Ajit Pai, Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, Visits the University of Nebraska

University of Nebraska College of Law Author

09/20/2019 Added

3 Plays

Description

Ajit Pai, chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, visited the University of Nebraska–Lincoln on Sept. 18. The visit was hosted by the University of Nebraska College of Law’s Space, Cyber and Telecommunications Law program and its co-director Gus Hurwitz.

Searchable Transcript

Search:

[00:00:04.190]Good afternoon.
[00:00:05.790]Thank you for your patience,
[00:00:07.070]it is my pleasure to welcome you to today's fireside chat,
[00:00:10.970]and public discussion with the chairman
[00:00:12.818]of the Federal Communications Commission, Ajit Pai.
[00:00:16.210]The questioner will be professor Gus Hurwitz
[00:00:19.640]from the College of Law.
[00:00:20.940]I'm Richard Moberly,
[00:00:22.000]I'm the interim executive vice chancellor.
[00:00:24.820]Those of you in this room,
[00:00:26.480]I know represent a wide variety of perspectives.
[00:00:29.790]We have students and faculty here,
[00:00:31.470]and other members of the immediate university community.
[00:00:34.890]Members of the broader Lincoln and Nebraska communities,
[00:00:37.410]business and industries that are regulated by
[00:00:40.340]or work with the FCC, and to all of you, welcome,
[00:00:43.010]and thank you for joining us.
[00:00:45.120]And of course welcome to our guest, Ajit Pai.
[00:00:48.510]We are so glad that you are here.
[00:00:50.950]The chairman grew up in Parsons, Kansas.
[00:00:53.040]And I just asked him if he had been to Nebraska before,
[00:00:55.500]which I hoped you had been, just growing up south of us,
[00:00:58.700]but he hadn't been to this part of the university before,
[00:01:00.910]so we're glad you're here,
[00:01:01.920]and a little bit about the chairman.
[00:01:04.930]He went on from Parsons to graduate from Harvard University,
[00:01:08.000]and the University of Chicago Law School.
[00:01:10.870]So he's a lawyer, like all right thinking people.
[00:01:13.250]We're glad you're here.
[00:01:15.430]He worked both for the telecommunications companies
[00:01:17.870]and congress before going to the Commission.
[00:01:20.730]He was initially appointed to the FCC
[00:01:23.110]in 2012 by President Obama,
[00:01:25.290]and elevated to the chairmanship
[00:01:27.110]following the 2016 election.
[00:01:29.950]Chairman Pai has helped shape our nation's
[00:01:32.200]telecommunication laws for the better part of a decade.
[00:01:35.500]He's worked on everything from modernizing the 9-1-1 system
[00:01:38.610]so that it works with text messages
[00:01:40.270]and GPS enabled cell phones, to combating robocalls.
[00:01:44.290]He's worked to provide funding
[00:01:45.650]for rural telecommunication carriers,
[00:01:47.880]and improve the recent deployments
[00:01:49.520]of the first satellite based internet service providers.
[00:01:53.400]I understand that you've had some dealings
[00:01:55.260]with net neutrality along the way.
[00:01:56.808](laughing) Yes.
[00:01:57.641]You may address some of that today.
[00:02:00.270]All of these and other issues that the FCC works on
[00:02:02.987]are very important to every citizen in Nebraska.
[00:02:06.790]The university, of course,
[00:02:07.860]relies on telecommunications
[00:02:09.300]for our students and faculty alike.
[00:02:11.290]Telecommunications connects us through the state
[00:02:14.104]and allows collaboration with students
[00:02:16.620]and researchers around the world.
[00:02:18.490]Our economy relies on telecommunications
[00:02:20.860]from the banking and insurance industry
[00:02:23.120]to precision agriculture,
[00:02:24.810]and farmers relying on the internet
[00:02:26.670]to export corn around the world.
[00:02:29.500]Distance education and telehealth
[00:02:31.180]are vital to our communities.
[00:02:33.750]As some of you know, and I just introduced myself,
[00:02:36.390]I'm currently the university's interim EVC,
[00:02:39.077]and the word interim is there because sooner or later,
[00:02:41.660]I'll be returning to my previous job
[00:02:43.690]as the dean of the law school.
[00:02:45.130]And I say this so that I can emphasize
[00:02:47.240]some of the values that we hold dear at the law school.
[00:02:50.800]Values that I think also reflect
[00:02:52.430]what it means to be at a university
[00:02:54.770]and part of a university community.
[00:02:57.160]At the law school, we challenge our students and faculty
[00:03:00.480]to speak thoughtfully, to listen graciously,
[00:03:04.080]and to demand excellence.
[00:03:05.540]And we welcome and expect rigorous,
[00:03:07.850]but respectful discussion and debate.
[00:03:10.330]We ask hard questions,
[00:03:11.527]and we don't shy away from hard discussions,
[00:03:14.170]but we do so with respect and compassion
[00:03:16.330]and in the pursuit of knowledge and understanding.
[00:03:19.480]So I invite the same of you here today.
[00:03:22.430]And I expect that Professor Hurwitz,
[00:03:24.020]the moderator of today's discussion,
[00:03:25.770]will ask hard, but thoughtful questions,
[00:03:28.480]and I expect that you will, too.
[00:03:30.370]And that the debate and the conversation
[00:03:32.740]will be rigorous and thoughtful and terrific.
[00:03:34.740]So Mr. Chairman, welcome to the University of Nebraska.
[00:03:38.493]I look forward for our community
[00:03:40.180]to hear from you today, thanks.
[00:03:41.440]Thank you.
[00:03:42.464]Thank you.
[00:03:44.110]Quick question to our technical support folks,
[00:03:48.530]I just wanna make sure that this is being recorded.
[00:03:50.760]Because at the end of today,
[00:03:52.360]we're gonna start a new tradition.
[00:03:54.190]We're going to have 10 rapid fire questions.
[00:03:57.440]And every time we have a speaker come through,
[00:03:59.480]I'm going to ask them the same 10 questions.
[00:04:01.770]And we're gonna compile it into a video podcast series.
[00:04:04.610]God help us all.
[00:04:06.112]Really I just want to be,
[00:04:07.890]this to be Inside the Actor's Studio.
[00:04:09.790]So that's my real aspiration.
[00:04:12.400]I'll try to keep it clean, too.
[00:04:14.720]So our plan for today is, I have,
[00:04:19.350]I'll start with 10, 15 minutes of questions for you,
[00:04:24.050]and then open the floor to any questions we have,
[00:04:27.830]and if there aren't questions,
[00:04:30.060]I will continue with my questions.
[00:04:33.339]So I want to start,
[00:04:35.586]we'll start with the easy ones, the softballs.
[00:04:40.272]EVC Moberly just mentioned that you grew up
[00:04:42.540]in Parsons, Kansas, a small rural town in America.
[00:04:45.850]And I wonder if you could just start
[00:04:47.250]by telling us a bit about how you went from Parsons, Kansas
[00:04:50.510]to Washington D.C. heading a large federal agency.
[00:04:54.300]Thanks for the question, but before I begin the answer,
[00:04:57.230]I do want to say thanks to the interim vice chancellor,
[00:05:00.050]slash dean emeritus, I guess that'd be the full title
[00:05:03.590]for the warm introduction,
[00:05:05.310]I thank you, professor Hurwitz,
[00:05:07.020]for organizing this discussion,
[00:05:08.530]and thanks to all the students and faculty for being here.
[00:05:12.070]I have to say, I typically will tell folks on the east coast
[00:05:15.700]and wherever I travel that there's no place like home,
[00:05:18.220]being a good Kansan, but, I have to say,
[00:05:20.420]given the hospitality that has been shown here on the campus
[00:05:23.400]I have to agree with the banner that's just downstairs,
[00:05:25.330]there's no place like Nebraska, so,
[00:05:27.540]thank you for allowing a jayhawker into your state
[00:05:30.150]with such warmth and collegiality.
[00:05:33.570]I think it's a very accidental path
[00:05:37.210]that took me from a small town in rural Kansas to the FCC.
[00:05:41.640]My parents were both physicians by training,
[00:05:43.740]and so I think they hoped and for a time I expected
[00:05:46.190]that I would just become a doctor as they did.
[00:05:48.300]But I very quickly found during my freshman year of college
[00:05:51.620]that I couldn't stand chemistry,
[00:05:53.590]I couldn't stand the sciences,
[00:05:54.740]I didn't want to sit there in a lab
[00:05:55.930]doing this stuff all day long.
[00:05:57.460]And I start to try to think about what else I would do,
[00:05:59.550]and I just loved the humanities,
[00:06:01.070]I was one of those debate geeks,
[00:06:02.350]and I also loved researching and writing
[00:06:04.590]in some of my courses, and I thought, well,
[00:06:06.460]law school seems to be the natural thing to do,
[00:06:08.460]and so, ended up going to law school in Chicago.
[00:06:11.200]Was clerking for a year in New Orleans
[00:06:13.200]and I had lunch with my judge
[00:06:14.960]in the fall of my clerkship,
[00:06:17.650]and we were talking about what I would do next,
[00:06:19.930]and I said, well, you know,
[00:06:20.763]I thought I would go back to a law firm
[00:06:21.960]that I was working at during the previous summer,
[00:06:23.720]and he said you should really think about
[00:06:25.260]applying to the Justice Department,
[00:06:26.870]to the honors program they have for young attorneys.
[00:06:29.090]And I did that, I somehow slipped through the cracks,
[00:06:31.900]got into the anti trust division,
[00:06:33.370]and the put me in the telecoms section,
[00:06:34.900]which was in the wake of the Telecom Act of '96,
[00:06:37.870]and I found much to my surprise
[00:06:39.244]that I loved not just the antitrust aspects of that job
[00:06:41.860]but also the telecom aspects.
[00:06:43.370]I kind of liked technology, intellectually curious person,
[00:06:46.060]love learning how stuff works,
[00:06:47.250]and one thing led to another, and I just kept getting
[00:06:49.410]a series of very interesting opportunities
[00:06:51.210]to work on Capitol Hill,
[00:06:52.600]to work at the Department of Justice again
[00:06:54.790]in a different capacity,
[00:06:56.150]and ultimately ended up at the FCC in 2007
[00:06:58.720]as a staff lawyer.
[00:06:59.900]I spent about four years doing that.
[00:07:01.390]And just was in the right place at the right time in 2011
[00:07:05.360]when the White House was looking for a commissioner,
[00:07:08.200]and I feel very fortunate in 2017
[00:07:11.460]to have become elevated to this position.
[00:07:13.820]So when I think back now, 30, 35 years.
[00:07:17.150]If you'd gone back and told that shy, awkward, dorky,
[00:07:20.260]Indian-American kid in rural Kansas,
[00:07:21.790]someday the President of the United States
[00:07:24.020]is gonna tap you on the shoulder for this job and say,
[00:07:27.240]go do it.
[00:07:28.320]I never would've believed it,
[00:07:29.670]but I think one of the great things about this country
[00:07:31.510]is that I would've wanted to have believed it,
[00:07:33.330]because it really is the land of opportunity
[00:07:35.750]and the example my parents have set for me
[00:07:37.800]and hopefully that I'll set for my kids exemplifies that.
[00:07:41.110]I love the message of a series of,
[00:07:45.580]I'll call it, fortunate events.
[00:07:47.630]Being there, being able and ready to jump on the opportunity
[00:07:50.820]as it comes up.
[00:07:51.830]Sometimes when you don't even know
[00:07:53.230]where it's going to take you.
[00:07:54.900]Great message for the students.
[00:07:56.740]Yeah, and being willing to take risks.
[00:07:59.400]It easily might not have worked out for me,
[00:08:01.240]but one of the things that I specifically remember
[00:08:03.880]when I was working in-house at a company,
[00:08:05.430]it was a very comfortable job, hours were good,
[00:08:07.690]pay was good, yada yada yada, but,
[00:08:10.060]I always thought there was something missing,
[00:08:11.570]and I don't know if they still show Schoolhouse Rock
[00:08:13.860]these days, but you know, I'm just a bill,
[00:08:15.690]up on Capitol Hill.
[00:08:16.920]Well I thought, yeah, just turned 30
[00:08:18.100]and living in Washington in the heart
[00:08:19.670]of the political nerve center of this country
[00:08:21.947]and I hadn't really gone into the political sphere,
[00:08:24.450]so I gave up the job, took a massive pay cut,
[00:08:26.930]and a huge bump in hours to go work
[00:08:28.500]on the Senate and Judiciary Committee, but,
[00:08:30.490]it was a great experience, I got to meet not just senators,
[00:08:32.830]but staffers who've become lifelong friends,
[00:08:34.740]and that's helped me throughout my career,
[00:08:36.630]so don't feel that you should never take a risk.
[00:08:39.640]Color within the lines, just think broadly,
[00:08:41.700]and take calculated risks, they could pay off in the end.
[00:08:45.810]So I, yesterday, Googled Parsons, Kansas.
[00:08:49.610]Wondered what the population was.
[00:08:51.660]9500.
[00:08:53.330]And I wondered, well, is that more or less
[00:08:57.450]than when you were growing up there.
[00:08:58.960]So I went to Wikipedia. A lot less.
[00:09:00.431]It's less, so it was about 13,000
[00:09:01.920]when you were growing up there, so,
[00:09:03.470]about 30% population decline.
[00:09:05.950]And that's representative of trends
[00:09:07.610]throughout a lot of rural America.
[00:09:09.620]And it really emphasizes in many ways,
[00:09:11.330]the importance of advanced telecommunications services
[00:09:14.300]being available throughout rural America,
[00:09:16.730]both so that there's economic opportunity,
[00:09:19.640]that these can be hubs,
[00:09:20.990]these can be places where there are jobs.
[00:09:23.430]And also so that these are places
[00:09:24.930]where people want to live.
[00:09:26.110]Where people can watch their Netflix
[00:09:27.600]and have their Amazon stuff shipped to them.
[00:09:29.837]So I wonder how your experience in and with growing up
[00:09:35.293]in rural America affects your philosophy as chairman,
[00:09:38.850]and what you bring from that experience
[00:09:40.480]to your approach to the job.
[00:09:42.360]It informs basically everything we do, to be honest.
[00:09:46.060]I mean our top priority is closing the digital divide,
[00:09:48.800]that gap between those Americans
[00:09:50.246]who have access to the internet
