

Non-Change Number One: The Internet is ***not*** going to change the
need for citizens in a democracy to be informed about politics, nor will
it change the fundamental importance of having a media that reflects
America's diverse ethnic, religious and cultural backgrounds.

Non-Change Number Two: The Internet will likely ***not*** change the
fact that pure commerce has never produced the full range of news and
cultural programming this country needs. In a world run purely by free
market principles, we wouldn't have had C-Span, McNeil-Lehrer, or even
the *New York Times* or *Washington Post* (which benefit from ownership
by very remarkable families). The current system is not on-track to get
us from here to there.

We don't know when the Internet-changed media environment will be
complete. But putting these four points together, I see two critical
challenges. One is getting the technology of the new age out to all
those who will live in that new age. The other is how to ensure that
this technology serves us as citizens.

Let's begin with a point that historian Paul Starr has made---delivery
systems matter and government choices can make all the difference in how
those delivery systems develop. For example, the federal government
decided near the beginning of the republic that it would subsidize the
postal service. The result? Newspapers and newsletters made their way to
the frontier and smaller cities ***very*** fast---much faster than in
Europe. America's choice about how media would be distributed reflected
our democratic values---and there were more newspapers, a more active
public debate, and a more educated and involved citizenry because of it.

The federal government made very different choices when it came to
handling our nascent broadcast industry in the 1920s and '30s. There was
a real movement in the 1920s to give licenses to local educational and
non-commercial institutions. But the commercial broadcasters won out and
we ended up with public airwaves dominated by a handful of national
networks operating under the condition that they serve the "public
interest." Although we've seen some changes over the years---like the
advent of public broadcasting in the '60s which opened a space for
non-commercial voices on the dial---much of the original blueprint
remains in place. The "public interest" standard itself, albeit battered
by the deregulation of the past few decades, still stands as a testament
to choices made over 70 years ago. I'm not here to debate the wisdom of
those choices---although I think you know where I stand on the need to
reinvigorate the public interest standard. My point is that government
choices, particularly at the early stages of a new medium, can have
effects that are profound and long-lasting.

Right now, we are at such a transformative moment with the Internet. I
will spare you my stump speech on how poorly we are doing, when compared
with our international competitors, in bringing high-value, high-speed
broadband to all our citizens. The OECD ranks us 15^th^ in the world; if
you don't like that study, I can point you to others that have us doing
even worse that that. The rank is less important than what is actually
happening on the ground. If you live here in Denver you probably pay
twice as much for a connection that's one-tenth the speed of what you'd
get if you lived in Tokyo, Seoul, Paris or London. If you live in
exurban or rural America, you're looking at slower connections or, in
many places, no connection at all. Only about half of American homes
have broadband.

So Job One is doing better on access and giving Americans reasons (like
lower prices and higher speeds) to sign up. The federal government gives
out nearly \$8 billion a year of subsidies as part of the Universal
Service Fund---and while some of it goes to wiring schools, libraries
and hospitals with high-speed lines, most of it goes to supporting voice
service. The kicker here has been that---under the FCC's rules, this
money is reserved for ordinary telephone service and cannot be used to
directly support broadband. And it's 2008! That needs to change. I think
my colleagues realize that Plain Old Telephone Service---the POTS of the
20^th^ century---has to give way to the PANS---the Pretty Awesome New
Stuff---that consumers and businesses need today. Our policies need to
be adjusted accordingly.

Getting that job done is, however, about more than changing the
Universal Service Fund. It's also about having a national strategy---a
commitment at the top to get high-speed broadband out to ***everyone***,
no matter who they are or where they live. It's about building basic
infrastructure. We've always managed to find ways---the public and
private sectors in all sorts of creative partnerships, operating under
many kinds of incentives---to build the infrastructure America needs.
Going back to the bridges and turnpikes and roads and railroads and
later the electricity and highways that we needed to move the American
people and the American nation forward.

So first we need a realization at the top about how critical this is.
Then we need a strategy and tactics to make it happen. The FCC has a
role here. Congress of course has an even larger role in devising the
strategy and considering the programs and incentives to achieve the
objective, ranging far beyond what our little agency can do.

The good news is that I think there is reason for some optimism. There's
growing grassroots support to get this done. Just three days ago,
*Communications Daily* ran a lead story on how numerous Congressional
candidates are being pushed by constituents to pursue broadband
legislation. The article quoted several Congressmen, like Zack Space of
Ohio who said, "Increasingly, people are realizing that what
electrification was to the country in the 1930s, broadband is to our
generation." And, more than ever, the issue has achieved real visibility
in the Presidential race. Having a Chief Technology Officer at the White
House, who is also kind of a broadband czar, to bring together the many
government agencies who have a finger in broadband but who don't
coordinate and connect---and then to work with the private sector to
develop innovative new partnerships, strikes me as a capital good idea.

