Wireless & Spectrum Policy

White Spaces Battle Heats Up as Broadcast Networks Seek ‘Time Out’

by on October 23, 2008 · 13 comments

Over at DrewClark.com, earlier today I reported today that television networks – which in recent years have had a strained relationship with local broadcasters on a variety of fronts – joined with the National Association of Broadcasters in calling for a time out on the politically simmering issue of “white spaces.” Here’s the start of the story, and you can read the full post at DrewClark.com

WASHINGTON, October 23 – The top executives of the four major broadcast networks on Thursday urged the head of the Federal Communications Commission to delay a vote on a politically simmering issue that pits broadcasters against Google and high-tech executives.

In the letter, the CEOs of CBS Corp., NBC Universal and Walt Disney, and the chief operating officer of News Corp., urge that the FCC exercise caution before taking irreparable action with regard to the vacant television channels known as “white spaces.”

Google and the other technology executives, including Microsoft, Motorola, Philips and others, want the FCC to authorize electronic devices that capable of transmitting internet signals over vacant television bands.

The network executives – CBS’s Leslie Moonves, Disney’s Robert Iger, NBC’s Jeffrey Zucker and Peter Chernin of News Corp. – want a time out.

They join their local broadcasting colleagues, as well as manufacturers and users of wireless microphones, like the National Football League and Boadway theater owners, who have been actively lobbying the issue.

[…]

Read the rest of the story at my blog, DrewClark.com – The Politics of Telecom, Media and Technology

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Should Government Funding Be Part of a Broadband Plan? Have Your Say on November 18

by on October 22, 2008 · 7 comments

Readers of Tech Liberation Front may be interested in a new breakfast series that BroadbandCensus.com has recently begun.

The next event in this series, “Should Government Funding Be Part of a National Broadband Plan?” will be held on Tuesday, November 18, from 8 a.m. to 10 a.m., and will include Stan Fendley, the director of legislative and regulatory policy for Corning, Inc., Kyle McSlarrow, CEO of the National Cable and Telecommunications Association (NCTA), and John Windhausen, Jr., president of Telepoly Consulting. I will moderate the discussion.

Two weeks after Election Day, this Broadband Breakfast Club meeting will consider one of the hottest topics in telecom: can and should funding for broadband work its way into a pending fiscal stimulus package?

Future meetings of the breakfast club (December 2008 through March 2009) will consider the role of broadband applications in harnessing demand, how the universal service fund will be changed by high-speed internet, the role of wireless in universal broadband, and the extent of competition in the marketplace.

The Broadband Breakfast Club meets monthly at the Old Ebbitt Grill, at 675 15th Street, NW, in Washington. (It’s right across the street from the Department of the Treasury.)

Beginning at 8 a.m., an American plus Continental breakfast is available downstairs in the Cabinet Room. This is followed by a discussion about the question at hand, which ends at 10 a.m. Except for holidays (like Veteran’s Day), we’ll meet on the second Tuesday of each month, until March 2009. The registration page for the event is http://broadbandbreakfast.eventbrite.com.

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What Was the Gore Commission on Digital Television Broadcasting All About?

by on October 2, 2008 · 18 comments

Note: Here’s a second post I just put live at DrewClark.com. It refers to an upcoming conference, on Friday, October 3, sponsored by the Information Economy Project at George Mason University School of Law. It will be held at 8:30 a.m. at the National Press Club. Registration details are below.

In the United States, the regulation of broadcast radio and television has always been done under a different standard than the regulation of the print medium.

As Secretary of Commerce in the administration of President Calvin Coolidge, Herbert Hoover declared: “The ether is a public medium, and its use must be for a public benefit,” he said at the Fourth National Radio Conference, in 1925. “The dominant element for consideration in the radio field is, and always will be, the great body of the listening public, millions in number, country-wide in distribution.”

