RSSFCC Chairman: Spectrum deficit could set wireless data back 50 years
By Tim Conneally | Published October 8, 2009, 1:40 PM
"We are fast entering a world where mass-market mobile devices consume thousands of megabytes each month," FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski warned at CTIA Wireless yesterday. "So we must ask: what happens when every mobile user has an iPhone, a Palm Pre, a BlackBerry Tour, or whatever the next device is? What happens when we quadruple the number of subscribers with mobile broadband on their laptops or netbooks?
"The short answer: We will need a lot more spectrum."
Given the current allotment of spectrum, Genachowski's statement sounds like Roy Scheider in Jaws.
But his portents were even more severe.
"I believe that that the biggest threat to the future of mobile in America is the looming spectrum crisis," Genachowski also said.
It's not often that the FCC uses a term like "crisis," especially when the issue is one as ostensibly benign as a bottleneck in the flow of data. But Genachowski is not warning of a crisis where economies crumble and families are forced to move into bomb shelters. This is a crisis of design, where more people are consuming far more bandwidth than originally anticipated.
Let's put this "crisis" into perspective: Genachowski said that there will be a 30-fold increase in wireless traffic, which will demand new wireless technologies be put in place by 2013.
The DTV transition freed the 700 MHz block and increased the available wireless spectrum by a multiple of three, Genachowski estimated. But that took more than five years to complete.
At that rate, it would take 50 years to accommodate our wireless data growth.
So fixing the "spectrum gap" is one of the FCC's highest priorities, Genachowski said. Looking at the wireless spectrum chart, anyone can see that sorting out licenses will be like sequencing the human genome, but the Commission has no choice: It must identify spectrum that's being underutilized, and re-allocate it to mobile broadband.
I predict this to be a non-issue due to the following happening:
Businesses will have an incentive to provide Wi-Fi service to anyone around them. Those businesses will get a few pennies per GB xfered through them BY THE CELL NETWORKS, the cost of which will be LESS than the cost of allowing that transfer over the cell networks. Clearly a win-win situation.
Everything will be encrypted and secured, obviously, with you getting access through VPN/dialer directly to your main data provider (smartphone/cell provider) without going thru their cell antennas.
Likewise, every public pay phone, post office, and other govn't institute will be mandated to provide the above services, so you'll always KNOW where you can get super fast, reliable WiFi.
Another thing that'll happen is hop-stations and chain-providers. In other words an individual could provide pass-thru data to customers around him without ever going through the cell antenna. The first person is connected through Wifi to a pay phone, and he becomes the cell provider to someone around them (further away from the pay phone), who becomes a pass-thru for someone further away etc. Will def kill your battery life, but will also gain you xfer "points" - so you'll have an incentive to "join the effort" for at least a few mins a day... You can also just carry around multiple batteries, charger, or install a stationary mobile in your vehicle that'll service people whenever you are parked next to a WiFi provider...
At any rate, 5GB for $60 is way too much. That's the price Verizon charges for EVDO. So even if their cost is, say $40 per month, that's still insanely high per GB charge that prevents really doing fun things like streaming audio/video, high quality VoIP/videoconference, etc. Govn't MANDATED and ECONOMICALLY-STIMULATED wifi will save us.
Or perhaps we can just learn from the Japanese... ;)
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|That may never be an issue.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2012_in_fiction
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|Don't forget the movie coming out. The first preview I saw was just scenes of the family fleeing (inches in front of the oncoming) destruction...
Sounds like a horrible movie, but I may have to go see it just for the "Mass amounts of destruction" fun-factor.
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|Let us not forget that a shortage of spectrum can be compensated by adding more cells. I am sure that someone has done a cost tradeoff analysis. Remember that spectrum is a resource that is fixed. There is not more spectrum to be discovered.
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|This is not necessarily true. You have to have open frequencies available to add more cells, and in densely populated areas, it is highly likely that all available frequencies are already being used, which will prohibit adding more cells. Now, you can narrow the bandwidth of existing cells (that you control at least), but by limiting the bandwidth of each cell, you'll be limiting the amount of data on a cell, you limit the amount of data you can process through it, which brings you right back to the same problem.
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|Mr. Julius Chairman of the FCC
Dear Chairman Julius Genachowski,
You said at a speech to the industry trade group CTIA-The Wireless Association in California; "I believe that the biggest threat to the future of mobile in America is the looming spectrum crisis”.
Then the next threat to mobile America has to be the loss of the "Copper Wire World" that is almost gone the (Information Gateway) Payphone. This hardwired network, bought and paid for by American Customers “the physical bandwidth” that should be maintained is going to be critical during the next catastrophic event. Mobile America is hard-pressed to find a payphone. FCC please finish the promises made to allow payphones to flourish. The work and deals you started, the New Services Test for the phone incumbents ordered by congress got twisted. It assisted the incumbent phone companies in receiving more funds with Dial Around income then delayed lower rates to competitors with the New Services Test mess. The inflated cost of the “Copper wire world” is supported by the fact that 50 cents can not support a payphone and thus communication for the "MOBILE" during an outage. China still has hers, Japan & Europe. Chairman Julius Genachowski blow life into the “rock” bottom basement side of mobile America, blow life into the payphone "a public information gateway". AT&T mobility and consumer markets Chief Ralph de la Vega says, "Customers will assess value, and they will pick winners and losers." Conversely to his words the payphone operator of (a short time ago) & YOU know about the anti-competitiveness that AT&T perpetuates in many industries aided with the help of our legislators corrected with the ACT, and miss-applied with a New Services Test/ Dial Around deal never honored. Give a payphone competitor back his money.
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|YEA that's real helpful blame it all on bush with dumb asses like u around we are all doomed
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|What happens when that spectrum become saturated with energy. Do we have periodic voltage wave fronts that start frying things? When radio waves collide do they create energy or heat pockets?
X-Files scenario: Soft internal tissue starts getting cooked. With the saturation of the spectrum people start having seizures. Follow the money.
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|Digital Radio (AM/FM, CB, HAM..etc).
We've learned a lot from the DTV transition. Put that to use and force a Digital Radio transition (already underway, by market demand, for a large part via "HD Radio").
Tim, throw up a map of the existing spectrum layout if you get time.
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|Everything in the Obama administration is a "crisis"!
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|That's because Bush/Cheney and the neo-conservatives left the country in such a mess that "everything" is in a crisis.
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|I guess Bush Cheney didn't put us far enough in debt. Obama is fixing that in spades. Look to Barney Frank, Maxine Waters and the rest of the group who said FNMA and FHLMC were the best run organizations in the world, when Bush Cheney was warning of impending disaster. Need to check your facts, goofball.
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|That's what I was going to say.
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