FCC Sends National Broadband Plan to Congress
March 16, 2010
Plan Details Actions for Connecting Consumers, Economy with 21st Century Networks
Washington, D.C. — Today, the Federal Communications Commission delivered to Congress a
National Broadband Plan setting an ambitious agenda for connecting all corners of the nation
while transforming the economy and society with the communications network of the future –
robust, affordable Internet.
“The National Broadband Plan is a 21st century roadmap to spur economic growth and
investment, create jobs, educate our children, protect our citizens, and engage in our democracy,”
said Chairman Julius Genachowski. “It’s an action plan, and action is necessary to meet the
challenges of global competitiveness, and harness the power of broadband to help address so
many vital national issues.”
“In every era, America must confront the challenge of connecting the nation anew,” said Blair
Levin, Executive Director of the Omnibus Broadband Initiative at the FCC. “Above all else, the
plan is a call to action to meet that challenge for our era. If we meet it, we will have networks,
devices, and applications that create new solutions to seemingly intractable problems.”
Closing Broadband Gaps
Titled “Connecting America: The National Broadband Plan,” the Plan found that while
broadband access and use have increased over the past decade, the nation must do much more to
connect all individuals and the economy to broadband’s transformative benefits. Nearly 100
million Americans lack broadband at home today, and 14 million Americans do not have access
to broadband even if they want it. Only 42 percent of people with disabilities use broadband at
home, while as few as 5 percent of people living on Tribal lands have access. Meanwhile, the
cost of digital exclusion for the student unable to access the Internet to complete a homework
assignment, or for the unemployed worker who can’t search for a job online, continues to grow.
Other gaps threaten America’s global competitiveness. A looming shortage of wireless spectrum
could impede U.S. innovation and leadership in popular wireless mobile broadband services.
More useful applications, devices, and content are needed to create value for consumers. And
the nation has failed to harness broadband’s power to transform delivery of government services,
health care, education, public safety, energy conservation, economic development, and other
national priorities.
America’s 2020 Broadband Vision
The Plan’s call for action over the next decade includes the following goals and
recommendations:
- Connect 100 million households to affordable 100-megabits-per-second service, building the world’s largest market of high-speed broadband users and ensuring that new jobs and businesses are created in America.
- Affordable access in every American community to ultra-high-speed broadband of at least 1 gigabit per second at anchor institutions such as schools, hospitals, and military installations so that America is hosting the experiments that produce tomorrow’s ideas and industries.
- Ensure that the United States is leading the world in mobile innovation by making 500 megahertz of spectrum newly available for licensed and unlicensed use.
- Move our adoption rates from roughly 65 percent to more than 90 percent and make sure that every child in America is digitally literate by the time he or she leaves high school.
- Bring affordable broadband to rural communities, schools, libraries, and vulnerable populations by transitioning existing Universal Service Fund support from yesterday’s analog technologies to tomorrow’s digital infrastructure.
- Promote competition across the broadband ecosystem by ensuring greater transparency, removing barriers to entry, and conducting market-based analysis with quality data on price, speed, and availability.
- Enhance the safety of the American people by providing every first responder with access to a nationwide, wireless, interoperable public safety network.
The Plan was mandated by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act in February 2009 and
produced by an FCC task force that set new precedents for government openness, transparency,
and rigor. Information for the plan was gathered in 36 public workshops, 9 field hearing, and 31
public notices that produced 75,000 pages of public comments. The debate went online with 131
blogposts that triggered 1,489 comments; 181 ideas on IdeaScale garnering 6,100 votes; 69,500
views on YouTube; and 335,000 Twitter followers. The task force augmented this voluminous
record with independent research and data-gathering.
About half of the Plan’s recommendations are addressed to the FCC, while the remainder are for
Congress, the Executive Branch, state and local government, working closely with the private
and nonprofit sectors.
Read the National Broadband Plan: http://download.broadband.gov/plan/nationalbroadband-
plan.pdf
An Online Support Team Is The Secret To Keeping Your New Year’s Resolution
January 19, 2010
MyMightyTeam.com is a new free site for getting support to keep your resolutions
NEW YORK, Dec. 16 /PRNewswire/ — In one corner, a piece of exercise equipment that soon became a clothes hanger. On a shelf, a pile of diet books. On a hard drive, the first few pages of a novel. Chances are your home or office contains these or other remnants from failed New Year’s resolutions. What will make the difference this year?
“The secret to sticking with a New Year’s Resolution is having the support of other people,” says Joan Greco, founder and CEO of My Mighty Team. “You’ve got to have a support team – people who know your plan, will cheer you on when you do it, and bug you when you don’t.”
MyMightyTeam.com is a new free online service for connecting you with a support team to help you make sure that this year you keep your New Year’s resolutions. On the site, you can easily and quickly invite friends, family or co-workers to join your team and help you make progress. If you prefer, you can use MIGHTY’s Teammate Finder to suggest like-minded people to work with.
Here's how My Mighty Team works:
-- First, declare your resolution and set a goal for the week or, even
better, for the day, such as getting to the gym; keeping a food diary;
starting a business plan; or writing the first chapter of your novel.
-- Second, do it!
-- Third, report back to your team before the deadline.
You can celebrate monthly milestones with your team, and rant about the challenges along the way. You can post evidence of your progress, whether it’s a photo of a slimmer self, or the first draft for a new business plan. The teams are private and invitation-only, so what’s shared with your team stays with your team. See more about how MIGHTY helps you Keep Your New Year’s Resolution.
My Mighty Team boasts communication tools that let you and your teammates blog, text, and get updates through email or cell phones. In addition to the private team pages, public pages on the most popular resolutions (such as “I Will Exercise More,” “I Will Quit Smoking,” “I Will Find a Job,” or “I Will Write”), rank top resources and let the larger MIGHTY community share tips and experiences.
My Mighty Team is the ultimate resource for helping people accomplish their goals and live their dreams. Use My Mighty Team’s free service to start a business, lose weight, quit smoking, write a novel – or achieve any other goal you can dream up. Founder Joan Greco dreamed up My Mighty Team after working on the most venerable small team in the nation: the United States Supreme Court. A graduate of Harvard Law School and an editor of the Harvard Law Review, Greco clerked for Justice Sandra Day O’Connor.
