######### REMARKS OF

#### **COMMISSIONER MICHAEL J. COPPS**

**NATIONAL SUMMIT ON BROADBAND DEPLOYMENT**

######### WASHINGTON, DC

**OCTOBER 26, 2001**

After the two intensive days you've spent talking about broadband, there
may not be a lot left to say, so I thought maybe the best thing I can do
is to raise a few questions that perhaps we haven't quite fully answered
yet. My Chairman asked some questions when he was here yesterday and I
thought that worked well. Some of my questions are different. One or two
are similar -- but my answers may be a little different. It reminds me
of that old story about the college professor who gave the same final
exam every year. After a few years of this, a conscientious student
finally came forward and said, "Professor, I just have to tell you
what's going on here, because every year your students find out from the
previous class what questions are going to be on the exam. They're
pulling the wool over your eyes, they're cheating the rest of us, it's
just awful." And the old professor answered, "Son, calm down, don't give
it another worry. It's true that I do ask the same questions each year.
But, you see, I change the answers each year." So there's precedent for
this, and at the FCC precedent is always important.

Before proceeding, let me express thanks to my state colleagues, NARUC
and NECA, for putting together this summit conference that gathers so
many distinguished representatives from government, industry, consumer
groups, and other stakeholders to discuss the challenges facing
broadband and also to craft solutions that will accelerate its
deployment.

**Question Number One: What does broadband deployment have to do with
our nation's economic health?** Surely the rosy scenario of a year ago,
with broadband providing added fuel for the roaring locomotive of high
tech that was taking us forever beyond the cruel world of business
cycles to the Nirvana of continuous economic growth and prosperity --
surely, that view no longer exists. It's been replaced by the new
conventional wisdom: the hyped Communications Revolution was built on
sand and we were all seduced by the over-promises of a highly leveraged
and hopelessly naïve industry. That industry, so the story now goes, is
(1) largely responsible for our present economic distress and (2) it
will be playing no positive role in getting us out of the doldrums we
are presently in.

The rosy scenario was obviously wrong. To my mind, today's pessimism is
equally misguided \-- and infinitely more dangerous. I believe that
providing meaningful access to advanced telecommunications for all our
citizens may well spell the difference between continued stagnation and
economic revitalization. One study estimates that universal broadband
access can add half a trillion dollars to the U.S. economy every year.
Even that may be conservative. Broadband is already becoming key to our
nation's systems of education and commerce and jobs and, therefore, key
to America's future. Broadband is going to be front-and-center in
America's Twenty-first century transformation. Bet on it.

# Question Number Two: Where is the demand? This is the question I hear whenever two or more people get together to talk about broadband. I sat through a conference session recently on the future of broadband where this seemed to be the only question in which people were interested. Now, I would be among the last to suggest that we ignore the realities of the marketplace. I think we sometimes get ourselves into trouble at the Commission when we don't inquire sufficiently, in the first instance, about supply and demand. The rollout of digital television is a case in point; 3G is another. Marketplace reality checks can save us a lot of heartburn. But let's look at the big picture, and the big picture suggests to me that maybe demand is a little less of a problem than some people think and supply may be, in some ways, the greater problem. 

# 

# According to a recent study by JP Morgan and McKinsey, it seems clear that there is *a lot* of demand out there from residential and business end-users. We had a 158% increase in broadband subscribership last year. We added nearly 100,000 new lines every week. We should be adding more. I hear more complaining from those who can't get broadband than I hear "no thank yous" from those who don't want it. And I believe that the technologies for telecommuting, teleeducation, telemedicine and tele-goodness-knows-what will create more than enough demand to put broadband at the forefront of those forces that are going to transform how we live in this century. 

# 

# Question Number Three: Where are those killer applications that are needed to fuel demand? Frankly, I'm not so worried about killer applications. Killer applications are not necessarily the *sine qua non* of every successful new technology. The attraction of broadband is that it has so many useful applications, with many more to come. Some will be, I am certain, dramatic; others will just be incremental steps forward, but that succession of small steps will translate into one giant leap for the industry. 

We could also note, I suppose, that one person's preferred application
may not be another's. Those folks making less than \$20,000 a year have
been shown to be much more likely users of the Internet for purposes of
finding a job, while you and I may find the Net's attraction in video
games or downloading music.

# I do believe that if we had more broadband out there right now, we would be seeing a lot more in the way of online video, telecommuting, interactive education and more. Hardware, software, computer electronics and service provider sales would all be vastly greater. I know about the chicken and egg dilemma, but maybe a more apt analogy is that a train can't carry freight anywhere until the tracks are laid. 

# 

# Anyhow, I think that those who keep asking, "Where are the killer applications?" are going to look like the new century's Luddites when Twenty-second century historians look back on the wonders that will transform the Twenty-first century. Look how far we've come in 20 years and compare what we are able to do now with what we could do then. I would be absolutely dumfounded if America's innovators didn't flood us with new and lifestyle-altering applications in the years just ahead.

# 

**Question Number Four: Can the market get the job of deployment done?**
I've asked just about every businessperson I've had the chance to meet
if he or she was convinced the market could get the job done. Some \-- a
minority \-- answer yes. The others will say that for that last 10 or
15% of Americans, probably not. I haven't seen the business model that
gets us beyond deployment to 85 or 90% of our people. And I would point
out that leaving 10% of our people behind amounts to about 28 million
souls and leaving 15% behind abandons 42 million people. So the issue
has a human face. One of America's foremost CEOs told me last week that
30% of Americans could be beyond deployment; that's 84 million people!
Maybe it's too early to say that we have a Broadband Divide in America
today because we are early in the process. But I will tell you this: If
we get to 2120 and we have 28 or 42 or 84 million people without
broadband, we will have a Broadband Chasm that not only denies our
fellow citizens of a precious right but denies our country of
critically-needed economic growth.

