I recently wrote a piece for the National Alliance for Media Arts and Culture (NAMAC) discussing the importance of White Space Devices and remaining a critical consumer of the so-called "information" being fed to them by Shure and the NAB. Due to space constraints, I did have to cut one of my favorite (though a bit wonky) parts from the article. I've included the original text below the article -- it illustrates how hypocritical and duplicitous Shure and the NAB have been in their dealings with cultural organizations.

From www.namac.org/node/5051:

White Space Devices and the Battle over Innovation: Public Access vs. Industry Control of the Airwaves

by Sascha D. Meinrath

I wouldn’t be surprised if you’ve never heard of a “White Space Device.” And yet, white space devices have the potential to be one of the most revolutionary new technologies to come along in the past twenty years. White space devices (WSDs) take advantage of wireless innovations and advances in computer processing power and automatically detect unoccupied TV frequencies—allowing the public to reuse spectrum that would otherwise go to waste, for everything from home networking to broadband connectivity. For consumers, they’re very similar to (and would be integrated within) the wireless devices we use today—such as wireless-equipped laptop computers, cell phones, PDAs, next-generation video game systems, and community media broadcast networks. White space devices will have a greater positive impact than wi-fi and spur far more innovation than mobile phones. They will revolutionize communications by spurring competition over new products, services, and applications.

And yet, the trade press and inside-the-Beltway media have been inundated by a massive, multi-million dollar PR campaign (including TV ads, websites, and full-page print ads), and Congressional offices have been swarmed by hundreds of lobbyists, all claiming that white space devices will destroy television broadcasting and make wireless microphones inoperable.

Why then has a large and growing coalition of public interest and consumer groups (including the Consumer Federation of America; Consumers’ Union, who publish Consumer Reports; EDUCAUSE, which represents institutions of higher learning; Common Cause; the National Hispanic Media Coalition, which advocates for “media and telecommunications policies that benefit the Latino community”; New America Foundation; Office of Communication of the United Church of Christ; Prometheus Radio Project; and US PIRG) teamed up with a growing number of high-tech companies (including Google, Dell, HP, Motorola, and Microsoft) to support white space devices? If consumers and businesses that are innovating new technologies are fighting for these devices, who’s funding the lobbying and PR against them? And what does this all have to do with the arts and cultural community?

I first joined NAMAC over half a decade ago and have been actively organizing community media and the arts for quite some time. I co-founded the Urbana-Champaign Independent Media Center (UCIMC) in 2000, created the UCIMC’s all-ages arts and performance venue in 2002, took part in the “Community Engagement Through Media” salon that NAMAC held in 2004, and have coordinated countless community media and arts projects over the years. I mention this because when I talk about the enormous benefits that white space devices hold for cultural venues, I do so as someone who wants to see them available both for use by the general media-and-arts community and by the organizations and projects that I help lead.

Recently, I have read talking points created specifically to mislead arts and cultural organizations and so-called “facts sheets” that no one wants to put their name behind because they’re so completely ridiculous and full of misinformation. As a practitioner, I felt it was important to provide information and resources to counter the fear, uncertainty, and doubt that is being manufactured by the opponents of white space devices. Public interest groups like the New America Foundation may not have the PR funding and lobbying power of the National Association of Broadcasters or microphone manufacturers Shure Incorporated, but we do have venues like this one to get the truth out about what white space devices are and the benefits they provide to arts and cultural organizations.

So what are “white spaces”? And why do some companies want to stop white space devices?

White spaces are vacant frequencies between occupied (licensed) broadcast channels or broadcast auxiliary services like wireless microphones. If you’ve ever used an old TV, the unoccupied channels that just show “snow” are the white spaces. After the completion of the DTV transition in February 2009, the amount of white space in most of the nation’s 210 local TV markets will greatly exceed the amount of occupied spectrum, even in most major cities. In essence, white spaces are an enormous, underutilized resource that the media and arts community (along with the rest of the general public) could be using for next-generation digital media and low-cost communications. The Public Interest Spectrum Coalition wants to open up access to these unoccupied bands for everyone by allowing wireless devices certified by the FCC to operate on vacant frequencies—in much the same way that tens of millions of wi-fi devices are in use today in laptop computers.