[00:09:51.880]and next generation technologies, and those who don't.
[00:09:54.660]And it's an unfortunate fact
[00:09:56.120]that millions of rural Americans
[00:09:57.960]either don't have access at all,
[00:09:59.220]or don't have access that is sufficient
[00:10:01.230]for them to do the things that the internet enables
[00:10:03.130]most folks to do.
[00:10:04.810]And we see that all over the place,
[00:10:06.870]and I have seen a lot of great technologies,
[00:10:09.450]things like telemedicine, precision agriculture,
[00:10:12.010]online education tools, ecommerce platforms.
[00:10:14.880]Those things are just something
[00:10:16.260]that a lot of people in rural America can only read about
[00:10:18.900]and so, that's why it has been our top priority
[00:10:21.500]over the last two and a half years to close that gap,
[00:10:23.550]both through the funding that we oversee,
[00:10:25.520]and through the regulatory modernization
[00:10:27.270]that we try to pursue.
[00:10:28.720]I wanna make sure that every American in this country
[00:10:31.080]has what I call digital opportunity.
[00:10:33.580]And if we get the job right in Washington,
[00:10:36.190]I'm pretty confident that we'll be able to do that.
[00:10:37.950]But it is distressing,
[00:10:39.230]you mentioned the stats about my hometown,
[00:10:41.150]I remember my graduating class from high school in 1990
[00:10:44.720]was 110 students.
[00:10:46.410]I spoke to a graduating class two years ago,
[00:10:48.900]I think it was three years ago.
[00:10:50.280]And it was 74.
[00:10:51.810]And that's a huge decrease over time,
[00:10:53.920]and not that broadband availability's
[00:10:55.770]going to stem that slide, but at least it would give folks
[00:10:59.280]in rural America hope that we don't have to move
[00:11:01.828]to a big city to have access to the same opportunities
[00:11:04.580]everybody else has.
[00:11:05.750]We can enjoy the rural lifestyle
[00:11:07.330]and still pursue whatever career we want.
[00:11:11.700]So changing gears a bit.
[00:11:14.266]I'm not going to ask you, in the interest of time,
[00:11:17.400]what your job is, what the work of the FCC is,
[00:11:20.180]what it's like to be a chairman or a commissioner.
[00:11:22.927]I just tweet a lot, basically.
[00:11:24.680]You just tweet a lot.
[00:11:26.060]I understand you drink a lot of coffee from oversized mugs.
[00:11:28.708]We might touch on that later. (laughing)
[00:11:31.320]But at its core, the commission is a communications
[00:11:34.880]and media regulator.
[00:11:36.160]Which means, you're up to your ears in the first amendment.
[00:11:39.210]Various first amendment issues.
[00:11:40.850]So I'm wondering if you could talk a bit
[00:11:42.820]about what the first amendment means to you
[00:11:45.190]and your thoughts of the state of free speech
[00:11:47.750]in our country today.
[00:11:49.270]As to the first, it's pretty easy.
[00:11:50.870]I think the first amendment
[00:11:51.910]is one of the bedrocks of American democracy,
[00:11:54.340]and you notice it especially by comparison.
[00:11:56.140]I think one of the things that distinguishes our country
[00:11:58.500]from virtually any other country in the world
[00:12:00.087]and even in particular, democracies,
[00:12:02.940]is the fact that we have the core constitutional protection
[00:12:06.150]of freedom of speech, of press, and of association,
[00:12:09.110]of the right to petition your government,
[00:12:11.270]embedded in the founding document of our country.
[00:12:14.180]And yesterday was Constitution Day,
[00:12:16.120]as I'm sure all of you know, September 17th, 1787,
[00:12:18.700]when the founding fathers signed the Constitution,
[00:12:21.550]and that gave me occasion to think about
[00:12:23.240]the first amendment and how unique it is
[00:12:24.653]that every American, regardless of who you are,
[00:12:27.680]powerful or not, urban or rural,
[00:12:30.820]anybody has the right to enter the public square,
[00:12:33.940]and express a view, and I think that's one of the great
[00:12:36.100]things about our country, which leads to the second point.
[00:12:38.810]I do worry that that culture of free speech is,
[00:12:42.800]if not unraveling, becoming a little bit tenuous.
[00:12:45.760]I often say that the first amendment
[00:12:47.360]is not just the guarantee that is on the parchments
[00:12:49.870]that you can see in the Constitution in Philadelphia.
[00:12:52.550]But it's also the culture of free speech.
[00:12:54.380]That quote that is actually misattributed to Voltaire,
[00:12:57.400]but I think is apt nonetheless, which is that yeah,
[00:13:00.060]I may disagree with what you have to say,
[00:13:01.620]but I'll fight to the death for your right to say it.
[00:13:05.470]That is quickly devolving as a lot of people
[00:13:07.620]become much more tribal in their opinions,
[00:13:09.330]and especially when it comes to politics,
[00:13:10.620]but even beyond that.
[00:13:12.000]I do worry that there's some folks who are willing to say,
[00:13:14.620]if I disagree with you,
[00:13:15.850]then it is not optimal for me to try to combat your view
[00:13:19.340]with counterspeech, it is sufficient, in some cases,
[00:13:22.480]even necessary for me to remove you
[00:13:24.360]from the public square altogether.
[00:13:26.400]And as somebody who is on the receiving end, I daresay,
[00:13:29.570]of a fair amount of vitriol and negativity,
[00:13:32.320]I nonetheless would say that I embrace that idea
[00:13:34.500]of the marketplace of ideas.
[00:13:35.970]And it's not always happy,
[00:13:38.420]but I think at the end of the day,
[00:13:39.500]our country is much better off if we embrace views,
[00:13:42.450]as the executive chancellor said, with respect and rigor,
[00:13:46.040]as opposed to disdain and the like.
[00:13:49.280]And so, like I said,
[00:13:50.530]I hope that culture of the first amendment
[00:13:52.130]is something that persists well into the future,
[00:13:54.330]especially on college campuses and other places where
[00:13:57.080]you have a unique chance to exchange views
[00:13:59.160]and to learn from those with whom you might disagree.
[00:14:01.570]So, let's talk about social media.
[00:14:04.385]I'm going to stand up a bit awkwardly and come over to this.
[00:14:07.910]We don't just have a fireside chat.
[00:14:10.490]I didn't even notice that!
[00:14:12.390]So...
[00:14:15.817]I can't resist, so it was announced,
[00:14:18.280]this event was announced,
[00:14:19.230]there was some discussion about it on Reddit.
[00:14:23.364]It's my core constituency, Redditors, yeah.
[00:14:25.870]I'm going to discuss this question a bit circuitously.
[00:14:29.620]How does it feel
[00:14:30.453]to have sold out your country to Verizon?
[00:14:32.210]They must be paying you a lot to screw,
[00:14:33.710]I always love these like,
[00:14:34.830]so I left working at Verizon in 2003.
[00:14:37.087]And I always love these conspiracies,
[00:14:38.690]everything he does is for Verizon.
[00:14:40.818]Yes, the grand plan in 2003, 16 years ago,
[00:14:43.820]was for Donald Trump to be elected,
[00:14:45.750]and for me to be appointed chairman
[00:14:47.030]so I could pay back the company a decade and a half later.
[00:14:50.370]Yeah, so, it seems a lot of folks online,
[00:14:53.570]let's just say, on the internet, don't like you.
[00:14:57.150]Which is amazing,
[00:14:57.983]since the internet doesn't exist any more,
[00:14:59.580]us having made the decision to destroy it back in 2017.
[00:15:02.450]Yeah, so, two questions.
[00:15:04.610]First, how do you respond to being
[00:15:07.770]the most hated person on the internet?
[00:15:09.952]And more generally,
[00:15:11.900]what's the role of social media in the FCC's work?
[00:15:16.900]What's the role of the government
[00:15:18.400]in regulating or thinking about regulating social media?
[00:15:21.670]So as to the second,
[00:15:22.820]I have been an early adopter of social media,
[00:15:25.280]I was the first FCC commissioner on Twitter back in 2012.
[00:15:28.680]And when I did it, some of my FCC colleagues said,
[00:15:30.670]oh, this is a big mistake.
[00:15:32.050]Rule number one of the interwebs, never feed the trolls,
[00:15:34.610]but to me at least it's been a very useful way,
[00:15:36.870]both to get the message out
[00:15:38.070]to people who might not otherwise visit the FCC
[00:15:40.960]or hire a lawyer to understand the FCC's work.
[00:15:44.360]So it's useful for me to broadcast what we're doing.
[00:15:47.260]But also to learn from some people.
[00:15:48.830]And not just reporters who cover our part of the world,
[00:15:52.800]or scientists who are doing interesting projects,
[00:15:54.730]but also from citizens.
[00:15:55.970]And so for example, one of the things I championed
[00:15:58.070]back in 2013 resulted from a tweet that I got.
[00:16:02.260]So, back in December 1st of 2013,
[00:16:04.670]a woman named Carrie Hunt was in a Marshall hotel,
[00:16:08.230]Texas room, Marshall Texas hotel room,
[00:16:11.050]with her three kids, meeting her estranged husband,
[00:16:13.330]as soon as she entered the room,
[00:16:14.750]her husband started stabbing her,
[00:16:16.400]and her daughter went to run to the phone to dial 9-1-1.
[00:16:20.360]She dialed 9-1-1 four times but the call never went through
[00:16:22.990]because she didn't know she had to dial the nine first
[00:16:25.430]to get an outside line.
[00:16:26.780]And somebody tweeted this story to me in December,
[00:16:29.780]and a couple weeks after that, I had Hank Hunt,
[00:16:32.330]Carrie's father, on the phone,
[00:16:34.200]talking to him about the problem.
[00:16:35.850]A month later I sent a letter to the CEOs
[00:16:38.000]of the top 10 hotel chains in the United States,
[00:16:40.150]as well as the Hotel Trade Association.
[00:16:42.610]A year after that, I stood next to Hank in Marshall,
[00:16:45.070]as we talked about some of the progress we had made.
[00:16:47.610]Then last year, I stood in the oval office with Hank
[00:16:49.570]as the President signed legislation
[00:16:51.020]named after his late daughter, that is aimed at making sure
[00:16:53.860]that every multi line telephone system in the United States
[00:16:56.560]enables direct access to 9-1-1.
[00:16:58.850]All of that started from a tweet that I'd got,
[00:17:01.150]and I have to think that in a previous age
[00:17:03.240]when that platform wasn't available
[00:17:05.060]we wouldn't have that ability
[00:17:06.230]to be as accessible to the citizenry
[00:17:07.690]and to be able to learn as we have.
[00:17:10.680]And now, that also has a downside,
[00:17:12.630]as you hinted at on the first part and look,
[00:17:14.480]you know I understand that a lot of people
[00:17:15.727]are really upset about some of the decisions we've made,
[00:17:18.430]this one in particular.
[00:17:19.970]But at the end of the day, we made the right decision.
[00:17:22.520]And I look at some of the predictions that were made
[00:17:24.360]in December of 2017 when we voted.
[00:17:26.700]This is the end of the internet as we know it.
[00:17:29.080]The internet is going to work one word at a time.
[00:17:31.620]You're gonna have to pay five dollars per tweet.
[00:17:33.890]Our internet is gonna look like Portugal,
[00:17:35.680]and all these different crazy predictions,
[00:17:37.720]none of which have come to pass.
[00:17:39.280]To the contrary, and independent reported showed
[00:17:41.670]in December of 2018 that speeds in the United States
[00:17:44.040]were up 40% year over year.
[00:17:46.700]More Americans got fiber connections in 2018
[00:17:49.000]than any year since they've been keeping records.
[00:17:51.230]And in addition to that, a broadband investment
[00:17:53.230]in the United States was up three billion dollars,
[00:17:55.080]the second consecutive increase in in capital expenditures.
[00:17:58.300]All of which is to say that as a result of our decision,
[00:18:01.650]more people than ever before, faster than ever before,
[00:18:05.040]are able to hate tweet and hate post
[00:18:06.990]our favorite FCC chairman,
[00:18:08.600]and I think that's a good thing at the end of the day.
[00:18:12.790]That sounds awesome, by the way.
[00:18:15.240]How dare you!
[00:18:16.900]Has he ever considered
[00:18:17.750]how his suicide would benefit society?
[00:18:19.990]So for all the folks out there who, I mean,
[00:18:22.230]look to me at least, you have the courage to say publicly,
[00:18:25.550]and to fix your name to what it is you're saying,
[00:18:27.740]and then I'll take you seriously.
[00:18:29.230]Otherwise, back to the basement with you.
[00:18:33.440]So, that's the response to the trolls.
[00:18:38.320]Continuing to talk a bit about the politics
[00:18:40.620]of net neutrality, and certainly,
[00:18:44.020]we will invite, shortly, questions if anyone wants to
[00:18:46.668]jump in on this subject. We'll be getting Redditors.
[00:18:50.420]During the net neutrality wars,
[00:18:53.440]which really started during your predecessor's time,
[00:18:57.580]or didn't start, but reached their peak I think
[00:18:59.460]during your predecessor, Tom Wheeler's time as the chairman.
[00:19:03.110]I will say for my part, I was exceptionally critical
[00:19:05.930]of Chairman Wheeler as being very partisan.
[00:19:11.366]It's my perspective that he didn't really care to engage
[00:19:15.306]with you and your Republican colleagues.
[00:19:17.800]His view was, I have my Democratic commissioners.
[00:19:21.080]And I was very critical of him for that.
[00:19:23.400]I, under your chairmanship, wonder, have things changed?
[00:19:28.390]And my question is,
[00:19:31.070]especially on these exceptionally partisan issues.
[00:19:34.310]Where there's strong views on both sides,
[00:19:36.300]where there aren't, it's hard to get agreement
[00:19:38.940]and there are political constituencies fighting,
[00:19:41.850]doing the Reddit thing.
[00:19:44.280]Writing all sorts of articles on both sides.
[00:19:46.400]Frankly on both sides, putting out a lot of bad research
[00:19:50.387]to support views.
[00:19:52.530]Does the chairman of a multi member commission
[00:19:55.593]have a responsibility to try and overcome that partisanship,
[00:20:00.280]and bring the commission together,
