organization that is capable of passing laws in accordance with the powers given them by the constitution of the united states. that is the whole point of the constitution. >> today at 7:00 p.m. eastern on c-span. this week, our guest is blair levin, executive director of the fcc national broadband plan. x and the opposition to the plan has been muted. are you surprised? >> i have been happy with the response to the plan. it is a comprehensive document. even though a lot of people

disagree with elements, to have a great appreciation for the work that went into it. they have appreciation for the professionalism. it is data-driven. it is analytic. it does not react to things that do not exist in the real world. it tries to lay out a path that is a visionary and practical. i think there was a great appreciation for that. third, i think there was an understanding and appreciation that is being transparent about what the government agenda should be. there are lots of details that inappropriate for the planning process. they are appropriate for the government as it starts to implement those things. we were very pleased that a wide variety of folks from all sectors gave us a lot of praise. we certainly appreciate it.

>> one of the critiques was from nicholas johnson, a former fcc commissioner. he wrote that as a result, the national broadband plan offers consumers no hope the protection -- i disagree. there are pro-competitive things in the plan. i think he completely ignores a number of recommendations. we are seeing that while wireless is not a perfect competitor, it does provide an alternative way that forces a market-based mechanism of putting price constraints on certain fixed offerings. we also think he ignored some other things we're doing to bea pro-competitive.

while we have received at criticism from some, yesterday there was not a single member of the house to criticize us for not being aggressive enough. there were a number of members of the house who said that we went to fo far. i find that criticism not to be valid in my view. >> 95% of people have broadband. 5% do not. the stimulus is not going to them. that is what torks people off. 95% of us have it with the private sector.

now we want to take over another 1/6 of the economy, moving the information age. we're not going to get a surprise from the chairman this time in the hearing because it is here. some have suggested a second approach in which the fcc would implement certain recommendations under the title two authority. what have the hearing. let's have the debate -- let's have the hearing. let's have the debate. it is not working in rural america. we've spent millions of dollars. the money is not going there. >> he is from illinois. your response? >> first of all, he appears to be critical of something that was not part of the plan. that is how the stimulus dollars are being spent. our focus on the plan was to address his concerns. there are 7 million american

homes that do not have access to broadband. we have a detailed, comprehensive reform package for universal service. it's been about $8 billion per year. it is not spending in a way that is likely to connect those homes. we figured out a way to shift dollars around to do that without raising the assessment that consumers currently pay on their telephone bill for universal service. >> what about his critique from switching from title 1 title two? >> the current law was adopted in 1996. there is a distinction between the regulation of traditional telephone companies under title two. their advance services under title 1. this is a complicated legal argument. there are important issues. the plan did not get into that. we took the view that our

purpose in the plan was to develop a data-driven set of recommendations that we thought were important for the government to take action on. the thing he is absolutely wrong about is the notion of taking over 1/6 of the economy. we're not proposing that in any way. we looked at the leaders of government --levers of government and ask the question of if we were doing it in ways to help the broadband ecosystem or in ways that were inefficient. we found that there were enormous efficiencies that needed to be corrected. the plan itself does not go into the titles. we were focused on concrete, practical recommendations to help make the country better in

terms of broadband performance. the proper place to address the jurisdiction question is indeed follow up rulemaking implementation. >> another criticism that came up yesterday during the hearing was that the plan could lead to mandates for unbundling the same way their mandates on voice services in the 1990's. is that you understand the plan to be suggesting? >> there are things under the law that require incumbent telephone companies to share facilities in various ways. there are a lot of different proposals for doing additional kinds of unbundling or requiring incumbents to share facilities. there is a broad spectrum of those things.

we want to primarily drive private investment. one thing that is really driven private investment in the past is the availability of spectrum. we were focused on the issues that were very important. how do you drive investment to those areas in rural america that are not getting it? we have various things for universal service performance. whether opportunities for competition, to what extent do you do that? it is traditional bottleneck analysis. there are things in the plan where we talk about how to get into the context of competition. a lot of those proceedings are very specific and more. for specific rule making. we have a competitive agenda. some things are already subject to existing proceedings. the should determine those

proceedings. -- the fcc should determine those proceedings. set top boxes is where we think we need to change the rules to drive investment, innovation, and american leadership in integrating traditional video with internet services. >> it seems as though the plan has a vision of trying to get these to be platforms people might use to get on the internet. it seems as though a looott of e low-adopting population is relying on mobile screens. do you think people do not want to buy a physical computer? do you think having the set top

box is going to be a real attraction for them if they are not interested in buying a computer? >> there are various barriers to adoption. 10 years ago, there were not as significant from a public policy perspective. as we move to a world where if you want your kids to be able to do their homework as well as other kids, they better have access to the internet at home. that is the primary tool that kids use now for doing homework. if you want to search for a job, the internet is the primary tool. if you want to train for a job, increasingly job training is being done over broadband. it is important to make sure it is available on all screens. there's a difference and we can do on a mobile device and on a larger screen. we're cognizant of that. we want to drive everywhere. this approach was different from other national plans. we want to drive the velocity of commerce across all the different parts. it is not just increasing network performance. it is about enabling better devices.