Opponents of WSDs have launched a misinformation campaign in an attempt to prevent more widespread access to the TV bands. While the broadcast industry lobby has attempted to convince newcomers to the discussion that WSDs cannot work, these WSD detractors have systematically ignored data showing that even the pre-prototype WSDs being tested by the FCC’s Office of Engineering and Technology work exceptionally well. What is particularly ironic is that unlicensed wireless microphones are already in use throughout the United States—these devices already use unused TV bands, and have done so for years; yet the same companies that manufacture and use wireless microphones are the ones saying that other devices won’t work.

Upon closer examination, opponents of white space devices have a remarkably simple problem—white space devices will make communications far more distributed and hardware far cheaper. For the National Association of Broadcasters, it means that local communities will be able to broadcast video and audio for free—which means competition and diversity on the airwaves. For Shure Incorporated, it means that a whole new generation of wireless microphones—white space device wireless microphones—will be entering the market, dramatically increasing competition and lowering the costs of this hardware.

If you look at the sides in the battle over white space devices, the only opponents of white space devices are the corporations that want to keep their own lock on this market. These companies want to ensure that arts and cultural organizations cannot build their own infrastructures, don’t have access to alternative distribution networks, and are not able to buy equipment from (lower-cost) competitors. Knowing that these battle lines were a losing proposition, opponents of white space devices have hired PR experts to “educate” arts and community organizations and win them over to their side.

Already, we’ve seen several very public marketing campaigns where several arts and cultural groups are made the public face of opponents to white space devices (in ads paid for by NAB and Shure). This is particularly egregious since these organizations are basically fighting against the best interests of the general public and that of their sister organizations. Recently, Country Music Television, the County Music Association, the Grand Ole Opry, and Viacom’s MTV Networks demanded that the FCC stop the white space proceedings (see: http://tinyurl.com/3hfouf). As this story was going to press, the Broadway League filed a petition with the FCC where they claimed that WSDs will “effectively cripple…Broadway.” According to sources familiar with the proceedings, the Broadway League comments were written in consultation with a paid lobbyist for Shure. Cultural organizations like the ones that recently petitioned the FCC have to be particularly careful not to become the mouthpieces for corporate lobbyists—particularly when those interests actually run counter to the best interests of the larger arts community.

What are the public benefits of white space devices?

TV frequencies are a valuable data networking tool for the same reasons they are desirable for television broadcasts—they easily penetrate obstacles such as buildings and trees and can reach longer distances than the higher frequencies used by wi-fi devices. Every region in America has a large quantity of unoccupied TV white space. Although the particular empty channels vary in each local market, in most parts of the nation a majority of local TV frequencies are not being used, but could be, to create everything from affordable broadband access to local media distribution. Currently, the vast majority of community and municipal wireless networks—commercial, municipal and community nonprofits, public-private partnerships, etc.—use unlicensed spectrum to transmit data. While existing use of unlicensed spectrum has driven a remarkable amount of innovation, opening more low-frequency spectrum for WSDs is the “rocket fuel” needed to facilitate and scale-up home, business, and regional networks. Below are just some of the benefits of white space devices:

Enhanced Local Coverage and Communications
Local communities could use WSDs to enable mobile video and audio services and citizen journalism. These services would provide information of special interest to the local residents (for example, a town hall or PTA meeting), coverage of local sporting events (for example, the high school football game), and new methods for local advertisers to reach customers in a more targeted and valued manner. As WSD technologies are integrated into next-generation wireless microphones and other media equipment, these systems will be substantially less prone to interference than today’s “dumb” equipment (which are often incapable of sensing whether other devices are transmitting on the channel they intend to use). In the same way that digital media equipment has spurred a new wave of consumer-generated media, the ad-hoc and distributed information dissemination networks that WSDs make possible will encourage the sharing of local content and user-generated content.

