ksw_92
join:2001-05-13
La Verne, CA
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| reply to rstrandb
Re: Another revenue source
This band has always been the red-haired stepchild of the licensed spectrum group...lots of failed commercial ventures (Tele-TV?), lots of scammers and charlatans promising naive educators the world and leaving them with the poopy end of the stick.
ITFS folks beat back the cell phone carriers with their 3G spectrum grab back in 99-2000 when Europe was kooky with that big flop of an idea. This ruling beats down Intel this time around (read the comments filed). The push was for WiMAX or similar wireless MAN systems (cha-ching! for Intel, they thought), fully owned by commercial interests (cha-ching! for Sprint -- they filed comments too). Intel really tripped on its own crank this time and even apologised to several members of Congress after the ruling for their over-the-top lobbying efforts.
The eligibility ruling is just a small step towards the re-purposing of the band though. There are still a lot of technical issues to be resolved. Lots of ITFS users are still xmitting 6MHz NTSC; this has to be morphed into a digital system so that the band can be segmented into one-way (i.e. broadcast video) and two-way systems (i.e. WiMAX). The FCC has also warned license holders that they're going to be watching the utilization of the band very closely now. No more squatting on that channel group Mr. Podunk Unified School District!
The next few years should prove interesting. The key will be getting the commercial interests and the educational license holders to work intelligently together...
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