ARS Technica

Wireless Future and Wired Event in Ars Technica | 'On Eve of Election, Obama Goes Gunning for Geek Votes'

Articles — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 11:44:00 -0500

New America in the News:
As surrogate Reed Hundt stressed at a New America Foundation event last week, he also envisions a more transparent and participatory government that makes more information available online, and provides venues for citizens to provide feedback on pending legislation or regulation. LINK

Wireless Future Program in Ars Technica | ' A Lesson from the White Space War'

Articles — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 10:42:00 -0500

New America in the News:
The white space battle has made progress in part because of the advocacy of groups like Free Press, Public Knowledge, the New America Foundation, and the Media Access Project. LINK

Michael Calabrese in Ars Technica | 'Larry Page Blasts White Space FUD on Capitol Hill'

Communications — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 09:49:00 -0400

New America in the News:
Among the panel speakers was New America Foundation scholar Michael Calabrese, who addressed an otherwise neglected argument offered against white spaces by broadcasters: The claim that auctioning white spaces for licensed use could provide a financial windfall to a cash-strapped government. Drawing on a freshly-released NAF working paper, Calabrese argued that industry estimates of some $10 billion in revenues from a white space auction were based on a flawed comparison between the "Swiss cheese" of white space bands and bands in the 700 MHz range, which are suitable for high power applications only because they are buffered by vacant "guard bands." LINK

Wireless Future Program in Ars Technica | 'White Spaces, Angry Faces: Inside the Battle Over 'Interference''

Communications — Tue, 23 Sep 2008 04:42:00 -0400

New America in the News:

Take the question of spectral availability. While this might seem one of the easiest to settle-is more than half of US TV spectrum lying fallow or is it not?—the answer isn't obvious. The New America Foundation, a think tank that supports white space devices, claims that 25 to 80 percent of TV bandwidth is unused, depending on where you look. When the group hosted Google co-founder Larry Page at a DC event a few months back, Page also spoke of all that prime spectral real estate that was being "wasted..."

And Sascha Meinrath of the New America Foundation calls the entire spectrum availability issue "absolutely ridiculous." The spectrum is only booked up, he notes, if the FCC rules out sticking a white space device on an empty channel adjacent to a TV channel. In fact, so concerned is the broadcasting industry about interference that it has asked for a "third adjacent" rule on white space devices, should they be allowed; a device would need two empty channels on either side of its transmission channel before it could broadcast (for a total of five empty channels).

The issue is tremendously important. If white space devices truly need to find three (next adjacent) or five (third adjacent) available channels before transmitting, their usefulness would be curtailed dramatically. LINK

Ars Technica Reports on J.H. Snider's Spectrum Working Paper

Communications — Thu, 19 Jul 2007 09:42:00 -0400

New America in the News:

Critics of US spectrum policy will have plenty of ammunition for their howitzers after reading the new working paper (PDF) from J.H. Snider of the New America Foundation. Snider heads up the Wireless Future Program at New America, and his paper offers an inside look at the sometimes-dirty world of spectrum lobbying, which Snider characterizes as responsible for a $480 billion giveaway from the public treasury.

The giveaway in question comes after Congress passed legislation in 1993 requiring the FCC to hold auctions for future spectrum licenses, a move that was itself prompted by a massive giveaway of prime spectrum in the late 1980s. Using the high end of his estimate (which ranges from $140 to $480 billion), Snider observes that the giveaway in question amounted to "more than 90 percent of the value of spectrum usage rights [the government] has assigned from 1993 through the present."

The giveaway that Snider's talking about isn't a massive grant of free spectrum to corporate interests; instead, it's something much more subtle and far more difficult for the public to understand. To understand why Snider considers this a "giveaway," let's first look at the difference between the amount of money the government has actually received for licenses since 1993 and the amount of money that such licenses are worth...

For the complete article, please visit the Ars Technica website.

For more information on the working paper event, please click here.