‘New’ FCC Must Walk a Fine Line
Michael Powell, the new chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, has a reputation for favoring free-market competition over government regulation. With similarly minded Republicans holding a 3-2 edge on the agency’s five-member commission, he will have more clout to implement his vision than did his predecessor, William E. Kennard.
Powell wisely argues that he and other regulators should “take our ignorance more seriously,” and he recognizes that “our bureaucratic process is too slow to respond to the challenges of Internet time.” But Powell, the son of Secretary of State Colin L. Powell, must also be careful to uphold old democratic values like fairness in rapidly evolving new media. The Internet is just as susceptible to anti-competitive, monopolistic pressures as were the railroads in their day.
For starters, he should reconsider his opposition as an FCC commissioner last year to requiring AOL and Time Warner to cooperate with competing instant Web messaging services and to give rivals access to their cable TV systems. Such requirements may be the only way to prevent companies like the new AOL Time Warner from using a gargantuan market share to freeze out competitors.
Powell becomes the information economy’s chief regulator after eight years of unprecedented deregulation. Big broadcasters, newspapers and regional telephone companies are already lobbying to further loosen the reins, especially ownership restrictions. Powell should certainly continue deregulation in cases where old laws inhibit promising technological trends like “convergence,” wherein telephones, computers and TVs morph into a single appliance capable of delivering a broad range of content. However, as Powell must have seen while working on antitrust cases in the Clinton administration, sometimes government regulation is the only way to truly foster competition and keep markets free.