Why, as a matter of course, when the Department of Housing and Urban
Development is planning low-income housing, aren't we coordinating to
make sure that building is wired for 21^st^ century communications? Why
don't all the agencies with a finger in broadband, like the Rural
Utilities Service, Commerce, Transportation, and the FCC, coordinate
what they are doing? Why, in the absence of having a truly interoperable
broadband network for public safety, are the DoD and Homeland Security
throwing a lot of money into a program for federal agencies while the
FCC has to struggle to find a way to build an entirely separate system
for state and local public safety?

It doesn't have to be this way. It ***shouldn't*** be this way. We need
some real innovation and coordination to get this done. We can't get
along without those bigger, fatter, more affordable pipes. So I'm not
talking do-gooder social theory here. I'm talking economic growth,
creating opportunity, creating jobs, making America more competitive,
public safety, the list goes on. This is about making you and me and 300
million Americans part of---our current economic crisis
notwithstanding---what can still be the most prosperous and exciting
century ever. It's about jobs and the economy, and what our
telecommunications sectors can do to help right the ship. By some
estimates, ubiquitous affordable broadband would quickly add \$500
billion to the U.S. economy and create 1.2 million jobs. Another study
concluded that every percentage point increase in broadband penetration
would mean 300,000 more jobs and increased national output. I think
these estimates are too conservative.

I continue to believe that an important piece of our larger broadband
agenda is maintaining the openness of the Internet. I understand the
need for reasonable network management. I daresay everyone in the room
agrees on that. And I understand that these are complex, difficult and
always-evolving issues. But this technology---broadband and the
Internet---is truly paradigm-altering. Life-transforming. It was built
on openness; it grew on openness; and its future must be openness.

Another part of the broadband challenge that doesn't receive as much
attention as it should is the need to ensure that we are doing
everything we can to foster innovation. I was just over at CableLabs
this morning and got to see first-hand some of the impressive and
exciting R&D efforts going on. But I don't believe we have enough of
that going on in our country today. We need to do better. And that's not
just me talking---I've met with lots of folks, including CTOs and CEOs
and technologists and innovators who share my concern. According to a
report by the National Research Council, industry-driven innovation over
the last several decades is in decline and the United States' role as
the global leader in technology innovation is at risk. The NRC found
that federal support has not increased sufficiently to replace the
decline in industry involvement and it emphasized the shift in what
research remains from long-term to short-term projects.

You know, the Telecommunications Act actually instructs the Commission
to consider the impact on innovation and on the competitive posture of
the United States of each merger that comes our way. That kind of
studied analysis is barely ever a factor in what we actually do these
days.

The second, perhaps even broader, set of issues we need to address is
what kind of content will flow over those hopefully abundant and
non-discriminatory broadband pipes.

Again, I think we're at one of those moments where choices will be made
that will be with us for a very long time. Nick Lemann, Dean of the
Columbia Journalism School, has written that each new medium gets a
pioneer who defines it. TV news had Ed Murrow and Walter Cronkite---who
came along in the early days and showed us all what TV news could be. I
think Brian Lamb and Ted Turner may be those kind of pioneers on cable.

But web journalism hasn't gotten its Ed Murrow yet---someone who defines
the voice and the ideals of the medium. (Nor, for that matter, has
traditional media been very good at cultivating new Ed Murrows.) But at
least a few people are thinking about how to use the new media to take
journalism to greater heights. For example, I've talked a number of
times with Google Founder Larry Page. He's thinking of ways that the
next generation of journalists can develop better local news. He and I
agree that we need to come up with ways to better use the Internet to
inform our civic dialogue. And the good news is that the Internet---with
its ability to blend video and text, and to offer almost unlimited
amounts of information---can be used to communicate a lot more, and in a
more useable way, than a daily paper or 30-minute newscast can.

Although it's not the Internet, I think the Elections '08
video-on-demand service launched in over 32 million digital cable homes
is the kind of innovative product that can make a real difference in our
civic dialogue. Kyle McSlarrow and I talked about the importance of this
kind of information being available about a year ago. I'm pleased to see
the industry develop this type of public service. I was navigating
around the service and found not only the Presidential debates and
convention coverage, but such information as to how to become a poll
worker and how to find the polling place. Here's another idea to build
on: provide this service not only for the Presidential race, but for
state and local contests as well. Why not let every candidate for mayor
or state representative at least tape a segment about why they should be
elected and make them available for voters to review on demand? And
while we're at it, why not on the Internet as well, for those citizens
who don't have On Demand service? A virtual public square. The
possibilities for our democracy are enormous.

