Policy Tracker

Dr. Snider is research director for the New America Foundation’s Wireless Future Program and he says he has good reason to believe that his paper, titled "Spectrum Policy Wonderland: A Critique of Conventional Property Rights and Commons Theory in a World of Low Power Wireless Devices," could change the terms of the current debate. (A summary of the paper appears on the next page).

In recent years that debate has centred on three models: command-and-control, property rights and commons. It is… more

The US Federal Communication Commission’s (FCC) Advanced Wireless Service (AWS) auction closed this month with T-Mobile topping the bids at around $4.2 million but revenues generated may have been dampened by national security concerns...

Says J.H. Snider, Research Director of the New America Foundation’s Wireless Future Program: ‘Despite all the hoopla over the high revenue it is actually pretty low, less than $1 on a per MHz population basis. That is less than a quarter of its peak in the mid-1990s… more

Critics are skeptical of the proposals arguing that the fact that the ">projected schedule released on September 11, came just a day ahead of FCC Chairman Kevin Martin’s confirmation hearing before Congress is cause for concern. ‘On the one hand we believe that this is largely a manoeuvre to defang Congress and shift the battle back to the FCC where the TV "white space" initiative can be further delayed and ultimately even killed,’ says J.H. Snider, Research Director of the… more