In all this conversation... the big guys wanting stiff enforcement to protect them from the "death by a thousand cuts" as small guys innovate by making their own equipment, and the arguments over the government's enforcement ability or will, sort of miss the point.
We need regulations that make sense for this industry. kWe need "Vivato-proof" regulatory rules, so that money can't buy anyone an advantage in the ability to deploy technology by lawyering their way into certification, what is an obvious fraud to the system. Device certification, as opposed to "system". It makes absolutely NO sense to certify a box with a 24 db panel, but object if someone needs to use a 21 db grid due to space or wind loading needs. Or vice versa. DEVICE certification let's there be 1000 innovators and developers figure out how to do do things better, and not incur huge costs for every tiny step along the way. So, if we use certified 20 dbm radio device, certified 16 db sector, then we have a 36 dbm system, do we not? This would do what we ALL want done, to know that what we buy is really what we get. This provides a solid basis and precedent for innovation and compliance in tv whitespace, etc. So you want to produce a radio that works at 4.9 ghz? Great. Certify it's behavior and let integrators use it however they wish. Why must the FCC care if the box it is in varies from deployment to deployment? This provides a great future framework for rapid innovation in wireless, be it unlicensed, low cost license, or normal licensed. It reduces the cost of compliance dramatically... and will have the effect of making enforcement workable and compliance both easy and cost effective without stifling innovation, or limiting it to the unimaginative like Motorola and Trango. The current regulatory structure encourages non-compliance... And the obvious lack of enforcement is tacit admission of the both the wrongness of the structure...and it's obvious problems. We SHOULD encourage both a framework that leads to compliance AND at the same time makes it no longer an obstruction to competition and cost-effective innovation. We need MORE integrators and builders, not less. We need to let ANYONE find creative ways to make a better mouse trap, not restrict to the biggest builders who then nail us with big dollars. This meets everyone's legitmate goals. It encourages outside the US manufacturers who want to build 100,000 radios to spread the certification costs among 100,000 units. Not 25 integrators each certifying the same radio with a different pigtail and antenna. WE need certified antennas that have patterns that are known good, so we don't deploy with bad patterns and ugly leakages. It provides a discipline for manufacturers. It lets a maker like Advanced Antennas or PacWireless focus on producing and marketing to the WISP community without having to try to get the same antenna certified 20, 40, 100 times just on different transmitters or even just different enclosures or connectors. Or a company like Ubiquiti have a legitemate place in the public marketplace to WISP's and not just a small handful of big dollar integrators. We need MORE suppliers, not less. More choices, not less. More options, not fewer, more innovation and minds creating, not less. THAT is how we as an industry can beat the dollars of the big guys. More minds, more thought, more creativity, more imagination. -- WISPA Wireless List: [email protected] Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