More broadly, as content migrates online, how do we promote the goals
that we, as a society, still care about? How do we educate and protect
our kids? How do we get information about local issues of public
concern? Typically, government regulation has been based on some sort of
licensing relationship or statutory directive. How does that apply to
the online world, where websites not only are not licensed, but they may
not even be ***in*** the United States? What if the market fails to
provide the things we care about---the things we need? How do we advance
those interests in ways that are effective and respectful of
constitutional and jurisdictional boundaries? How do we accomplish our
goals as a free society while making sure we don't impinge the potential
of these life-changing new technologies?

I don't pretend to know the answers, but I do know we need to begin the
dialogue. Going forward, this is not about parsing the provisos and
nuances of the Telecommunications Act of 1996. It's about a serious
national discussion that we're not having. And, for Heaven's sake, let's
not allow this dialogue to get teed up as yet another sterile round in
that tired old debate between "regulation" and "deregulation," which has
pushed so much substantive public discussion off to the sidelines. This
isn't, or shouldn't be, a multiple choice question with only two
take-it-or-leave-it options. All kinds of new direct regulation isn't
going to get this done. Maybe we need a way to address market failures
in a more affirmative way. Take children's educational programming. If
the Internet ends up as broadcasting's eventual home and it isn't
producing enough good, educational programming for children, maybe we
could at least talk about something other than trying to force private
industry to do it. Should we find a way adequately to fund PBS or some
other group that is actually interested in doing the job? Maybe PBSS---a
Public Broadcasting System on Steroids. That can't be done on the cheap.
And Lord knows in this environment there's not a lot of extra cash
floating around. Then again, neither is this a short-term problem. The
point is we need to start talking, start planning, now. I hope when we
do, we'll find lots of creative ideas out there. It is time to get
serious about a future we know is coming, don't you think?

There are so many other questions. We need to be thinking much more
broadly and deeply about where this all is going---and where it
***should*** go. Media's migration to the Internet won't be accomplished
immediately. I think it will take some years---but, then again, change
can come more quickly than we think. And in no case should we believe we
have the luxury of not stepping up to the plate and considering these
questions.

At the end of the day I remain an optimist. I believe that the questions
you and I are grappling with are formative questions in determining how
well our country will fare in this still-new century.  I believe the
issue of a national broadband strategy is beginning to take
on---belatedly but assuredly---a life of its own. And I believe with all
the great talent and resources we have, we can meet the challenge and
create the opportunities that 300 million Americans must and should have
in this competitive century. It's a big challenge, to be sure, but we've
met similar challenges in the past, and I believe we can tackle this one
the same way---with business, government and communities all pulling
together to get the job done.   After all, that's how we built this
country. I look forward to working with you, with my colleagues on the
Commission, with Congress, with states and localities and with all the
diverse set of stakeholders that make up our great country to make it
happen.

One last thing before I say those two words you're maybe ready to hear
by now---"in conclusion"---and that's DTV. Exactly four short months
from today, we are going to flip the switch nationwide and end
full-power analog broadcasting in this country. I've been sounding the
alarm for a long time that we needed to treat this as the national
priority that it is and create a coordinated public-private partnership
at the highest levels. Unfortunately, that didn't happen. So now we're
scrambling in these final weeks and coming across problems that could
have been---should have been---identified and dealt with long ago. But
we are where we are and we have to make the best of it. I spent the day
yesterday trying to spread the word here in Denver, and all my
colleagues are doing the same kind of things in other cities. One other
proposal I've made to Chairman Martin is to find a way to permit
stations to continue to broadcast an analog message for a short period
after February 17. The message would tell consumers who were unprepared
for the transition what happened to their TV signals and what they need
to do to restore service. It could avoid a lot of problems, a lot of
heartache, a lot of consumer backlash.

We did just that in Wilmington and it proved very effective. Over 80% of
the calls from troubled consumers were made to the toll-free number
provided in the analog on-screen message. I think many in the broadcast
community will support this effort. And it's gaining support in Congress
as well. Senator Rockefeller and Congresswoman Capps have introduced
bills calling on the FCC to make this happen. I hope all of you will get
behind this idea too. I haven't met anyone who doesn't think it's a good
idea. But, as you know, Washington can sometimes be the place where a
good idea goes to die. We can't let that happen here---the stakes are
too high.

So thank you again for having me. It's an uncertain time, I know---but
also an enormously exciting one. I believe we can redress the errors and
excesses of the recent past if we're smart about it, and we can harness
the power of all these exciting new technologies and 21^st^ century
communications to expand opportunity for all our people and keep this
great nation of ours the leader it has for so long been. Old models are
giving way, but who better to invent new models than us? And where
better to invent them than right here at home? That's prospect enough to
get me excited. We're not---any of us---bystanders to the story of
America. We're its authors. Let's step up---government, industry, labor,
consumers, academe---and make it happen.

Thank you.