Google Confirms Intent To Bid for 700MHz Spectrum

narramissic writes "Today Google put an end to the 'will they or won't they' debate with the announcement that the company intends to join in the bidding for 700MHz wireless spectrum in late January. 'We believe it's important to put our money where our principles are,' Eric Schmidt, Google's chairman and CEO, said in a statement. 'Consumers deserve more competition and innovation than they have in today's wireless world. No matter which bidder ultimately prevails, the real winners of this auction are American consumers who likely will see more choices than ever before in how they access the Internet.'"

Comments

Must have missed that debate?

[explosivejared]

...put an end to the 'will they or won't they' debate...

I never saw any sound evidence put forth that they wouldn't bid on this spectrum. As far as I was concerned this was a sure thing. Here's to hoping they win the auction!

Re:Must have missed that debate?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why? What is the worst thing that could happen? If AT&T wins? When have they ever been against innovation?

Re:Must have missed that debate?

[CaptainPatent]

It's not that they're against innovation as much as crap like this.

Re:Must have missed that debate?

[Anonymous Coward]

I've never seen any sound evidence put forth that Google aren't building a moon base. So, as far as I'm concerned, it's a sure thing! Here's to hoping they make good use of all that lunar land.

Re:Must have missed that debate?

[Dun Malg]

Why? What is the worst thing that could happen? If AT&T wins? When have they ever been against innovation? Against? Maybe not against, really, but arguably rather indifferent towards innovation. See, the problem is that the company we now call AT&T is not the same one that operated the giant phone monopoly in the US up to 1984. The current AT&T was called SBC until two years ago, when it bought the burned out husk of the old AT&T (which had sold off most of its parts already) and adopted the name. The parts of the old AT&T that were actually innovative (e.g. Bell Labs, Olivetti & Oracle Research Labs) were either closed (O&O) or reduced-renamed-and-sold (Bell Labs/Lucent, now Alcatel-Lucent). The new AT&T is a large megacorp mostly concerned with increasing its size.

Re:Must have missed that debate?

[aurizon]

I have seen mobiles phones develop badly in Canada/USA from the start. Little monopolies in the analog age that you roamed through as you drove from state major city to major city with these little grubs billing you a roam fee and rubbing their hands in glee if you ever made a call.

The spectrum auction creates a group of wide ranging monopolies/oligopolies(small gangs) so there are no roam fees, instead there is a uniform high fee. The logic being they have to recover the billions of $$ spent at the auction.

How would you like a road auction? Ford bids and buys the roads, and then charges you a per mile fee for every foot you drive. It will never happen, you say. Well the spectrum is an aerial road from person to person and should not be monopolized or oligopolozed.

Thinking like the state and federal highway system as an analog and making spectrum users make radios that conform to standards that allow communications, much like the WWW, we would have the WWRW, world wide radio web. Of course it must be real time, minimal latency, and so has to have channels, and they have to have enough of them for the demand and they have to have WWRW peering so they all speak to each other. Well, they do that now, so why not bring the low prices in long distance interstate calling to the mobile radio business. India does it, phones and communications are cheap there.

In summary, no auction, but freely licence carriers to provide fully compatible CDMA or ? cellular service, and while we are at it, add web circuits for data etc in such a way that voice is not slowed.

Still Undecided

[immcintosh]

I'm still undecided whether Google as a whole genuinely are agents of good in the corporate world or if it's just the spin they're clever at putting on things, but if the latter is the case... then damn they're good.

Re:Still Undecided

[physicsboy500]

It honestly depends on your definition of good and evil. They are a corporation founded upon bringing information to you be it ads or otherwise. They make their money off of insane amounts of ad revenue so in that sense they're "bad," but at the same time, they do make very sure to only bring things to you that you may be interested in and this careful filtering is "good."

It really just comes down to viewpoint. If you like finding things for yourself and don't want anyone telling you anything about where and how to spend your money then google is "evil." If you like having them point out deals and lead you to companies that are selling what you want (similar to an errand boy doing some of your shopping and looking around for you) then they're "good."

The only potentially frightening thing about google is the power they have if some of their information gets into the wrong hands (i.e. Government Subpoena).

Re:Still Undecided

[leoxx]

Corporations are fundamentally amoral, their only concern is to make a profit, ostensibly without breaking the laws of the countries they operate in. Once they are huge and dominant in their field, the need for continual growth means they have to begin looking at ways around traditional limitations, which is what often leads them into trouble.

Re:Still Undecided

[Stewie241]

Except that Google has decided to be bound not just to the laws of the countries they operate in, but have also claimed and I believe attempted to operate to a higher standard. At least in some matters they ask themselves not only is something legal, but is it right.

They still make me nervous, but I believe they do a better job of being ethical than some of the other guys.

Bob Marley said it best

[BadAnalogyGuy]

Strike while the iron is hot.

Google is on fire now, and as far as the market is concerned, can do no wrong. There will not be any future time where Google will be able to put together the sort of money needed to make these types of investments.

But that doesn't mean they will succeed in their wireless plans. As cool as they are, the wireless spectrum is a well established area with not only wireless carriers already bumping against each other for more elbow room but also broadcast radio and television conglomerates. Google can't play David successfully forever. They may have done a great job on the web where they led the technology, but here they will be following and a look at their online office suite, it is clear that they are poor followers.

Re:Bob Marley said it best

[StickyWidget]

What wireless plans? Seriously, this is the modern equivalent of a land grab, buy up the largest tract of contiguous land you can, and sit on it until people come along and ask to use it for something. Google is buying the spectrum to let people come and make money using it. Sound familiar? Kinda like building a search engine and a fantastic intelligent ad system so that marketers can come and make money using it? And because they own it, they can charge a small fee('rent') to those who want to use the spectrum. Large amount of users, equals large amount of fees, which equals smaller fees for users and large profits for Google.

They have no wireless plans, it's all about the oldest fact of life in the book: Whoever controls the most territory wins. Google may develop a product or two, but the idea is that they will rent the 'land', and let people build on it. And in this kind of game, the guys with the best implementation, the best business plan, the best technological expertise, the best of breed software, and the best ideas will be able to use this spectrum to it's fullest extent. This is why I'm hoping Google gets the spectrum.

