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4 posts tagged internet
What kind of Internet do you want?
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Up For Auction: The Internet
What You Can Do:
If you care about ensuring that the Internet is built out in unserved and underserved communities, and that people of color and the poor have affordable access to an open Internet:
Contact the FCC (202) 418-1000
E-mail julius.genachowski@fcc.gov or mignon.clyburn@fcc.gov
Tell them that the current regulatory framework is not a solution. If there is to be any hope of closing the digital divide, the FCC must reclassify broadband as a Title II service.
Why You Should Do It:
According to yesterday’s Washington Post, Chairman Genachowski is buckling under industry pressure to side against open Internet protections. The Post cites several sources within the FCC who say that Genachowski is leaning toward keeping the current regulatory framework for broadband services in place.
But the current regulatory framework is unacceptable, because an appeals court ruled in April that the FCC lacked authority over Internet access issues. The court was simply responding to a problem of the agencys own making: Under the Bush administration, it undercut its own authority over the Internet by classifying broadband as a Title I “information service” rather than a Title II “telecommunications service.” The Obama FCC can now fix this bad history by simply reversing the decisions made during the Bush era.
To close the digital divide, Chairman Genachowski must do this. Without new authority, the FCC cant carry out the most important aspects of the National Broadband Plan. It also cant protect the open Internet, one of the top items on the Obama administrations technology agenda. According to the Post, however, Genachowski intends to do nothing.
Should Genachowski opt NOT to reassert the FCCs authority, he would effectively hand AT&T, Comcast, and other corporations the power to interfere with Internet content and undermine Net Neutrality for good. He would betray his earlier pledges to be a champion of the open Internet. The FCC got us into this mess. Now Genachowskis FCC must get us out of it.
A Public Interest Internet Agenda
Download a full copy of A Public Interest Internet Agenda here
See a list of all endorsing organizations and sign on as an endorser here
Executive Summary
Connecting our entire nation via high-speed broadband will bring remarkable economic, social, cultural, personal, and other benefits. Robust economic development, job creation, improved health care at lower costs, enhanced educational opportunities, increased homeland security and public safety, reduced energy consumption and pollution, a reinvigorated democracy and more open government – these are just a few of the benefits that will flow from our nation linking its entire population to the Internet at broadband speed. Recognizing these benefits, many of America’s global competitors have already embarked on aggressive national broadband strategies to deploy fast, high-quality broadband. But the quality of U.S. broadband access is lagging. According to the most recent statistics (December 2008) available from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), the United States ranks just 15th among developed nations in broadband penetration.
