Key move
Here's a letter from Google that you should read. It's significant, for at least three reasons:
1. This is the moment when the internet mindset finally engages with the telecom mindset in a concrete way. Google's point is that highspeed internet access is just that - access. Google wants the pipes to be commoditized, to be as open as possible so that, like the internet itself, this transport can make possible all kinds of innovation, economic growth, and creativity. The pipes, the sidewalks, shouldn't be controlling or monetizing the conversations that we have as we walk along.
2. Google is not doing this out of sheer goodwill towards humanity. Google has in mind that this spectrum could be used to create a realtime auction for internet access - with Google running the auction. You, the user, wouldn't see the auction going on. Your retail provider of access would be going through a central Google-clearinghouse that would serve as a spot, instant market. This will use spectrum much more efficiently, yes, but it also puts Google right in the center. If Google's plan works, this will be the moment when the inefficient market for access, like the inefficient market for advertising and search, will be leveraged by Google.
3. Google is willing to say it would pay the minimum, reserved price of $4.6 billion for twelve large regional licenses that (packaged together) would create a national license. This means that Google is actually willing to put its money behind its telecommunications policy goals. This changes the landscape significantly.
The story in a nutshell: the FCC is about to create rules for an auction of former-TV spectrum. Chairman Martin has created a compromise that would provide for devices to work across networks and for applications not to be blocked. But that's less than half the openness we need - it doesn't require that access be on a wholesale basis. Wholesale access would create platform-competition in the wireless broadband market, which right now is dominated by Verizon and AT&T and their closed-world approach. (Not that this 22 MHz block would necessarily be enough for highspeed access - but it would be a big step, and could be leveraged by smart radios and other clever devices that would be able to use “whitespaces” for even faster speed.) So Google is saying it's willing to pay the minimum price, if and only if the “open access” conditions tied to this license are real.
Thursday links
Very nice article by J.H. Snider about the Art of Spectrum Lobbying — it turns out that the real game isn't really the license conditions, it's modifying the license conditions after you have the license (which is very hard to follow from the outside). Someone has to figure out how to tell this story so that mainstream media outlets will write about the scandals in this area.
Great piece from FreePress by S. Derek Turner debunking US broadband myths — particularly the old canard that we're so far behind because we have so much low-population-density territory. Baloney! The report states: There is absolutely no correlation between a country's population density and its broadband penetration.
Nice BusinessWeek piece by Jennifer Schenker about the French lead in high-speed internet access infrastructure.
And today's terrific post by Harold Feld explaining why AT&T may have decided it was a good idea to support Chairman Martin in this morning's USA TODAY.
It was a hot, muggy, miserable, spitting-rain day today in NYC. Cabs can't get across Midtown, people are sweating helplessly — but the web keeps producing great trails to follow.