Broadcasters-having invested hundreds of millions of dollars transitioning to digital technology and now bracing for a government ruling on whether to allow Wi-Fi service in unoccupied television guardbands known as white spaces-turned up the volume of its opposition by launching an inside-the-Beltway advertising blitz that the high-tech sector criticized as a scare tactic.
“Interference is not acceptable to our viewers. While our friends at Intel [Corp.], Google [Inc.] and Microsoft [Corp.] may find system errors, computer glitches and dropped calls tolerable, broadcasters do not,” said Alan Frank, television board chairman of the National Association of Broadcasters and president of Post-Newsweek. “Consumers know that computers unexpectedly shut down. TVs don’t. TVs work and people expect them to work.”
Broadcast support
NAB, joined by the Association of Maximum Service Television, TV manufacturers and pro sports leagues, have arranged for advocacy ads to run on Washington, D.C., television stations and political journals in the nation’s capital.
The FCC, with added prodding by Sens. John Sununu (R-N.H.) and John Kerry (D-Mass.) to cease regulatory delays, said it will rule on white spaces by October. Most indications are that, if approved, Wi-Fi would be permitted in TV white spaces on an unlicensed basis.
Prototype device failed
Federal Communications Commission engineers last month said a signal-sensing Wi-Fi prototype supplied by Microsoft failed to avoid causing interference to TV channels, an outcome high-tech giants attributed to the device being broken. They pointed out the Philips Electronics Wi-Fi prototype passed muster in FCC testing. Google, Dell Inc., Hewlett-Packard Co. and Intel also provided the FCC gear for evaluation, hoping to prove smart Wi-Fi products can exploit broadcast spectrum without disrupting TV signals or wireless microphones.
Bickering behemoths
In recent weeks, broadcasters and high-tech companies have ratcheted up the already-heated rhetoric on the white-spaces debate.
Broadcasters chided whitespaces advocates for allegedly suggesting the TV sector opposes deployment of rural broadband services. “It is disingenuous for companies like Microsoft and Intel to insinuate that broadcasters oppose new technology,” NAB President David Rehr told reporters. “Broadcasters support rural broadband through a fixed service. The issue is whether these not-yet-invented devices should be deployed at the expense of broadcast television. We think such a move would be wrongheaded.”
High-tech representatives and a major think tank rebuked the broadcast industry’s lobbying tactics.
“Rather than give FCC engineers and Chairman [Kevin] Martin credit for their good work, the NAB and MSTV are using a high-dollar media scare campaign to attack and discredit technological innovation that could help bring broadband to all Americans,” said Brian Peters, director of government relations at the Information Technology Industry Council. “The NAB should spend money to educate consumers about the DTV transition, not confusing them with fabrications designed to scare consumers and score lobbying points.”
Peters added: “In cities and communities across the country, there is a substantial amount of unused spectrum in the television bands. Access to the TV white spaces can facilitate more affordable and ubiquitous broadband deployment for all Americans, particularly in rural areas. The white spaces also represent a tremendous opportunity for public-safety services.”
Universal broadband play
Implicit in Peters’ statement is President Bush’s goal of achieving universal, affordable broadband access in 2007, an unfulfilled objective compounded by the United States’ mediocre global ranking in high-speed Internet access penetration, and ongoing administration efforts to improve public-safety communications six years after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
“What’s at stake here is simple: the promise of greater broadband access for millions of Americans including those in underserved rural areas. The FCC’s analysis has confirmed that this spectrum can be used for broadband Internet without interfering with Americans’ TV signals,” said Scott Blake Harris, counsel to the White Spaces Coalition. “Utilizing this spectrum is an important step toward achieving the ultimate goal of delivering the significant benefits of broadband access to more Americans.”
Indeed, white-spaces backers insist the engineering debate is over. “NAB scare tactics cannot change the engineering facts. There is no longer any doubt about the technical feasibility of mobile, low-power devices to detect and avoid channels occupied by licensed TV stations or wireless microphone systems,” said Michael Calabrese, director of the New America Foundation’s Wireless Future Program. “The remaining challenge for the FCC is to define explicit operating rules to govern device certification, so that America’s high-tech industries can embark on the research and development necessary to bring compliant consumer devices to market.”
Retail marketing of whitespaces wireless devices is not expected until early 2009, when broadcasters surrender spectrum under a congressional deadline tied to the digital TV transition process.
