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FCC Official Asks Agency To Investigate Ban On Journalists' Wi-Fi Personal Hotspots At Debate (arstechnica.com)
Yesterday, it was reported that journalists attending the presidential debate at Hofstra University were banned from using personal hotspots and were told they had to pay $200 to access the event's Wi-Fi. The journalists were reportedly offered the option to either turn off their personal hotspots or leave the debate. Cyrus Farivar via Ars Technica is now reporting that "one of the members of the Federal Communications Commission, Jessica Rosenworcel, has asked the agency to investigate the Monday evening ban." Ars Technica reports: Earlier, Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel tweeted, saying that something was "not right" with what Hofstra did. She cited an August 2015 order from the FCC, forcing a company called SmartCity to no longer engage in Wi-Fi blocking and to pay $750,000. Ars has since updated their report with a statement from Karla Schuster, a spokeswoman for Hofstra University: The Commission on Presidential Debates sets the criteria for services and requires that a completely separate network from the University's network be built to support the media and journalists. This is necessary due to the volume of Wi-Fi activity and the need to avoid interference. The Rate Card fee of $200 for Wi-Fi access is to help defray the costs and the charge for the service does not cover the cost of the buildout. For Wi-Fi to perform optimally the system must be tuned with each access point and antenna. When other Wi-Fi access points are placed within the environment the result is poorer service for all. To avoid unauthorized access points that could interfere, anyone who has a device that emits RF frequency must register the device. Whenever a RF-emitting device was located, the technician notified the individual to visit the RF desk located in the Hall. The CPD RF engineer would determine if the device could broadcast without interference.
you underestimate the free or low cost tenant agreements mobile providers are given by the universities. on my little podunk state-funded school, we had 8 base stations per building to ensure sufficient coverage. they would provide additional mobile base stations for larger activities such as graduation. you know the one commonality all these devices shared? a fiber connection back to a switch in a room they controlled and an rj45 that came out which we gladly provided free bandwidth on our (then) internet2 backhaul. 2 hops and they were directly on the federal and education funded backbone (of the time).
this was over 10 years ago. i'm pretty sure they (the mobile carriers) can handle the large^H^H^H^H^H relatively small gathering of people using data.
-dk
There is not a limitless amount of bandwidth to broadcast in a small area. Most of these devices are operating in the same spectrum (since they are WiFi, UHF and SHF). The FCC almost certainly has the exclusive legal right to regulate the radio spectrum, but the organizer of an event should be given some way to coordinate and organize access to the limited resource. That the FCC lacks any way for an event to legally do something that I believe they should be doing. I argue that the FCC needs a form and a fee for this sort of thing before organizers are allowed to restrict WiFi access. And that requests are temporary and limited to santioned events and not for a coffee shop or theme park that wants to gouge customers.
Of course I'm ignoring the issue of free speech. Does your right to free speech include running your own WiFi network to circumvent a potentially malicious organization's WiFi?
$200 per head seems about right on price, if I had to hire some consultants to throw together a network for 3 days, then tear it all down, seems like a bargain.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
Unfortunately, putting any kind of restriction on a part-15 device is exactly "sub-licensing", which you're not allowed to do.
That it was private property is... going to be an interesting argument :)