we focused on the set top box because we looked at mobile devices and general desktop devices. it did not seem to be a problem. there's a lot of competition and innovation. the set top box market was very different in terms of the competitive structure. the big thing is the applications. increasingly, broadband applications are going to be the way this country and all countries address practical problems. we think there are a lot of ways that our plan is trying to get the country on the right side of history. it is a call to action to follow where the macro technology and a macro markets are going. one way to do that is to make sure that we have applications that help us to address health care and education, that improve the performance of public safety

and government generally. that is a really important part. it has to be done across all devices. there have to be improvements on all networks. it has to be a focus on applications to help drive our national purposes. >> another issue brought up at the hearing yesterday had to do with television broadcasters. there's a proposal in the plan to voluntarily return some of their spectrum. senator dingell did not seem to buy that would be voluntary. there was resistance from other members of congress if they do not go along with what you are proposing. does the fcc had enough carrots and sticks in its arsenal to accomplish this without congress? >> the fcc does need the congress to give them the tools to help it in the reallocation

of the spectrum. this is one part of the plan that i am most proud of. it puts us on the right side of history. one of the fundamental lessons we learned in looking at it was the importance of spectrum and the difficulty of correcting if you do not have enough. if it turns out he did not have enough inputs, the market will create them. no market can create more spectrum. the problem is in the reallocation based on market proportion. i used to be in the wall street analysis business. if you had an investment company that was forced to invest money based on the way it invested 60 years ago, the company would go out of business right away. you cannot do that. you have to react to what is going on today. the single visibiggest capital investment the federal government makes each year is

how it allocates spectrum. in many ways, spectrum is not been allocated on the basis of market or technology or consumer demand, but rather on the basis of history. the fcc needs tools such as giving incumbents incentives to reallocate spectrum when that is the market demand. if you look at where technology, market, and advertising trends are going, if the fcc is given those tools, there will be a significant number broadcasters who volunteer. it is a relatively small number of broadcasters in a small number of cities that can create a huge upside for the entire american economy as well as creating an upside for themselves. that is what we are asking for. i think once that is well understood, congress will feel that they should give us the tools.

>> should broadcasters be compensated for the spectrum? >> we think they should be. one interesting thing to look at is to think of it this way. this is really about how broadcasters to give the appropriate assets -- view the. . assets. they will all have a different view of that. if you are cbs affiliates, if you want to be able to do the super bowl and high-definition. that requires more spectrum and if you are running home shopping networks. the cbs affiliate in new york is worth a lot more than the #25 broadcaster in new york. interestingly, the spectrum is worth exactly the same. we think the incentive will allow the number 25 broadcaster in new york and was probably not doing local news to have a different incentive structure.

the key is how we allow them to do that. it is about all the spectrums. the government spectrums, mobile satellite spectrums. how we enable the market to send signals about the relative worth of spectrum's versus the existing models. >> we've heard all along and what has been improved over the many years. we've heard about cooper's alaw on spectrum efficiency. the government still has about 50% of the spectrum? >> not all spectrums are equal. it requires sophisticated analysis. >> how much of the beachfront is still available? >> our point of view is you have to look at this overtime on a dynamic basis. when the various recommendations about different spectrums.

you need to look at the tools that send the signals. i was at the fcc during implementation. it taught me cannot really know exactly what is going to happen in the world. you have to be able to course correct. john malone did a great speech in 1992 and december where he accurately predicted that the forces of microprocessors, digitization, and fiber optics would lead to a brand new, exciting world. he got that exactly right. he went on to say the brand new world would be 500 channels. that is exactly wrong. if john malone got it wrong, we all can. there were students at the university of illinois who were inventing mosaic that became netscape and an infant -- infinite number of channels.

part of what we say in this plan is that there are certain things we need to get right. we need to get the spectrum right. we need to get universal service right. the market is going to do all kinds of things we cannot predict. we need to make sure that the inputs are appropriately available and then let the market worked its wonders. one of the most important things in the plan is understanding the barriers to using these tools to solve a number of problems. we go into what is preventing the best courses in the world from being offered to all students everywhere in terms of education. what is preventing our kids from going around with 25 pounds of books and probably out of date instead of using the most up-to- date information on ebooks? there are barriers to use.

