FCC Commissioner Mignon Clyburn spoke alongside several entrepreneurs in a discussion...

talked of jobs and other economic developments tied to “digital opportunity,” said National Coalition on Black Civic Participation President Melanie Campbell. “All of us have to be advocates.” Mobile Future Chairman Jonathan Spalter argued that “mobile innovators” flourished even as the recent recession hit and credited “communities of color” with leading the way in smartphone adoption, noting the data of the Pew Research Center on these trends. Clyburn, a former state regulator, discussed developments in the states, including a recent bill in Georgia that would make it “extremely difficult if not impossible” for a community to build its own broadband network, she said. Her home state of North Carolina already moved in that direction with a law in 2011, she said. She contrasted that bill with the broader stated mission of the government to encourage ubiquitous, affordable and high-speed service. House Bill 282 was introduced into the Georgia Legislature last Friday and proposes that any municipal networks, after July 1, “can only offer broadband service to unserved areas” unless they've already been serving census blocks prior to June 30 of this year (http://xrl.us/bogrny). It would give the Georgia Public Service Commission authority to oversee any such municipal networks, to deal with any petitions from municipalities interested in building them and to determine whether areas are unserved. Groups such as the Institute for Local Self-Reliance have asked Georgians to write to legislators objecting (http://xrl.us/bogroe). “The Kansas City examples are incredible,” Clyburn said of Google’s efforts to build gigabit-fiber in Missouri and Kansas. That project involved a company trying to work with local governments effectively and more such examples will follow, she predicted. On a national level, “the USF is how we're attempting to be smarter,” as the president advocated to the country, she said. Panelists emphasized education in furthering broadband adoption and the opportunities out there now. “Our mission is to break down the digital divide through creative and measurable ways,” said Kathryn Finney, founder of the minority-focused digitalUNdivided. CodeNow Executive Director Ryan Seashore described a major change: “I realized coding is the new literacy,” he said. His two-year-old startup focuses on teaching children how to be “builders” rather than merely consumers, he said. Education is important but organizers have to teach young people how to market and monetize the knowledge, said Marvin Dickerson, vice chairman of development for 100 Black Men of America and Dickerson Technologies CEO. He helps run weeklong camps to teach students about robotics and the fundamentals of science, technology, engineering and mathematics. Politic365 editor-in-chief Krystal High described broadband as “a huge equalizing factor” in many communities and the importance of health apps: “There’s a huge economic tie to lack of adequate healthcare,” she said of their benefits to some users. “Mobile is everything to my business,” said Janine Hausif, responsible for an app that identifies black-owned businesses. Overly high wireless taxes and the need for more spectrum are key regulatory concerns, said High. Not only is broadband adoption important but a sense of broadband ownership and the need to make tech issues sexy in competing for attention with Beyoncé and Honey Boo Boo, she said: “You have to start speaking in the language that people care about.” Communities need Internet access “at their doorstep,” Dickerson said. Think of broadband as a utility, advised Finney, pointing to what she judged to be positive examples in the Kansas City area and in Chattanooga, Tenn. The world of tech and telecom needs to be fully inclusive and perhaps look to a new “evaluation matrix,” Clyburn said. Other panelists run good programs for fostering broadband adoption for young people but that’s only half the battle “if you don’t hire them,” she said of companies. She worried about the consequences of “lost opportunities” and encouraged seizing on innovation, mentioning a teen pancreatic cancer researcher who attended the State of the Union: “Are we doing all we can to be inclusive?”