It's better than what the others will do. They will get the spectrum, they will define the protocols, they will build the chips and the antennas to interact with it, the software that can be deployed on it, the people they will allow to access it, all at 500% markup and no guarantee that everything is best of breed and a product of a free-market. Look at the history of Sprint, Qualcomm, Motorola, and the others, and you'll see what I mean.

~Sticky
/Looking to lease a piece of the spectrum to build dream house....

Re:Bob Marley said it best

[suggsjc]

I don't disagree with you one bit. But I think Google has two things going for it.

1) The current/established players aren't very keen on change. They know how to do what they do (wring money out of customers, haha) and they do it very well. Even when they do "try" to roll out something new, they are like the music/movie industry, they only half-ass it because they try to shoehorn their existing/old business models into it...resulting in a giant flop...resulting in them becoming even codgier and more set in their old "tried and true" ways.
2) Despite its size, Google still acts (for the most part) like a smaller more nimble company. They bounce around several ideas, see what works (or buy what works) and *THEN* throw their money at it. So yeah, they may flounder a little at first while they test the waters, but once they find their groove it could be a real shake-up.

All that said, *IF* Google does find is groove/niche/business model/wireless 2.0/whatever *THEN* we might see some more innovation and competition coming from the wireless arena. But if they don't then its going to be 6 more weeks of winter.

Re:Bob Marley said it best

[1310nm]

I figured you meant the soldering iron. Imagine all the mobile handset companies with resistors in hand waiting to see the outcome of the auction. Is it really going to be for mobile networking, or a way to overcome the CLEC's last mile networks to the home? Longer waves ~700MHz are going to have longer reach than the current >2GHz frequencies my CDMA phone uses.

Re:Bob Marley said it best

[tieTYT]

Even if Google is unsuccessful, it will scare the pants off of the other cell phone companies until Google actually fails. The result of that will force them to come up with some innovation to compete and that will benefit the consumer. Even if this turns out to not be a win for Google, it'll be a win for us.

Re:Bob Marley said it best

[Dancindan84]

They don't need to play David. Look at the amount of consumer unrest with wireless carriers in the media (and online)recently. This is especially the case for cell data access and "hidden" surcharges that cell companies feel it's their right to charge. If google wins the bidding and can come out with something even remotely competitive, there are a lot of people who will hop on that bandwagon.

Re:Bob Marley said it best

[devjj]

Google hasn't been David for a long time. Google is a Goliath, although - to date - not a particularly evil one.

Re:Bob Marley said it best

[TubeSteak]

There will not be any future time where Google will be able to put together the sort of money needed to make these types of investments. Put together?
Google is sitting on billions.

http://www.google.com/search?q=google+sec+exemption

Around August 2006, they had to ask the SEC for an exemption from being considered an investment company because they had >40% of their assets either tied up in securities or cash.

Re:Bob Marley said it best

[Tacvek]

Well actually Google would be best off not to use the spectrum at all. Instead rent it to telecoms, who would provide wireless broadband services. See the current problem is that there is virtually no competition in the wireless broadband arena. The spectrum is owned by the very companies that use it, so it is not in their interest to allow competition on their part of the spectrum. On the other hand, there are so few chunks of spectrum that no real competition can emerge. If Google were to run this well, companies would be required to used standardized equipment and protocols on the frequency. Further they would allow multiple companies to license the spectrum for the exact same purpose in the same geographical area. Thus if AT&T's offering was a good deal you sign up with them. But when Sprint has a better deal, you can easily switch to Sprint with no hassle, after all, the equipment and protocols would be standardized. Further, the overhead for a new company to enter the business would be significantly smaller than it is currently. So some real competition would develop. The end result should be widely available low-cost wireless broadband. That is very much in the interests of Google. However that is not in the interests of the large telecoms, who currently own virtually all the available spectrum usable for this. So in this case the interests of Google and the interests of the consumers are the same. This is because Google is not in the telecom market. I really feel that this should always be the case. For example, phone lines should not be owned by the phone companies, but a separate company who has a strong interest in having phone/data services available at minimal cost.

Re:Bob Marley said it best

[Dun Malg]

For example, phone lines should not be owned by the phone companies, but a separate company who has a strong interest in having phone/data services available at minimal cost. Indeed. The fact that the telecom companies provide both infrastructure AND service is arguably an artifact of the 130+ year old analog phone system, where "service" consisted of nothing more than continuous voltage on a copper loop.

Re:Bob Marley said it best

[zerkon]

This could arguably be an excellent test case for Google's "principles". If they do win the spectrum, how well they handle it and how open they make could really show us if they're willing to put their money where their mouth is.

Help with the Wikipedia Article?

[AchiIIe]

Some time ago I started an article on wikipedia regarding the auction. It has not progressed much.

Could someone help please?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/700_Mhz_wireless_spectrum_auction

Unfortunately there are many parts of it that I still don't understand.
* It seems that it comes with several 22Mhz blocks. '
* Are they saying the actual 22mhz band or are they saying the first 22mhz of the 700 mhz band
* Rules specify that it's split in four major areas, southeast, northeast, etc, what does this mean?
* What four original restrictions did google want on auction? Which two were granted?

Re:Help with the Wikipedia Article?

[squiggleslash]

* Are they saying the actual 22mhz band or are they saying the first 22mhz of the 700 mhz band

Well, think about it. If it were the 22MHz band, then (a) we wouldn't be referring to this auction as being 700MHz spectrum, (b) we'd be looking at mobile phones with very long antennas and (c) the amount of bandwidth available would be somewhat unimpressive.

* Rules specify that it's split in four major areas, southeast, northeast, etc, what does this mean?

It means that the auction for spectrum in the southeast is separate for that in the north east, so if you want spectrum in both of those areas, you better bid in both auctions. Spectrum is usually split regionally in the US. Look at TV and radio franchises.

* What four original restrictions did google want on auction? Which two were granted?

Appropriately, you can use Google to find the answer to this. Essentially Google was trying to ensure the resultant networks would be open.

Re:Help with the Wikipedia Article?

[AchiIIe]

Thanks!
A few more questions:
* The FCC set a 4.6 Bln limit on the auction, if it did not reach the limit the restrictions would go away. Is this for each of the regional areas or is it 4.6 for all of them.
* Google is exptected to bid 4.6 B on the auction, Did they indicate if they would lean on certain areas more than the others?
* Thus it's still possible for google to bid more on certain regions, less on other regions. This could mean that someone else who bids more on the southeast would get the spectrum instead.
* This has been referred to as "beachfront property" in terms of spectrum, why is that?
* I've sporadically heard talk about emergency services (police etc) making use of this spectrum, is it bundled in this auction or is it outside?