you will see a lot more uses of it. the important thing to understand this is a call to action that understands we will have to course correct. there will be many developments we cannot anticipate now. >> our guest is blair levin, executive director of the broadband initiative at the fcc. lynn stanto is our guestn reporter. part of the goals in the 1990's was to make broadband the new national median. was that the purpose in the 1990's? >> he is a much better historian than i am. i may become an historian later in life. i will not do now. what is certainly true is the understanding that every country needs a common medium

with certain characteristics. there were a number of decisions we made back then that a useful -- that were useful to the internet and broadband. it is really the market driving this. the market is speaking. i was reading something this morning that said in early 2000 when asked if he would rather give up television or the internet, 80% said they would rather give up the internet. today, the majority people say that they would rather give up television. if you look at the under 45 crop, it is overwhelming. that is consumers and the market speaking. it is important we make sure that broadband is widely available. we must make sure it provides a common medium for specific purposes -- civic purposes. it is important to let the market determine that. >> one of the ways the plan

proposes making broadband widely available is for licensees to provide free or low-cost wireless service. it knowledge is it that telecom services have not taken off in the past. -- it acknowledges that telecom services have not taken off without in the past. is the fcc going to identify the business model? will it be the licensees? will there be opportunity for pilot, test, or proof of concept for the business model before someone commits money in an auction? >> we republic that the fcc did not have the data it needed to do certain things. there are certain recommendations that we felt we could not make without more sufficient data. but we were very concrete about

the data we had. the fcc needs to be up-to-date with the information it is getting. no business would commit billions of dollars in various problems unless it had been market tested. there are very concrete recommendations about pilot projects. where there had been sufficient testing, we said we can make concrete recommendations to reform universal service. it is not a recommendation of the plan. we were saying that we need to revise the way we think about how we provide broadband to low income individuals. there are various programs like the lifeline program where we need to run some pilots to determine how best to do it for broadband. one should think about whether

there is a spectrum-based approach that might be a complementary service or do other kinds of things. we know we have sufficient data to be able to make that a concrete recommendation. there is a valid question about whether that business model would work. we want to be both visionary and practical. we were raising that is something that ought to be considered alongside other things that we could more competently recommend. >> blair levin, why in the proposal to call for contiguous, nation wide band for unlicensed use? >> that is a great question. one thing we focused on was what we know and how we can make sure there is an opportunity for technology development. we have seen great success with

various unlicensed technologies in terms of improving performance of broadband networks. we think there are various business models that compete. they're licensed and unlicensed business models. they tend to do different things. we think having spectrum is so important because you need to have enough so the licensed providers can do what they need to do. there's also an opportunity for unlicensed. we think having a contiguous, nationwide band would enable all kinds of technology development. we also said a secondary -- also said that secondary uses are important. we need greater transparency about the usage of the spectrum so there's better information and insight into the marketplace.

we do not know how these different business models will evolve. we want to make sure that there is enough room for all three to compete with each other and in other ways to provide better value and services for the american public and to improve the economy. >> there was criticism earlier this week -- it may be more of a suggestion that the success be judged about whether the country moves up in the rankings of broadband penetration. in the past, the phoenix center and other organizations have criticized that ranking as not really relevant or not well thought out. what is your reaction?

>> it is a very good and fair question. we looked at a large series of studies. we found that one should be judged on multiple factors. if you pick any one factor over any of this, you will bias what you are doing. we could be number one in broadband penetration, but if our performance was the slowest and our applications were the worst, that would not seek a victory. we could be the fastest in the world. if it was $1 million a month and no one could afford it, that would not be good. you have to have a multiplicity of factors. there's something else that we looked at. that is the concept that early on in a technology -- this was exactly true of electricity and computers. in the early stages, there's something called measurement bias.

you are measuring something based on the way you think in the past. broadband is a paradigm-shifting technology. it is a general purpose technology it will allow all kinds of things that we can barely envisioned today. it will take time to figure out what the metrics are. i think some folks are getting closer to it. it involves a broad series of matches rather than a single one. >> the universal service fund, do you see a date when it will be dedicated solely to broadband and not landlines? >> right now, it is dedicated to voice. we do see a day and are trying to hasten that when it supports broadband + voice. you can now get voice service over broadband. we think is important to do. one of the best things about the plant is it enables a process where you bring lots of

different stakeholders' into the room. when we started the process, people thought this was an impossible thing. if you look at the reaction to the universal service plan, we rolled out a few weeks ago before we published the plan. you saw a wide range of folks supported by what we did. we think the planning process has helped to drive a political consensus about the direction to go in. we laid out a three-stage, 10- year plan that we think gives markets and businesses time to adjust. it is very clear that we need to move to support broadband. along with that, there's an obscure but very important thing called inter-carrier competition. we made a change in how we do that. it is very important to change

that system. we think if you change that, a lot of great economic activity can evolve. . verison -- >> verizon and at&t to have expressed concern. >> we did not engage in the debate in the planning process. that is a legal, political analysis. the planning process is where we were bringing in experts and data. the legal question is very important, but we did not do much on it. from the planning perspective, we think there has to be a government agency that has the jurisdiction to make sure that broaan