I am going to post this rant clearly under the OPINION category, as we here at BMCS strive to maintain strict neutrality with regard to our work and our dealings with customers. I will clearly state at the outset that it is my OPINION that the current head of the US Federal Communications Commission, Julius Genachowski, is either completely ignorant of the industry he is charged with regulating or he is criminally liable for promulgating false information in the service of private parties.
According to this Financial Times article, Genachowski "warned on Wednesday that there is not enough room in the airwaves for the “explosion” in wireless data traffic, setting the stage for a big realignment of spectrum usage as the government tries to help mobile carriers keep up with consumer demand."
“The biggest threat to the future of mobile in America is the looming spectrum crisis,” said Julius Genachowski, the Obama administration appointee who took over as head of the five-member FCC in late June.
Mr Genachowski noted that what had been seen as a big auction of spectrum last year helped cap a three-fold surge in the amount of commercial spectrum available.
“The problem is, many anticipate a 30-fold increase in wireless traffic,” he said at the CTIA wireless industry convention in San Diego.
We have known for years that there is no spectrum shortage except for that which is artificially manufactured by the government's control and licensing of this naturally present "space" through which we can transmit and receive signals locally or over distance. Consider: since the advent of HD programming from regular "Over The Air" local broadcast television stations, these stations haven't yet purchased or licensed any more bandwidth than they had before, but now they are able to offer multiple complete channels, with a picture quality (information density) an order of magnitude than what they were offering before, as well as side-band data streams with additional languages and programming information.
The headroom for wireless trasmissions in the US is massive. To state otherwise is ignorant at best, and at worst is an indication of angling for particular benefits for "concerned" parties. Consider the source of those echoing Mr. Genachowski's comments.
“We’re seeing a disproportionate number of users driving consumption,” Ralph de la Vega, AT&T Mobility president, said at the conference.
“If we don’t find a way to keep them from crowding out others, we’re going to have a very significant issue.”
Mr de la Vega said the top 3 per cent of its smartphone customers were responsible for 40 per cent of data usage, consuming 13 times more than the average smartphone user.
Of course, the top 3% of AT&T smartphone customers are ALL using iPhones. And that doesn't obviate the fact that 40% of AT&T's data usage doesn't include it's VOICE network - and is only related to AT&T's network capacity - which has very little (if anything) to do with the amount of specturm they have licensed - and which is a minute sliver of spectrum available in the Radio Frequency range. It's a straw man argument and completely irrelavent.
I'm not sure what the end game is here, but watch carefully for less competition, more taxes and sur-charges, and a tightening of the networks we use to transmit information and ideas freely among one another.
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