The grand master plan for European broadband is out, and one target leaves the United States in the digital dust—a goal of 30 Mbps "or above" for all Europeans by 2020. So says the European Commission's Digital Agenda for Europe, which also wants 50 percent of EU households subscribed to links of 100Mbps or more by that year.

"Today only 1 percent of Europeans have a fast fibre-based internet connection, compared to 12 percent of Japanese and 15 percent of South Koreans," the document laments. "Europe needs widely available and competitively priced fast and ultra fast internet access."

No suboptimals please

The European Commission is the policy arm of the European Union. Needless to say, Europe isn't jealously comparing itself to the United States, high-speed Internet-wise. Here our supposedly bold and fearless Federal Communications Commission thinks it's cool by setting a pokey universal broadband goal of 4Mbps, sans fiber, which the agency says costs too much.

Not the EC, which is wringing its hands over the lack of fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) build-out in Europe. That's even less than the US's two percent, Digital Agenda ruefully notes.

Beyond all the sturm und drang, however, it isn't entirely clear how the EC hopes to reach its goals. "Without strong public intervention" the continent risks "a sub-optimal outcome," the document warns. So expect a "communication" from the Commission some time soon outlining a common framework for development.

What will this compendium say? "For instance," Digital Agenda says, "the competent authorities should ensure: that public and private civil engineering works systematically provide for broadband networks and in-building wiring; clearing of rights of way; and mapping of available passive infrastructure suitable for cabling."

Great, but that isn't terribly different from language found in the FCC's National Broadband Plan. The government should establish policies "for the use of spectrum and oversee access to poles, conduits, rooftops and rights-of-way, which are used in the deployment of broadband networks," our NPB recommends. "Ensuring these assets and resources are allocated and managed efficiently can encourage deployment of broadband infrastructure and lower barriers to competitive entry."

And the European broadband situation is also very similar to the US in another respect: 30 percent of Europeans also don't use the 'Net, the EC report discloses.

One iTunes store to rule them all

But while Europeans aren't looking to the US for leadership when it comes to broadband speed goals, they do see us as way ahead on another front: the online music scene. Americans download four times as many tunes as Germans, Britons, and Swedes, "because of the lack of legal offers and fragmented markets" in Europe—not that Euro-trade associations aren't plenty peeved at the illegal download rate.

"Citizens should be able to enjoy commercial services and cultural entertainment across borders," the report observes. "But EU online markets are still separated by barriers which hamper access to pan-European telecoms services, digital services and content."

At this point, if iTunes or an equivalent wanted to set up a Euro-wide online music store, Digital Agenda notes, it would have to bargain with rights management organizations in over two dozen countries. Thus consumers can still stroll across national borders to buy CDs (and many still prefer to do so), but can't do the same online because of national rights policies. And 92 percent of consumers who buy stuff on the Euro-net do so via national sellers, rather than cross-border vendors.

The lack of progress in these areas has also set Europe back in the development of online content, the EC gripes. "The EU is falling behind in markets such as media services, both in terms of what consumers can access, and in terms of business models that can create jobs in Europe," the report complains. "Most of the recent successful Internet businesses (such as Google, eBay, Amazon and Facebook)" have originated (euphemism alert) "outside of Europe."

So it's time to open up access to legal content by streamlining transborder licensing and copyright clearance, the policy doc recommends, on three fronts. First, proposing a "directive on collective rights management" by the end of this year. Second, setting up cross-European policies on orphan works and out-of-print items, supported by rights information databases. And finally, updating the EC's policies on the reuse of public sector data.

Digital Agenda also urges the Commission to update its cybersecurity rules, noting that only 12 percent of Europeans say they feel "completely safe" making online transactions. And the report promises, as did the EC's Digital Agenda boss Neelie Kroes last month, that updated net neutrality provisions are in the works—maybe.

The Commission will launch a "public consultation" before this summer "on whether additional guidance is required, in order to secure the basic objectives of freedom of expression, transparency," and "the need for investment in efficient and open networks."