Knight Digital Media Center on Attending the Next Broadband Breakfast Club

The Knight Digital Media Center web site promotes the upcoming Broadband Breakfast Club, “Setting the Table for the National Broadband Plan: Where to From Here?”

Track the action. Either attend (if you’re in the DC area) or watch the archived webcast of this March 16 BroadbandBreakfast.com event: Top Congressional tech staffers will discuss Setting the Table for the National Broadband Plan: Where to from Here?. Representatives of the main Congressional committiees hashing over the plan will be there: the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, and the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation. (Good committees to start monitoring regularly.)

The National Broadband Plan is highly controversial—expect a big political battle here. Large, established businesses such as cable companies, broadcasters, and telcos have much at stake and are throwing substantial lobbying muscle toward protecting their interests. Expect that the there will be changes to the plan between the time it goes to committee and the version that eventually makes it to the floor of Congress.

Another great resource for tracking this issue is Drew Clark’s BroadbandBreakfast.com blog—one of the best sources of news and update for national, regional, and state broadband issues.

The Knight Digital Media Center is a partnership between USC Annenberg and UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism funded by the Knight Foundation.

Registration for the event is available at http://broadbandbreakfast.eventbrite.com. Confirmed speakers include:

• Shawn H. Chang, Majority Counsel, Communications and Technology Policy, House Committee on Energy and Commerce
• Neil Fried, Minority Counsel, Telecommunications, House Committee on Energy and Commerce
• Brian Hendricks, Minority General Counsel, US Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation
• Daniel Sepulveda, Senior Advisor, Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass.