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We Could Have Had Cellphones Four Decades Earlier (reason.com)
_Sharp'r_ writes: Professor Thomas Hazlett of Clemson University analyzed the history of wireless spectrum and concluded the technology was known and available for cellphones in the 40s, but there was no spectrum available. Based on assumptions cellphones would always be luxury goods without mass appeal, significant spectrum for divisible cellular networks wasn't legally usable until the early 80s. Instead, the unused spectrum was reserved for the future expansion of broadcast TV to channels 70-83. Here's an excerpt from the report: "When AT&T wanted to start developing cellular in 1947, the FCC rejected the idea, believing that spectrum could be best used by other services that were not 'in the nature of convenience or luxury.' This view -- that this would be a niche service for a tiny user base -- persisted well into the 1980s. 'Land mobile,' the generic category that covered cellular, was far down on the FCC's list of priorities. In 1949, it was assigned just 4.7 percent of the spectrum in the relevant range. Broadcast TV was allotted 59.2 percent, and government uses got one-quarter."
IMTS isn't the same as MTS. Also, the reason why MTS was so expensive and rare is because in the 1940s the technology simply wasn't there to run such a system without hugely expensive equipment weighing 80 pounds. Reason's argument that it's the Government's fault for not allocating the spectrum just doesn't fly; the UHF frequencies they're talking about are, if anything, harder to operate on than the VHF frequencies used by MTS. Similarly, the technology to do handoff between cells and automatic frequency selection and dialling didn't exist yet either. Both MTS and IMTS were actually right at the bleeding edge of what was possible when they were introduced - bear in mind that IMTS predated the availability of ICs and MTS that of transistors, while cellular handsets were complex enough to need microprocessors.
It's important to remember that Reason magazine has an ideological opposition to government regulation and indeed government in general that drives a lot of their reporting.