[00:20:02.580]or is it appropriate, is it necessary for the chairman
[00:20:06.960]to focus on achieving the policy goal,
[00:20:09.430]even if it means fracturing the commission?
[00:20:12.340]For those who don't know,
[00:20:14.780]agencies like the FCC, multi member commissions,
[00:20:17.639]they're typically five member agencies
[00:20:19.980]where you have three appointees,
[00:20:22.220]one of whom is the chair from the President's party,
[00:20:24.750]and two from the other party.
[00:20:26.610]So they're inherently multi party commissions.
[00:20:30.870]Yeah, so we had a fundamental decision to make
[00:20:33.250]once I learned that we were going to be in this position,
[00:20:36.530]and that is, do we continue that model of governance?
[00:20:39.460]When I was in the minority it was typically, as you said,
[00:20:42.290]the chairman said, okay, I've got my three votes,
[00:20:44.460]I don't really care what the commissioners have to say.
[00:20:48.160]It would be easy for us to do that
[00:20:49.790]for any given policy that we wanna pursue.
[00:20:52.400]There's a sort of built in majority by presumption,
[00:20:55.950]but it was important to me not to slam the door
[00:20:58.730]in any commissioner's face.
[00:21:00.380]So two of the unique things we've done
[00:21:02.310]over the last two and a half years.
[00:21:04.060]The first is that I have asked every single member
[00:21:07.070]of the commission, every single one,
[00:21:08.610]Republican and Democrat, to lead,
[00:21:10.970]to speak for the commission on an issue of significance.
[00:21:13.970]Whether it is something like wireless infrastructure reform,
[00:21:17.810]or certainly like 3.5 gigahertz band.
[00:21:21.830]Or, leading the charge in terms of our
[00:21:23.940]location and accuracy investigation,
[00:21:26.000]or things like what public safety standard we should have
[00:21:28.530]for wireless 9-1-1 calls in terms of the vertical access.
[00:21:31.730]These are important issues, I know they might seem arcane,
[00:21:33.980]but these are really important issues
[00:21:35.230]that I've asked other commissioners to lead on.
[00:21:37.660]To my knowledge, and we've researched this,
[00:21:39.210]no chairman in history has ever asked any commissioner
[00:21:42.630]to do something along the same lines,
[00:21:44.090]let alone all of the commissioners
[00:21:45.540]including those of the minority party.
[00:21:48.090]The second thing is that it's important to me
[00:21:50.586]to be very productive at our monthly meetings,
[00:21:52.550]we're required by law to have a meeting
[00:21:54.120]in which the commissioners vote on various items
[00:21:57.020]that are teed up by the chairman.
[00:21:58.640]And so we've had, over the last two and a half years,
[00:22:01.500]something like 193, I think it is,
[00:22:04.430]issues that we've voted on at these monthly meetings.
[00:22:06.970]The percentage of bipartisan and even unanimous votes,
[00:22:10.640]under my chairmanship has gone up dramatically
[00:22:13.198]compared to those of my predecessors, so I think,
[00:22:15.920]those are my predecessors, I think were 53%,
[00:22:18.330]something like that, bipartisan.
[00:22:20.450]We're now at something like 79, 80%,
[00:22:22.610]and in addition, one of the things I've told
[00:22:24.840]my Democratic and Republican colleagues is, look,
[00:22:27.140]if you have a good idea, let me know what it is,
[00:22:29.810]and if we can incorporate it, we'll do that,
[00:22:31.820]and even if that means I get 80%, or that's not, 70%,
[00:22:36.120]of the core original proposal as I did it,
[00:22:39.000]I'd much rather have us speak with a unified voice.
[00:22:41.200]At the end of the day,
[00:22:42.420]a lot of these issues are not partisan in nature.
[00:22:45.340]I mean to me I think net neutrality and issues like that
[00:22:47.560]obscure the core truth of the FCC,
[00:22:49.980]which is that so much of our work
[00:22:51.160]has nothing to do with politics.
[00:22:53.090]Getting rural broadband to communities
[00:22:54.950]that are on the wrong side of the digital divide
[00:22:56.590]is not a Republican or Democratic issue.
[00:22:58.790]Making our public safety communication system
[00:23:00.630]work better for everybody
[00:23:01.780]is not a Republican or Democratic issue.
[00:23:03.890]Extending the promise of technology
[00:23:05.410]to those with disabilities, and minorities,
[00:23:07.680]is not a Republican or Democratic issue.
[00:23:09.860]Those are, to me at least, are the bread and butter issues
[00:23:12.770]that the FCC works on, and we have spoken,
[00:23:14.930]by and large, I would like to say,
[00:23:16.450]with a bipartisan voice there, so,
[00:23:18.550]those are the issues I wish the press and the public
[00:23:20.980]would think about as well when they're thinking about
[00:23:23.100]the FCC and communications policy.
[00:23:25.860]Okay, let's turn to a couple of core substance issues.
[00:23:31.810]Let's, if we can, try to run through these quickly,
[00:23:34.500]I want to queue them up for discussion and question from,
[00:23:36.697]questions from the audience, perhaps.
[00:23:40.720]But a few things I want to have in front of us.
[00:23:43.600]First, robocalls.
[00:23:44.982]Ugh.
[00:23:45.815]Everyone hates them.
[00:23:46.648]They're the most complained about telecom issue,
[00:23:49.060]both at the FTC and the FCC, bar none.
[00:23:52.640]What's the holdup in stopping them, and more precisely,
[00:23:56.900]there's a new framework, the stir shaken framework,
[00:24:00.700]which is basically a cryptographic authentication system
[00:24:03.970]for signing phone calls.
[00:24:05.760]Lots of words there,
[00:24:07.353]many folks might not know what that means,
[00:24:09.290]but it's basically a public key infrastructure,
[00:24:11.740]the same thing that web browsers use to say,
[00:24:14.330]this website is coming from this server.
[00:24:17.270]It's not fraudulent, it's not being forged.
[00:24:19.690]And we've had PKI for websites for 20 years, 20 plus years.
[00:24:25.180]Why has it taken so long to get a technology
[00:24:29.360]that's existed for and been understood for decades,
[00:24:33.440]into the telephone network?
[00:24:35.110]A great question.
[00:24:36.190]This is the top consumer complaint we get,
[00:24:39.190]and have gotten for many many years,
[00:24:40.810]and it's a frustration to me not just as a regulator,
[00:24:43.640]but also as a consumer who gets robocalls regularly.
[00:24:46.482]So it drives us crazy,
[00:24:48.340]and we've made it our top consumer protection priority,
[00:24:50.830]and so over the last two and a half years,
[00:24:52.600]we've pulled out the stops in terms of changing the rules
[00:24:55.630]in order to attack this problem.
[00:24:57.510]For example earlier this year,
[00:24:58.690]we made clear that phone companies
[00:25:00.140]can block robocalls by default.
[00:25:02.300]Why couldn't they before?
[00:25:03.840]They couldn't before, because traditionally the FCC
[00:25:05.900]has said that every phone call you get,
[00:25:07.720]you have to transmit over the network,
[00:25:09.440]and that was sort of the core title II voice regulation,
[00:25:12.493]that was the reason why a lot of Title II exists
[00:25:15.420]was to make sure the phone network was essentially
[00:25:17.970]carrying all of that traffic,
[00:25:19.090]even if it was fraudulent traffic.
[00:25:20.730]And so, there was a 2015 ruling that left unclear
[00:25:23.300]whether or not phone companies
[00:25:24.380]could block some of these robocalls by default.
[00:25:26.400]We made clear earlier this year
[00:25:27.510]that they could in fact do so,
[00:25:28.999]and that we expected them to do so,
[00:25:30.530]to offer some of those tools using advanced analytics.
[00:25:32.920]And so they're starting to do that now.
[00:25:34.730]The second thing is we've made clear
[00:25:36.220]that we want some of those spoofed robocalls
[00:25:38.470]to be blocked as well.
[00:25:39.950]So if they're making up the area code,
[00:25:41.490]the next three digits, the prefix for example,
[00:25:43.910]we want to make sure we take action against that.
[00:25:46.250]Other steps we've taken as well,
[00:25:47.790]I've demanded last year that the phone companies,
[00:25:49.640]major ones, adopt shake and stir,
[00:25:51.500]that framework you were talking about,
[00:25:52.810]by the end of this year.
[00:25:54.210]They're making progress right now,
[00:25:55.330]we're seeing some of the major carriers
[00:25:56.920]exchange signed traffic, which I think is a good thing
[00:25:59.150]in attacking that problem.
[00:26:00.620]Then on the enforcement side as well,
[00:26:02.000]the largest fines in the FCC's history
[00:26:04.150]have been imposed on robocallers
[00:26:05.590]over the last two and a half years, so,
[00:26:07.460]I recognize that technology has progressed to a point
[00:26:09.800]where it's all to easy to robocall consumers,
[00:26:12.010]but hopefully, through some of these steps we've taken
[00:26:14.390]with additional steps I hope Congress will likely give us
[00:26:17.720]in the near future, we'll be able to put a dent
[00:26:19.840]in the problem and people can answer that phone,
[00:26:21.920]with confidence going forward.
[00:26:24.770]Next substantive topic, net neutrality.
[00:26:27.010]We've already spoken a bit about it,
[00:26:28.910]and you've given your defense
[00:26:30.780]of the Restoring Internet Freedom order.
[00:26:34.260]I want to ask a follow up question.
[00:26:36.390]What's the importance of net neutrality
[00:26:38.170]to rural America and the digital divide in particular?
[00:26:41.350]To me, the importance is that the previous
[00:26:44.240]utility style of regulations were disincentivizing companies
[00:26:47.220]from building out infrastructure in these rural areas,
[00:26:49.360]as it is, it's already hard to build a business case
[00:26:52.390]for building broadband infrastructure
[00:26:53.966]in a part of the country
[00:26:55.210]where the people per square mile is relatively low.
[00:26:58.110]Those people have a lower per capita income anyway.
[00:27:00.600]And so the return on the investment
[00:27:02.100]for any rational business is already pretty low.
[00:27:05.960]Add to that the utility style of regulation
[00:27:07.660]coming from Washington,
[00:27:08.630]and what we heard from and what we saw
[00:27:10.890]was that infrastructure investment was decreasing, and so,
[00:27:13.860]what I said consistently is that we can have
[00:27:15.820]a market based regulatory system
[00:27:17.430]that preserves the free and open internet
[00:27:19.140]that all of us want.
[00:27:20.390]We all of course want there to be
[00:27:22.084]the exchange of lawful content over the internet,
[00:27:25.180]it's what makes the internet great.
[00:27:26.690]But we also want to make sure that the regulations
[00:27:28.530]aren't so onerous that it's disincentivizing companies
[00:27:31.740]from building that broadband infrastructure,
[00:27:33.410]and that's part of the reason why I'm so grateful
[00:27:35.150]for the efforts we've seen
[00:27:36.650]over the last two and a half years by the FCC staff,
[00:27:39.060]by private sector companies building this infrastructure
[00:27:42.410]that is now connecting more people than ever before.
[00:27:44.630]That wouldn't happen,
[00:27:46.040]or at least wouldn't happen at the same pace,
[00:27:48.180]if we had more of a utility style approach.
[00:27:51.520]So my next question is a multimedia question.
[00:27:54.480]I have two more substantive area questions
[00:27:56.770]before I turn to the audience, so,
[00:27:58.490]be thinking about your questions.
[00:28:00.320]Let's see if this works.
[00:28:06.289](relaxing electronic music)
[00:28:09.120]We're gonna listen to two minutes of this.
[00:28:10.560]This month, we're looking at the tech issues
[00:28:12.490]that most affect rural American, and today,
[00:28:14.890]we go to a remote place,
[00:28:16.780]where one of the most isolated native American tribes
[00:28:19.310]is finally getting more broadband internet service.
[00:28:22.170]And it hasn't been easy.
[00:28:23.790]But if the Havasupai can install reliable,
[00:28:26.700]high speed internet at the bottom of the Grand Canyon,
[00:28:29.820]they could bridge the digital divide for other tribes.
[00:28:32.850]From member station KJZZ, Laurel Morales reports.
[00:28:37.470]The Havasupai reservation
[00:28:38.860]is only accessible by foot, by mule, or by helicopter.
[00:28:42.357](helicopter whirring)
[00:28:43.470]It's a five minute flight from the rim of the canyon
[00:28:45.600]to Supai Village, where 450 tribal members
[00:28:48.810]live in small homes made of panel siding,
[00:28:51.320]and materials that can be easily hauled
[00:28:53.590]to the canyon floor.
[00:28:55.280]It's no wonder internet access has been a challenge,
[00:28:58.090]but recently the Havasupai have had some help
[00:29:00.520]from the Oakland-based non profit, MuralNet.
[00:29:03.330]Oh yeah.
[00:29:04.390]Look at that.
[00:29:05.240]We got bars.
[00:29:06.190]Holy smokes.
[00:29:07.094]Damn! Three!
[00:29:08.228]MuralNet's Mariel Triggs trains the Havasupai
[00:29:11.070]how to install a network box outside a home.
[00:29:14.380]Triggs, with the help of Flagstaff based Niles Radio,
[00:29:17.330]built what's called a microwave hop from towers at the rim,
[00:29:20.690]that beam a signal down to Supai Village.
[00:29:23.050]And we were able to up the network
[00:29:24.450]in just a few hours.
[00:29:25.910]For less than the cost of a Toyota Corolla, frankly.
[00:29:28.460]Triggs says the geography wasn't the issue,
[00:29:30.570]it was policy holding up the process.
[00:29:33.240]The Federal Communications Commission
[00:29:34.910]finally granted the tribe a permanent license last spring.
[00:29:38.610]Now the Havasupai want to increase the signal,
[00:29:41.180]but they've run into another hurdle.
[00:29:43.180]Another internet provider says it maybe interested
[00:29:45.600]in bringing broadband here.
[00:29:47.310]So now the FCC is dealing with concerns over competition.
[00:29:50.820]We have the funds,
[00:29:52.410]we have the money, we could do it,
[00:29:53.680]we could put the materials that are needed in the towers
[00:29:56.320]and connect everything, but we have to wait
