Tag: radio service

FCC Announces 2.5 GHz Broadband Radio Service Auction. Who Will Show Up to Fight Over Rules? Or Bid?

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One might think from the press coverage that all spectrum auctions are multi-billion dollar affairs like the AWS-1 Auction in ’06 or the 700 MHz Auction in ’08. But these auctions are the exception rather than the rule. More typical are the steady stream of small auctions like Auction 78, which auctioned remaining licenses in the AWS-1 band.

Which brings us to the Wireless Bureau’s Public Notice of the Broadband Radio Service (BRS) auction. Some of us have followed the adventures of the 2.5 GHz band back when it was “Wireless Cable” and the non-commercial licensees used it to offer closed circuit television for what we now call distance learning. These days of course, we know this as the “Broadband Radio Service” (BRS) and the “Educational Broadband Radio Service” (EBRS), and we care about the 2.5 GHz band as the home of Clearwire and the great hope of WiMax.

You might think that the “WiMax” auction would be a big deal — but only if you don’t know the band, its history, and the inventory up for auction. If you know that, you know why this auction is likely to prove as boring but ploddingly necessary as a run for office supplies.

So why do I consider this worth blogging about, other than my sentimental fondness for the band and my general obsession about things spectrum? Because (a) my cause celebre, anonymous bidding, faces its first post-700 MHz challenge, and (b) 2.5 GHz is the home of the major WiMax plays, and what happens in the auction has the potential to shape the field going forward and influence whether deployment goes more smoothly or gets all bollixed up.

More detail below . . . .

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NAB/MSTV Embrace Radio Pirates, Make Up Engineering Data, And Do Whatever Else It Takes To Kill White Space Devices.

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I gotta admire the broadcasters (as represented by their trade orgs, the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) and the Association for Maximum Service Television (MSTV)). Even with the facts completely against them, they never give up trying. Sadly, they all too often succeed through a combination of heavy duty lobbying power (what politician doesn’t suck up to his or her local broadcaster?) and the fact that most decision makers don’t know squat about engineering and regard the whole thing as black magic. Heck, it worked to hamstring low-power FM (LPFM) radio, despite a subsequent independent government report showing the broadcaster interference claims were unsubstantiated bologna.

But embracing radio pirates by proposing to expand the availability of wireless microphones in the broadcast white spaces for their political allies and tacitly agreeing to amnesty for illegal wireless microphone users? Even I never thought they would go that far.

So let me get this straight, NAB, a million unauthorized mobile wireless microphone users operating “dumb” transmitters at higher power don’t cause interference. But smart devices, identical to those relied upon by the U.S. military to share frequencies with unlicensed devices, operating at much lower power and required to use a geolocational database, do cause interference? Wow, that makes so much sense. I can see why NAB and MSTV did not include any actual engineering analysis with their comments.

Personally, I think that if spectrum sensing and “smart radio” is good enough to protect the lives of American soldiers, we can trust it to protect viewers of American Idol. But I do not expect the broadcasters to let a piddly little thing like reality stop them — especially when using false interference claims and blatantly bogus evidence made it possible to clip the wings of the fledging low-power FM (LPFM) radio service back in 2000 (more details on the Prometheus Radio website LPFM fact sheet).

Still, I never thought I would actually lie to see the day the NAB would embrace unauthorized users, utterly reverse everything it ever said about the need to restrict access to the broadcast bands, and walk away from the more than 1 million unauthorized users in the band. Mind, you’d think that after a five year proceeding marked by such shenanigans as giving themselves free air time to push bogus interference concerns onto the public, adorable made up videos that purport to be real like Your Neighbor’s Static (aka “white spaces Reefer Madness), and the ”experiment we refuse to explain so you can’t check the results,“ the NAB would have already shot its credibility beyond all hope of recovery. But since no one not obsessed with this proceeding pays much attention to it, the NAB and friends gets to rerun the same bogus claims over and over and over again.

On the plus side, I hope my friends at Prometheus Radio are taking notes for when they make another run at Congress next year (or even this year in a lame duck session) to get the Local Community Broadcasters Act passed and get the shackles based on the broadcasters’ bogus ”interference concerns” lifted. After all, if the NAB doesn’t give a rat’s patootie about interference from unauthorized users anymore and is willing to embrace unauthorized operators, Congress should take them at their word.

More below . . .

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The XM-Sirius Merger: Part One

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For a first go I thought I would try something a bit controversial. We expect that the media reform movement, and I count myself part of that movement, would generally oppose mergers which increase media consolidation. As a general rule, that’s true. But the XM-Sirius satellite radio merger is a different case and raises questions about how we approach the issue of mergers generally. This is going to be a bit long (and I tend to be a bit longwinded in any case), so I shall be posting it in installments. Endnotes are at the bottom of the page. There will be a brief quiz…. No. Sorry, forgot where I was for a moment there.

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Hallmark Channel to Show Documentary on Low Power FM

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I’m posting an announcement for a documentary about low power FM (LPFM). As regular readers probably know, I represent United Church of Christ, which made the documentary, at the FCC on LPFM issues.

LPFM: The People’s Choice“ to air on the Hallmark Channel on Sunday, January 8th at 7 am EST and 7 am PST.

There’s a new sound on the air and it’s emanating from a source deep in the hearts and minds of Americans across the country. ”LPFM: The People’s Choice“ chronicles the extraordinary story of a low power, low cost radio service that withstood the rigors of Capitol Hill and special interest attacks. Today, LPFM is sending out a loud and clear signal — Freedom of Speech has a new ally, and it’s LPFM. ”LPFM: The People’s Choice” is more than a documentary- it is a rallying cry to build community around locally owned media. The film chronicles how low power FM radio is bringing diverse people closer together and giving new life to disadvantaged communities, new strength to neighborhoods and new voices in the marketplace of ideas. This program is not a debate about the merits of LPFM vs. the radio industry. Rather, it is meant to educate the audience about the possibilities for finding a new voice with LPFM. The film was produced by the Office of Commmunication of the United Church of Christ. For more information, please visit us at www.ucc.org/ocinc, or call 202-263-2576.