Ro Khanna Quotes

As chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, I've logged more than 5,000 miles driving across the country to see first-hand how digital technologies are unleashing opportunity in U.S. communities and to understand the connectivity challenges many Americans face.

More and more of the world's population is gaining access to the same kind of computing power and connectivity that has transformed daily life for developed nations.

Accordingly, it is our task to ensure that the Government formulates policies that foster the continued development of the IT sector while also providing for citizens' access to technology and opportunity for economic advancement.

Many people see technology as the problem behind the so-called digital divide. Others see it as the solution. Technology is neither. It must operate in conjunction with business, economic, political and social system.

I would like to spend my next two years showing how the aim of making technology available to every young person can be built into the effort to make our nation more secure. That is my latest concern and what I will be pushing over the next two years.

Not all rural communities have affordable and reliable access to telecommunication networks. Rural incomes still lag behind urban incomes. Job creation and retention is hampered because of infrastructure deficiencies

If getting young people computer-literate through putting school systems online is a no-brainer, at least in retrospect, getting older people and those in rural areas online can be a tougher nut to crack.

At the very least, you must make the Internet free in areas that are poverty-stricken. Without the Internet and access to information, poverty-stricken households will never catch up to households above the poverty line - throwing the African-American community deeper into the stone ages.

The digital revolution is one that every community should and can participate in.

Falling entry barriers and lower access costs have significantly democratised participation, whether in production or consumption.

The Internet offers untold potential for humanity. To make the most of it, we need to think of the Internet as 'ours.'

If our language, our programs, our creations are not strongly present in the new media, the young generation of our country will be economically and culturally marginalized.

As a society, we haven't spent as much time building the citizen Internet.

I was inspired by the Hole in the Wall project, where a computer with an internet connection was put in a Delhi slum. When the slum was revisited after a month, the children of that slum had learned how to use the worldwide web.

The smug complacency of technology adverts disguises a pretty mixed picture, with too many people not connected, too many passive users of technologies designed for interactive, and far too much talk about empowerment but far too little action to make it happen.

Given that my title at Google is Chief Internet Evangelist, I feel like there is this great challenge before me because we have three billion users, and there are seven billion people in the world.

Five or ten years ago, when it was clear the Internet was becoming a mainstream phenomenon, it was equally clear that a lot of people were being left out and could be left behind.

A family living at the poverty level is unlikely to be able to afford a computer at home. Even with a computer, access to the Internet is another significant expense. A child might borrow a book from a public library; but it is not possible to take a computer home.

Technology should be an important ingredient. It may be and should be a tool for social development.

As technology changes the way we communicate, connect, create, consume and innovate, it is democratizing access to opportunity. Education is no exception.

We want to make it so that anyone, anywhere - a child growing up in rural India who never had a computer - can go to a store, get a phone, get online, and get access to all of the same things that you and I appreciate about the Internet.

The Internet's great promise is to make the world's information universally accessible and useful.

We tend to look at computers and the Internet as items of nicety. In the 21st century, they will be items of necessity.

We need an equity plan for technology in general.

Computer literacy is a fundamental civil right.