I was happy to watch live the most part of the Freedom to Connect 2009 conference via a broadcast feed, setup especially for the event. It proved really worthy and helped gain additional insight on how the issues of open access, municipal broadband and Government involvement in broadband development, are addressed on the other side of the Atlantic. It’s one thing to read about it in the extensive US literature and press coverage and absolutely another to follow the debates on the issues live. Europe had also a fair share of presentation time, due to its presumable success in municipal broadband development initiatives. Dirk var der Wounde, L. Aaron Kaplan, Herman Wagter and Benoit Felten presented their views on municipal broadband and open access.
Good coverage of the event is provided by Lynn Stanton. David Weinberg also covered the conference live. Here’s also the presentations from the event.
I certainly don’t consider myself an expert on US broadband policy-making but more and more I get the feeling that contemporary discussions in US on Government involvement (spurred primarily by the soon to be released stimulus package) fall short on examining the lessons learned from EU’s extensive experience, successes and failures, in broadband promotion and development. For more than a decade, member states have stimulated broadband demand and infrastructure availability, via EU and national funds, and significant conclusions have already been drawn. Maybe a closer look in related findings from past European broadband funding initiatives could help align properly the investment priorities of the US broadband stimulus plan.
