D-day Part 2 - Politics as usual

Then there is the political aspect of the FCC. For example, the first thing George W. Bush did when he got to the White House was to appoint Michael Powell as FCC Chairman. Michael’s father is General Colin Powell. Janet Jackson’s “performance”at the Super Bowl would be Michael’s downfall.

Obama appointed his Harvard Law Review pal Julius Genachowski as Chairman after he did such a great job helping the Prez manage the campaign technology. Besides, Julius was the FCC lawyer in the Clinton administration. (Even in these times of transparency, openness and change, there is always a connection.)

Of course, at the time no one had any idea of the impact of this digital revolution. The technology hadn’t caught up to Washington.

For example, one would have been labeled a madman to suggest that a room full of cassette tapes could be exchanged for an mp3 player no larger than a cigarette lighter simply by converting the songs from an analog format to a digital one.

Nor did they realize…
...that the cell phone would infiltrate society beyond anyone’s imagination and
...that the spectrum requirements would shrink considerably once that technology went digital.