At 05:01 PM 7/16/99 -0700, you wrote: >My general take on what I have seen of the entire DNS controversy is that >it is similar in nature to past struggles over "shared scarce resources" >such as the ones Tony cited. Certainly, from what I have read of the >establishment of the FCC and the 1934 Radio Act, there are striking >similarities. > Greg, As a ham radio operator for nearly 25 years, I think you may be even closer here than you believe. The amateur radio community in 1934 was much more powerful a force than it is today, even though there are nearly 600,000 US hams today. The hams, at that time, were considered *the* technical resource for commercial and experimental radio technologies. Much of the early work on radio was done by amateurs. The USG believed (and rightfully so) that the amateurs were an indispensible resource. They successfully lobbied for the preservation of certain frequency allocations for continued use by the amateur community. This, however, created a dichotomy between the commercial and amateur communities, including separate licensing and testing methods. The bad news for us? Both commercial and amateur models involve a "license fee" for the testee (my amateur license, N9OZI, expires in 2002 and I will have to pay the then current renewal fee). This fee is paid, however, to a government agency (FCC), not a private organization. What value do I receive for this license fee? NOTHING BUT THE LICENSE ITSELF. The USG, in fact, recently "sold" some of the valuable amateur radio spectrum to the highest bidder at auction. No correlation? Consider the people involved in networking technology who are also ham radio operators, and who have seen this happen before. Ethernet was invented by a ham. So was microwave communication. So were most satellite technologies, etc., etc., etc. The USG has precedent to which to refer, and it is not pretty. Even worse, the USG is in tight with the ITU regarding the allocation of frequency spectrum. The next WARC meeting (discussing radio spectrum issues) will likely be a bloodbath of commercial entities pushing for further available commercial spectrum, including the re-allocation of amateur and military frequencies. We are dangerously close to heading down the same path. Unless a concerted effort to self-organize takes shape quicly, we may be at the mercy of precedence. Gene... ++++++++++ Gene Marsh president, anycastNET Incorporated 330-699-8106