Re:Help with the Wikipedia Article?

[Anonymous Coward]

I didn't read about this (doesn't really concern me here in Europe).
As far as I understand, the auction is for 22MHz channels on the 700MHz band.
So they will be selling a channel from 700MHz to 722MHz, then 723MHz to 745MHz and so forth (and back).
I don't know how many channels are for sale and how much should be the guard band (the gap between channels) for these frequencies (don't feel like googling).
But I guess this is pretty much enough to understand...

Re:Help with the Wikipedia Article?

[nirnaeth]

Ars Technica has rather exhaustive coverage of the auction. You can start here and work your way back, they've gone over everything you've asked about in previous articles.

Re:Help with the Wikipedia Article?

[darthflo]

* The FCC set a 4.6 Bln limit on the auction, if it did not reach the limit the restrictions would go away. Is this for each of the regional areas or is it 4.6 for all of them.

From what I've heard, the FCC would not have auctioned the spectrum off if the $4.6bn minimum wouldn't have been reached. Google's two rules seem to have been established as an exchange for bidding $4.6bn.

* Google is exptected to bid 4.6 B on the auction, Did they indicate if they would lean on certain areas more than the others?

* This has been referred to as "beachfront property" in terms of spectrum, why is that? Because it seems to be the best compromise of high bandwidth (GHz bands excel here, see W-LAN) and pervasiveness (The low to medium MHz bands' speciality, see FM radio). Ideally, it'd "go through concrete like a hot knife through butter" yet provide nice bandwidths).

* I've sporadically heard talk about emergency services (police etc) making use of this spectrum, is it bundled in this auction or is it outside?

Internationally, some emergency services seem to be shifting away from the 700 MHz bands, I don't have any insight here though. My best guess would be them using some other block in the 700 MHz range.

Again, most of this is from dubiously trustworthy news outlets, [citation needed] so to speak.

Re:Help with the Wikipedia Article?

[Zach978]

Take a look at this page:
http://wireless.fcc.gov/auctions/default.htm?job=auction_factsheet&id=73

Google is supposedly after Block C, which is 746-757 MHz and 776-787 MHz, for a total of 22Mhz.

Re:Help with the Wikipedia Article?

[pragma_x]

* This has been referred to as "beachfront property" in terms of spectrum, why is that?

From what little I understand, this is the soon-to-be-re-purposed TV spectrum, which happens to be fantastic at penetrating walls.

The QOS on this spectrum is going to make slogans like "more bars in more places" seem downright antiquitated in comparison.

Re:PRINCIPLES?

[CriminalNerd]

"Please ignore the fact that they will hand you and your data over to anyone who asks, and sell your soul for a buck-fifty."

You must be thinking of Yahoo!.

Oh If Only

[mpapet]

Having had only a tiny glimpse into the world of government contracting, I find it impossible to believe it will all come down to the price Google pays.

Some other /.'ers with contracting experience will probably back me up when I claim the price offered (or paid in this case) has nothing to do with winning a contract.

Re:Oh If Only

[mcho]

Actually, in my experience, price does matter but other factors are considered when awarding a federal contract (such as your team, their experience and skills, your company's past experience completing similar tasks, and it always helps if you have an ex-fed on your staff).

Re:Oh If Only

[squiggleslash]

This isn't really about winning contracts, this is an auction, just as it was for PCS and AWS. PCS was an unmitigated disaster precisely because the entire thing was "highest bidder wins". Swathes of spectrum were unused as they were owned by speculators, and no operators were ever able, in practice, to purchase spectrum in every market. The notion that the intent was to create usable mobile phone networks was simply not considered by the FCC, who were only interested in raising a huge amount of money, and used "free market" justifications for the ensuing chaos.

On the other hand...

[Cryophallion]

Think of it like an auction. The more people competing, the higher the price goes. You add in all the reports that estimate where a company will bid, then another company tops that, then another tops that....

In the end, 5 bidders bidding will probably jack the price up to higher than 2 bidders.

And who in the end pays that price in some form or another? Yup, us.

So while I am all for increased competition, and so far google hasn't passed on too many costs to us (I assume it gets passed on the the advertisers), it still makes me nervous. What if they don't win? Where do the prices go?

I think they need to split up the spectrum into parts, and then only allow a certain number of parts to be owned by one entity. That allows for competition, and therefore cost cutting. Just an idea.

Re:On the other hand...

[magarity]

And who in the end pays that price in some form or another? Yup, us.
 
It's a private sector company. The only way they get your money is if they use said spectrum with some amazingly cool widget or service that you're willing to spring for it. Otherwise they lose out and that's just tough. So they're really motivated to make such widgets and services that will bring you enough benefit that you'll pay the premium. So *IF* you pay for it, it'll be a good thing.

Why do they need wireless?

[Anonymous Coward]

What does Google plan to do with this spectrum? Is the end result for themselves or for consumers? If consumers, will it be ad based, or cheap and flooded with Google-ads? And if free to connect, how much will the hardware cost? Or, does Google plan to enter the cellphone market like every other provider, screwing users with 3 year contracts?

Google is not a hardware company. They should stick to what they are good at, which is being an ad distributer. I believe this is a big mistake they are making.

Re:Why do they need wireless?

[Ash-Fox]

Google is not a hardware company.

They have been building Enterprise Google search appliances from as long as I can remember.

They should stick to what they are good at, which is being an ad distributer.

I think they're actually good at large scale projects, from search technologies to e-mail.

I believe this is a big mistake they are making.

I don't know enough of their 'plan' to call it a mistake or such and I don't think you can safely say that right now either.

Re:Why do they need wireless?

[dsginter]

What does Google plan to do with this spectrum?

Offer residential broadband-to-700mhz VoIP routers to customers who would, in turn, become cellular access points.

Just food for thought (there's a lot standing in the way of something like this). It would be nice to have privately-licensed spectrum available to the public because then we wouldn't be limited to 100 milliwatts.

Re:Why do they need wireless?

[um_atrain]

Right, like Google is going to pay 4.7 billion just to be nice and give free access to all. I don't think so. There must be some business model behind their decision. This is Google, they may not be evil, but they are still a business, and need to make money.