[00:29:58.610]for all this policy stuff again, to sort out.
[00:30:01.490]Triggs says she's worried it could take years.
[00:30:04.460]It just kills me, because,
[00:30:06.170]I feel like policy is actually causing
[00:30:09.030]the digital divide right now, rather--
[00:30:13.620]So, my question is,
[00:30:16.200]when it comes to closing the digital divide,
[00:30:18.240]is regulation part of the problem or part of the solution,
[00:30:22.070]and I ask this in particular, obviously,
[00:30:25.150]the context of this radio excerpt.
[00:30:27.560]But also in Nebraska, we have a lot of innovation
[00:30:30.120]going on on the ground.
[00:30:32.290]How do we allow that sort of innovation
[00:30:34.950]to thrive and be part of the solution,
[00:30:38.190]when it needs to go through at times
[00:30:39.930]cumbersome regulatory processes?
[00:30:41.910]So that question and also,
[00:30:44.440]if, for those of you who either were,
[00:30:46.860]or might consider going to law school
[00:30:48.750]and taking my telecom class.
[00:30:51.410]Playing that excerpt and then saying discuss,
[00:30:53.980]would be a typical exam question for me.
[00:30:55.940]So discuss.
[00:30:56.902](laughing)
[00:30:58.190]Feel like I'm back in law school, wonderful.
[00:31:00.740]So I think regulation is both part of the problem
[00:31:03.810]and part of the solution.
[00:31:05.010]In terms of part of the problem,
[00:31:06.630]one of the issues I think she might be hinting at,
[00:31:08.720]and I can't recall this particular petition
[00:31:12.700]off the top of my head, but,
[00:31:14.390]there's a principle against funding overbuilding,
[00:31:16.910]so essentially if one provider
[00:31:18.360]is already providing service to a given area,
[00:31:21.550]there is a general principle at the FCC,
[00:31:23.100]we shouldn't fund another company to overbuild,
[00:31:25.540]because that would duplicating private investment,
[00:31:27.260]instead that investment should be targeted
[00:31:28.880]at a part of the country that doesn't have service at all,
[00:31:31.040]so, I'm not sure if that's the issue here,
[00:31:32.830]but to the extent it is,
[00:31:34.260]that's certainly something we would want to sort out.
[00:31:37.050]I will say though, it's also part of the solution,
[00:31:39.370]so for example especially on tribal areas,
[00:31:42.110]we've been focusing on that quite a bit.
[00:31:43.830]And one of the first orders I introduced,
[00:31:45.760]after I became chairman in February of 2017,
[00:31:48.004]was an order extending support, federal subsidies,
[00:31:51.280]for the operational of tribal carriers,
[00:31:53.770]carriers serving tribal lands with broadband.
[00:31:56.120]Because we recognize that serving tribal lands
[00:31:58.710]is even more of a challenge than serving non tribal lands.
[00:32:02.170]Secondly, we also made sure we introduced
[00:32:03.900]what's called a tribal broadband factor,
[00:32:05.910]essentially giving a boost to some of the carriers,
[00:32:08.221]to, one, to serve tribal land.
[00:32:10.320]In addition to that, earlier this summer,
[00:32:12.293]we introduced what's called a window
[00:32:14.420]for participating in the spectrum auction,
[00:32:16.650]for tribals, for a certain kind of band
[00:32:19.130]called the 2.5 gigahertz band.
[00:32:21.070]Essentially giving tribal companies
[00:32:23.320]a chance to compete for the spectrum,
[00:32:25.230]an exclusive chance to compete,
[00:32:26.781]so long as they promise to use that spectrum
[00:32:29.180]to benefit folks who are on tribal lands
[00:32:31.230]who don't have wireless connectivity and so,
[00:32:33.600]in a sense, I understand the frustration.
[00:32:36.100]I also want folks on tribal lands to know
[00:32:38.280]that we are doing a lot in order to promote connectivity,
[00:32:41.420]and it's not just from my office in Washington,
[00:32:43.330]I mean I've personally been to many tribal reservations,
[00:32:46.330]from the Coeur d'Alene reservation in Idaho,
[00:32:48.508]to the Jemez Pueblo of New Mexico,
[00:32:50.430]from Navajo nation in Arizona,
[00:32:52.360]to the Rosebud Sioux reservation in South Dakota.
[00:32:55.160]And I personally go to these places
[00:32:56.720]because I wanna understand
[00:32:58.410]the nature of the challenges that they are facing,
[00:33:00.280]and to me at least, the digital divide is most keenly felt
[00:33:03.330]on some of these tribal lands.
[00:33:04.820]It's a really sad situation
[00:33:06.230]and we need to be able to fix that soon.
[00:33:09.410]Last substantive area question.
[00:33:12.100]This is a softball.
[00:33:13.170]Satellite internet, how cool is that?
[00:33:15.845]It's, yeah.
[00:33:17.880]I think historically a lot of people
[00:33:19.300]have thought of satellite as being relatively low speed,
[00:33:21.900]and with a lot of latency,
[00:33:23.070]it's not a really responsive type of network,
[00:33:25.240]but now in some of the new companies
[00:33:26.600]that we've authorized over the last two years,
[00:33:28.940]we're seeing satellite innovation
[00:33:30.170]at a scale we haven't seen since honestly,
[00:33:32.050]the dawn of the space age, and so,
[00:33:34.210]we've authorized companies like SpaceX and OneWeb
[00:33:36.430]and LeoSat and Kepler and others,
[00:33:39.350]to launch hundreds or thousands of these satellites
[00:33:41.490]into low earth orbit,
[00:33:42.560]and they're gonna provide internet access
[00:33:44.300]at a speed and at a price point
[00:33:45.950]that's comparable to what you would get on the ground,
[00:33:47.930]and there are other innovative companies too,
[00:33:49.630]doing things like industrial IOT,
[00:33:52.250]using some of these cubesats, really really tiny satellites,
[00:33:55.170]and so, this is a really exciting time
[00:33:56.760]for folks who want to enter the space industry,
[00:33:58.700]and even for lawyers who want to enter
[00:34:01.150]this field of space law,
[00:34:02.300]I know Nebraska has a great program on that.
[00:34:05.390]There's a lot of good stuff happening,
[00:34:06.980]and so we wanna make sure that we encourage
[00:34:09.260]that kind of innovation here in the United States.
[00:34:12.160]Okay, if there are anyone,
[00:34:13.950]if there's anyone in the audience
[00:34:15.390]who'd like to ask a question.
[00:34:17.730]If no one, okay, we've got a plant in the audience.
[00:34:22.590]Who you might know, Wade Berkholder,
[00:34:24.890]former student from the law school,
[00:34:26.330]if you can grab the mic, or the mic will be brought to you.
[00:34:29.440]And if you are interested in asking a question,
[00:34:31.800]put your hand up.
[00:34:37.170]It's...
[00:34:44.940]How are we doing?
[00:34:45.773]Ah, the voice of god is here.
[00:34:47.359](laughing)
[00:34:48.830]I gave you a softball this time,
[00:34:50.322]so I have a hard question this time,
[00:34:52.130]so do you want the fun one or the policy one?
[00:34:55.290]I'll take the policy one.
[00:34:56.400]Okay, alright.
[00:34:57.560]Well, it's about section 230.
[00:35:00.171](laughs)
[00:35:01.260]Recently, there was a leaked memo about an executive order,
[00:35:07.450]the Protecting Americans from Online Censorship.
[00:35:10.623]This is something that's come from the Trump administration
[00:35:12.920]and Republicans in general.
[00:35:14.830]Something that I was very concerned about
[00:35:16.670]during my time in Washington, D.C. is that Republicans
[00:35:19.610]want to take a swing at section 230
[00:35:22.510]of the Communications Decency Act.
[00:35:24.547]For those who aren't familiar,
[00:35:26.330]this is what protects social media websites
[00:35:29.300]from being able to...
[00:35:33.330]This is what allows people to post things on social media
[00:35:35.810]and this is what protects social media websites
[00:35:37.900]from liability, essentially,
[00:35:40.600]and they're allowed to moderate how they want to.
[00:35:43.060]Republicans are very scared
[00:35:44.380]that there is a lot of anti-conservative social media bias,
[00:35:47.590]which is unproven at this point.
[00:35:50.710]And so, this executive order would give the FTC and the FCC,
[00:35:58.000]it would basically force you to create
[00:35:59.940]a social media panel to decide whether websites
[00:36:03.421]are neutral or not, and if they're not neutral,
[00:36:06.630]then they would potentially be liable
[00:36:10.700]for removing certain content.
[00:36:12.210]So I'm wondering if the FCC has a plan
[00:36:16.390]with respect to section 230.
[00:36:19.600]I don't know if this executive order did indeed come out.
[00:36:23.088]It has not.
[00:36:23.921]It has not, okay.
[00:36:25.150]So it's speculative. At least if it has,
[00:36:26.680]I haven't heard about it.
[00:36:27.953]I think I would have heard.
[00:36:30.060]So, you would have rulemaking authority over that
[00:36:32.746]but you would have no jurisdiction.
[00:36:34.970]So I'm wondering, if you're allowed to go and do it,
[00:36:38.710]what would the FCC's plan,
[00:36:40.720]how would you go about tackling that?
[00:36:42.520]And even if you're not allowed to go into it,
[00:36:44.420]I'd be interested to hear.
[00:36:45.765](laughs)
[00:36:46.720]So, the easy answer, which is the true answer,
[00:36:49.440]is that it's a hypothetical.
[00:36:51.250]There has not been an executive order issued,
[00:36:53.260]and so I would certainly defer to the White House,
[00:36:55.360]as an executive order,
[00:36:56.830]that is something for the administration to consider.
[00:36:58.740]The FCC is an independent agency, and so,
[00:37:01.170]I can't speak to the particulars of that order
[00:37:04.840]which I haven't seen.
[00:37:07.010]I would point out though, however,
[00:37:08.160]the other gloss on the issue, I mean I know you focused
[00:37:10.100]on Republicans, but let's be clear.
[00:37:11.920]There are plenty of Democrats on Capitol Hill
[00:37:13.500]who are actively proposing legislation
[00:37:16.690]that would either strip section 230 immunity,
[00:37:19.870]or otherwise water it down with certain exceptions,
[00:37:22.480]so this is a bipartisan issue these days in Washington,
[00:37:25.750]and I think that's part of the reason why
[00:37:28.236]that there's a great deal of interest,
[00:37:29.550]and how should we regulate,
[00:37:31.130]or should we even regulate these social media platforms,
[00:37:33.580]and that's a pretty robust discussion
[00:37:35.950]that the political actors are having,
[00:37:37.310]at least thus far, anyway.
[00:37:38.830]The FCC has been more focused
[00:37:40.260]on the nuts and bolts of connectivity,
[00:37:42.370]and we haven't gotten into some of those content decisions
[00:37:45.520]as it affects social media companies.
[00:37:47.390]Would it be fair to say
[00:37:48.530]you would not like to touch those issues from either side?
[00:37:53.880]Certainly an A plus for effort,
[00:37:55.840]but what I would say at this time, that yeah,
[00:37:59.350]I can't opine about the EO that hasn't been issued.
[00:38:03.560]A related followup question.
[00:38:06.090]I was curious what the fun one was.
[00:38:08.230]Oh, okay, well, fine Wade, we'll allow, if there's time,
[00:38:11.680]we'll come back to you, Wade.
[00:38:14.350]Followup question about media generally,
[00:38:17.120]something that clearly is in the FCC's jurisdiction.
[00:38:20.180]You are a media regulator.
[00:38:21.630]There are many media regulations,
[00:38:24.030]both statutorily required and otherwise
[00:38:26.320]that the commission has promulgated.
[00:38:30.040]What's the future of media in this country?
[00:38:33.540]What's the future of local newspapers, local television.
[00:38:37.160]Are we moving to a world where we're going to have,
[00:38:39.890]again, three national networks,
[00:38:42.070]where everything reconsolidates,
[00:38:44.153]and the three national networks compete with Google?
[00:38:49.050]Things are changing.
[00:38:49.883]What's your vision about the future?
[00:38:51.610]I think the future is very challenging
[00:38:53.250]for some of the more traditional companies.
[00:38:55.800]Just to give you an example a couple of days ago
[00:38:57.590]I was in Brookings, South Dakota,
[00:38:59.210]and we had a chance to visit a radio station there,
[00:39:01.750]and they told us how it was increasingly difficult
[00:39:03.750]for them to persuade the local car dealership
[00:39:06.890]and other local businesses to advertise
[00:39:09.000]on the radio station, and because one of the things
[00:39:11.380]we often hear from broadcasters is,
[00:39:13.270]look, it's much easier for us
[00:39:14.590]and much more cost effective for us,
[00:39:17.230]for our advertisers like car dealerships
[00:39:19.270]to simply advertise on their Facebook page,
[00:39:21.080]or over Google, and so,
[00:39:22.870]there's much more competition than ever before,
[00:39:24.680]for some of those revenue streams
[00:39:26.060]that broadcasters in particular have counted upon.
[00:39:28.570]For the local newspapers, I mean,
[00:39:29.880]I'm sure folks are quite aware that that industry
[00:39:32.950]has been the canary in the coal mine for the last decade.
[00:39:35.200]We've seen a lot of newspapers across the country close,
[00:39:37.590]especially in some of these smaller markets
[00:39:39.200]where it's already difficult anyway to keep the lights on,
[00:39:42.270]and so from our perspective at least,
[00:39:44.040]one of the things I've tried to introduce
[00:39:45.460]is the concept of modernizing the regulations
[00:39:48.150]to recognize the marketplace as it exists today.
[00:39:51.110]Congress in 1996 told the FCC
[00:39:53.390]it has to take a quadrennial look,
[00:39:54.870]every four years we have to look
[00:39:56.060]at our media ownership regulations
[00:39:57.650]and determine whether or not those regulations
[00:39:59.740]should be revised, repealed, or kept the same, retained.
[00:40:03.610]And I've consistently said, it doesn't make any sense
[00:40:05.650]for us to think about newspapers and broadcast
[00:40:08.480]being the only media players in the marketplace,
[00:40:10.610]that's just not the way it is.
[00:40:12.330]Younger people in particular.
[00:40:13.830]They get their news from a variety of sources,
[00:40:15.710]everything from Twitter and Google and Facebook,
