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FCC to Investigate D-Block Auction
eweekhickins writes "Feds and public interest groups are taking seriously accusations that someone tampered with the wireless spectrum auction process. The block of spectrum that was supposed to go to emergency responders failed to get close to the reserve price, raising suspicions that someone was trying to make money off the Sept. 11 national tragedy. But that would never happen, right?" This is a follow up to last week's allegations.
I have not been happy with almost anything this group has done in the past 7 years. This just has the same slimy feel that so many other activities of the FCC. At this point I would be surprised to find out that some was manipulated to favor someone particular group. The surprise would be that the people who did manipulate the situation did not do a better job of destroying the evidence. However the stench of corruption will still linger.
They didn't come anywhere close to meeting the 1.3 billion reserve. They fell something like 900 million short. They're not sure why, but they think it might be related to this company that was spreading FUD about charging an extra 50 million on top. Somehow I don't think it's that company.
The FCC had put in some pretty strong wording about building in first responder capability. It was more than what was typically done in the past, but it didn't seem totally outrageous. I think the problem is that a lot of the wireless carriers are moving towards commodization, and thus low margins. 90% of the population in the US can get good cell service from multiple providers. With low margins, why would you take on a huge risk that could be a brick around your neck? Better to spend the little bit extra and get a chunk of spectrum whose only restrictions were pretty much that you had to use it? I think it's that that piece of the spectrum just isn't worth the hassle if you have to build in tons of first responder equipment also.
It's just worth only 50% of what they thought it was. Oops, they messed up. But since they messed up big, they have to start an investigation.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/9/11_conspiracy_theories
pen & teller
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kcrF346sS_I
Debunking the 9/11 Myths
http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/military_law/1227842.html?page=1
http://www.debunk911myths.org/
http://www.debunking911.com/
That should to keep the paranoids and nutters silent for a least a min or two.
http://rds.yahoo.com/_ylt=A0oGkl7up.dHWO8ADoFXNyoA;_ylu=X3oDMTEzNmRvbGhpBHNlYwNzcgRwb3MDMTEEY29sbwNzazEEdnRpZANGODIzXzg3/SIG=11gi164v7/EXP=1206450542/**http%3A//www.debunking911.com/
"(I) have this unfortunate condition that causes me not to believe a single thing any politician says when a mic's on.
The summary asks if someone is trying to make money off 9/11. The article makes no such claim - doesn't even allude to it. The only direct mention of 9/11 in the article is that members of the 9/11 Commission are asking the FCC to look into the allegations of fraud and collusion. Is the reference to 9/11 something that the submitter slipped in to try to generate additional interest in the story - like just about every form of media these days (and at least one defunct presidential candidate)?
The only connection the D-block auction has to 9/11 is the fact that it is meant, not just for a commercial communications network, but also for emergency responders to have access to it as well. The different agencies responding on 9/11 (and in the days that followed) were hampered by the fact that they use different radio systems and had difficulty communicating with one another.
It is question of ethical practices whether it is related to 9/11 or not. And the question is if these charges are true, whether we could trust this consulting firm for any business.
hilarious
Not be OT or feed the troll, but it was in a single morning.
I think you have nailed it exactly. First responder network requirements are an absolute brick around the neck. Generator backup for every site for 8 hours is an expensive brick, 24 hours for major sites. There are probably calea requirements also that go beyond normal 'here is the subpoena, not give me the records' kind of thing.
You're confusing some things here. The backup power requirement applies to ANY telecom site. Wireless or wireline, any block, any sort of CMRS. They're all subject to the same backup power requirement (at least until the D.C. Circuit rules on the appeal of that requirement). And the D-block requirements have nothing to do with CALEA. CALEA will apply exactly the same to the D-block as to the other blocks in the 700 MHz auction. What made the D-block different is that whichever commercial carrier won the spectrum rights was to work out some arrangement where, in addition to building a commercial network on that spectrum, they would also build capacity for use by public safety agencies.
What killed the D-block was uncertainty. The FCC put out vague, put potentially onerous, obligations on the D-block. The auction winner's ability to exploit the spectrum was to be dependent on their ability to negotiate out some deal with a big mess of first responder organizations. At the time the FCC didn't seem terribly worried about this because they set everything up along the lines of a plan proposed by Frontline Wireless (a plan that first responders seemed favorably disposed towards), with Frontline's assurances that they would bid past the reserve price and ensure the block was sold. Then Frontline failed to secure the necessary capital to bid for the D-block and had to drop out. Everyone else just looked at the requirement of having to cut some sort of deal with the first responder organizations (who would all be fighting each other for bigger slices of the pie) before exploiting the spectrum and thought, you've got to be kidding me. No fucking way.
Feel free to mark this off-topic, but Pen & Teller are bullshit. For those unaware, Pen & Teller had a several year running program called "Bullshit", where they went out of their way to debunk things they perceived to be bullshit. Now, most of the time, they argued on points I agree with, but it didn't take long for them to discuss two of my sacred cows, evolution and global warming.
Okay, really, it's not that they're sacred cows. It's that both are confirmed and tested under the same system, the scientific method. So, imagine my surprise when on the one hand Pen & Teller would gladly mock those who disagree with the consensus of science, having dared to argue as if there was room for debate; yet, on the other hand, Pen & Teller painted a conspiracy cloaked in the words of science, arguing that there was always room for debate and there never really was a consensus in science (only possibly very strong majorities) nor could go off of such majorities anyways.
Now, I rather subscribe to the latter view, as I don't consider science as intrinsically infallible (if it was, there'd be little point in testing scientific theories) or hold the people of science as some sort of single-minded body (let alone would I trust such a single-minded organization without debate). But, Pen & Teller spent more time issuing ad hominem attacks than bothering to actually prove what was bullshit. Their discussion of 9/11 conspiracists was no different.
