Google Urges National Inventory of Radio Spectrum

Hugh Pickens writes "Google, the wireless industry, and consumer advocates have come together to support a bill that would require the federal government to take a complete inventory of the national airwaves to determine what spectrum is being used, how it is being used and who is using it. The government needs to clean up its sloppy record keeping, they say, or the US risks running out of wireless capacity with the increasing use of the mobile Internet. 'Radio spectrum is a natural resource, something that here in the US is owned by all of us American citizens,' wrote Richard Whitt, Google's counsel for telecom and media. 'Most of us don't give it much thought — and yet use of these airwaves is precisely what makes many of our modern communication systems possible.' The new law, if passed, would require the Federal Communications Commission and the National Telecommunications & Information Administration to report on the use of all spectrum bands between 300 megahertz and 3.5 gigahertz, including information on the licenses or government user operating in each band and whether the spectrum is actually in use. The unusual alliance between Google, public interest groups, and big telecommunications companies may be temporary. The telecom companies want to have the opportunity to buy any extra spectrum at an auction while Google advocates the use of new technologies that would allow the spectrum to be shared by whoever needs it."

Comments

National Parks

[Ozoner]

Great idea...

It's like Big Business saying "National Parks are not in use, so you should sign them all over to us..."

Re:National Parks

[benjamindees]

Anyone can get a permit to cut wood in a National Forest. It is public land, after all. And recently, businesses have been given the same opportunity in order to clear out wood that would otherwise contribute to the frequency and severity of forest fires.

Besides, unlike National Parks, the government isn't saving radio spectrum for future generations. They're just denying access to a common resource.

Re:Spectrum should not be opened for auction

[Anonymous Coward]

That's like saying you should be allowed to determine what light enters your eyes.

At least it's not the HF bands...

[bhtooefr]

But this could screw over amateur radio... a bunch of very desirable spectrum combined with the people actually using it dying off.

Re:At least it's not the HF bands...

[Skuld-Chan]

Disclaimer: I'm a ham radio operator - got my extra class license back when you had to pass a morse code test, and I'm 32.

Anyhow above 300 mhz most bands are technically tertiary use to hams if you do some investigation. Also most are somewhat small - I think 900 mhz being the exception where last I checked there was 28 mhz allocated to hams (going off memory here). There again there is way more bandwidth available the higher you go.

I think the part that is near impossible to determine is "is this bandwidth being used". In certain parts of the country (rural especially) you could listen to a frequency where you know there is a 911 paging service in place (specifically used to dispatch medics, alert doctors etc) and not hear a single thing for days, but that could easily be argued as an essential service.

I think what its aimed at is the military really - who technically has primary rights to all that bandwidth, and one could easily argue they don't use it all.

If google is reading this - please don't touch amateur radio - it is after all where a good amount of the innovators in modern communication come from, and if they can't experiment it will stifle your and our countries ability to innovate.

Who Is This "us"?

[rsmith-mac]

I'm not sure who "us" in "owned by all of us American citizens" is supposed to be. I know I'm a citizen, and my neighbor is one too. But the last time I checked, Google is not a United States citizen. Only people can be citizens. People are people, my dog thinks he's people, and even Soylent Green is people, but Google is not a member of the "people" class.

Perhaps the lawyer meant "owned by all of the American citizens" or "owned by all of you American Citizens". Because if Google's not a citizen, they sure can't own any radio spectrum. Unless Google things they own something that doesn't belong to them...

Re:Who Is This "us"?

[TheRaven64]

You know, Google doesn't actually write things. People employed by Google write things, and a great many of them are US citizens.