[00:40:18.480]and if you broaden out, the denominator so to speak,
[00:40:22.330]to encompass just information.
[00:40:24.490]Radio's competing with Spotify and Pandora
[00:40:26.460]and satellite radio and all these other kinds of media.
[00:40:30.660]The TV stations as well are competing
[00:40:32.210]with streaming services like Netflix and the like,
[00:40:34.510]and so, to me at least, we need to update our rules
[00:40:37.250]to make sure that we aren't unnecessarily holding back
[00:40:40.820]some of the companies in the broadcast space,
[00:40:43.320]especially in the smaller markets
[00:40:44.603]that are looking to provide local news.
[00:40:47.300]So this is going to be a very wonky,
[00:40:49.230]in the weeds question, I apologize, but,
[00:40:51.540]given the quadrennial review process
[00:40:53.918]and given that the media industry,
[00:40:56.560]the traditionally regulated media industry,
[00:40:58.720]they're really competing for advertiser dollars.
[00:41:01.280]And they're competing nowadays with Google and Facebook
[00:41:04.160]for those advertising dollars.
[00:41:06.040]Given your regulatory jurisdiction
[00:41:07.980]over the traditional media industries,
[00:41:10.050]do you have ancillary jurisdiction
[00:41:11.560]to get into regulating the broader advertising ecosystem?
[00:41:14.800]I don't believe we do.
[00:41:15.810]I mean we certainly rely on Southwestern Cable,
[00:41:17.520]the old ancillary jurisdiction case and some of its progeny,
[00:41:20.010]I don't think we have the legal jurisdiction to do,
[00:41:22.160]so I don't really think as a policy matter should we do,
[00:41:24.230]so I mean the answer to me,
[00:41:25.860]if the broadcasters are coming at us saying,
[00:41:27.460]look, we're competing with Google and Facebook,
[00:41:30.590]you know, instead of heavily regulating us,
[00:41:33.280]why don't you heavily regulate them also?
[00:41:35.260]The answer to that is, no, we should relax regulations
[00:41:37.812]on the legacy companies
[00:41:39.331]to recognize that the marketplace has changed
[00:41:41.300]and give them a full and fair opportunity to compete.
[00:41:44.060]Other questions from the audience?
[00:41:46.183]Yes. Yeah?
[00:41:48.520][Male Audience Member] Hi.
[00:41:49.353]I'd like to talk about the 5G a little bit.
[00:41:52.447]And as the nation's premier policy leader, internally,
[00:41:57.930]I get your views on, what realistically can we expect
[00:42:03.470]in a state like Nebraska, as far as 5G deployment,
[00:42:09.460]in a reasonable time frame in the state.
[00:42:12.340]If you watch TV today, you'd swear that every nook
[00:42:15.550]and cranny of the state probably already had 5G,
[00:42:19.580]just by, you know, the widespread blanketing
[00:42:23.010]of advertising from the carriers, but,
[00:42:25.910]I guess I'm, you know, you're closer to this
[00:42:28.272]at a foreign policy level than anybody,
[00:42:30.410]I'm kind of interested in your views, so,
[00:42:32.310]what realistically over time might we expect
[00:42:36.390]that as far as widely available 5G,
[00:42:40.020]even from multiple carriers?
[00:42:42.230]Great question.
[00:42:43.180]So we're still at the early stages, of course.
[00:42:45.660]Some of the bigger carriers are doing trials
[00:42:47.360]around the country.
[00:42:48.350]And not just in bigger cities like New York and Los Angeles,
[00:42:51.310]but in some mid sized cities like Indianapolis
[00:42:54.750]and Oklahoma City and the like, and so,
[00:42:57.600]as they start to do those trials,
[00:42:59.030]we certainly hope that they find use cases
[00:43:00.954]that resonate in even smaller markets.
[00:43:03.380]And as somebody who comes from a rural part of the country,
[00:43:05.680]I want to make sure that rural Americans too
[00:43:08.220]have the benefits of this 5G revolution that's coming.
[00:43:12.230]To me at least, I think the early use cases
[00:43:14.600]are not necessarily going to be in terms
[00:43:16.460]of the wireless services as we know them today.
[00:43:19.850]Voice calls and the like.
[00:43:21.230]I think things like industrial IOT, precision ag,
[00:43:23.700]might be more of a use case in rural areas,
[00:43:25.850]and so that's one of the reasons why,
[00:43:27.620]in addition to the policies I discussed earlier,
[00:43:29.860]closing the digital divide by getting fiber penetration
[00:43:32.720]deeper into rural America,
[00:43:34.350]that fiber is also going to be critical
[00:43:35.970]for backcalling 5G traffic, for example,
[00:43:38.360]from farms that are generating a huge amount of data
[00:43:41.010]through connected combines and soil probes and the like,
[00:43:44.140]back to the core of the network for advanced analytics.
[00:43:46.790]And so, I do hope that 5G will penetrate into
[00:43:51.085]rural America to enable some of those use cases.
[00:43:53.770]I would point out as well that it's not just,
[00:43:56.690]so as a condition of the T-Mobile Sprint merger,
[00:43:59.750]which is pending before the FCC,
[00:44:01.550]one of the things that was important to me
[00:44:02.920]was to make sure that the companies lived up
[00:44:04.650]to the commitment they said they wanted to offer,
[00:44:07.560]which was nationwide 5G deployment.
[00:44:10.210]I said, okay, if you need it,
[00:44:11.600]then you've gotta put it on the page,
[00:44:12.890]and so they've committed within the next three years,
[00:44:15.340]as soon as the merger is approved,
[00:44:17.320]to deploying 5G at 15 megabits per second or greater
[00:44:20.750]to 97% of the American population.
[00:44:23.800]Within six years, they would deploy that same standard
[00:44:26.310]or greater to 99% of the American population.
[00:44:29.920]And so that one merger alone, for example,
[00:44:32.530]is one way that the FCC's making sure
[00:44:34.790]that rural Americans are not left behind
[00:44:37.090]as 5G services are deployed.
[00:44:38.970]So I understand that there's always going to be
[00:44:41.400]that inherent attraction to the urban areas,
[00:44:44.920]because obviously, with densely populated urban areas,
[00:44:47.110]you can get much greater return on the investment.
[00:44:49.230]But to me at least, some of the rural 5G use cases,
[00:44:52.320]precision ag, fixed wireless, you know, telemedicine,
[00:44:55.660]and things like that, are really going to be
[00:44:58.220]what makes 5G pop.
[00:45:03.433]Absolutely.
[00:45:06.502]Absolutely, for those companies alone,
[00:45:09.450]if the merger were successful,
[00:45:10.720]I mean they would be on the hook for billions of dollars
[00:45:13.480]in penalties if they didn't meet that commitment.
[00:45:15.780]What's the enforcement mechanism?
[00:45:18.210]For anyone online, the question was,
[00:45:20.810]are the fines sufficient for the merged companies
[00:45:23.750]if they fail to meet those thresholds,
[00:45:25.450]and as a followup question.
[00:45:27.860]What's the enforcement mechanism?
[00:45:29.260]How does it actually happen?
[00:45:31.120]Yeah, so they'd be subject to FCC enforcement action,
[00:45:33.440]so if we determined that a condition
[00:45:35.244]that had been applied to the parties was not met,
[00:45:38.740]then our enforcement bureau could and would take action
[00:45:41.930]to make sure that those penalties were collected,
[00:45:45.130]or the condition were otherwise met.
[00:45:52.770]Hi again.
[00:45:54.470]Since we're in a university,
[00:45:56.020]I'm gonna ask an education question.
[00:45:58.130]Yeah.
[00:45:59.570]When I was listening
[00:46:00.640]to the senate hearings on 5G
[00:46:04.530]related to security issues and Huawei,
[00:46:08.530]I was deeply disappointed to hear most of the senators
[00:46:12.810]start their question saying, well I don't know too much
[00:46:15.920]about these technical issues, but.
[00:46:19.650]So being someone, a lawyer, who,
[00:46:22.380]obviously have educated yourself on the telecom issues.
[00:46:27.060]What are the things that we need to do as universities,
[00:46:31.130]as public, to make sure our lawmakers
[00:46:34.330]are well versed in the intricate details of,
[00:46:38.210]especially the communication technology,
[00:46:40.700]which is now changing everything.
[00:46:43.460]That is a great question, Professor,
[00:46:45.460]and what I would say is, please come to Washington,
[00:46:48.670]make yourself available for briefings to lawmakers
[00:46:51.240]and to regulators.
[00:46:52.410]One of the great things I love about this job
[00:46:54.840]is that I have the ability to get anyone on the phone,
[00:46:57.180]or meet with anybody,
[00:46:58.300]and have them explain what it is they do.
[00:47:00.480]And I fully recognize that there's a lot I have to learn,
[00:47:04.270]and so, I love reading papers or meeting with experts
[00:47:07.700]like you, and asking them, what makes this technology tick?
[00:47:10.920]What are the risks and benefits?
[00:47:12.610]Is there anything we should be thinking about?
[00:47:14.580]And I think 5G security is arguably
[00:47:17.640]one of the most important areas
[00:47:19.068]that policymakers need to learn about.
[00:47:21.120]I've been spending a lot of time over the last year or so
[00:47:24.142]learning with folks from the intelligence community
[00:47:27.270]and elsewhere in the telecom agencies,
[00:47:29.400]about how these 5G services might present
[00:47:34.000]greater or larger attack vectors,
[00:47:35.900]and what the security gaps are that we need to fill.
[00:47:38.600]I've been meeting with some of my counterparts
[00:47:40.010]around the world, I just came back
[00:47:41.210]from a swing through Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates,
[00:47:43.950]Saudi Arabia and Germany, to talk to some of our allies
[00:47:46.330]about these issues and compare notes.
[00:47:48.300]But I think it's important for lawmakers too,
[00:47:50.180]as they're coming up with the legislation,
[00:47:52.560]the actual laws that are going to guide agencies like mine,
[00:47:56.211]they need to be aware of the expertise
[00:47:58.440]that people like you have to offer.
[00:48:00.330]So if we can be a facilitator, let us know,
[00:48:02.520]I'm always happy to put together panels of experts,
[00:48:05.850]we did something similar with AI and machine learning
[00:48:07.850]last December where we held the first ever forum
[00:48:10.660]on artificial intelligence and machine learning.
[00:48:12.410]Brought in academics and entrepreneurs and others
[00:48:15.418]to help educate Washington
[00:48:17.000]about how these technologies worked
[00:48:18.677]and what use cases could be,
[00:48:20.780]what some of the policy issues could be.
[00:48:22.650]We could easily do the same with security,
[00:48:24.610]and the time is now.
[00:48:26.350]This is when the critical decisions are being made.
[00:48:29.350]The question, oh, we have another question.
[00:48:33.665][Female Audience Member] Hello.
[00:48:34.900]I am a proud general manager of a local TV station
[00:48:37.780]here in Lincoln, and also several TV stations
[00:48:40.750]throughout the state of Nebraska.
[00:48:44.150]Talking a little bit today,
[00:48:46.379]Google earns more local advertising revenue in our market
[00:48:49.572]than all of the broadcast television stations combined,
[00:48:53.220]and Google is taking more and more share every day.
[00:48:55.710]A little bit of a review there, right?
[00:48:58.010]Yet broadcast stations remain under the heavy hand
[00:49:00.540]of government regulations,
[00:49:02.250]while our biggest competitive threats
[00:49:04.070]operate without any restrictions.
[00:49:06.740]I know you've been a big champion of deregulation,
[00:49:10.623]but from our perspective of operating local TV stations,
[00:49:14.940]here in Lincoln and the smaller markets specifically,
[00:49:17.840]even with a deregulation champion at the head of the FCC,
[00:49:21.700]the government still cannot move fast enough,
[00:49:24.230]in our perspective.
[00:49:26.556]We look at just the changing pace
[00:49:29.020]in some of what we've talked about here today.
[00:49:31.230]In those smaller markets,
[00:49:32.510]I'm really concerned that local TV and the local TV news,
[00:49:35.530]specifically, that was referenced, will go by the wayside.
[00:49:39.150]Perhaps the same as some of the local newspapers
[00:49:41.640]that we've talked about.
[00:49:43.210]And as you know,
[00:49:45.800]there were threats against those newspapers.
[00:49:48.160]And perhaps they were literally regulated to death
[00:49:51.280]in some cases.
[00:49:52.600]With the famed companies that we've talked about
[00:49:54.870]taking more and more share,
[00:49:56.680]the FCC is going perhaps to do the same
[00:49:59.470]to local broadcast television stations
[00:50:01.870]in those smaller markets that we've talked about.
[00:50:04.960]I know you see the same things that I do,
[00:50:07.370]but at the FCC's current pace,
[00:50:10.110]I'm afraid that we will fix the regulatory imbalance
[00:50:13.560]once it's too late.
[00:50:15.110]Getting to the question.
[00:50:16.630]When the next tornado hits North Platte, Nebraska,
[00:50:18.900]no one will be there to warn viewers
[00:50:20.480]to get to that safe space.
[00:50:22.810]How can you get the gears of the bureaucracy to grind
[00:50:26.550]at least as fast as the media marketplace is evolving?
[00:50:31.800]That's a good question.
[00:50:32.910]Look, we've tried over the last two and a half years,
[00:50:35.260]and part of it is bureaucratic inertia,
[00:50:38.090]it's just very difficult to get the trains moving.
[00:50:40.850]Part of it is the fact that media ownership policy,
[00:50:42.780]as you know, has been stuck for many years,
[00:50:45.600]in an endless cycle of appeals,
[00:50:47.110]and the US Court of Appeals for the third circuit,
[00:50:49.610]which has essentially been setting
[00:50:51.450]media ownership policy for a while.
[00:50:54.380]Part of it is Congress, which,
[00:50:56.694]I think some members of Congress might recognize
[00:50:58.763]that the marketplace has changed, but nonetheless,
[00:51:00.870]the law is what it has been in some cases,
[00:51:03.750]all the way back to 1975, and so,
[00:51:06.311]I recognize the challenges that you face,