Judging buy their current model (Transparency for end users, but get lots of income from companies that advertise through them) I would pose the option that what they are making is ad based. Otherwise, they would have to charge the consumers, which would be a radical change to their normal business model.

As for the power limitation, I doubt that will be raised. Several reasons include:
1) Crazy / Paranoid people who make the law think that powerful wireless signals can and will melt your brain, and must be reduced.
2) Security: If someone finds an exploit and acts as a host / connection node, if they choose to exploit it for illegitimate reasons (eg: stealing passwords, credit cards, etc.), then the less area they can cover with their signal, the better. This of course can have problems if there is a mesh model in place, which would route other connections nodes to his client. Also, you don't want your data to be transmitted further than needed.(eg: If your using WEP, you don't want your signal covering 3 blocks, because it would be an invitation for people to join your network.)
3) Battery life: Whether Google plans to release a phone network (OHA) or a computer network, both laptops and cell phones run on batteries.
4) While High-Powered solutions are great if you are an isolated client, lots of interference and wireless noise is created when you have many high-powered clients in too close an area.

Re:Why do they need wireless?

[dbdweeb]

Google's success is due in large part to their hardware prowess - the Google infrastructure is world class... 500,000+ servers running Linux, MySQL, etc.

Apple wasn't a music distribution company but now they own the market and Tower Records is shrinking dramatically.

OHA will do to the phone companies what the PC did to the mainframe and the VAX. Without government intervention, inexpensive open systems and open markets drive out expensive closed systems and closed markets. To paraphrase Clinton, "It's the NEW economy stupid."

Re:Why do they need wireless?

[Anonymous Coward]

Right, like Google is going to pay 4.7 billion just to be nice and give free access to all.

Where is it implied that this would have to be free?

There are many ways to skin such a cat (e.g. - customers who install the AP can use it with no additional cost - on top of their own broadband connection - in order to support google's paying customers... or even revenue sharing... but free certainly isn't the only route).

Re:Why do they need wireless?

[randyjg]

Good question.

More important question. Are they acting on behalf of a third party (say, a foreign telecomm) that would normally not be allowed to bid, or at least would generate serious public debate.

For example, Google is getting their butt kicked up around their ears in China by Baidu. I wonder if, say, a government sponsored access to the market along, say, the Yangtse tiver might be worth trading some spectrum rights in the US for. After all, what investor want to see is growth in market share, and Google would not have to actually legally assign the rights, just some quid pro quo deal that would give China access to most of the residential networks in the US, and the telecommuting traffic on them. Think of it as the obverse of the AT&T-NSA deal

Re:Why do they need wireless?

[SnowZero]

I think you've been reading too much John C. Dvorak.

DING DIN G DING WE HAVE A WINNER

[Anonymous Coward]

Yup, the two head honchos at google realize this and figure hey, we better buy something worth while with all the fake money we have so they buy the 700MHZ spectrum. A very sound investment as when the house of cards they have built comes crashing down they will be left with a pile of rubble and rights to a spectrum worth more then they could ever dream.

Re:PRINCIPLES?

[pwnies]

Except unlike most advertising companies, Google provides us with a service that is extremely useful. Sure, advertising is how they make their money, but that's how they keep the service they provide for us free. It's like broadcast television. They provide us with entertainment with the catch that there will be a few commercials here and there. Except with Google we don't have 30 second annoyances which take up the whole screen and don't allow us to view anything else. Google has pleasant little text ads on the side. That's why everyone loves them.

Hmm

[Hells]

A new and exciting development.

Gotcha

[neuromancer2701]

The key here is that they have got the wireless companies where they want them even if they don't win the auction. If the other companies knew that Google was not going to bid on it then they would just wait for it expired and be put up without the requirements. Now Google assures themselves an open network even if they don't win because the other companies have to follow the requirements.

700MHz?

[ajs318]

I thought 700MHz was somewhere in the television broadcast band?

Re:700MHz?

[squiggleslash]

Yes, it is. Part of the switch over to digital involves moving TV channels using the higher numbered channels to lower numbered channels, so that this spectrum can be made available.

There's oodles of TV spectrum available in part because there's never been enough interest in terrestrial broadcasting, and also because every single TV station in the US has been allocated two channels, one for their existing analog service, and one for the digital replacement. Once the analog spectrum goes away, 50% of the TV spectrum currently in use will become available.

One interesting oddity is that digital channels have "soft" numbers from an end-user point of view rather than being tied to the frequency they're allocated. For example, CBS broadcasts on channel 12 in analog here but digitally on channel 13, but both are numbered "12" on the TV. So TV channels broadcasting on the frequencies being removed may continue to appear in the same place on your "dial" even though those actual frequencies aren't even available any more, let alone in use. (This is by design, the aim being to help make the switchover as smooth as possible.)

Re:PRINCIPLES?

[Billosaur]

In case you haven't noticed, most sites have become Advertising agents, deriving their revenue almost exclusively from adverts. I personally would like to see a shift toward a pay-for-service model where I could avoid all the advertising. I go to web sites to find information, not to be bombarded with flash-driven crap hawking things I wouldn't buy in a million years. If Google wanted me to pay $10 a month so I could do searches and use Gmail and all their other tools without the constant Madison Ave pitch, I'd sign up. Plus, if I'm paying them my money, I could hold them accountable more easily.

Re:PRINCIPLES?

[mooreti1]

No, they are a search company who has worked out a successful way to tie their core business to a viable method of generating a profit...oh, wait, that's what they're supposed to do! Geez-us, that they make money out of providing a necessary service is neither evil nor under-handed. What, exactly, would you have Google do? Because without cash you get no search, no blogs, no YouTube. A company has obligations to meet, especially to it's employee's and it's stockholders. You want it to be free and open with no type of editing or censoring? Start your own search company and run it solely out of pocket. Let me know how far you get.

DO YOU REALIZE WHAT THIS MEANS?!?!?!?!

[Anonymous Coward]

cause I don't.

This is why my masterful plan will succeed

[WillAffleckUW]

It's very simple.

1. Buy the spectrum at 699.9 MHz.

2. Buy the spectrum at 700.1 MHz.

3. Put Seattle garage band music on both bands and bleed it to the edge ...

5. Profit!

Translation

[Stringer Bell]

"We believe it's important to put our money where our principles are," Eric Schmidt, Google's chairman and CEO, said in a statement.

