Stephen Ezell, one of the authors of ITIF’s new report, “The Need for Speed: The Importance of Next-Generation Broadband Networks,” encouraged the audience to imagine what a connected family’s life in five years from now would look like. This is difficult since so many of the possible applications we will be using in five years are yet to even be discovered. So even doing the visualization experiment only considering innovations that already exist, the necessity for increased high speed capacity becomes very clear. The vision described includes a father using telepresence for work, a mother streaming video of her choice, and children using distance learning applications for their homework, all simultaneously from home.

In order to make this futuristic vision a reality, next generation broadband is necessary. The report highlights four transformative functionalities that next generation broadband would enable:

1) Dramatically faster file transfer speeds
2) Transmission of streaming video
3) High quality, real-time collaboration (telecommute/telepresence)
4) Ability to run a multiplicity of bandwidth heavy applications simultaneously

Ezell called for a paradigm shift, recalling the transformation that occurred when society went from dial-up to broadband. He urged the audience to consider how much technology has changed now that we are in an always-on environment and all of the new applications that has enabled, including VoIP, podcasting, and even getting directions online. And now consider what a next generation network would be capable of enabling. It will take imagination, but also investment in speed.

A full copy of the report is available here.
Watch the video of the release event here.

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