# 

# One of my overriding goals as an FCC Commissioner is to help bring the best, most accessible, and cost-effective telecommunications system in the world to our people -- and by that I mean *all* of our people. I am committed to that personally. More germanely, it's the law of the land. Section 706 of the 1996 Act charges the FCC and each State commission to encourage the deployment of advanced telecommunications capabilities to all Americans on a reasonable and timely basis. Each and every citizen of this great country should have access to the wonders of telecommunications -- whether they live in rural areas, on tribal lands, or in our inner cities; whether they have limited incomes or disabilities; whether they are schoolchildren or rural health care providers. Those who have access win; those who do not, lose. I don't think it exaggerates much to characterize access to telecommunications in this modern age as a civil right. 

We need a serious national dialogue about this. Rather than endlessly
debating what the exact definition of broadband should be, let's try to
define the future of America.

Let's look at what other countries are doing. We don't pay nearly enough
attention to this. It's not that we need to emulate what others with
different traditions and cultures and economies may be doing, but let's
be serious enough to at least look at what they're doing and see if
there may not be a lesson or two there for us. We do know this: most
industrialized countries do have national plans for broadband
deployment, and we do not.

# Let's look at what some communities right here at home are doing. I've heard some people say that the most un-businesslike thing we could do would be to have government helping build broadband infrastructure. But isn't it curious that in some communities in America, there is so much unmet demand that they are already taxing themselves to get broadband deployed, and that they are actually deploying it? 

**Question Number Five: Is government involvement in
infrastructure-building really a Halloween horror?** Put another way, if
indeed rolling out the infrastructure of the Information Age is a
central driver toward America's future, is there something to be said
for having a serious national discussion about the proper involvement of
government in the enterprise? Historically, business and government have
worked closely together in just about every great economic
transformation this country has undertaken. From the days of our
earliest land policies to constructing the roads and canals and ports
and harbors of the early Nineteenth century to the building of the
Transcontinental railroads and, more recently, the Interstate highway
system, there has more often than not in our history been a critical
role for government. Indeed, one could hazard that there has almost
always been such a role when there is a truly critical nationwide
infrastructure need. It's already been there in communications, too, in
the building of our telephone infrastructure in the early 1900s.
Following the invention of the telephone, many communities, especially
those in rural areas, were very often left behind \-- more isolated than
before and with comparatively fewer economic opportunities. In response,
although not nearly so quickly as could have been hoped, we began to
tackle the problem. The public and private sectors went to work to bring
basic telephone access to rural communities. We're not all the way there
yet \-- just visit some of our tribal lands if you need proof \-- but
for most Americans this access fostered economic development. Having
access to ***advanced*** communications and information will be just as
important in the 21^st^ century as access to basic telephone service was
in the 20^th^ century.

Some will argue that broadband infrastructure doesn't rise to the level
of developmental importance I have ascribed to it. But don't you think
that we should at least talk about it? I must say, however, that my
initial take is that broadband networks are indeed the roads, the
canals, the railroads and the interstate highways of the Information
Age. All of these were built with the public and private sectors working
together to provide Americans with the infrastructure we needed in order
to prosper. History doesn't necessarily repeat itself, but there are
enough resemblances to merit our attention.

Question Number Six: Shouldn't business lead the way? Of course it
should. While some towns and other areas will continue to move ahead and
build their own broadband infrastructure, the private sector can, should
and will be the lead locomotive here. As Chairman Powell noted here
yesterday in a somewhat different context, government involvement can
take many forms, from good regulation to barrier removal and investment
incentives to outright subsidies such as our forebears used to build
those cross-country railroads. The important concept here is not the
exact form of interaction, but the more essential concept of
cooperation, of private sector-public sector partnership. We must build
public sector-private sector partnerships to get this job done. I am a
believer, a true believer, in this kind of cooperative endeavor.

In the world of global commerce and competition that I focused on during
the past eight years in the Commerce Department, I quickly realized that
neither the government nor the private sector alone could make much
headway in tackling the challenges we faced. Working together we could,
and did, accomplish much more. I am convinced that there is significant
room for just this kind of cooperative effort in addressing the major
challenges of broadband deployment.

We must recognize of course that business plays the critical role in
innovation and investment. We should rely upon the market, rather than
upon government regulation whenever possible to accelerate broadband
deployment. The role of government is not to pick winners and losers
among competing technologies. Indeed, different broadband access
technologies work better in different locations and circumstances. Our
role here is to eliminate barriers to competition so that companies have
the incentive to invest and innovate, and to regulate with clarity,
transparency and predictability so that business is not asked to operate
with a question mark. If we are successful, America's consumers will
have the opportunity to choose the technology and service that best
meets their needs.

I don't pretend to have the answers to even these few questions I have
raised this afternoon. Nor am I saying these are the only questions we
ought to be asking. There are others I would propound if we had more
time; more importantly, there are no doubt many other, and perhaps
better, questions that this audience would propound. I'm merely saying
we need to ask basic questions. We need to avoid knee-jerk reactions to
one another's suggestions. We need to put ideologies aside and try to
get a handle on meeting one of the most important challenges we face as
a country today, a challenge made even more important by our current
economic sluggishness and, more recently, by the terrible tragedies of
September 11.

I'm an optimist. I believe we can do it. I believe we will do it.
Together. We will find the ways to use our broadband and digital tools
to open even further the doors of economic opportunity for all our
citizens. Each of you is a player in this great pursuit. To quote my
hero, it might just be this audience's "rendezvous with destiny."

Thank you.