Analysis: Tom Wheeler's FCC Legacy

Ultimately, Federal Communications Commission Chairman Tom Wheeler had a clear sense of his mission, which was to make sure that broadband—the transformative technology of this century—was available to all—which he combined with a distrust of the marketplace. Chairman Wheeler is a famed student of history, which includes the struggles to get electricity to the farm wives still beating clothes on rocks well into the last century. Some can fault—and many in the industry do—how he chose to accomplish his task, but it is hard to argue against trying to get broadband to everyone.

Chairman Wheeler signaled from day one that he viewed the FCC as a consumer-focused agency and that they, not industry, were his constituency. But again, media companies argue that they serve consumers too and could serve them better freed from some of the regulations Wheeler imposed or refused to un-impose. He also made it clear that he viewed edge providers like Google and Facebook, as creative forces for good in need of protecting against Internet Service Providers and their monopoly conduit into the home.