Notes from the Broadband Breakfast Club

It was enough to send shivers down the spine. On September 15, at a breakfast gathering sponsored by Broadband Census, Comcast Senior Vice President, Joe Waz, declared that the government got it “exactly right” in the current broadband stimulus program. Waz was referring specifically to the focus on getting broadband to the last 8% that remain “unserved”, and to stimulating adoption overall. Joanne Hovis, President-elect of the National Association of Telecommunications Officers and Advisors countered the Waz statement by pointing out that much of the reason cable now reaches 92% of the population is that local governments mandated that carriers provide service to un-profitable as well as profitable regions in exchange for their franchises. She also called for lowering the barriers for municipalities to provide broadband services to fill the gaps left by commercial providers. Asking for a level playing field, Hovis pointed out that despite the setbacks that many municipal Wi-Fi projects have suffered, the next generation of fiber-based projects could work.