Google, others call for new broadband, energy policies

The US government may be poised to reverse course on its market-only approach to rolling out broadband and a smart electricity grid to all corners of the country, advocates said Thursday. With a Democratic Congress and a Democratic and tech-savvy president in Barack Obama, the upcoming months will be the time to push for government involvement in building network infrastructure, said Ben Scott, policy director of Free Press. In recent years, some conservatives and broadband providers have called on the government to stay out of broadband rollout, saying such "industrial-policy" intervention could lead to a heavily regulated industry, with little competition and high prices. "I'm about to use some words that have been profane in this town for the last eight years," Scott said at a Google-sponsored forum on broadband and electricity policy. "We need an industrial policy." If policy makers agree that universal broadband and a higher broadband adoption rate are crucial for the U.S. economy, "then we're going to have to take some really aggressive measures to get there," Scott said.