"We believe it's important to develop new sources of revenue wherever we can to keep the stockholders happy," Eric Schmidt, Google's chairman and CEO, said in a statement.

"Consumers deserve more competition and innovation than they have in today's wireless world. No matter which bidder ultimately prevails, the real winners of this auction are American consumers who likely will see more choices than ever before in how they access the Internet.'"

"The stockholders require more diversity and multiple revenue streams to support our close-to-$700 stock price, otherwise they might start to get nervous and sell. We will be the real winners of this auction, but we'll frame it as a populist victory because the media's here and they want a sound byte."

I'm not opposed to companies making money by any means, but let's at least be honest with ourselves that Google isn't doing this out of a sense of altruism.

Re:Translation

[binaryspiral]

I'm not opposed to companies making money by any means, but let's at least be honest with ourselves that Google isn't doing this out of a sense of altruism.

If by making a sick amount of profit they can build and deploy a wireless service that is better, cheaper, and faster than any available from current suppliers - more power to them.

Re:Translation

[kimchimofo]

But even if they don't really pull it off, and they just end up being a slightly-above-average provider with slightly-less annoying service, I'm sure the public will continue to feel warm and fuzzy about Google because it seems that they've reached the much sought after "we can do no wrong" status. Maybe that's because they've led a good company and provide excellent products. Or maybe it's because even if Google does invade our privacy and uses our information to make massive profits without continually improving the quality of their products, that nobody is going to publicize any massive backlash against them because the people who would have the most to lose by Google falling out of favor. I'm not a conspiracy theorist or anything, but Google has been creeping me out lately. That and the fact that I'm growing increasingly discontent with the quality of their services.

Re:Translation

[cowscows]

It's likely a little bit of both, Google seems to be run by people with enough imagination to see places where the public interest and their interests as a corporation can match up nicely. There are plenty of ways to make decent profits that don't require screwing over your customers as much as you can get away with.

I'm more and more convinced ...

[ubrgeek]

... That google's purchase in the near future will be for a substantial plot of land (I'm talking miles by miles.) Their actions kind of remind me of Walt Disney's original plan for EPCOT - He wanted it to be the perfect '50s neighborhood (the Leave-it-to-Beaver kind, not necessarily realty.) They're looking at wireless, data centers, power/electrical considerations, gathering information on public transportation (google.com/transit). I don't know. Such a diverse set of items - some without direct revenue generation potential in the near future - is just strange. An attempt at a Utopia project (dear Lord, if it happens, don't "Gutopia") might not be realistic, but it's the only thing my (very) limited imagination can come up with...

Re:I'm more and more convinced ...

[imageek]

"An attempt at a Utopia project (dear Lord, if it happens, don't "Gutopia")..."

I think "Gootopia" is what you're getting at, as "Gutopia" would be pronounced "gut-opia."

However, if Google were to undertake such a project with the assistance of Richard Stallman, "GNUtopia" might be more appropriate.

Re:I'm more and more convinced ...

[Anonymous Coward]

No, it will be called GNUtopia

Re:Principles?

[Anonymous Coward]

My principle is this: if you come in my house, please don't piss all over my toilet seat. I take a great deal of pride in my toilet seats; I have several crafted from pure ivory, extracted from an elephant I shot myself. Covered in exquisite carvings, the detail is impressive, and many male guests appear to become distracted, and piss all over the seat. It really makes me angry!

I also have to mention that I have used the power of Linux and Open Source Software to solve this problem, but to no avail. I have written lengthy Bash scripts, tweaked my configuration files and even recompiled my kernel but this seems to be one area where the power of Linux and Open Source Software cannot help.

I would try Windows, but it does not have the power of Linux and Open Source Software, instead it is for the sheep who piss all over my toilet walls.

I mentioned Linux, can someone mod me up, please?

Exactly

[Foerstner]

This is the motivation behind the move to digital television. Free up spectrum so that it can be sold.

What, you thought the government was pushing HDTV just so you'd have a sharper picture?

innovative technology company

[us7892]

Aren't they an "innovative technology company"?

They simply pay the bills with their advertising revenue. :)

Re:PRINCIPLES?

[archiephl]

Google is not JUST an advertising company -- they have revolutionized they way advertising is done, in a fairly positive way that "works" for (almost) everybody: end-users, advertisers, and web sites. Google ads work for advertisers because they make economic sense -- they drive business. They work for web sites because they provide a way for almost any site of almost any size to easily monetize the viewers it attracts. And it works for end-users because the ads are relevant and fairly unobtrusive. Most importantly, the economic model enabled by Google supports a much greater quantity and diversity of offerings on the web. Everybody wins.

Re:PRINCIPLES?

[That's Unpossible!]

Seriously, you're going to try to reduce Google to this level?

First and foremost, they provide you with the best search results, and have done so for years, for free.

They provide an outstanding email system, with now 5GB of free space and growing, for free.

They provide one of the most amazing mapping systems ever, continually adding new, cutting edge features, for free, both on the web, on your phone and in Google Earth.

They provide office collaboration online apps in Google Docs (which I use almost every day with friends spread out across the globe), for free.

They provide a really great photo organizing software (Picasa) and even some space on their site to upload pictures to, for free.

They provide a place to share gigabytes of video with everyone on earth in Google Video and YouTube, for free.

And we're merely scratching the surface.

And you're going to try and reduce them to the level of "Madison Avenue hucksters"?

Oh, that's right, they developed a cutting edge advertising system that provides context-sensitive, extremely-low-key advertisements in an un-annoying way, and a backend system that allows any size company to competitively bid for ad placement in this system at a reasonable rate.

You're right, Google sucks, man! Fight the power!

Google DeathStar(TM)

[Anonymous Coward]

I am waiting for Google to take the final step toward domination of the universe.

Sure, now they have the 700 MHz spectrum, and soon they'll own most fiber in the US and Europe, and after that the world, but these are trivial things...

What really matters is their dominion over the life force that suffuses us all.

Come to me, gentle consumer... take my hand and let me show you the power of the Dark Side

great strategy

[recharged95]

Sure, I can bid too if I had the deposit amount. And if I don't win, I don't waste any money aside from upfront fees. This is a great strategy to keep the telcos in check.

