Wireless is one of the most powerful and potentially influential subjects in history. The premise is simple and until now, the Internet was something that kept users on the end of a leash, essentially, the wire that connected them, and cutting the cord makes the Internet truly universal. There is still the issue of how much coverage there is, and that is the entire debate. Wireless has already made telephones obsolete, while numbers show an increasing number of people have no actual telephone service, but are mobile only.
With the explosion of the tablet and the smartphone market, the Internet is now going mobile. It brings up scary images of the Beast of Revelations or The Matrix, but the real battle ground is the electromagnetic spectrum. All wireless data is transmitted over the air using one part of the spectrum or another. In the US, the US government auctions off that spectrum to private companies and there is a battle brewing between the Government, wireless carriers, and broadcasters.
Obama's Wireless Plan and the frequency warehousing
What many believe is happening is that wireless companies are buying up spectrum and sitting on it. This is called spectrum warehousing and it is illegal. When a company buys a given spectrum from the government, they agree to “build out” the spectrum, meaning that the company agrees to begin building the infrastructure needed to use the spectrum. The new Chairman of the FCC stated that there is no warehousing going on, but the National Association of Broadcasters is screaming that there is.
There has been talk of a spectrum crunch, an increasingly limited amount of spectrum that is available for development, but the NAB says that there is no shortage, just a few massive wireless companies that have leased the spectrum and are doing nothing about it. Part of the debate comes from President Obama's National Broadband plan, an initiative to expand the wireless coverage to rural parts of America, and subsidize mobile access to low income citizens. This will involve the use of 500 MHz of spectrum for wireless applications, but 120 MHz is to come from TV broadcasting. Television broadcasting went digital in 2008, the same year that the Government auctioned off the 700 MHz spectrum it was using. The fight is that Broadcasters have already given up spectrum and should not be asked to give up more.
The Wireless Monster
Mobile is rapidly becoming the ruling force of the 21st century and here in the US, the political issue is rapidly gaining weight. The Obama National Broadband act is, in reality, a Government sponsored build out of the mobile industry facilitated by auctioning off even more spectrum to wireless carriers, some of which it plans on getting from the TV stations that will be compensated.
The Government plans to make about $9.5 billion on the deal, and low-income families will have access to boot. This only underscores the power of mobile companies, as they are salivating for more spectrum while fighting to dominate this century. Frequency spectrum is the de-facto landscape of the future. This is the only infrastructure that matters. All communication, all entertainment, information, education, and personal activities will happen on the airwaves, and the control of these spectrum amounts could mean control of society itself. No wonder Net Neutrality died, imagine if the government had a say over how things were done? A quick view of the FCC's Spectrum Dashboard shows that there is a lot of spectrum available, but only some of it is usable due to the constraints of physics, for now. The spectrum that is leased out that is being fought over is in the 700 MHz band and the NAB is seeing the writing in the air, wireless will replace all and they will no longer be relevant.
