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Blair Levin would have made an excellent FCC chairman, but I'm also glad he's returning to his work as an analyst at Stifel, Nicholas and can address issues more freely than a Chairman can. Best of luck to him in four years if Jules follows precedent and moves on. At the Columbia event, I got a chance to talk with Blair about what I think is the toughest question facing D.C. policymakers: What do you do if competition is unlikely to solve key problems? His comments are OTR. I note nearly everyone in industry and financial circles believes the industry will continue consolidating, less competition rather than more. Nearly everyone in Washington thinks they will “incent” more competition and thereby reach their goals. One or the other is wrong.

The Werblog is back as Kevin Werbach returns to the University of Pennsylvania from the transition.  Kevin's in the middle of Joi Ito's picture, flanked by Andrew McLaughlin (also on the transition) and the legendary Yochai Benkler, the inspiration for nearly all of us. His first posting on his return was "Last summer, I criticized the FCC’s Comcast P2P decision for actually hurting the cause of network neutrality that it supposedly advanced.  One of my arguments was that the FCC reviewing broadband discrimination complaints on a case-by-case basis would relieve the pressure in Congress for legislation." I believe a great Internet affordable for all Americans should take higher priority for a wonderful reason: we (mostly) won in the U.S. Details remain essential to get right, and the telcos are fighting a disingenuous rear guard action on wireless, but most of the abusive behavior we feared is now unthinkable in D.C.

Jules pulled his old friends from early Clinton days together for the transition team, NTIA, and presumably the FCC.  Besides Blair and Kevin, that includes Reed Hundt,  Bill Kennard,  Phil Weiser, Don Gips, and as well as some not officially part of the transition team. (?Larry, Larry, Anna, ...). Most are getting very rich in their old jobs, so probably won't go back to government. The one standout on the transition team who doesn't go back to Clinton days is  Susan Crawford,  probably headed back to teach at Michigan.

It's pretty easy to guess what's coming by reading these folks. Kevin has slews of papers, including several on why and how the FCC will free bandwidth.  I have books from Hundt and Weiser; Susan Crawford is profilic on the net. They all have been very accessible for years at events like VON and we all know each other.  They really are the best and the brightest.