[00:51:08.300]and I'm sympathetic to them,
[00:51:09.200]and I've consistently said that every chance we can,
[00:51:11.888]we need to simply make sure
[00:51:13.530]that our rules match the marketplace, that's all I'm asking.
[00:51:16.550]I mean some might call it deregulation,
[00:51:18.110]but to me I think most reasonable people would say,
[00:51:20.960]if the government is going to have a regulation,
[00:51:22.810]it should match the marketplace we're in,
[00:51:24.690]as opposed to the marketplace
[00:51:25.870]when the regulation was adopted and so,
[00:51:28.190]we're gonna continue to try to do that as soon as we can,
[00:51:31.060]but I recognize that there are folks like you out there
[00:51:33.060]who have to find ways to get those news crews
[00:51:36.943]in front of cameras to provide local news,
[00:51:39.140]it's gonna be difficult to do.
[00:51:50.185][Male Audience Member] Hi.
[00:51:51.700]Just curious, broadband mapping.
[00:51:53.560]Yeah.
[00:51:54.393][Male Audience Member] Hot issue here locally,
[00:51:55.560]and I know in D.C..
[00:51:56.596]What's your prediction on when a more reliable
[00:51:59.910]broadband map would be available?
[00:52:02.000]What kind of information would you seek
[00:52:04.990]to make it more accurate?
[00:52:06.600]And do you foresee the general public
[00:52:09.159]being able to access that map
[00:52:11.240]or at least the state commissions, legislatures?
[00:52:15.300]Yeah, I'm just curious, your thoughts on that.
[00:52:17.330]Yeah, definitely.
[00:52:18.163]So you can see on August 1st, the FFC voted on a proposal
[00:52:22.010]to overhaul the way we do mapping,
[00:52:23.790]broadband mapping in this country,
[00:52:25.120]and so, going forward, number one,
[00:52:27.390]we want to get more granular information
[00:52:29.070]from broadband providers, not just the entire census bloc
[00:52:32.120]that is served, but a more circumscribed geographic area
[00:52:36.610]where we can get coverage information.
[00:52:39.030]And secondly we also wanted to make sure that there's
[00:52:40.880]third party validation of some of that information.
[00:52:43.490]So we've invited state and local governments,
[00:52:45.593]consumer groups, farm bureaus, anybody to be able to come in
[00:52:50.500]and essentially crowdsource the broadband information
[00:52:53.660]they see on the ground.
[00:52:54.650]So we want to incorporate
[00:52:55.483]not just the provider's perspective
[00:52:56.790]but also the lived experience of consumers
[00:52:59.310]and governmental officials.
[00:53:00.410]And that mapping we just proposed on August 1st,
[00:53:03.290]so we're gonna be taking action,
[00:53:04.780]I would anticipate in the coming months,
[00:53:06.260]and so we would certainly welcome your perspective
[00:53:08.061]while we're in what's called the comment period,
[00:53:10.500]essentially the public input period.
[00:53:12.040]And then whatever maps we do come up with,
[00:53:13.860]we'll make publicly available to the extent we can.
[00:53:18.910]I think a gentleman over here.
[00:53:23.242][Male Audience Member] I don't know if you're aware
[00:53:24.075]of the issue, but are there any penalties
[00:53:26.870]or are you looking into making penalties for SIM swapping?
[00:53:30.910]We are not currently, no,
[00:53:32.103]I'm not aware of the phenomenon, but that's not currently,
[00:53:36.657]are you engaging in it, are you making a confession?
[00:53:39.166](laughing) I'm just kidding.
[00:53:40.900]No.
[00:53:41.842]Just kidding, if we were, I would give you a pass,
[00:53:43.620]you seem like a nice guy.
[00:53:44.610]But no, currently we're not doing that.
[00:53:50.667][Male Audience Member] I'll just scream it out.
[00:53:52.050]Oh sure.
[00:53:52.883][Male Audience Member] I'm following up
[00:53:54.550]on the discussion about FAANG.
[00:53:56.537]I'm gonna ask it from a perspective that's,
[00:53:59.530]you're here, not it from your FCC perspective,
[00:54:03.060]as a regulator, but maybe as a citizen or otherwise,
[00:54:08.400]is FAANG, are they too big, and do we need as a country,
[00:54:14.850]if you can have a personal opinion
[00:54:16.840]or a professional opinion, if you will.
[00:54:19.640]Do you think we as a country need to look
[00:54:22.810]in some bipartisan way at reigning some of them in
[00:54:27.050]in some way so that the little guys,
[00:54:30.620]I guess I'll say ourselves included,
[00:54:32.210]although they are customers of ours, and good customers,
[00:54:34.980]we appreciate their business, they're a network business,
[00:54:37.100]but nonetheless.
[00:54:39.910]I guess I'd be interested in your personal views,
[00:54:42.186]if you're allowed to have them,
[00:54:44.140]and share them publicly. Oh sure.
[00:54:45.220]I have a lot of personal views.
[00:54:47.490]Kansas City Chiefs are America's team,
[00:54:49.040]that's a personal view.
[00:54:51.467]And a correct view, by the way.
[00:54:54.837]So no, I think there's obviously a huge
[00:54:56.193]political discussion in Washington,
[00:54:58.170]and I think it would've been unthinkable,
[00:55:00.060]just a couple of years ago,
[00:55:01.660]the notion that senators and representatives,
[00:55:03.640]Republicans and Democrats, would be saying things about
[00:55:06.890]reigning in some of the tech giants
[00:55:08.790]that would have been unthinkable.
[00:55:09.780]I just don't, the conversation has progressed very quickly.
[00:55:13.260]And so, as somebody who was trained in antitrust law,
[00:55:16.208]I think of it usually through that prism.
[00:55:19.060]And under the consumer welfare standard,
[00:55:20.800]as I was taught anyway, the question is,
[00:55:22.610]what is the impact on consumer welfare
[00:55:25.219]from the conduct of some of these companies,
[00:55:28.070]and it's a very unusual marketplace
[00:55:29.980]in the sense that a lot of the products
[00:55:31.823]that we're talking about are free.
[00:55:33.610]You don't have to pay Gmail.
[00:55:35.420]You don't have to pay to get a Facebook account.
[00:55:37.540]You don't have to pay to tweet, and that kind of thing,
[00:55:40.180]and so, in that sense it's sort of unusual
[00:55:43.640]but I think a lot of people are wondering, well,
[00:55:45.650]do we need to think about a revamp to antitrust law?
[00:55:49.582]And on the consumer protection side,
[00:55:51.470]do we need to think about the FTC
[00:55:53.690]taking a more aggressive stand or the Department of Justice
[00:55:56.050]taking a more aggressive stand on these issues?
[00:55:58.830]I personally am not sure yet,
[00:56:00.150]I mean I'd have to see a lot more evidence about
[00:56:02.250]exactly what anti competitive conduct we're talking about,
[00:56:04.750]what is the anti competitive effect on consumers.
[00:56:07.970]What would the remedy be?
[00:56:09.180]I mean it's very easy for politicians to say,
[00:56:11.330]break them up, but you know, break them up in to what,
[00:56:13.500]and what would the effect be on consumers
[00:56:15.300]at the end of the day,
[00:56:16.133]would they be better off or worse off?
[00:56:18.180]What I will say, however, is something that I said
[00:56:20.250]in November of 2017 in a speech I gave,
[00:56:23.080]in which I said that a lot of the concern
[00:56:25.860]that consumers have about these companies
[00:56:28.250]is that they're not transparent.
[00:56:29.740]They don't disclose, for example,
[00:56:31.260]how they use certain algorithms
[00:56:32.530]to order what it is you see on the internet.
[00:56:34.730]Or whether you see things on the internet at all.
[00:56:37.490]So that's one of the things that I think members of Congress
[00:56:40.380]are coming to appreciate, is the fact that transparency,
[00:56:43.660]across the internet economy,
[00:56:44.970]whether you're a network operator, or a tech company,
[00:56:47.780]a content provider, is something that I think generates
[00:56:50.520]a lot of good will among a lot of consumers.
[00:56:53.520]The other vector of course is privacy,
[00:56:55.230]which is somewhat related to that.
[00:56:56.890]A few years ago, I pointed out that consumers have a uniform
[00:56:59.830]expectation of privacy.
[00:57:01.410]If I'm going on a website, and I'm buying a product,
[00:57:03.820]or sharing my health information or whatnot,
[00:57:06.000]I frankly don't care whether it is a tech company
[00:57:08.010]or a network operator that has access to that information.
[00:57:10.980]I want that information to be protected and safeguarded.
[00:57:13.910]And so I think that uniform expectation of privacy
[00:57:16.380]is something that members of Congress
[00:57:17.960]are now starting to see as well,
[00:57:19.890]the need for a consistent level of regulation
[00:57:21.770]across the internet economy and so,
[00:57:23.850]whether this results in actual legislation,
[00:57:26.510]or the FTC or DOJ taking action,
[00:57:29.100]I think remains to be seen, but,
[00:57:32.302]it's an important conversation to have, and...
[00:57:37.670]So riffing on the question,
[00:57:39.930]I have a perhaps, overly philosophical question.
[00:57:45.840]The question is simply,
[00:57:47.070]what is the role of trust in all these discussions?
[00:57:49.470]But to back that up, the relationship between
[00:57:53.140]large private industry, government regulators, and trust.
[00:57:57.210]For much of the 20th century, AT&T, ma Bell,
[00:58:01.590]was in many ways a loved company.
[00:58:04.530]They were heavily regulated,
[00:58:06.170]but they were also a central driver of the economy,
[00:58:09.180]they were an industrial military complex.
[00:58:12.260]They worked with the government.
[00:58:15.200]Post breakup, moving into the modern era,
[00:58:17.650]we start to really hate the phone company.
[00:58:20.410]And then in the early internet era
[00:58:22.230]we hated the cable companies
[00:58:23.600]and we hated our internet providers,
[00:58:25.030]and today, we hate the FAANG companies.
[00:58:29.540]We don't trust them.
[00:58:30.740]We don't understand their algorithms,
[00:58:32.150]they lack transparency.
[00:58:34.900]You want to disconnect your service
[00:58:37.150]or upgrade your service, you call customer service
[00:58:39.920]and it's impossible to get through.
[00:58:41.860]Whatever.
[00:58:42.800]We don't trust the companies.
[00:58:45.030]What is the role or is there a role
[00:58:47.280]for regulation in establishing trust
[00:58:50.680]between the American consumer and companies
[00:58:53.550]that they don't necessarily have visibility into
[00:58:56.340]or understand the complex dynamics
[00:58:58.240]of how these companies operate at nationwide scale?
[00:59:02.580]That's a good question.
[00:59:04.620]So I guess I would answer in two ways.
[00:59:06.300]One would be that there's a, there's arguably a role,
[00:59:09.930]whether the FCC or some other agency,
[00:59:12.470]for certain types of regulation.
[00:59:14.260]So we talked about privacy for example.
[00:59:16.747]Does the FTC or some other agency
[00:59:19.390]have the authority to adopt uniform privacy regulations
[00:59:22.250]to ensure that information is safeguarded?
[00:59:24.250]That can generate a fair amount of trust.
[00:59:27.430]But secondly I guess and I'm gonna sound
[00:59:29.380]a little bit old fashioned.
[00:59:30.870]I actually think that the right approach
[00:59:32.600]to the maximum extent possible, is to solve that problem
[00:59:37.018]by promoting a lot more competition.
[00:59:39.680]Ultimately, that is the best way I think,
[00:59:41.980]to guarantee consumer welfare.
[00:59:43.470]If one company is doing something with my data
[00:59:46.330]that I don't like and I have the ability to switch
[00:59:48.750]to another company then that is ultimately
[00:59:52.050]a market based way to ensure
[00:59:54.810]the companies safeguard that data and so,
[00:59:56.950]I think there's a role for both potentially,
[00:59:59.700]but that's ultimately a decision
[01:00:01.356]for Congress to have to make,
[01:00:03.020]but there's no question that I think that level of trust
[01:00:05.660]that we've seen historically has frayed in many quarters.
[01:00:10.930]That's an interesting question.
[01:00:16.231][Male Audience Member] Alright, this one's
[01:00:17.064]a lot less philosophical.
[01:00:18.533](laughs)
[01:00:20.070]Just out of curiosity,
[01:00:20.960]what would you say the number one thing you do
[01:00:22.670]in your regular day is as chairman of the FCC?
[01:00:26.110]Oh my gosh.
[01:00:27.060]That is a great...
[01:00:30.060]I guess, so I'll answer the question this way.
[01:00:32.610]When I was a commissioner, when I first came on board,
[01:00:35.510]Julius Genachowski was the chairman.
[01:00:37.230]And so I'd have these meetings with him.
[01:00:40.219]Yeah, I was this ankle biting commissioner.
[01:00:42.770]Julius, you've got such an easy job,
[01:00:45.040]you've got 1500 people who answer to you.
[01:00:47.420]You have a staff of 15 people in your own office.
[01:00:50.170]How hard could this job be?
[01:00:51.700]And he told me, Ajit, someday,
[01:00:53.800]you're gonna be in this chair,
[01:00:54.930]and you're gonna understand how hard it is,
[01:00:56.420]I'm like, pshaw, come on, how hard could it be?
[01:00:59.160]Now Julius and I are very good friends.
[01:01:01.150]Every time I get together with him,
[01:01:03.160]I tell him, Julius, you were 100% right.
[01:01:06.620]The job is all encompassing.
[01:01:08.340]It is really 24 hours a day.
[01:01:11.650]You're always on call, there's always something happening
[01:01:13.970]that you can't expect.
[01:01:15.620]So there's really no typical day, if I'm in the office,
[01:01:18.280]I might have meetings scheduled throughout the day.
[01:01:20.840]If there are no meeting,
[01:01:21.870]even if there aren't any meetings,
[01:01:23.150]people are always popping in every 10 minutes,
[01:01:25.040]hey, here's this fire that just erupted.
[01:01:27.880]It's not your fault but you gotta figure out a way
[01:01:29.580]to solve it in the next 10 minutes, that kind of stuff.
[01:01:32.270]I'm often on the road,
[01:01:33.440]so up here for this week, going through North Dakota,
[01:01:36.160]South Dakota, Nebraska, and Kansas.
[01:01:38.040]In part to educate myself about some of the issues
[01:01:40.030]people are facing and to try to build support