Enterprise Networking
From a base of essentially zero in 2000, an estimated 60% of U.S. corporations now provide some type of wireless networking using unlicensed spectrum last year. On May 25, 2006, in testimony before the Senate Commerce Committee, Roger Cochetti, federal policy director of the Computing Technology Industry Association (CompTIA), stated that reallocating the TV white spaces for unlicensed use “will be used by small business to improve their productivity, not least of which will be access to new wireless broadband services.”

Rural Broadband Deployment
The highly favorable propagation characteristics of the TV broadcast spectrum allow for wireless broadband deployment with greater range of operation at lower power levels. Thus, the TV white spaces could be used to provide better broadband service in less densely populated areas or as a first broadband service in many underserved areas, including rural and other remote areas. Today more than 3,000 wireless ISPs and rural telephone cooperatives already rely on the current “junk” bands of unlicensed spectrum to provide broadband to remote customers, mostly in rural areas. Which is why the Wireless Internet Service Provider Association (WISPA) and the National Telecom Cooperative Association (NCTA) have been advocates of opening the TV white spaces for unlicensed access.

Education and Enterprise Video Conferencing
The TV white spaces could be used to give local high schools and middle schools the same multimedia capabilities available to major university campuses: mobile, high-speed Internet access for every student and teacher with a laptop or portable wireless device. WSDs also can be used to increase the reliability and decrease the cost of video conferencing on college and commercial campuses. Such video conferencing could help enable distance learning for students in remote locations for whom traditional classroom-based learning is impractical. This is why EDUCAUSE, which represents the nation’s colleges and universities on technology issues, is a leading advocate for white space devices.

Personal Consumer Applications
WSDs could be used to provide new services and applications to consumers by taking advantage of the improved signal reliability, capacity, and range of the TV broadcast spectrum. Wireless local area networks using low power and battery-operated devices could enable new communications technologies that bring safety, convenience, and comfort to consumers in their homes. This is why major consumer groups like the Consumers Federation of America and the Consumers Union support opening the TV spectrum to white space devices.


The take-home message

The FCC is completing a critical phase of the process needed to bring WSDs to consumers. Extensive feasibility testing has been conducted and extensively documented, and this testing has demonstrated that WSDs can and do work. A new round of feasibility testing is currently underway and will add further support for the viability of WSD technologies. The next step will be for the FCC to issue the necessary technical specifications for WSDs based upon the empirical data collected during feasibility testing and regulatory precedent. The FCC will then be able to certify consumer devices, ensuring that those devices meet required technical standards. Only after all three phases of this process are completed will consumer WSDs be made available to the general public.

Taken together, this multi-step process will ensure that WSDs co-exist with current license holders without causing harmful interference, and that manufacturers and implementers will have the flexibility to develop new features and innovative uses for WSDs. Public interest groups have been vocal in their support of rigorous testing and also have remained committed to the end goal of certifying useful new wireless technologies that operate within TV bands without causing harmful interference to licensed users.

For arts and cultural organizations, this process (and white space devices generally), have the potential to add much needed tools to help us conduct our work. New, less-expensive video and audio communications equipment, wireless broadband services, and a host of social networking and geo-locational applications are just around the corner.

For those who would like to find out more about the issue of white space devices (WSDs):
• Check out the Wireless Innovation Alliance
• Read the policy backgrounder on WSDs.
• Or contact Sascha Meinrath directly at the New America Foundation—especially if your organization would like to join the Public Interest Spectrum Coalition or the Wireless Innovation Alliance.

 

NOTES

(1) The share of the DTV band (channels 2 to 51) that will be vacant after the February 2009 turnoff of analog transmission ranges from 30% in the most congested, coastal markets (e.g., Trenton, NJ) to 80% or more in small-town and rural markets (e.g., Fargo, ND). For more information and a survey mapping available white space in a representative number of TV markets, see Measuring the TV “White Space” Available for Unlicensed Wireless Broadband, New America Foundation and Free Press, January 2006.

