Thanks Jack. I am reasonably sure that your number 2 assumption is on
the mark. I used the "slap in the face" statement to illustrate the
emotional impact these issues have on me and thousands of others who
tell 60% of potential customers each day that they cannot get their
broadband because Uncle Sam refuses to give us the spectrum we need to
bring them broadband. This borders on outright lunacy.
If the House lawmakers wanted to do some good they would have at least
read what their Senate counterparts were proposing and saw that undoing
the FCC hold-up of the 04-186 rulemaking is the key to the entire
effort. Any other sideline efforts such as the House Spectrum Bill are
simply ways of tripping up the process and further slowing the wheels of
real progress. I am appalled that my own Representative, John Shimkus,
who serves on the House Telecommunications Subcommittee has never once
even called me for some feedback into what is really happening. I have
called him asking for support more than once and I even personally went
to his Washington D.C. office once and delivered papers outlining these
efforts..
I see more and more why there is so much cynicism about politics today.
If I were a Congressman I would admit freely and openly if I did not
understand the nuances of a given subject. After all none of us know
everything. Most Congressman appear to me to be unable to make that leap
and ask for real guidance and try to understand what is at stake in
their decision making. It is not enough for politicians to hide behind
the rhetoric and be led by cash driven lobbying efforts which direct
them like lemmings. The lack of objectivity and rational thinking in
D.C. boggles the mind at times.
With that said I am sure that telling the House they are "Slapping us in
the face" may be a bit harsh. Maybe they need to hear harsh though if
they cannot see what is really happening. If I were drafting a bill I
think I would certainly learn what is at stake and what is being played
out in the Senate before being part of a crippled effort like that of
this House Spectrum Bill. Thanks for listening to my rant.
Scriv
Jack Unger wrote:
John,
Yours is an articulate, well written summary. Although some WISPs may
feel "slapped in the face", politics (law-making) is, as we know, not
about face-slapping. Politics is about making laws that bring specific
benefits to specific (large or small) groups of people. I expect the
6 MHz of proposed spectrum is either 1 or 2, below:
1. A sincere attempt to provide more license-free spectrum and to
bring affordable broadband access to large numbers of rural citizens,
proposed by lawmakers who are TECHNICALLY UNEDUCATED about how "x"
amount of spectrum is needed to deliver "y" amount of broadband
throughput to serve "z" number of citizens.
2. An sincere attempt on the part of TECHNOLOGY-SAVVY lawmakers to
improve the business power and dominant political-economic position of
the monopolistic telecom industry while ordinary citizens are "on
their own" to cope with the consequences.
Thank you for your write-up.
jack
Tom DeReggi wrote:
John, Well said.
I agree 6 mhz, a slap in the face.
I understood, Brad Larson's comment that 50Mhz is a lot to be thankk
full for, when Marlon was suggesting that 50 Mhz was not enough, in
critiquing Marlon's proposal. We learned with 900Mhz that we can do a
lot with 30 Mhz, although tough. But 6 Mhz, useless, and pointless.
Tom DeReggi
RapidDSL & Wireless, Inc
IntAirNet- Fixed Wireless Broadband
----- Original Message ----- From: "John Scrivner" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "WISPA General List" <[email protected]>
Sent: Thursday, April 06, 2006 9:54 AM
Subject: Re: [WISPA] TV spectrum
Please read below and see my remarks on this feeble attempt to help
Americans.
New spectrum legislation crafted
By Dan O'Shea
Apr 5, 2006 12:02 PM
Five members of the U.S. House of Representatives have announced new
legislation that allow broadband wireless carriers and other
companies to use television spectrum in the band between 608 Mhz and
614 MHz for unlicensed wireless services.
The legislation was introduced by Jay Inslee (D-Wash.) and his co-
sponsors Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.), Tammy Baldwin (D-Wisc.), Paul
Gillmor (R-Ohio) and Rick Boucher (D-Va.).
The Telecommunications Industry Association applauded the move.
Agency president Matthew Flanigan, said in a statement, "TIA
believes that these proposals could provide for more efficient and
effective use of the television broadcast spectrum, as well as have
significant benefits for the public by increasing competition in the
wireless broadband industry and providing incentives for the
development of new and innovative broadband devices and services for
businesses and consumers.
http://telephonyonline.com/wireless/regulatory/House_spectrum_bill_040506/
My thoughts:
The House bill to give us a single 6 MHz channel is far too little
to help and could even be regarded as a slap in the face if you have
been starved for the quality spectrum we need to do the job as we
all have for so long. This does not match the legislation being
introduced by the Senate at all and could lead to making this a dead
issue instead of helping bring broadband to the masses as intended.
It does not surprise me that the TIA has applauded this as it serves
their purposes of holding our efforts back. They would prefer to
either have only licensed spectrum which acts as a means of keeping
competitors out of the wireless space or as we see here they would
like to see competing offers from the Senate and House so that the
true opportunity as outlined in the FCC 04-186 is locked in debate
and taken off the table to meet some compromise or worse yet the
effort is killed from having too little common ground to pass a vote
from both sides of Congress.
If any of you are in the states of Washington, Tennessee, Wisconsin,
Ohio or Virginia I certainly hope you will call your Reps today and
let them know that 6 MHz of spectrum is like giving a spoonful of
water to a man walking in the desert for days. The parched man will
surely take it and wonder why you even bothered to mock him with
such a paltry offer. This is terrible news and we need to act quickly.
The FCC has created the logical platform to move ahead in allowing
the unlicensed use of unused television channels in its 04-186
rulemaking which it has allowed to leave in a limbo state and
tasking the FCC with passing their own rulemaking is the logical way
to move forward and help the broadband industry. Believing that one
6 MHz channel for broadband use is helpful is just plain laughable
and shows a complete lack of understanding of our problems in
helping deliver broadband to rural and under-served citizens who are
begging for access to broadband and cannot receive it from any
source. These unused television channels will give them broadband. A
single 6 MHz channel is not a true effort to help and is insulting
to the public. Without several channels to allow for frequency reuse
the single channel forces providers to either segment the single
channel into minuscule sizes delivering substandard speeds or face
almost certain interference as multiple attempts to use the same
small 6 MHz channel space would interfere with adjacent efforts from
other operators doing the same. In short this is not worthy of
consideration and should be scrapped.
The only logical step is for the House of Representatives to pass
legislation which will task the FCC to pass its 04-186 rulemaking
which will open unused television channels up for use as unlicensed
carriage of broadband to Americans. This is not just important, it
is mandatory if we are to truly close the "Digital Divide" which is
now wider than ever due to a lack of quality spectrum able to do the
job. The problem is not that rural Americans do not want broadband
or that private enterprise has failed them in some way, the problem
is that the thousands of Wireless Internet Service Providers who
serve them lack the necessary spectrum to bring their citizens the
broadband they are begging to receive.
Now I want you guys, all of you guys, to go to
http://www.house.gov/writerep/ and write a letter to your Rep. The
site will find your rep by zip code for you. Even if you are not in
the states where this laughable legislation originated you need to
speak out. We obviously do not want to alienate the whole House of
Representatives but we do need them to understand that this is not
going to come close to doing the job they are trying to do and that
this is not going to fix anything unless we have access to a larger
amount of quality spectrum. So please go now and make this happen,
right now, in the next 10 minutes.
Scriv
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