1. So Powell resigns having lost his battles with Kevin Martin - is Martin the Brutus and Kathleen Abernathy the Anthony? Certainly Martin pulled no punches in isolating Powell on the FCC - in a five-person Commission, usually the President’s pick for Chair (Powell) gets his way, but fellow-Republican Martin ‘defected’ on key issues, producing a blocking 3-2 vote against Powell. As a result, Powell couldn’t do anything on Baby Bell de/re/regulation (even if he wanted to!) and was reduced to an impotent figure talking big about WiFi/WiMax/radical spectrum overhaul, but doing very little in practice. And as for taking on the media lobby in election year - he should have read Clintonian former Chairman Reed Hundt’s memoir ( on not taking on television policy….
2. Verwaayen threats to OfCom - now the ‘equivalency’ debate is really warming up! Highly intrusive regulation in the UK is - as Dr Ungerer and Ed Richards hinted - in contrast to the French/Italian/German/Dutch experiences - simply because BT killed LLU here, and is now paying the price for screwing over David Edmonds’ Oftel in 2000-2. Will Stephen Carter and David Currie’s OfCom do any better? This is the key credibility test!
3. ‘Stakeholder’ groups - Dr Ungerer made the very simple point - new entrants are the lifeblood of competition policy. Stakeholder groups do not - by definition- include those not already in the cosy oligopolies of communications policy-making - so stakeholder groups should be scrutinized very carefully. Notice the Conservatives abolition plans for the Broadband Stakeholder Group? Whether that’s principled or not, any shaking up of the ancien regime is to be welcomed.
4. Britain is far behind on broadband, as we all now know. Less well-known is that we’re also slipping behind on spectrum licensing - because of the Treasury obsession with auctions. The equipment manufacturers want free spectrum for their intelligent equipment - and, far from being ’spectrum communists’, they are actually the WiFi mass manufacturers. So please show me a policy where OfCom is genuinely in the lead? I want them to succeed - any competition-oriented analyst does - but the current planning doesn’t convince - not yet. In answer to the key question at the Oxford Media Convention - where the �300m for yet more public service broadcasting will come from - not one of the panellists would say - but if the answer is spectrum auction or general taxation (let alone a licence fee increase), this will penalise competitors with more radical ideas. The stakeholders may disagree…