Google has nothing to lose and everything to gain--it's an auction for crying out loud. If they lose the auction, they win by pushing the telcos inline with the gphone alliance. If they win, well, they have bandwidth for an internal company network and a R&D network (think beta apps FTW!). Problem is they can not provide free [production level] service to consumers cause they are not geared up for customer service at that scale, unless your willing to accept telco QoS. I suspect they are planning to lose the action, but it's an easy chess move and adds to the bling status of Google.

Cue Massive Rise in Stock Price....

[StickyWidget]

Step 1: Buy Google Stock.
Step 2: Wait for Google to Announce intent to Bid
Step 3: Sit on Google stock
Step 4: Sell Google stock after successful acquisition of 700 MHz Spectrum
Step 5: Profit!!

~Sticky
/You think it's funny, but isn't this what you should be doing?
//Currently on Step Dumb@ss: Kick self for not buying Google stock last week.

Re:PRINCIPLES?

[Anonymous Coward]

I seem to remember that not only will they not hand over your data to anyone who asks, but they'll fight the government to protect your privacy. Compare that to AOL or Yahoo =P

Re:PRINCIPLES?

[kcornia]

god damn son, that is some hard core own.

Excuse me while I go check my gmail and upload last weekend's pictures to Picasa...

Re:PRINCIPLES?

[MilesNaismith]

You only have to look back a COUPLE OF DAYS in Google stories to see how they handed over the IP of a blogger without even waiting to get sued over it. Is y'alls memory that short? I don't have to look very much further back to find examples in China. Oh yeah, they are so PRINCIPLED and Do No Evil is the first thing on the list? That's gold paint on the turd. Google are ad-men and hucksters who happen to be flying so high they can afford to pretend to have principles, instead of being so patently obvious about it as Madison Avenue. Please ignore their transgressions because HEY FREE 5-GIG MAILBOX WOOHOO!

700MHz + Android

[Anonymous Coward]

Would Android satisfy the FCC restrictions? If so, then Google could lock down their newly acquired 700MHz spectrum (if they win) to only Andriod devices. This would essentially make this "open-access" spectrum a Google controlled spectrum. All they need now is a wireless carrier and some phones to dominate another market.

That's what I call overclocking!

[giafly]

I've got a 3.5 MHz Spectrum in the attic if they want that.

Re:That's what I call overclocking!

[Surt]

Commenting on your sig:
Did you hit calculate on every page? I also happened to get exactly 0.59 (well, 0.586), which made me suspicious, and caused me to discover that you have to hit the calculate button on every page in order not to get that apparent default.

Also, that page is pretty heavily biased. A lot of things they are calculating on are absolutely not settled science. The 'secondary' footprint page is particularly bad.

Still, if you're really at 0.59, that's pretty impressive. You don't drive, and your housing is solar powered, must be nice to have those kinds of resources.

Re:PRINCIPLES?

[everphilski]

Google has pleasant little text ads on the side.

I don't know. I got an email in gmail from a friend the other day which said simply:

Hey everphilski, give me a call, john. 123-456-787.

The textual advertisements were for colon cleansing.

Not exactly pleasant or relevant. Unless they figured we were gay or something ... but I email my wife several times a day you think gmail would have picked up on that by now :P

Re:PRINCIPLES?

[Myrcutio]

They are an ADVERTISING COMPANY! Yknow, for an advertising company they have a history of doing some very altruistic things for the consumer. It wasn't until they were practically a monopoly on search engines (MSN search is a joke, and yahoo is only still around for their online mail services) that they started doing nice things for their happy customers. Gmail, googleoffice, igoogle to name a few. you could make the argument that yes these are just clever ploys to keep their consumer base, but honestly, would you use the MSN search if google didn't have them?

They aren't angels, but i don't think they're deceptive on this front. they really do think that it's better for everyone if the 700mhz range is an open medium.

This is good news + google is smart

[mycal]

The good news is that Google will make all cellphones better if they get into the race. The reason? Openness. From the beginning of time it seems the US carriers have locked down there phones so you can't do things like load MP3 songs and java applets to them without buying them online. They have the java networking locked down so you cannot connect to everything or use regular sockets (IE not web).

Right now companies like Verizon are panicking and racing to open there networks (IE http://www.phonescoop.com/news/item.php?n=2552), if google gets spectrum it will be good for all because google will have lots of cool applications and programs on there phones, and the other carriers to even compete will have to open up there phones for development to everyone.

Also the 700mhz spectrum is a great place to be for a new network as you can get better coverage and need less cell density when your starting out.

-M

Re:This is good news + google is smart

[Anonymous Coward]

I've actually been quite a fan of Sony Ericsson phones for some years now, in large part due to the fact that they're fairly open (relative to other phones you might buy). I presently own a W600, and I can upload MP3s to it via USB and use them as my ringtone and/or text message sound. I previously owned a differend Sony phone prior to this one (don't remember which model and don't feel like looking it up), but the same thing was true for that one as well.
(Also, their phones do pretty well at surviving falls to the floor/pavement. Which is also a nice feature in a cell phone.)

Re:Cue Massive DROP in Stock Price....

[TheAwfulTruth]

They have a decent core ad revenue buisness but they are just THROWING their money away at things that they know nothing about and have no buisness plan for. Investors are going to get tired of it. If Google just starts tossing money out "for their principles" with even LESS chance of recouping it than in previsous fruitless ventures, people will simpley stop giving them any more money. Stock price /could/ severely DROP if they go through with this...

Of course we all know that "logic" no longer controls the stock market at all or Googles share price would only be $200 as it is so who knows...

Re:PRINCIPLES?

[erikkemperman]

It's like broadcast television. They provide us with entertainment with the catch that there will be a few commercials here and there.

As if the viewer were the customer in this transaction and those `few commercials' an unavoidable nuisance to both viewers and broadcaster, when the fact is of course that the advertisers are the customer and the viewers are the product. It seems to me a similar misunderstanding is all too prevalent with respect to google.

Announcement Timing

[CopaceticOpus]

Google chose to announce this on a Friday to piss off Robert Cringely, who now has to wait an entire week to write wild speculations about Google's plans.

Re:PRINCIPLES?

[Anonymous Coward]

Absolutely true.

Amazing what little amount of trinkets it takes to herd sheeple. I thought geeks were a bit smarter than your average Joe, but I guess not.

Re:PRINCIPLES?

[abigor]

I love it when complete non-technical nobodies try to pretend they understand technology corporations, or technology in general.

Re:PRINCIPLES?

