Copps at State of the Net

Speaking to the Congressional Internet Caucus' State of the Net Conference, Federal Communications Commission member Michael Copps warned that simply because the US has generally met its infrastructure challenges before that it will rise to the occasion concerning broadband.

"[W]ouldn't it be an awful irony if we short-change the present opportunity? If this liberating, dynamic technology that can make so many things better, ends by creating more and even wider divides in this country going forward than we have had in the past? If the Internet, rather than opening doors of opportunity for all, becomes yet another province controlled by, and serving primarily, the elite and affluent while the rest fall even farther behind? If, instead of closing the divides-digital and otherwise-that this technology can so clearly help us close, we end up instead with more and wider divides between us?"

He said the US must no longer tolerate digital divides and must continue to maintain an open Internet.