Open Spectrum: Latest Publications

There is general agreement that traditional mechanisms for managing radio frequency (RF) spectrum are inefficient and in need of significant reform. Many, if not most, of the economists who have considered the issue appear to concur with the view that increased reliance on market forces would enhance efficiency, and support assigning spectrum via transferable, flexible licenses, especially when spectrum is perceived to be scarce. The FCC’s Spectrum Policy Task Force (SPTF) has endorsed this perspective, advocating only limited use of… more

There is a general consensus that accelerating the digital TV transition -- thereby freeing up the 108 MHz of “beachfront” spectrum corresponding to TV channels 52- to-69 -- is clearly in the public interest. Because transmissions at this frequency range pass easily through walls and trees, the 700 MHz band could jumpstart the deployment of more affordable wireless broadband connections, particularly in rural areas. Although Congress has already reallocated a portion of these TV channels for public safety agencies (to… more

For the complete document, please see the attached PDF version below.

Thanks to the computer revolution, radios are evolving from being dumb to smart devices, which allows wireless networking and communication based on dynamic sharing of frequency bands. This radio revolution calls for radically different government regulation of public access to the radio spectrum, popularly known as the "public airwaves." Increasingly, access to spectrum should be regulated based on free speech ("unlicensed") rather than exclusive speech ("licensed") regulatory principles.

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In recent years, the license-exempt bands have been the font of astounding economic growth in the telecom sector and expanded opportunities for broadband Internet access for hundreds of thousands of Americans. In 2003 alone, an estimated 22.7 million wireless access points and networking cards using unlicensed spectrum were shipped, generating over $2.5 billion in revenues. The wide-scale adoption of WiFi technology (short for “Wireless Fidelity,” but referring to the 802.11 engineering standard for wireless local area networking) largely explains… more