When Congress created the Federal Radio Commission in 1927, it decreed that broadcasting was to serve the “public interest, convenience and necessity,” and this standard was re-affirmed in the Communications Act of 1934. Several Supreme Court decisions — albeit decisions that have been much criticized — affirmed that broadcasting could and should be treated differently than the traditional “press.”

This differential treatment for broadcasting — versus the print medium, and also cable television — was underscored by the decisions in Red Lion Broadcasting Co. v. FCC (1969), which upheld the “Fairness Doctrine,” and also FCC v. Pacifica Foundation (1978), which upheld indecency rules for over-the-air broadcast television. The Fairness Doctrine required broadcasters to grant reply time to those who said their views were criticized.

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History of DRM; IIPI Event Reviewed

by on October 2, 2008 · 2 comments

http://penny-arcade.com/comic/2008/9/26/

Speaking of snakes, I am just returned from a camping trip along the Appalachian trail in the Michaux Forest, quite out of wireless reception range. Several days’ heavy rain had washed the forest clean, left the moss glowing green and the mushrooms, salamanders, crayfish, and frogs quite content. There one combats the same problems confronted by earlier settlers–mice (and the snakes they attract), staying dry and tolerably warm, the production of decent meals, and keeping small children from wandering off into the woods. Why do some people enjoy briefly returning to this world? Despite being one of those people, I can’t say. Now I am back and my day is easy and comfortable (comparatively), with time to spare contemplating the meta-structures of finance, property, and capital. Let’s all hope these structures are not nearly as fragile as our confidence in them, which, judging from the tone of remarks at last week’s ITIF conference on innovation, has fallen quite low. Continue reading →

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Do TV Broadcasters Have Obligations to the Public? Forum TOMORROW, 10/3

by on October 2, 2008 · 8 comments

Note: Here’s a post I just put live at DrewClark.com. It refers to an upcoming conference that might be of interest to Tech Liberation readers. Make sure to follow the link to the bottom of the post for registration information for this FREE conference, to be held tomorrow, Friday, October 3, at 8:30 a.m.

If all goes according to plan, on February 17, 2009, television broadcasters will power down their analog transmitters. They will be broadcasting their signal only digitally.

After more than 20 years in the long transition to digital television, this might be considered progress. Now, millions of Americans are collecting vouchers from the Commerce Department to subsidize their purchase of converter boxes. These are the electronic devices that take the digital signals — and convert them back to analog — so that viewers without high-definition televisions can watch broadcast TV on their old sets.

What about the bigger questions? Is there any benefit to the public, or to consumers, from the transition to digital television? What about the vaunted visions of hundreds of broadcast channels, through multi-casting? What would be the new public-interest obligations, if any, of broadcasters? This question has definitely not been resolved.

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Problems in Muni Wi-fi Paradise, Part 9 (amazing article about Philly failure)

by on September 29, 2008 · 10 comments

In my nearly 17 years of public policy work, I have never felt so vindicated about something as I did this weekend when I read Dan P. Lee’s Philadelphia magazine feature on “Whiffing on Wi-Fi.” It is a spectacularly well-written piece about the spectacular failure of Philadelphia’s short-lived experiment with municipally-subsidized wi-fi, which was called Wireless Philadelphia.  You see, back in April 2005, I wrote a white paper entitled “Risky Business: Philadelphia’s Plan for Providing Wi-Fi Service,” and it began with the following question: “Should taxpayers finance government entry into an increasingly competitive , but technologically volatile, business market?”  In the report, I highlighted the significant risks involved here in light of how rapidly broadband technology and the marketplace was evolving. Moreover, I pointed to the dismal track record of previous municipal experiments in this field, which almost without exception ended in failure. I went on to argue:

Keeping these facts in mind, it hardly makes sense for municipal governments to assume the significant risks involved in becoming a player in the broadband marketplace. Even an investment in wi-fi along the lines of what Philadelphia is proposing, is a risky roll of the dice. [… ]  the nagging “problem” of technological change is especially acute for municipal entities operating in a dynamic marketplace like broadband. Their unwillingness or inability to adapt to technological change could leave their communities with rapidly outmoded networks, and leave taxpayers footing the bill.

