Remarks of Chairman Pai at Hillsdale College in Michigan

At the dawn of the commercial Internet, policymakers faced a fundamental choice. Should we regulate this new thing called the Internet like a lumbering utility? Do we want it to be as innovative as a water company? Do we want it to work as fast as the DMV? Or do we want the free market to guide its development and allow it to scale? In a historic and bipartisan decision in 1996, President Bill Clinton and a Republican Congress went the latter route. They made it our national policy that the Internet should be “unfettered by federal and state regulation.” But in 2015, a partisan majority at the Federal Communications Commission abandoned this successful approach and chose a different path. The Internet wasn’t broken, but the FCC imposed on the Internet heavy-handed rules anyway—rules developed in the 1930s. Thankfully, in December 2017, the FCC changed course. We’ve restored the bipartisan, well-established rules that will both protect consumers and promote infrastructure investment.

As it turns out, you, too, will likely graduate from college in what will be a key inflection point in American life. There are many candidates for the Next Big Thing, but perhaps the biggest for your generation will be artificial intelligence, or AI. Today, the AI of science fiction is finally becoming reality. is a key point I wanted to make to you today: Classical liberal arts training will only be more valuable in this digital future, not less. What I’m getting at is that your school’s unique commitment to a classical liberal arts education—to “understanding the good, the true, and the beautiful”— isn’t just excellent preparation for life. It’s preparation for working in the digital age.