[01:01:42.330]for some of the policies we're adopting.
[01:01:44.080]I'm also on the road abroad,
[01:01:45.790]so as part of the effort to work with our allies,
[01:01:48.840]I visited a lot of countries
[01:01:50.100]to try to talk to them about how the US
[01:01:51.760]is approaching issues, with respect to 5G and security
[01:01:54.480]and the like.
[01:01:56.670]That pays dividends at the end of the day
[01:01:58.040]with some of these international conferences,
[01:01:59.910]including one that's coming up in Egypt in October,
[01:02:02.330]where the entire globe is gonna set policies for spectrum
[01:02:04.990]that could help the United States lead the world
[01:02:07.140]in innovation and investment, so,
[01:02:08.980]there's no real typical day I would say.
[01:02:11.300]Oh, I do also make a little bit of time for tweeting
[01:02:14.160]as you probably have seen from my Twitter feed,
[01:02:16.640]much to my wife's chagrin.
[01:02:18.928]But to me the best part of the job
[01:02:20.820]is just getting to work with my coworkers at the FCC
[01:02:22.887]who are super talented.
[01:02:24.470]Getting out there into the field to meet people
[01:02:26.450]who are much smarter than me, who are doing amazing things,
[01:02:29.200]and it just makes me proud to be a public servant,
[01:02:32.610]every time I drive into Washington, I come into the office,
[01:02:34.860]I come with a pep in my step,
[01:02:36.670]partly because of the ridiculous amount of coffee I drink
[01:02:39.130]but also partly because I really love this field
[01:02:41.560]and I love the chance to know that the day's
[01:02:43.950]never gonna be boring, even if it's a really challenging day
[01:02:47.083]it's not a boring day, and so,
[01:02:49.855]yeah, I hope that goes a little bit of a ways
[01:02:52.120]towards answering the question.
[01:02:53.749]And I would also encourage public service, by the way.
[01:02:55.430]I know that government work gets a bum rap for some,
[01:02:59.210]but I've gotta say, if you wanna make a difference
[01:03:01.350]for your country, for your state, for your community,
[01:03:04.530]sign on the dotted line, make the sacrifice,
[01:03:06.820]it's really worth it despite all the flak that you might get
[01:03:10.770]at the end of the day, you're gonna see results
[01:03:13.430]that are really gonna make you feel good
[01:03:15.250]about the work you did during your career.
[01:03:18.090]A follow on question to that.
[01:03:21.550]When we think of public policy jobs and jobs at the FCC,
[01:03:24.960]most people think lawyers.
[01:03:26.600]Law, law, law.
[01:03:27.820]The bureaucracy is filled with lawyers.
[01:03:30.360]We're the problem.
[01:03:31.340]And to some extent we are.
[01:03:33.310]This is being recorded, I shouldn't have said that,
[01:03:35.060]I apologize to my dean.
[01:03:36.660]It's a statement against the interest.
[01:03:38.310]Yes.
[01:03:39.707]The question is, how's that changing under your leadership?
[01:03:43.230]I know you've done some reorganization at the commission,
[01:03:46.080]you're working to hire engineers, entry level engineers.
[01:03:50.130]What are the opportunities there,
[01:03:51.660]what are you looking for,
[01:03:52.660]what's the importance of these initiatives?
[01:03:54.540]What's the future of the commission,
[01:03:57.500]and telecommunications policy as a typically,
[01:04:00.710]traditionally, law defined field?
[01:04:02.870]Yeah to me everybody should have a seat at the table
[01:04:04.780]regardless of discipline, and as you mentioned,
[01:04:06.830]in my first year I proposed,
[01:04:08.330]and in my second year we implemented
[01:04:10.110]a reform to create an office of economics and analytics.
[01:04:13.400]So we have a centralized shop now
[01:04:15.650]where economists and data scientists,
[01:04:17.970]GIS specialists and others, have a seat at the table.
[01:04:21.490]So whenever I'm proposing X, Y, or Z,
[01:04:23.940]we run it through our process, and the OEA as it's called,
[01:04:26.530]the Office of Economics and Analytics,
[01:04:28.170]has a seat at the table and they can tell us,
[01:04:29.670]well, from a cost benefit perspective
[01:04:31.500]this might not make sense, or,
[01:04:33.220]from a data analysis standpoint we would need this data set
[01:04:36.480]in order to be able to pursue that policy.
[01:04:38.460]That's something that we didn't have before,
[01:04:40.560]in a systematized way,
[01:04:41.980]and so I'm really glad that we did that.
[01:04:43.940]The other thing you pointed out
[01:04:44.900]is making sure we have engineers
[01:04:46.650]who have a seat at the table.
[01:04:48.540]And especially in this field, it's engineering heavy,
[01:04:51.790]you've gotta be,
[01:04:52.880]you have to have an understanding of this technology,
[01:04:54.630]and so we rely very heavily on our engineers.
[01:04:57.000]So I set up an honors engineering program
[01:04:59.180]to make sure that we have the best and brightest
[01:05:00.690]coming into our agency every single year.
[01:05:03.410]And we're hopeful that that first batch of engineers
[01:05:05.640]I think starts, I want to say it starts next month,
[01:05:08.570]something like that, but I can't wait for them
[01:05:10.130]to get on board, because,
[01:05:11.900]we need to learn all of the new technologies
[01:05:13.760]that are out there and not just in our space.
[01:05:16.160]One of the things I'm very interested in
[01:05:17.510]is adjacent technologies.
[01:05:18.890]So I mentioned artificial intelligence, machine learning,
[01:05:21.040]but there's blockchain and quantum computing
[01:05:23.600]and all of these other technologies.
[01:05:25.400]We want to stay ahead of the curve
[01:05:26.700]so that we're not surprised by anything, and yeah,
[01:05:30.060]hopefully these new engineers
[01:05:31.100]will help us have a chance to do that.
[01:05:34.810]Hey.
[01:05:35.643][Male Audience Member] Alright, I have a fun one.
[01:05:36.476]Since Twitter and on typical days,
[01:05:38.190]and putting out fires in 10 minutes has been invoked.
[01:05:41.320]On February 21 at 8:55 a.m.,
[01:05:45.630]@RealDonaldTrump tweeted, I want 5G,
[01:05:48.600]and even 6G technology in the United States
[01:05:51.930]as soon as possible, it is far more powerful, faster,
[01:05:54.640]and smarter than the current standard.
[01:05:57.200]American companies must step up to their effort
[01:05:59.130]or get left behind, there is no reason that we should
[01:06:01.600]be lagging behind on, dot, dot, dot,
[01:06:03.330]and there was a second tweet.
[01:06:04.800]Something that is so obviously the future.
[01:06:07.040]I want the United States to win through competition,
[01:06:09.250]not by blocking out currently more advanced technologies.
[01:06:12.400]We must always be the leader in everything we do,
[01:06:14.460]especially when it comes to the very exciting
[01:06:16.760]world of technology.
[01:06:18.362][Male Audience Member] Very exciting world of technology.
[01:06:19.770]I'm curious if you have push tweets,
[01:06:24.230]and how Twitter changes your job on a daily basis,
[01:06:29.010]especially with...
[01:06:31.320]I mean I think in general, the executive branches have,
[01:06:33.750]you know, been getting more active on social media.
[01:06:36.190]A lot of things sometimes come to people first
[01:06:40.810]through social media, as I'm guessing that might have, so,
[01:06:44.440]how does that change your daily job?
[01:06:48.170]In terms of the tweets that I put out,
[01:06:49.810]or the tweets that I see?
[01:06:51.914][Male Audience Member] In terms of tweets about policy
[01:06:55.170]that affect your job.
[01:06:56.812]There's...
[01:07:00.390]There were a lot of, in the last six months,
[01:07:01.870]you know, different inter-agency things
[01:07:04.030]within the executive branch that I think
[01:07:05.740]were just kind of fascinating, because,
[01:07:08.600]you know, you're all on the same team,
[01:07:10.410]but you all have your own specialties, so,
[01:07:13.280]sometimes that gets hashed out online.
[01:07:17.036]So I'm curious how the online world changes
[01:07:20.190]how you do policy.
[01:07:22.230]To be honest it doesn't really affect it at all.
[01:07:25.060]I mean we're gonna continue doing what we're gonna do
[01:07:28.510]and so, no matter if there's some tweets out there,
[01:07:32.750]sounds kind of bizarre to say,
[01:07:34.280]but we are always going to be driven by two things,
[01:07:37.363]and two things only, the facts and the law.
[01:07:41.180]And I can't put it any more simply than that.
[01:07:44.170]I think we're always gonna be focused
[01:07:46.000]on what we think is in the public interest,
[01:07:47.700]and with respect to 5G, a couple months after that,
[01:07:50.470]when the President and I held an event at the White House,
[01:07:52.580]and he said the policy, we want the United States
[01:07:54.650]to lead in 5G, we want this effort to be
[01:07:56.770]private sector driven and private sector led,
[01:07:58.750]and that was consistent with my message, and so,
[01:08:02.250]yep, I don't have time all the time
[01:08:04.120]to follow all the Twitter accounts
[01:08:06.290]of various government officials and private sector folks,
[01:08:08.410]but to the extent I do, I use it more as,
[01:08:14.100]sort of, or education resources about the news of the day
[01:08:16.220]as opposed to a policy input that we need to incorporate
[01:08:20.560]into our decision making.
[01:08:22.440]I will say one of the fun things about Twitter
[01:08:23.920]from my perspective is just being able to
[01:08:26.040]interact with all these people that I never would have met
[01:08:28.670]in a previous life, so I mean,
[01:08:30.310]to be followed by Kurt Warner, the quarterback of the,
[01:08:33.527]the former quarterback of the Arizona Cardinals and Rams
[01:08:35.820]started following me like,
[01:08:36.870]man, this is a dude, he won the Super Bowl!
[01:08:39.370]Incredible, how cool is that?
[01:08:40.830]What does he see out of my Twitter feed?
[01:08:43.110]I don't know if you follow me on Twitter,
[01:08:44.040]but you'll see I'm just unbelievably eclectic,
[01:08:45.790]just random stuff that may or may not have to do
[01:08:49.680]with the telecom space, but it's just kinda neat
[01:08:51.680]to have that sort of accessibility to people.
[01:08:56.730]Hey.
[01:09:03.282][Male Audience Member] I don't know if this is going to be
[01:09:04.730]a philosophical, but I'll give it a shot
[01:09:07.050]as a computer engineer.
[01:09:10.070]I wanna ask how the changing technological landscape
[01:09:14.860]changes the way you make laws and your metrics.
[01:09:18.980]So for example, the traditional 25/3 megabit per second
[01:09:25.770]for this much percentage of the population
[01:09:28.950]that you put in your reports.
[01:09:31.595]So, somewhere between 2017, 18,
[01:09:35.600]we have now more connected devices than the people on earth.
[01:09:40.580]And the projections are pretty close,
[01:09:42.430]we're gonna have eight to one ratio.
[01:09:46.070]So that means the resource we have with spectrum
[01:09:49.530]is being shared by IOT devices,
[01:09:52.344]some of which we don't know who the owner is,
[01:09:55.680]for example, for a smart city, the city may own it.
[01:10:00.380]Who does it benefit, and how do we measure it,
[01:10:03.790]or think about a soil moisture sensor on a farm.
[01:10:08.950]What does it represent?
[01:10:10.310]On one hand, is it only related to the farmer that owns it?
[01:10:14.680]Or does it represent an entire country,
[01:10:18.160]because your food security
[01:10:19.800]depends on how efficiently you raise crops.
[01:10:23.570]And that would have to do also with connectivity metrics,
[01:10:27.550]and you know, fairness metrics that the FCC
[01:10:30.130]deals with a lot.
[01:10:31.570]So what are your thoughts on this changing landscape,
[01:10:34.780]because we might be very easily talking about,
[01:10:36.980]today we're talking about rural urban digital gap.
[01:10:41.560]But we might be talking about digital divide
[01:10:44.250]between a farm and a town next door,
[01:10:47.040]because if the farm is hugely connected
[01:10:49.400]with all the farming devices that you imagine,
[01:10:52.140]so what is your take on the changing landscape,
[01:10:54.560]and how the FCC you think should adapt to those changes?
[01:10:59.740]A few interesting aspects to your question,
[01:11:01.510]and one is, what is broadband?
[01:11:03.500]And so the FCC's metric has changed over the years,
[01:11:06.530]now as you mentioned, it's 25 megabits per second down,
[01:11:08.970]three megabits per second up.
[01:11:11.100]And there's always a question, every single year,
[01:11:13.460]we are required by Congress to do an assessment
[01:11:15.660]of the state of advanced telecommunications capability,
[01:11:18.780]and should we adjust that speed metric.
[01:11:20.910]And that's one of the things we're constantly evaluating,
[01:11:22.980]is how do people use the internet?
[01:11:24.560]And increasingly now it's becoming more complex than ever
[01:11:27.470]thanks in part to IOT and I think 5G
[01:11:29.510]will only accelerate that.
[01:11:31.040]You could see some low bandwidth applications
[01:11:33.070]which will become the norm, all these wireless sensors
[01:11:36.200]in the lights sending very small amounts of data
[01:11:38.070]that require low latency.
[01:11:39.550]But you could also imagine very high bandwidth applications,
[01:11:41.890]things like precision medicine,
[01:11:45.100]where you need very high bandwidth, low latency services,
[01:11:48.890]and if you're gonna do robotic surgery,
[01:11:51.120]or VR and AR, is just gonna be very high bandwidth as well.
[01:11:54.230]So, how do we think about what is broadband
[01:11:57.228]in that kind of environment?
[01:11:58.880]And it's gonna become increasingly more challenging,
[01:12:01.370]as time goes on.
[01:12:02.880]And one of the good examples of that
[01:12:04.480]I heard from, today, from a farmer who told me
[01:12:08.370]that the farm is much more connected today
[01:12:11.200]than most people appreciate,
[01:12:12.720]and it's not just basic internet connectivity,
[01:12:15.340]just 4G LTE to make a phone call,