I got a stunning amount of hate mail and cranky calls from people after I released this paper.  Everyone accused me of being a sock puppet for incumbent broadband providers or just not understanding the importance of the endevour.  But as I told everyone at the time, I wasn’t out to block Philadelphia from conducting this experiment, I just didn’t think it had any chance of being successful.  And, again, I tried to point out what a shame it would be if taxpayers were somehow stuck picking up the tab, or if other providers decided not to invest in the market because they were “crowded-out” by government investment in the field.

But even I could have never imagined how quickly the whole house of cards would come crumbling down in Philadelphia.  It really was an astonishing meltdown.  Dan Lee’s article makes that abundantly clear:

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California Telecom Regulator Rachelle Chong, Former FCC Commissioner, to Keynote ‘Broadband Census for America’

by on September 25, 2008 · 4 comments

Our conference, “Broadband Census for America,” is fast approaching…. The event is tomorrow. If you want to attend, follow the instructions in the press release below:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

WASHINGTON, September 25, 2008 – California Public Utilities Commissioner Rachelle Chong, a member of the Federal Communications Commission from 1994 to 1997, will kick off the Broadband Census for America Conference with a keynote speech on Friday, September 26, at 8:30 a.m.

Eamonn Confrey, the first secretary for information and communications policy at the Embassy of Ireland, will present the luncheon keynote at noon. Confrey will overview Ireland’s efforts to collect data on broadband service through a comprehensive web site with availability, pricing and speed data about carriers.

Following Chong’s keynote address, the Broadband Census for America Conference – the first of its kind to unite academics, state regulators, and entities collecting broadband data – will hear from two distinguished panels.

One panel, “Does America Need a Broadband Census?” will contrast competing approaches to broadband mapping. Art Brodsky, communication director of the advocacy group Public Knowledge, will appear at the first public forum with Mark McElroy, the chief operating officer of Connected Nation, a Bell- and cable-industry funded organization involved in broadband mapping.

Also participating on the panel will be Drew Clark, executive director of BroadbandCensus.com, a consumer-focused effort at broadband data collection; and Debbie Goldman, the coordinator of Speed Matters, which is run by the Communications Workers of America.

The second panel, “How Should America Conduct a Broadband Census?” will feature state experts, including Jane Smith Patterson, executive director of the e-NC authority; and Jeffrey Campbell, director of technology and communications policy for Cisco Systems. Campbell was actively involved in the California Broadband Task Force.

Others scheduled to speak include Professor Kenneth Flamm of the University of Texas at Austin; Dr. William Lehr of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology; Indiana Utility Regulatory Commissioner Larry Landis; and Jean Plymale of Virginia Tech’s eCorridors Program.

Keynote speaker Rachelle Chong has been engaged in broadband data collection as a federal regulator, as a telecommunications attorney, and since 2006 as a state official.

Chong was instrumental to the California Broadband Task Force, which mapped broadband availability in California. She will speak about broadband data collection from the mid-1990s to today.

The event will be held at the American Association for the Advancement of Sciences’ headquarters at 12th and H Streets NW (near Metro Center) in Washington.

For more information:
Drew Bennett, 202-580-8196
Bennett@broadbandcensus.com
Conference web site: http://broadbandcensus.com/conference/
Registration: http://broadbandcensus.eventbrite.com/


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Problems in Muni Wi-fi Paradise, Part 8 (Boynton Beach, FL)

by on September 21, 2008 · 17 comments

Boynton Beach, Florida’s experiment with municipal wi-fi has ended.  [Add it to the list of recent failures]. According to the South Florida Sun-Sentinel:

There’s a roadblock in Boynton Beach‘s information superhighway. The city’s Community Redevelopment Agency decided this month it has no more money for free wireless Internet service in its district.  Boynton Beach was the first city in Palm Beach County to offer Wi-Fi three years ago. It operated 11 “hot spots,” or access points, paying $44,000 annually for vendors to keep the system running. But the CRA dropped vendors who failed to meet their contracts. Other companies wanted to sell the Community Redevelopment Agency new equipment, but in a tough budget year, offering free wireless was no longer viable, said the agency’s executive director, Lisa Bright.  […]  “There is clearly no way for it to be a revenue generator at this time,” Bright said. “It’s premature for us to go to the next level.”