[pwnies]

Not exactly pleasant or relevant. Unless they figured we were gay or something ... Getting your colon irrigated doesn't mean you're gay, so you emailing your wife would have nothing to do with whether or not that was in your text ads at the side. What would influence it is if you have health conscious related emails (e.g. fitness workouts, organic foods, etc.).

Re:Cue Massive DROP in Stock Price....

[StickyWidget]

Let's say that I were to acquire a square mile of undeveloped land in downtown Manhattan, and I have no freaking clue what to do with it. Does that make me an idiot? NO. I will have people hammering down my door with ideas on how to use it, and will be able to make money without a problem.

Let me sum up the business plan of Google, cause it's a variation of one that has been used for hundreds (maybe thousands) of years:

1. Buy large tract of undeveloped land in an area that is incredibly congested.
2. Invite people to propose ideas for the use of said land.
3. Charge the people with the best ideas for the priviledge of using the land.
4. Let idea people build on the land, charge for it.
5. Charge people who use the new infrastructure on the land.
6. When the idea gets old, evict the old idea people, and start over at Step 2.

Now, replace "land" with "Spectrum". Welcome to Money City, now owned by Google.

~Sticky
/Don't have a business plan? COME ON!!
//Seriously, DUH!

Re:PRINCIPLES?

[Kimos]

It's like broadcast television. Except broadcast television isn't free like Google services are. The TV networks are getting paid twice. Google only charges the advertisers, not the consumers. TV viewers are paying to be subjected to ads for 20 or so minutes out of an hour.

Re:PRINCIPLES?

[kimchimofo]

Yeah but... I'm not a huge fan of Google either, amazing technologies or not. First of all, their technologies aren't as effective in today's internet world as they were when they first started -- I'm spending more and more time weeding through meaningless results for things and my queries have only gotten more specific so I'd expect pretty accurate matches -- so I would say they should focus on quality and not quantity. In other words, make your search better. I'd love to take their advice and share their ideas about several ways they could do this, but they're cutesy little "help us improve" link they have takes me to a list of jobs that I'm not qualified for because I don't have a CS degree, relegating me to gripe about their problems in some Slashdot forum instead. Secondly, Google wants us to buy into the fact that even though they have the ability to abuse our information, that they won't because they adhere to some kind of moral principal. If that was really the case it seems they wouldn't store your search history indefinitely. They don't really need more than some simple information to effectively target ads to you, in other words they could purge your searches and retain only what they need to to target ads. But they don't. Even Microsoft and Yahoo purge their search histories more frequently. From what I understand, Google reserves the right to use this information to "profile" its users in the future. To paraphrase something I heard once from someone who works at EFF.org, your Google history is the closest thing in the digital world to what's in your brain. Google makes money off selling targeted ads. They are very good at it, look at their stock. This is how they can also try to pull off a bid on a part of a wireless spectrum valued as highly as $10 Billion. But each one of those dollars was made by showing you, albeit only slightly annoying, ads in response to your search queries. The difference between Google and bulk spammers is that Google actually provides a useful service. But as the quality of their search results deteriorates, hopefully the world will realize that they've spread themselves too thin and either force them to improve, or move onto someone else. Long live creative destruction. Google, I'll keep using your service if it's good. But if it starts to suck, I'll move on.

Re:PRINCIPLES?

[ari wins]

I truly wish I hadn't wasted my mod points on this morning's news. Bravo!

700MHz auction details.

[Radon360]

I'd start more here.

There are six 22MHz blocks in the 700MHz band up for auction. Each bidder bids on one or more 22MHz blocks. Note that the blocks are assigned for different purposes and larger and smaller geographic areas. Block C, for example is for regional uses, and therefore there will be several license winners for that particular 22MHz block, each winner coming away with a region. Block D is a nationwide license, so one winner gets use of that 22MHz block throughout the United States. Overall, there's 1099 available licenses with varying uses, modes, and geographic areas up for auction. The fact sheet gives a little more of a breakdown.

Here are the regions.

My guess is that Google will be going after block D, which is one licensee, with nationwide geographic coverage.

what will they call the spectrum?

[evwah]

personally I think they should name it googleherz.

CORRECTION.

[Radon360]

There are six blocks, two 12MHz, one 22MHz, one 6 MHz and one 10MHz.

Re:CORRECTION.

[Anonymous Coward]

Are you sure? According to google 2+1+1+1 only makes five blocks.

Re:PRINCIPLES?

[Monchanger]

What's the matter, Steve? Run out of chairs?

By the way- your keyboard need replacing. Your shift keys keep sticking.

How ironic

[Anonymous Coward]

... then damn they're good.

And of course, by "good" you mean "good at being bad".

No matter what the case: Worship the Goog.
(if "the singularity" or "skynet" or whatever you want to call it ever happens, it'll be out of this mass conglomeration of data)

cynical ain't ya?

[yodleboy]

corporations are bad! money is bad! spectrum is bad! it's nice to know there are so many self-employed philanthropists on /. would you guys get together in utopia and bid on this for the benefit of all mankind? please?
dunno, i'm willing to give google a chance on this one. there's NO WAY they can be as inept, immoral, incompetent and possibly inbred as the rest of the mobile carriers in the U.S.

Altruism != results can't be positive

[Steve Hamlin]

"but let's at least be honest with ourselves that Google isn't doing this out of a sense of altruism"

So what? Since when does the intention of the actor impact the result? Isn't it better than it was? Do you see latent downsides that are hiding in the FCC's rules and Google's bid that overwhelm the positive rules that Google has pushed?

Contrary to what seems to be the anti-capitalism** mindset around here, a company can pursue profits in a manner that creates long-term value for all stakeholders and is net beneficial to society as a whole. Google might not be acting strictly out of altruism, but that doesn't mean that the result can't have a net positive impact on "The Internet" or "The Information Communication Fabric" or whatever.

Altruism with no concern for profits? I'll grant you Google doesn't act that way.

- A search for long-term value, that is guided by smart, competent and seemingly well-intentioned founders and management?
- Who appear to have a fairly-unique business mindset focused on creating and developing new ideas into open platforms that they then leverage into profits?
- While seeming to interact with 'The Internet' in a open, honest manner?
- Which might lead to a net increase in "Value", as happens when human societies develop in a productive way?

In most of what they've shown so far, Google seems to act like THAT. Not altruistic. But the result is net positive in a number of ways. And I like it - it's refreshing to see profits accrue to a company, that in my mind, is doing capitalism-in-modern-society correctly.

