Dave Farber has been named chief technologist at the Federal Communications Commission. This is good news.
Farber, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania, is one of the classiest people in the telecommunications business. His combination of brains, skill, integrity, vision and curiosity makes him a perfect choice for this post.
The FCC has been making some bad choices lately, notably its repeated cave-ins to the new telecom oligopolists who are bent on reducing, not expanding, choice for customers. But Farber’s appointment helps ensure that the commission won’t be making its decisions, good or bad, on the basis of faulty information.