Ten Years Ago... FCC's 1st Bandwidth Forum

TEN YEARS AGO...

FCC Bandwidth Forum
[SOURCE: Federal Communications Commission 1/23/1997]
Ten years ago, then-FCC Chairman Reed Hundt hosted the first bandwidth forum at the Commission. He said, "[P]ublic policy is becoming increasingly important to the emerging industry of bandwidth delivery, if I can call it that. But part of the purpose of this forum is to define what the interactions are between conventional telecommunications public policy and the bandwidth issues that increasingly are preoccupying so many of the industries of the world. Bandwidth delivery for data, now as never before, is an important part of the functions of our traditional telecommunications industry." Chairman Hundt pointed out that George Gilder had recently suggested an end to spectrum auctions and that the Economist had declared that "time and distance have no meaning in telecommunications." Chairman Hundt also noted a conversation between Microsoft's Bill gates and Intel's Andy Grove: "As exciting as the Internet is, though, there is one big problem: telecommunications bandwidth," Grove said. And Gates responded, "Bandwidth bottlenecks. No question. That's the biggest obstacle to where we would like to take the PC." See Chairman Hundt's opening remarks at the URL below.
http://www.fcc.gov/Speeches/Hundt/spreh703.html

* Read a transcript of the forum at http://www.fcc.gov/Reports/970123.txt