Whenever I read one of these articles about the small town or mid-sized town wi-fi experiments failing so miserably I have to admit that I am a bit surprised.  After all, many muni wi-fi supporters have argued that it is precisely in those communities where government support is most necessary and will be most likely to fill in gaps left by sporadic / delayed private broadband deployment.  Frankly, I always thought this was the best argument for muni wi-fi and it’s why I made sure to never go on record as opposing all government efforts, even though I am obviously a skeptic and don’t like the idea of wagering taxpayer money on such risky ventures. (By contrast, I could just never see the reason for government subsidies of wi-fi ventures in major metro areas with existing private broadband operators. Like Philly and Chicago.)

But the fact that many small town or mid-sized town wi-fi experiments are failing is really interesting because it must tell us something about either (a) the viability of the technology or (b) demand for such service.  Now, many municipalization believers will just say that clearly (a) is the case and argue that we just need to wait for Wi-Max solutions to come online and then all will be fine.  It certainly may be the case that Wi-Max will help boost coverage in low density areas, but is that really the end of the story?  What about demand?  What really makes me mad when I read most of these stories about current failed experiments is that they rarely give us any solid numbers about how many people utilized the services.  To the extent any journalists or analysts are out there contemplating a story or study on this issue, I beg you to dig into the demand side of the equation and try to find out how much of the currently muni-wifi failure is due to technology and how much is due to demand, or lack thereof.  Of course, government mismanagement could also be a culprit. But I suspect there is a far less demand for these services than supporters have estimated.

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Forget Duopoly – Fear the Quadropoly!

by on September 10, 2008 · 6 comments

Scott Cleland has an unusually even-keeled post today (Where are the bullets and bolding, Scott?!) about how Google undermines its own policy arguments on net neutrality regulation by promoting more sources of broadband – in this case, satellite.

What has always mattered, of course, is getting more broadband platforms up and running. The debate over net neutrality regulation is a sideshow, and probably a detriment to communications progress as it casts a cloud of regulatory uncertainty over the industry. Higher costs, slower rollouts, and lower profits from uncertain regulations probably chills investment in any potential new broadband platform.

But I’m here to tell you, Scott, that even if Google helps put a couple more broadband platforms in place, the goalposts will move.

Today, I came across a letter sent by Senate Antitrust Subcommittee Chairman Herb Kohl (D-WI) asking the four major wireless providers why the price of text messaging has gone up. He says that the price has gone from 10 cents per message sent or received in 2005 to 20 cents on all four carriers.
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More on M2Z / AWS spectrum fight

by on August 16, 2008 · 3 comments

Several of us here have outlined our reservations about the proposal to allocate a block of the Advanced Wireless Services (AWS) spectrum for a free, nationwide wireless service. (Here’s a filing I signed on to that critiques the portion of the plan that requires censorship of the entire band once allocated).

But, strictly from an economic perspective, this is the best overview and critique of the plan I have seen so far: “The Static and Dynamic Inefficiency of Abandoning Unrestricted Auctions for Spectrum,” by Bob Hahn, Allan Ingraham, Greg Sidak, and Hal Singer. It’s a response to a paper favoring the M2Z plan that was penned by Simon Wilkie of USC, who also formerly served as the Chief Economist of the FCC. (Wilkie’s work on behalf of M2Z can be found on the M2Z site here). It’s a good debate and I encourage you to look at both papers if you are interested in this issue.

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