-
**: I agree that "capitalism at all costs, consequences-be-damned" is bad. And that not all societal costs and benefits are measured by a financial bottom line.

Re:PRINCIPLES?

[TheRealZeus]

Would you rather have m$ own this spectrum? Google certainly isnt perfect, but many of you need to face the fact that it takes $$$ to buy this spectrum and it could be a lot worse.

Re:Principles?

[Belial6]

I would like to thank you for making your toilet seat IP Open Source, so in the spirit of Open Source, I would like to submit a bug fix. In the next release of your toilet seat, put the exquisite cravings on the bottom of the seat. This will encourage your Windows using guests to 'lift' the seat, thus reducing the the amount of piss landing on the seat. This will also allow the top of the seat to be a smooth surface, making the user interface more comfortable for users when sitting, which is when the exquisite carvings would be obstructed from view anyways.

I eagerly await the official release of version 0.42 of Exquisite Toilet Seat.

Re:PRINCIPLES?

[Anonymous Coward]

"First and foremost, they provide you with the best search results, and have done so for years, for free."

agreed.

"They provide an outstanding email system, with now 5GB of free space and growing, for free."

The service is just as good as Yahoo!, Aol, or MSN. fat-client email tools (outlook, entourage, eudora, thunderbird) work so much better.

"They provide one of the most amazing mapping systems ever, continually adding new, cutting edge features, for free, both on the web, on your phone and in Google Earth."

Same as Mapquest, MSN Live and Yahoo! Only nice thing is gmaps supports traffic. The iPhone apps are much better IMO. As for mobile, it really comes down to bandwidth (the old J2ME gmaps was horrible on 2002 GPRS phone). Android is really Linux and J2ME, but will be branded as 'Google native' by the fanboys.

"They provide office collaboration online apps in Google Docs (which I use almost every day with friends spread out across the globe), for free."

Still not as good as Office or OOo. And they can search/own all your documents, so no sensitive docs...In the end it's a glorified email/abiword writer. where they can alter content as needed--is that in their policy? Hmmm... Google security, non-existent...

"They provide a really great photo organizing software (Picasa) and even some space on their site to upload pictures to, for free."

Have you seen flickr lately, why have 3 apps (XP, Picasa, Picasa Web) when you can have 2 (XP, Flickr). Also, it's easier to share photos on Flickr and their API is way more robust/easier to develop.

"They provide a place to share gigabytes of video with everyone on earth in Google Video and YouTube, for free."

Yes, to YOU, the consumer, but the copyright holders pay by having their content lose [monetary] value as it's being gained by google ad payouts back to google"

...

"And you're going to try and reduce them to the level of "Madison Avenue hucksters"?"

Yes, that's their [core] business model and "do no evil" is a great Madison Ave. created MOTTO. Remeber Madison Ave. creates company slogans. Grassroots movements create analogies.

"You're right, Google sucks, man! Fight the power!"

There's nothing to fight, just switch to a competitor's service if you're unhappy--you're a consumer right? You have choices... which of course our marketing gurus are trying to skew (i.e. create the herd/fanboy mentality).

ok, I had to provide a rebuttal.

How does this help consumers?

[scott1973]

How does another deep pocket company joining a bidding war going to be good for consumers? Ultimately this will just drive the price of the spectrum up- the cost of which will ultimately need to be passed on to someone.. (perhaps the consumer?) This does nothing to help the consumer, it only gives google more leverage.

It's a hope...

[XB-70]

..that Google also bids on the Canadian spectrum too. The monopolistic wireless carriers up here have formed a vicious cartel that has us paying a fortune in fees. Let's hope that Google brings some competition to the equation.

It blows me away that a taxi driver in the Dominican Republic can afford a cell phone while hauling in $10 per day whereas a business user up here pays around that amount DAILY to simply use their phone.

The word 'wireless'

[Lewrker]

Why does everyone insist on using it. It means that you do not require wires to use it. A 700mHz wireless spectrum might just as well be that high pitched sound when you discover there's no beer left in the fridge.

Re:Cue Massive DROP in Stock Price....

[Plaid Phantom]

Google has some of the top engineers in the country. I suspect they know a thing or two about what they're doing.

Re:Principles?

[Anonymous Coward]

Funniest post I've ever read on slashdot. yay

Pigeons!

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm looking forward to Google getting this chunk of spectrum. Google search is based upon pigeonrank. I happen to keep and race homing pigeons. Now, if Google opens the spectrum, I can create an app to track my homing pigeons. Beautiful!

Re:PRINCIPLES?

[General Wesc]

The service is just as good as Yahoo!, Aol, or MSN.

Those services offered something like 2MB until Google provided real competition.

will it?

[nerdyalien]

I am from South Asia.. I have this strange feelinf that this (700MHz free phone) gonna work. I mean, it will be a hit in most of the Asia due to...

1. Asians love anything comes with free
2. Current operators (specially in my own country) aren't that cheap even the heavy telecom competition is out there.
3. Marketing is something larger than life in this part of the world. So.. Google won't run out of local advertisements.
4. Population and tech users are relatively high compared to total population.

Only problem is.... affording the Android phone. But it wouldn't be a problem after market saturation.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:Cue Massive DROP in Stock Price....

[Anonymous Coward]

Of course we all know that "logic" no longer controls the stock market at all or Googles share price would only be $200 as it is so who knows... If you "correct" Google's stock price so that its F P/E is the same as Microsoft, you'd still get a price of $377 per share. Translation: Even if you take away the buzz a company like Google has when compared to Microsoft, they are still raking in insane amounts of money with strong growth.

That said, buying spectrum is risky, so they had better be careful not to get carried away in this auction.

Sinclair computer came to my mind

[Anonymous Coward]

I thought google was bidding for a rare Sinclair Spectrum computer at 700Mhz...

Re:PRINCIPLES?

[That's Unpossible!]

ok, I had to provide a rebuttal.

Where is this rebuttal you speak of? I listed all the things that makes Google more than a "madison avenue huckster," and you simply listed some competing services to Google's. Then you sprinkled on some of your paranoid delusions at the end.

BTW, you are high when it comes to Google Maps. Do you remember what the competing services looked like before Google Maps came out and its ajax interface blew them completely out of the water? All of those other services have played nothing but catch up with Google on every feature.