• by Wayne Friedman , Staff Writer, March 16, 2010

The FCC's National Broadband Plan has many optimistic and publicly uplifting goals -- and that is where things usually fall apart.

Many equate the commission plan as a big pie-in-the-sky endeavor that veteran broadband service providers, such as AT&T, believe will be hard to achieve in 10 years. That is, a national service that will race along at 100 megabits a second about 25 times the current faster data rate, and get to some 100 million homes that don't have broadband currently.

Broadcasters are worried; perhaps the FCC is looking to push them aside. Advocates would say it's about pushing them to be more competitive. By 2020, local broadcasters probably will hope to be in a different, valued-added video marketplace -- one that is HD, 3D and/or MobileTV.

The FCC's plan has some of the same feel when the push was made in 2009 to go from analog to digital. The change was made, in part, for the safety of the U.S. citizenry in terms of timely emergency information.

One of the last items list in the agency's big broadband plan was this: "Enhance the safety of the American people by providing every first responder with access to a nationwide, wireless, interoperable public safety network."

Another item concerned digital education -- an area where many feel the U.S. trails behind other countries.

"Move our adoption rates from roughly 65% to more than 90% and make sure that every child in America is digitally literate by the time he or she leaves high school."

Safety and education? It's hard to argue with that.

Those two issues have been something the FCC has promoted on the broadcasting public airwaves -- not always successfully -- for the last 50 years. That's in addition to getting entertained freely (with advertising support) from shows such as of "The Honeymooners," "Gunsmoke," "Married with Children," and "The West Wing."

Some broadcasters are also up in arms with FCC's plan to have them give up some spectrum for future wireless businesses in exchange for receiving proceeds from a spectrum auction.

Broadcasters want something bigger in exchange for their participation, such ridding themselves of many regulations that encumber their businesses. They want freedoms other newer media currently enjoy.

Is FCC's prepping a broadband plan that will eventually replace broadcasting? Not anytime soon -- but the usual media seeds will be planted again.