The Economic/Legal Reply Comments filed by NAF, et al. are below. NAF, et al. also filed a separate set of Technical Reply Comments, which you can find here.

BEFORE THE
FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION

In the Matter of Unlicensed Operation
in the TV Broadcast Bands, ET Docket No. 04-186

Additional Spectrum for Unlicensed Devices
Below 900 MHZ and in the 3 GHz Band, ET Docket No. 02-380

ECONOMIC/LEGAL REPLY COMMENTS OF
NEW AMERICA FOUNDATION,
COMMON CAUSE, EDUCAUSE, PUBLIC KNOWLEDGE,
U.S. PIRG, CENTER FOR DIGITAL DEMOCRACY,
NATIONAL HISPANIC MEDIA COALITION,
WIRELESS INTERNET SERVICE PROVEDERS ASSOCIATION,
ASSOCIATION FOR COMMUNITY NETWORKING, CTCNET,
CUWIN FOUNDATION, ETHOS GROUP, NYC WIRELESS,
TRIBAL DIGITAL VILLAGE, NEWBURYOPEN.NET,
ACORN ACTIVE MEDIA, FREENETWORKS.ORG

NAF, et al. filed extensive comments in this proceeding on January 31, including separate Technical Comments that appended the results of two engineering studies demonstrating that harmful interference to television reception can certainly be avoided. In these Reply Comments to the FCC’s FNPRM, NAF, et al. focuses on two topics: 1) the incumbents’ pleadings for additional free spectrum rights, which in each case would entail enormous opportunity costs with respect to spectrum efficiency and unlicensed innovation; and 2) arguments claiming superiority of licensed over unlicensed allocation of the TV white spaces, which are based in each case on false or contradictory assumptions. These Reply Comments are supplemented by a separate set of Technical Reply Comments, drafted by leading RF engineers and filed concurrently with this filing. We also incorporate and endorse those comments by reference.

I. SPECIAL PLEADINGS BY INCUMBENT LICENSEES WOULD, CUMULATIVELY, DESTROY THE VALUE OF THE TV BAND FOR BROADBAND AND WIRELESS INNOVATION

The comments to this FNPRM represent a diverse array of incumbent interests and an even greater variety of arguments supporting those interests. Earlier comments have focused on the incumbent interests of the high power TV broadcasters, public safety, and wireless microphone licensees to the broadcast spectrum. This set of comments brought out the medical telemetry, cable operators, LPTV, and TV translator incumbents in greater force. Some of the comments are transparent efforts to leverage the proceeding to grab additional spectrum rights; others are blatant attempts to stifle competition to their licensed offerings; while still others are desperate bids to protect an inefficient and eroding status quo despite the enormous social and economic opportunity costs of continuing to warehouse TV band spectrum rather than redeploy it to facilitate wireless broadband and other innovation.

One approach to responding to all the incumbents’ arguments is to deal with each one individually. Many of the most consequential assertions of the spectrum incumbents are addressed in NAF, et al.’s separate Technical Reply Comments. Yet even if NAF, et al. had the resources to file hundreds of pages of rebuttal backed by millions of dollars worth of experimental data, it wouldn’t be possible to respond to all the hypothetical arguments the incumbents have raised. But that is surely the point of many of the arguments. Rarely do the incumbents come close to proving their arguments. But they are banking on the fact that they don’t need to; that the burden of proof will be on non-incumbents who seek to use the white space. So all they have to do is sow doubt – and convince the FCC to prohibit unlicensed access to so many unused TV band channels that the potential market for wireless broadband and other new services will be deterred.

NAF, et al., is not going to respond to all those arguments. This is the sixth time NAF, et al. has filed comments on the use of the TV white spaces. Our previous comments, which did attempt to do so, run to more than 400 pages. Instead, NAF, et al. will focus on the heart of the matter.

The unstated assumption underlying the incumbents’ arguments is that the long-term interests of the many should be sacrificed for the short-term interests of the few. They are saying, in essence, that to potentially protect the spectrum uses of a small fraction of the public, for a small fraction of the time, they are willing to sacrifice spectrum uses that could benefit the vast majority of the public in an abundance of different ways, including to facilitate broadband deployment, affordability, and ubiquity at a time when our nation has fallen to 16th in the world in broadband adoption (and with prices ten times higher, per Mbps, than other advanced economies). With rare exception, the spectrum incumbents have been completely unwilling to explicitly deal with this objection, implicitly asserting that if even a single potential user of their service would be inconvenienced, they have the right to absolute protection. Their arguments, therefore, are completely at odds with the FCC’s mission to manage the public airwaves in the public interest, which, in economic terms, means to maximize social welfare, as well as to facilitate robust and diverse communication based on First Amendment principles.

To view the full comments, please see the PDF document linked below.