Michael Copps: “We Should Be Ashamed Of Ourselves” For State of Broadband In The US

A group of Internet industry executives and politicians came together to look back on the Telecommunications Act of 1996, and to do a little crystal-ball gazing about the future of broadband regulation in the United States.

Former Federal Communications Commission Commissioner Michael Copps was among the presenters, and he had sharp words for the audience about the “insanity” of the current wave of merger mania in the telecom field and the looming threats of losing net neutrality regulation. Unlike many of the other presenters at the conference, Copps, was anything but retrospective when he stood to speak.

“I’m not here to celebrate,” he began, “I’m here to advocate.” And the landscape he laid out is indeed not one to cheer for. He led off by agreeing with the several executive speakers that true competition is the way of the future, and the best way to serve consumers.

“But we haven’t given competition the chance it needs,” he continued, before referring to how poorly US broadband compares on the global stage. “We have fallen so far short that we should be ashamed of ourselves. We should be leading, and we’re not. We need to get serious about broadband, we need to get serious about competition, we need to get serious about our country.”

Broadband competition is indeed scarce in the United States, and the looming wave of “merger mania” is unlikely at best to improve the situation for anyone.