(2) Pages 1-2 of comments filed with the FCC in proceeding 04-186, 06/18/08 and signed by The Broadway League, Nederlander Producing Company of America, Jujamcyn Theaters, 321 Management, NAMCO, The Shubert Organization, White Dog Productions, Ostar Theatricals, Aged in Wood, Circle in the Square Theatre, Iron Mountain Productions, Scorpio Entertainment, Manhattan Theater Club, Center Theater Group of Los Angeles, Alan Wasser Associates, Adam Epstein Company, Scorpio Entertainment, Iron Mountain Productions, Richmark Entertainment of Los Angeles, Berlind Productions, Helen Hayes Theatre, Fox Associates, Dodger Theatricals, The Producing Office, Broadway Across America, Vienna Waits Productions, Jeffrey Richards Associates, Tonka Productions, Marc Platt Productions, and Richard Climan.

(3) Telecommunications Industry Association, 2006 Telecommunications Market Review and Forecast, p. 188. For a larger estimate, see In-Stat, “In-Depth Analysis: Wireless Data in the Enterprise: The Hockey Stick Arrives,” December 2006. See also ABI Research, “Enterprise IP Telephony,” 2006.

(4) CompTIA’s 20,000 members are predominantly among the nation’s 32,000 value-added resellers, a $43 billion industry that deploys IT networks for small- to medium-sized businesses and professional offices across the country.

(5) Roger J. Cochetti, CompTIA Testimony before the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, May 25, 2006.

---

SASCHA MEINRATH is research director of the New America Foundation's Wireless Future Program and a board member and co-founder of the Urbana-Champaign Independent Media Foundation. He blogs regularly at www.publicponderings.com.

Here's the original text from the end of the section, "So what are 'white spaces'? And why do some companies want to stop white space devices?":

Already, we've seen several very public marketing campaigns where several arts and cultural groups are made the public face of opponents to white space devices (in ads paid for by NAB and Shure). This is particularly egregious since these organizations are basically fighting against the best interests of the general public and that of their sister organizations. Recently, Country Music Television, the County Music Association, the Grand Ole' Opry, and Viacoms' MTV Networks demanded that the FCC stop the white space proceedings (see: http://tinyurl.com/3hfouf); and, as this story was going to press, the Broadway League filed a petition with the FCC where they claimed:
Granting immediate national access [by white space devices] will effectively cripple dozens of long standing industries, including Broadway...Google's plan, essentially, recommends the use of (1) beacons, which would be purchased by current white space users to jam local transmissions in the white space spectrum, (2) a signal “safe harbor,” granting incumbent users exclusive use to channels 36-38, and (3) use of spectrum sensing technology. As has been noted in other recent filings, this proposal is patently flawed and essentially ineffective.

According to sources familiar with the proceedings, the Broadway League comments were written in consultation with a paid lobbyist for Shure Microphone. Unfortunately, they position arts and cultural groups as a lunatic fringe, allowing Shure and the NAB to hide behind the public face of these organizations. In fact, Shure is using arts organizations as a facade to fight for a position that it does not hold itself. As Shure's own filing with the FCC states:

The introduction of new unlicensed devices in the television broadcast bands must be done carefully to avoid causing interference problems on a grand scale. In these comments, we have recommended a three-part solution for mitigating interference to wireless microphones:
• Designate 6 “exempt” TV channels in each television market, in which unlicensed devices would not operate.
• Use of cognitive “spectrum sensing” techniques by unlicensed devices to prevent transmission in TV channels that are occupied by incumbent users, including television broadcasting stations, wireless microphones, and wireless audio systems.
• Use of an RF “smart beacon” transceiver to enhance the interference prevention capabilities of spectrum sensing at greater distances, as described above.

In essence, Shure made the exact same proposal several years ago that engineers from numerous other technology companies have supported more recently. Cultural organizations like the ones that recently petitioned the FCC have to be particularly careful not to become the mouth pieces for corporate lobbyists – particularly when those interests actually run counter to the best interests of the larger arts community. The fact that Shure itself knows that the position that the Broadway League and its allies took was at odds with their own public filing makes this example particularly egregious.

