Deborah D. McAdams / 10.19.2012 04:04PM
McAdams On: Channel 37
... before the storm
WAITING, 4 IT: The
spectrum incentive auction notice hit the broadcast industry like a nap in
church. R. Scott Flick of Pillsbury noticed the silence. Flick, a D.C.-based
media and telecom attorney said it wasn’t because there were no surprises in
the notice, but because it crystalized “the sheer enormity of the task ahead.”
“Ahead” being June of 2014—when the Federal Communications Commission aims to
auction off voluntarily relinquished TV spectrum. Flick figured the commission would
have to “resolve a paragraph’s worth of issues each and every day” that it does
business after reply comments are due Feb. 19, 2013, to get rules in place by October of 2014. But Flick is like the
rest of us who must adhere to the natural laws of physics. Most of us cannot
make a year or more out of 180
days.
Fortunately for the FCC, it can bend time, because, as Flick notes, the
incentive auction notice is a doozy. It covers—in some detail—the auction,
who’s eligible; what to do with low-power TV stations, broadcast auxiliary
operations, wireless microphones, white spaces, Canada, Mexico, pesky TV
stations that stay on the air, extraterrestrial communications and annoying
people visiting emergency rooms with heart attack symptoms. Any one of these
things alone typically would be addressed in a separate ruling, possibly to
flounder indefinitely, but the FCC has to pry the spectrum away from
broadcasters before the public discovers that its “public” airwaves are being
completely privateered by the progeny of Ma Bell.
Among the proposals in the Oct. 2 Notice of Proposed Rulemaking is one to boot
radio astronomers and wireless medical telemetry devices off of Channel 37. It’s
hard to say if this is a feint to simulate a consistent approach, or if the
wireless corsairs are really that greedy. After all, it would look kind of bad
to kick everyone (broadcasters) out of Chs. 31-51 “except for you guys (not
broadcasters).” Perhaps that’s even too anti-broadcasting for the current
commission! (Joke.)
Whether or not the commission is trying to seem fair or the wireless cabal is at
work, they may be poking a beehive on Ch. 37. So far, only five comments have
been filed on the Oct. 2 NPRM’s 1,000 or so questions. Twenty percent of the
five is from Nickolaus Leggett of Reston, Va. Mr. Leggett, a spectrum watchdog
and ham radio operator among other things, told the FCC leave Ch. 37 alone. He
noted that the NPRM said there are “relatively few radio astronomy operations,
all at specified locations.”
“This is not correct,” he said. “In reality, there are just a few professional
radio astronomy operations. However, there are many more amateur radio
astronomy operations within the United States… These amateur scientists are not
accounted for at all in the commission’s proposed regulations for radio
astronomy in Ch. 37.”
The key word here is “amateur,” which in radio frequency context means guys who
make radar systems out of garage door openers and kitchen appliances. They
don’t all wear Shuron eyeglasses, so
you can’t really tell who or how many until you mess with their spectrum. There
once was a concept called “broadband over power lines,” for example, that would
have endowed household electrical outlets with high-speed Internet
connectivity. BPL is dead as a doornail because the amateur radio frequency
contingent hammered it into oblivion. The BPL death squad comprised amateur
radio operators, many of whom are also the “amateur scientists” of which Mr.
Leggett writes.
The TV spectrum incentive auctions aren’t likely to be derailed by the proposal
to clear Ch. 37, but in no way will it help to get the process completed by
June of 2014 or perhaps within the solar cycle. The commission best enjoy the
silence while it lasts.