Both Sides Make Last Pitches on White Spaces Order
Google CEO Eric Schmidt sent FCC Chairman Kevin Martin a letter asking that the FCC not delay a Nov. 4 vote opening the TV white spaces to unlicensed portable devices. Meanwhile, 28 members of Congress, including five from Martin’s home state of North Carolina, urged delay. Lobbying was intense from both sides Tuesday, with the FCC set to release a Sunshine Notice cutting off further lobbying. The notice hadn’t been released at our deadline, but FCC sources said they expected Martin to schedule a vote as planned.
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Schmidt told Martin the stakes are huge. “Just as Wi-Fi sparked a revolution in the way we connect to the Web, freeing white spaces for unlicensed mobile use will help unleash an entirely new wave of technological innovation, creating jobs, and boosting our economy,” he said. Schmidt urged the FCC to ignore a broadcaster petition asking the agency to seek public comment on a Office of Engineering and Technology report on white spaces interference issues before it votes. “Groups that have long opposed opening up the white spaces are now employing stalling tactics to derail the technology -- before the FCC can write rules for this spectrum,” he said. “I urge you and your fellow Commissioners to ignore these baseless entreaties.”
The Technology CEO Council also urged the FCC to proceed as planned. “Authorizing unlicensed use of the TV White Spaces spectrum will boost America’s high technology sector and stimulate the investment, entrepreneurship and innovation needed to accelerate deployment of broadband,” the group said in a statement. “For the technology CEOs in our group, this is critical national infrastructure and a foundation for innovation and entrepreneurship,” Bruce Mehlman, executive director of the council, said in an interview. “The FCC has spent more than four years, thought everything through exhaustively, and no reasons for delay remain.”
Wally Bowen, executive director of the Mountain Area Information Network in Asheville, N.C., said in a letter to the FCC the white spaces spectrum is the “Holy Grail” for those working to “solve the rural broadband and low- income/urban Digital Divides” and create a third broadband pipe to rural America. Bowen told us Tuesday he’s concerned that the interests of small groups are being ignored as the media focuses on the “clash of the titans” pitting broadcasters against high-tech giants. “My nonprofit has been serving the rural mountains of western North Carolina since 1996,” he said. “I can say, unequivocally, that unlicensed use of the white spaces is the only rural broadband solution on the horizon, especially in a rugged mountainous region like ours, where fiber can only be used for middle mile backbone networks, not last mile to home or business.”
An attorney who has been active in the proceeding on behalf of high-tech companies said he sees no signs that the efforts to delay the order are bearing fruit. “From what I hear… it’s going to go on Sunshine tonight and none of the commissioners has asked Martin to delay it,” the official said.
But broadcasters and their allies, if they're losing, aren’t going down without a fight. NAB and the Association for Maximum Service TV said in a filing at the FCC that nothing in the OET report on white spaces interference provides proof that devices that rely on sensing alone can safely be used without causing interference to TV broadcasts. “There is no basis for concluding that devices that rely on spectrum sensing only, without geolocation, are feasible,” the groups said. “In accordance with applicable law and sound public policy, broadcasters, other interested parties, and most of all the public should be allowed adequate time to review and comment on the OET Report before the Commission adopts rules based on that report.”
NAB circulated a letter signed by 28 lawmakers from both parties, which also asked the FCC to seek comment on the OET report. “Broadcasters and numerous other groups, including sports leagues, Broadway theater groups, cable operators and networks, wireless microphone manufacturers, religious groups and 70 lawmakers, continue to express concern over the proposed ‘white space’ devices,” said NAB spokesman Dennis Wharton.
The American Federation of TV and Radio Artists (AFTRA) asked the FCC to delay a vote, saying the risk of white spaces devices operating in the TV band range from “sudden disruption of sound during a concert to preventing broadcast journalists from reporting emergency information to the public during a disaster.” The National Association of Music Merchants, the International Music Products Association, the American Federation of Musicians, AFTRA, the Country Music Association, the Grand Ole Opry, and the Recording Artists Coalition said the white spaces order could “lead to a significant disruption of live music across the country.” The National Grange also asked the FCC to delay a vote on the order.