Consumer Choices Key to Defining Section 706 Advanced Telecom Capability, Jamison Says
The FCC should focus on consumer choices in defining advanced telecom capability under Section 706 of the Telecom Act, blogged Mark Jamison, American Enterprise Institute visiting scholar and former Trump transition team member. He noted that the FCC's recent notice…
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of inquiry on whether ATC is being adequately deployed (see 1708110034) asked how to define the broadband-like capability. "Don't customers define broadband every day? Why not simply watch what they do?" he wrote Wednesday. Most of those commenting on the NOI "will be pundits, special interests, and companies with skin in the game," he wrote. "Their self-interests will influence their input. Maybe the FCC is asking the wrong people." He said the FCC should gather data on what customers are buying and correlate it with factors such as geography, demographics and local business economics to identify problems and changing patterns; it could then do a cost-benefit analysis to craft solutions through a reverse auction of USF subsidies. Commissioner Mignon Clyburn voiced concern Aug. 8 about the NOI's desire for comment "on whether the Commission should establish a speed benchmark based on the speed tier consumers are subscribing to" (see 1708080070).