Wednesday the FCC gave a sneak preview of its National Broadband Plan. I didn’t listen in on the session but I’ve checked out their materials online. So far I like a lot of what I see.

Broadband is part of the solution to the nation’s greatest challenges – that’s my favorite line from the presentation (Slide 30). The rest of the presentation supports the idea that broadband is a solution – not a problem – and we just need to tweak policies to ensure that we’re all part of the solution.

The FCC seems to recognize that what the federal government can do today (in a not-so-great economy) is to create policies that promote broadband access and adoption. To start they mention right-of-way, dig once, universal service fund, and spectrum deployment issues as well as suggestions for change that should help promote wider deployment.

I’ve been thinking about the universal service funds (USF) since I read a cautionary tale of USF in the Daily Yonder the other day. The authors (Sharon Strover and Nick Muntean) are wary that USP will favor “proprietary, privately-held infrastructures over net neutrality and shared infrastructure with multiple ownership types”. Yet as my colleague Bill Coleman points out in a comment to that article, “funds have enabled rural cooperatives and privately held independent telephone companies to expand their networks to reach their far flung customer base first with telephone service over party lines and now increasingly with fiber to the home networks offering voice, video and data services.”

There are (at least) two sides to each story and I think the FCC has outlined them in their preliminary sneak peek. That’s great but still leaves room for decision making. That being said it’s nice to see that so many sides have been heard. Here’s the outline for the presentation:

1. USF
2. Infrastructure access
3. Spectrum
4. Tribal lands
5. Set-top boxes
6. Consumer information
7. Media
8. Adoption
9. Accessibility
10. Public safety (Other national purposes in January)

Again my interest was strongest in the first five items because I feel as if that’s where the FCC has the greatest control – at least until/unless there is money to be spent in the others areas.