On Wed, 30 Apr 2008, Alric Knebel wrote:
You could have kept control over them like, oh say, the current model
of that very same part of spectrum. You could have allocated them for free
to public safety or some other worthy group. Any number of other
possibilities if they had wanted to go that way. If you look at the
history, the auction was largely a justification for taking the spectrum
away from TV and not staying with a dual system for a few more years.

What do you mean, a dual system? I'm not up on the term you're using, and
since it's so specific, it must be critical to understanding your point.

And what is the current model for controlling that part of the spectrum? I
thought that part of the spectrum was sold off?

Surely it means leaving the old tv system in place while allocating more
of the spectrum for digital tv, and running them in parallel.

The auctioning, once again, is a smoke and mirror for the conspiracists.

The issue is whether to continue using 70 year old technology, or move
ahead. The changeover does require some sacrifices, but as someone
pointed out, they do get things with the switchover. A really
inefficient allocation of the radio spectrum gets to be recycled into
other uses. If you can't make a radical break with the past, you
are stuck in that past.

The same conspiracists continue to spew their theories, complete with
the same misspelling of "government". They can't add anything to
the discussion because someone has already spelled out the party line.

They don't know that tv has been around since the late 1930's, even though
at least some of the participants in this thread have spewed before
and I've mentioned it. TV got an allocation then, and then after the
war got a bigger allocation, most of the prime real estate. Eventually
they had 82 channels, six megaHertz wide, and I've done the math before
on how much that adds up. Yet, the reason for so many channels was
not because there'd be so much content, but because you had to space
the stations out in any given local, and any nearby stations needed
different channels. So in any given location, most of the hoarded
spectrum is unused, certainly unuseable by other radio services.

These conpiracists don't talk about how commercial broadcast stations
hog the AM broadcast band, and then end up serving up a lot of
syndicated programming that we could find anywhere else up and down
the dial. They don't talk about how commercial broadcast stations
hog the FM broadcast band, and then serve up basically the same
music up and downt he dial.

They think the "government" did all this for the revenue from the
auction, yet no word on how the "government" took control of the radio
spectrum almost a hundred years ago, because back then everything was
concentrated into a very small area due to technology restrictions,
and everyone wsa fighting for the same space. But that same "government"
let the commercial broadcasters have massive amounts of space, and it
may be entertaining but is is the most important "public good"?

Like I've said before, cellphones are the thing that has popularized
radio. Far more people today use radio as a communication device, rather
than passively sitting at home watching tv or listening to the radio, than
ever before. The cellphone gives that, and while I don't have one, I
suspect is as valuable to the users as the people spouting off about
the "government taking away their tv sets".

So TV has hoarded a massive slice of the spectrum for fifty years, and
meanwhile all kinds of developments have come along that make use of
radio. Yet, there is tv with the prime real estate. The move to digital
releases some of that spectrum. But once something is in demand, how
do you allocate it, especially when it's just another commercial concern
(no different from all those tv stations, I should point out)? Why not
acution it off, get some revenue rather than merely letting some
commercial concern profit off the "public airwaves".

But of course, they are conspiracists, so the truth doesn't get in the
way.

So once the decision is made to make a radical change, instead of
hemming and hawing like they did over "am stereo" so eventually it
was "everything goes" instead of a standard and nothing much happened,
then the question is, "how do we make the transition without making
too big a wave".

That's where the certificates come from, making sure that everyone
gets the new tv signals so the old can be turned off at a definite
date. No more wishy washy leaving the old in place while hoping
people move to the new. No more building a new standard on the old,
which means the new can't be too different from the old. Throw out
the old and begin again.

There is very little around that wsa in use 70 years ago,

Michael