Experts Encourage Government To Expand Broadband Access
A new report on Friday concluded that the nation needs to give the same urgency to making sure all Americans have broadband access as the Eisenhower administration did in building an interstate highway system a half-century ago, The Associated Press reported.
Concerns have been expressed over whether the news industry’s financial woes will make for a less educated citizenry and whether the government should prop up independent journalists, according to the Knight Commission on the Information Needs of Communities in a Democracy.
Two former FCC chairmen, newspaper publishers, a top Google executive, the NAACP president and a former CNN president are all members of the commission.
The report stated that a free flow of information "is as vital to the healthy functioning of communities as clean air, safe streets, good schools and public health," and that it’s time for leaders to give it a higher priority.
It compared today’s issues with the Eisenhower administration’s building of roads and the Lincoln administration’s effort to build the transcontinental railroad.
The commission said it’s vital to get as many people plugged in to the Internet as possible, considering how much business is done on the Web, including the process of applying for jobs. Over a third of Americans do not subscribe to broadband services and, in many rural communities, broadband is not even available.
Alberto Ibarguen, former Miami Herald publisher and president and CEO of the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, said you have to have access in order to be socially first class, economically first class and politically first class.
But Ibarguen said the Obama administration appears to be making the effort a priority.
Michael Powell, a former Federal Communications Commission chairman and member of the Knight group, said he would like to see the FCC be less entangled in regulation and take a more active role in providing government incentives to broadband and cable television service providers so they quickly wire areas that are underserved.
The commission also said funding should be provided so public libraries can make Internet access and media literacy programs readily available until all broadband needs are met.
Independent journalism also plays a vital watchdog role and needs to be encouraged, according to the commission.
The commission also encouraged government to increase support for newsgathering at public radio and television stations and explore how it could provide incentives for new business models that offer quality journalism.
However, it did not rule on whether private-sector journalists should get public subsidies, an idea that would test the historical tradition of journalists’ independence from government.
Some hoped the report would not be misinterpreted as a call for government to replace local reporting done by newspapers as newspapers retrench. ABC News President David Westin, who was not on the commission, said there are already new businesses emerging to try and fill that role.
People should be less concerned about the format in which information is provided and more concerned that people are available to provide it, Powell noted.
Westin said it’s difficult enough getting calls from people in government complaining about the way things are reported. "But if the person himself who is getting the call is either directly or indirectly employed by government, that could be dangerous," he added.
The government was urged to operate with as much transparency as it can in coming years, offering low-cost access to public records and making social data readily available, the commission said.
It also endorsed efforts to provide communities with information in as many forms possible, including mobile phones. It also suggested each community should have an Internet hub – a Web site that provides links to many forms of local information.
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