[01:12:18.070]or send a little bit of data.
[01:12:19.890]They need a huge amount of symmetric service,
[01:12:22.670]not just the download speeds,
[01:12:24.430]but also they're generating so much data
[01:12:26.210]when they send a connected combine over a corn field,
[01:12:28.980]that they need to upload a significant amount of data,
[01:12:31.250]and one of them told me that in some cases,
[01:12:33.500]it would be quicker for him to upload all of that data
[01:12:35.760]to a thumb drive and physically drive it to San Francisco
[01:12:38.970]where the company they use analyzes that data,
[01:12:41.340]than it would be to upload it terrestrially,
[01:12:43.880]and so that's one of the things
[01:12:45.060]that we're trying to think about,
[01:12:47.160]not just as we think about what is broadband, but also,
[01:12:49.470]how do we adjust our universal service and other policies
[01:12:52.580]to provide that kind of high speed symmetric service?
[01:12:55.210]And in the context of our upcoming
[01:12:57.880]rural digital opportunity fund,
[01:12:59.300]this is gonna be a 20 billion dollar capex fund
[01:13:01.550]that's gonna be rolled out.
[01:13:02.590]We're gonna release something hopefully
[01:13:04.870]in the fourth quarter of this year about it.
[01:13:07.110]We wanna think about how do we prioritize
[01:13:08.720]those higher tier speeds, up to gigabit speeds,
[01:13:11.930]to make sure that people in rural America
[01:13:13.970]get the connectivity they need?
[01:13:15.980]It's not just folks in urban America who need it.
[01:13:18.540]It's also some of the folks in rural America, so,
[01:13:21.702]it makes the job all the more complex.
[01:13:25.970]Sometimes you wonder back in the old days
[01:13:27.380]when the goal was just to get telephone service everywhere.
[01:13:30.170]That was kind of a simple thing, in a way,
[01:13:33.020]because telephones, you know, a voice call is a voice call,
[01:13:35.560]and so now you have all of these different types
[01:13:38.180]of internet access that fit different types of use cases,
[01:13:41.120]and it's not just a simple question of saying okay,
[01:13:43.610]this is what we're aiming for.
[01:13:46.140]We've gotta have everything, the whole smorgasbord,
[01:13:48.930]on tap for the American consumer.
[01:13:51.720]Okay, so it's time for the rapid fire questions.
[01:13:55.850]Oh man.
[01:13:56.710]A little nervous. I believe that they
[01:13:58.050]were sent to you.
[01:13:59.160]I don't if you got them.
[01:14:00.540]I certainly didn't get them.
[01:14:01.660]So Preston, we might have some words for you later.
[01:14:05.050]But we'll see how this goes.
[01:14:07.560]We're trying to do this, 10 questions, five minutes.
[01:14:12.300]What is your favorite movie?
[01:14:14.120]Oh, The Big Lebowski.
[01:14:15.270]Okay, that one was easy.
[01:14:16.960]The Dude abides, right?
[01:14:18.110]Come on, yeah.
[01:14:18.990]What's one class that you wish
[01:14:20.210]you could go back to school and take?
[01:14:22.260]Oh.
[01:14:23.740]Wow that is a...
[01:14:25.450]So I would say probably multivariable calculus,
[01:14:28.560]I loved math as a student,
[01:14:29.950]and that's one of my great regrets at Harvard,
[01:14:33.150]I had the chance to learn
[01:14:34.080]from some of the great mathematicians,
[01:14:35.820]and because I made that choice
[01:14:37.620]to go down the humanities path I thought,
[01:14:39.120]why am I ever gonna use calculus again,
[01:14:40.940]and sometimes I wonder, ugh, had I pursued it,
[01:14:44.540]could that have led to either a career in applied math,
[01:14:48.250]or what, so, that's probably the big one.
[01:14:50.297]That's a solid answer, I like that one.
[01:14:52.645](laughs)
[01:14:53.478]What's the most important skill you look for
[01:14:55.420]in colleagues or employees?
[01:14:57.910]Oh.
[01:15:00.185]Did you say single most important skill?
[01:15:02.090]Single most important skill.
[01:15:03.420]Oh gosh.
[01:15:04.253]So if I were to list all the skills I would say,
[01:15:06.950]the ability to think critically,
[01:15:08.400]the ability to write persuasively.
[01:15:10.710]The ability to process a lot of information quickly,
[01:15:13.560]and the ability to explain it verbally
[01:15:16.810]in an understandable way for the audience,
[01:15:19.660]so of those, I would say, probably analytical ability,
[01:15:23.920]meshed with curiosity about the world.
[01:15:25.270]I like other people who share the same sense of wonder
[01:15:28.250]and awe about technology, and can go on that journey with me
[01:15:31.520]to help me understand how things work.
[01:15:33.130]I'm gonna say a sense of curiosity,
[01:15:35.020]though you demonstrated an analytical ability
[01:15:37.650]in your approach to the question.
[01:15:38.483]Oh I guess that's true.
[01:15:40.460]Who is someone with whom you have significant
[01:15:42.540]personal, political, or moral disagreements,
[01:15:45.060]but nonetheless look up to and have great respect for?
[01:15:48.780]Wow, there are so many.
[01:15:50.872]I would say, a lot of the folks I worked with
[01:15:53.110]on the Senate Judiciary Committee, way back when,
[01:15:55.959]are friends to this day.
[01:15:57.600]And some of them are publicly known, for example,
[01:15:59.960]Preet Bharara, who was the US Attorney
[01:16:01.800]for the Southern District of New York.
[01:16:03.778]Strident critic of the administration
[01:16:05.690]as you're probably aware, but he's a friend to this day,
[01:16:09.160]and there are others too, I don't want to out them.
[01:16:11.404](laughs)
[01:16:12.640]But one of the great things
[01:16:14.710]is that they have remained friends to this day
[01:16:16.630]and quietly they'll send me an email
[01:16:18.700]or get me on the phone and say hey,
[01:16:20.760]just want to let you know you're doing a good job.
[01:16:23.140]Keep taking the heat,
[01:16:24.100]and do what you think is the right thing to do
[01:16:26.077]and just know that there are others out here
[01:16:27.880]who while we may disagree with you on policy,
[01:16:30.450]nonetheless we know at the end of the day
[01:16:31.910]you're a good person trying to do the right thing.
[01:16:33.850]And those are the friends who will be with me 'til the end.
[01:16:38.500]If you could be present at, but not change,
[01:16:41.370]any historic event, what would it be?
[01:16:44.100]Oh my god.
[01:16:46.080]Where to start with that one?
[01:16:48.750]So, I have to pick one?
[01:16:50.990]Only one.
[01:16:52.260]So one of the things I've always been curious about.
[01:16:53.990]So my wife and I honeymooned in Turkey,
[01:16:56.470]and so when you're standing there in Bosporus
[01:16:58.270]for any those of you have been,
[01:16:59.780]you sometimes wonder, in April 1453,
[01:17:02.800]what it must have been like
[01:17:03.710]when the Byzantine empire's crumbling, and Mehmed II,
[01:17:07.712]Mehmed the Conqueror has got his forces amassed,
[01:17:10.290]and what it must have been like to know
[01:17:11.680]that this incredible Eastern empire
[01:17:14.542]which was hobbled, of course,
[01:17:16.530]by the fourth Crusade in 1204,
[01:17:18.340]and then finally collapses in 1453.
[01:17:20.790]What it must have been like to know,
[01:17:21.780]there's so much of civilization's patrimony that was there.
[01:17:24.650]The previous 250 years had been withering away.
[01:17:28.400]What it must have been like to see when it finally fell.
[01:17:32.160]That's one of the things
[01:17:32.993]I've always been very curious about.
[01:17:34.120]The secondary one would be when Diocletian,
[01:17:36.310]the Roman emperor who abdicated in 305.
[01:17:39.140]To me he's one of the underrated emperors in Roman history.
[01:17:41.700]He confronted the Empire
[01:17:42.840]during the crisis of the third century.
[01:17:46.460]For him to right the ship,
[01:17:47.500]and then sort of like Cincinnatus,
[01:17:48.920]stepped down and grew cabbages in Croatia,
[01:17:51.270]I'm not making this up.
[01:17:52.340]He actually gave up the Roman emperorship
[01:17:54.240]to grow cabbages in the Balkans.
[01:17:57.486]I would just be fascinated to see what his thinking was
[01:18:00.800]going into that.
[01:18:01.633]Both good answers.
[01:18:02.466]Mind would've been the Battle of Hastings.
[01:18:04.270]Oh, 1066.
[01:18:06.770]What's one professional skill of yours
[01:18:08.630]you wish you could improve?
[01:18:10.910]Oh my gosh.
[01:18:12.250]I mean...
[01:18:14.710]To work more quickly.
[01:18:16.000]I still tend to be a somewhat slow reader.
[01:18:18.450]And so when somebody sends me a document,
[01:18:20.210]I'm reading it closely, or sends me an email,
[01:18:22.140]I'm reading closely, and it would save me a lot more time
[01:18:25.100]if I could just focus on it and get it done a lot quicker.
[01:18:28.500]Luckily I have really smart people, much smarter than me,
[01:18:31.540]and faster than me, who are able to do it, but,
[01:18:34.460]you know, one of the things I try to maintain in this job
[01:18:36.470]as best I can, notwithstanding what I said
[01:18:37.880]to that gentleman is, to maintain that work life balance.
[01:18:40.760]My kids are the most important thing in the world to me.
[01:18:42.780]I always make it a priority to get home by 6:00, 6:30,
[01:18:45.730]to have dinner with them.
[01:18:47.020]It'd make it a lot easier to do that
[01:18:48.510]if I were faster in the office.
[01:18:50.910]What's one personal skill of yours
[01:18:52.680]you wish you could improve?
[01:18:55.630]The ability to compartmentalize.
[01:18:59.510]You know, I give everything to this job, I really do,
[01:19:02.450]and once my kids are down at eight,
[01:19:04.600]I'm back online, doing stuff.
[01:19:07.690]I just wish that sometimes you could just remember, look.
[01:19:11.260]There's a bigger world out there.
[01:19:12.720]There are people going to work and putting food on the table
[01:19:15.640]and educating their kids, and,
[01:19:17.270]they're not gonna care whether 47 CFR
[01:19:19.250]changes in this direction or that direction and so,
[01:19:22.190]just having that sense of perspective is something
[01:19:24.040]that I wish I could do more often.
[01:19:26.280]Who is your favorite character from a work of fiction?
[01:19:29.940]From a work of fiction?
[01:19:31.490]Oh, I mean, Ignatius Riley, Confederacy of Dunces, right,
[01:19:35.310]from John Kennedy Toole.
[01:19:36.310]I mean that's one of the funniest characters I would say.
[01:19:39.077]One of the more serious characters.
[01:19:40.810]Well anyone in All the King's Men,
[01:19:42.360]which I think is the greatest novel in the American canon.
[01:19:47.820]Yeah, those are just great, great books.
[01:19:49.970]So two more, and this one I think might be the hardest.
[01:19:52.300]Okay.
[01:19:53.133]What's the worst professional advice
[01:19:54.770]that you've ever given someone?
[01:19:56.610]That I've ever given somebody?
[01:19:57.860]Oh my god.
[01:20:00.326](laughs) Gosh, that's a good one.
[01:20:03.820]Worst professional advice I've ever given somebody.
[01:20:06.830]This is the one I wanted to make sure
[01:20:08.566]they got to you beforehand.
[01:20:10.200]Oh.
[01:20:11.033]I think he might have mentioned this one,
[01:20:12.440]now that I think about it.
[01:20:13.273]Of course I didn't come up with obviously
[01:20:14.560]a good answer to it, but...
[01:20:18.250]Yeah, I would say probably to a friend of mine,
[01:20:22.220]who's debating two different courses of action.
[01:20:25.520]Play it safe and just stay where you are,
[01:20:27.500]instead of moving.
[01:20:29.020]In that particular circumstance,
[01:20:30.380]it was not the right thing for her to do.
[01:20:32.730]I couldn't have known that at the time,
[01:20:34.300]but given the information I had it was probably
[01:20:36.810]the right thing.
[01:20:38.080]Echoes an earlier sentiment of, take calculated risks.
[01:20:42.097]Yeah, that was early on in my career and hers too.
[01:20:46.370]Last question, if you could say thank you
[01:20:48.420]to one historic figure, who would it be?
[01:20:51.090]To a historic figure.
[01:20:53.880]Dead or still alive.
[01:20:56.978]An historic figure defined as, just somebody famous?
[01:20:59.930]Sure.
[01:21:01.460]Oh, man.
[01:21:02.880]So I would say,
[01:21:05.410]I would say Teddy Roosevelt.
[01:21:08.000]So when you come into my office at the FCC you will see,
[01:21:12.150]the first thing you see is a big plaque
[01:21:14.590]of the speech in the arena.
[01:21:16.310]And I'm sure those of you have heard of the,
[01:21:18.890]what counts is not the person,
[01:21:20.530]it's not the critic who counts,
[01:21:21.910]but it's the person who's in the arena,
[01:21:23.780]whose toil and sweat is devoted to higher labors,
[01:21:27.980]who gives everything of himself,
[01:21:29.350]so that at the end of the day,
[01:21:30.810]his fate is not to be among those timid few
[01:21:34.040]who didn't take a risk, and so, to me at least.
[01:21:37.140]And for those of you who haven't read it,
[01:21:39.830]I would definitely urge you to read
[01:21:41.040]Edwin Morris's first volume of the TR biography,
[01:21:43.960]The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt.
[01:21:45.890]You just finish that book saying, you know.
[01:21:48.640]What an incredible, quintessentially American figure.
[01:21:52.250]Just so energetic, pugnacious, in the public square,
[01:21:56.620]doing what he thought was the right thing to do.
[01:21:58.430]Just a man of action,
[01:21:59.700]and that's something that I aspire to be every single day.
[01:22:02.180]And sometimes I get it right, sometimes I get it wrong,
[01:22:05.240]but at the end of the day I'm in the arena,
[01:22:07.710]and for that inspiration I have TR to thank.
[01:22:10.730]Great answer and on that note, I can say, thank you.
[01:22:13.604]Thanks.
[01:22:14.804]It's a pleasure. (audience clapping)
[01:22:16.300]It's a pleasure.
[01:22:17.133]That was great.

The screen size you are trying to search captions on is too small!

You can always jump over to MediaHub and check it out there.

Comments

0 Comments

Ajit Pai, Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, Visits the University of Nebraska

Description

Searchable Transcript

Comments icon comment

Related Channels

Comments