Thursday, October 31, 2002

FCC and open spectrum

I like Michael Powell. I liked the sort-of-libertarian-with-a-sense-of-humor portrait of him in a recent New Yorker article (thanks for the link, DF). I like the way he kinda grins and does nothing, infuriating crusty incumbents and opportunist entrants alike. It seems he gave quite a remarkable speech on reworking radio spectrum pointing out (quite correctly) that current spectrum usage is grossly inefficient.

While I'm no fan of unregulated spectrum, there might be more 802.11x like bands we can free up, and current spectrum owners should certainly be encourages to sell of what they're not using efficiently now. Will we see perpetual leases, with no use restriction, and a free spectrum aftermarket? Sadly, I doubt it, but I think more radio bandwidth is going to become available under Powell.

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