So, I really wouldn't rely upon Pen & Teller for political, scientific, etc views. But, if you really want to know magic, they'll put on a great show.
Eurohacker European paranoia, gun rights, and h
Eh, the bush administration changed what was considered to be 'dangerously polluted' seeing how they know better than the scientists. In the 30seconds it took to sign that paper certainly more than 2500ppl were fated to die.
So based on poor or no research, they banked on greed for a product whose marginal utility is low, whose costs are excessive, and then are shocked when real businesses (who have to do this for a living) saw through it and backed away? Another example of how the government is bad at business.
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
If the FCC was using the trusty, as in "trust our machine or we'll drive our lawyers up your yinhang", Sequoia voting machine then there's no wonder the auction was a disaster.
The Russians have won. They have made the world a cesspool of distrust, greed, fear and hate.
In 2001, 42,196 people were killed in motor vehicle accidents in the US. That works out to an average of ~115 per day or ~14 9/11's. Or, in short, more people die in a month *regularly* than were killed on 9/11.
Now, perhaps them all dying on one day does make it a tragedy. But, then, so was the Boston Masacre a tragedy. But, if one is going to obsess about such things, perhaps it'd be better to look at the root cause instead of focusing on the symptoms. I mean, after the Boston Masacre, did Boston hire security agents to monitor British troops? Or did such eventually (well, it took over five years) lead to a revolution (ie, an entirely new way of thinking about the problem) in an attempt to fix the symptom? Until the day in which 9/11 invokes something other than some gut-level short-term fix, it's hard to treat it any different than when local governments decide to put up more prominent stop signs when people keep dying in dangerous intersections--and there isn't a national concern about that.
Eurohacker European paranoia, gun rights, and h
There are already frequency blocks set aside for emergency services in a variety of different ranges.
Emergency Agencies can apply for and receive an assigned frequency for free. The capital costs can be expensive. But the frequency is free to use once we get past that. If our neighbor is using a frequency and we work with them, they can give us permission to use their frequency too. System works pretty well. It could be better, but it works.
Now, the government is going to sell the emergency services spectrum in the 700Mhz range? If emergency agencies want to use 700Mhz, we will be expected to pay a monthly service fee so some private company will make a profit off of emergency services.
I don't care if it will be a nationwide service. My fire department is in Idaho. They don't need to talk to a police department in Georgia ever.
If you want to see an interoperable radio system that works, go talk to the National Interagency Fire Center and look at the comms packages they send out with Type I and II Incident Command Teams. They bring all the radios, repeaters, frequencies with them. Everyone of the incident gets issued a pre-programmed radio and a frequency assignment list so that they know how to get hold of each other.
This 700Mhz plan is worthless. You want to make effective use of the frequency range and not waste local taxes, let us use the frequency for free like the other public service blocks.
All right, who was the idiot moderator that slapped parent with flamebait? It was interesting at least, and insightful at best.
The FCC should pay someone to build D-Block. This is another example of Bush/Cheney incompetence.
I've seen these "spectrum auction" stories before... and I just don't get it. Isn't this like auctioning off the ocean? or the atmosphere? Who claimed original ownership and who's getting these obscene amounts of moneys? If its the US goverment, and this auction is just for regulation, what part of gov't gets the money and what's it going to be spent on?
Seems to me everyone owns the spectrum, and the money should go to everyone.
The Admin and the Engineer
Open up the airwaves back to the damn public.
Allow cheap powerful walkie talkies for the public. The free market will help build public owned towers and we will then have an alternative to government/big business colluding ripoff.
Is there any reason it has to be a network-level mode switch rather than just issuing emergency responders "cell phones" that get a higher priority all the time?
What part of the TAS, or its asinine policies, is about "[hitting] terrorists first"? What part of labelling all terrorists al Quaeda to stir up fear is "an entirely new way of thinking about the problem"? The only thing "new" is the rate at which overly broad and unprepared plans are enacted because they're focused on "[hitting terrorists] hard" without any consideration for either collateral damage or even if the people involved really *are* terrorists.
Now, unless all of the above is malicious attempts by the administration and/or Congress, I'd say the actions that keep being endorsed "because of 9/11" have little to do with thinking and a lot more to do with "something has to be done" where that "something" is never really thought about, since there is rarely a clear "something" to resolve problems like terrorism. Even if bin Laden was killed and al Quaeda was destroyed, what's to prevent another terrorist organization from springing up with similar goals, but in an entirely seperate part of the world? Going about, trying to use the US Army to try to crush every hotbed of "terrorist activity" is not "new" thinking. It's very old, military thinking.
Last I checked, Bill Clinton (for better or worse) didn't go off and try to appease bin Laden. The policy of hunting down bin Laden, dead or alive, came about in '93, after the *first* WTC attack. And it involved the same sort of casual disregard for sovereignty in the name of hunting terrorists that Bush has displayed. A real revolution would be to establish a policy that is neither appeasement nor turning the US into the world police. Whether that translates into fewer terrorist attacks directly is questionable.
The US being the world police is a large part of the reason groups like bin Laden's are even interested in attacking the US. Of course, bin Laden would probably want to attack western countries anyways, as indirectly western values are eroding the foundation of the countries bin Laden has interest in. And there are times when someone needs to defend the more helpless countries from senseless aggression, and the US is often the best/most willing candidate for that position. In short, I know I don't have an answer to the problem. But, I do know that the current "solutions" aren't any sort of revolution in thinking at all.
Eurohacker European paranoia, gun rights, and h