The first quote is from pages 1-2 of comments filed with the FCC in proceeding 04-186, 06/18/08 and signed by The Broadway League, Nederlander Producing Company of America, Jujamcym Theaters, 321 Management, NAMCO, The Shubert Organization, White Dog Productions, Ostar Theatricals, Aged in Wood, Circle in the Square Theatre, Iron Mountain Productions, Scorpio Entertainment, Manhattan Theater Club, Center Theater Group of Los Angeles, Alan Wasser Associates, Adam Epstein Company, Scorpio Entertainment, Iron Mountain Productions, Richmark Entertainment of Los Angeles, Berlind Productions, Helen Hayes Theatre, Fox Associates, Dodger Theatricals, The Producting Office, Broadway Across America, Vienna Waits Productions, Jeffrey Richards Associates, Tonka Productions, Marc Platt Productions, and Richard Climan. The second quote is from pages 50-51 of comments filed by Shure Incorporated, 12/01/04.

The Washington Post just ran an article about Shared Spectrum, a company that's been developing white space devices for many years for DARPA. I've been following Shared Spectrum's work for awhile now -- the most interesting element about it is that they're already doing what the National Association of Broadcasters says isn't possible. Here's more from the Post:

An engineer, Mark A. McHenry litters his speech with dizzying terms like gigahertz and cognitive radio. But on one topic in the national news he is plain-spoken: the claim by the broadcast networks, the NBCs and CBSs of the world, that a new technology to provide Internet service over the air will interfere with TV viewing.

"They're wrong," says McHenry, the chief executive of Shared Spectrum, a Vienna technology company.

The Federal Communications Commission is weighing a proposal that would allow companies to share airwaves. McHenry said his eight-year-old, 30-person firm has already received $30 million from the Defense Department to develop the concept. The broadcasters' position is "not what the DoD thinks," McHenry said. "It works in the harshest environments."

My colleague, Benn Kobb, sent me a fascinating article from 1991 where the National Association of Broadcasters is engaging is a massive misinformation and lobbying campaign against (I kid you not), data communications via cellular telephone networks. That's right, NAB fought to prevent technologies like Blackberries and iPhones from ever being allowed.

Today, the NAB is at it again -- this time targeting white space devices. But the notion is exactly the same -- any new wireless technology, no matter how useful to consumers or innocuous, will be fought against if NAB sees it as somehow against their own self-interests. In fact, as their own record illustrates (and being anti-smart phone is only the tip of the iceberg, NAB has systematically fought against innovations in the field of communications for decades.

But read on, this will certainly resonate with anyone who's ever sent a text message:

From: www.findarticles.com.

Mobile Phone News
Dec. 19, 1991
Copyright 1991 Access Intelligence LLC

NAB protests cellular operators offering information services

On the heels of PacTel's announcement to offer Star Info, a new service that provides up-to-date information ranging from traffic reports to financial news, the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) has petitioned the FCC to prohibit the cellular phone industry from offering pay-to-use radio services such as news, sports and weather. The NAB said that information services over cellular would duplicate the same news provided free to radio listeners by broadcasters.

"There is already a glut of sources for this information in the broadcast marketplace," said NAB in comments to the FCC. Offering such services over cellular frequencies would jeopardize cellular companies' system capacity and inhibit the operator's ability to handle conventional telephone calls, it added.

There is a growing business for private companies to offer niche programming services to cellular operators. NAB has no objections to cellular operators who want to buy programming and to provide information services, said Doug Wills of the NAB. "We do object, however, to the cellular operators out bidding the broadcasters for sports rights and then becoming barbarian gate keepers to programming," Wills added.

The NAB said that the cellular operators are misusing their spectrum. "Cellular spectrum should be reserved for the two-way communication for which it is designed," said the NAB. "One-way transmission of news, sports, weather and traffic would be a misuse of this spectrum and a needless duplication of broadcast services."

... PacTel's Star Info Is a Breakthrough for Cellular Customers

In November, PacTel Cellular initiated the Star Info which allows subscribers one-number dialing to access information. At no additional charge, subscribers will have access to 280 local businesses and services. Somewhat like a cellular yellow pages service, Star Info includes direct lines to restaurants, stock updates, sports scores, ticket offices for Plays, movies and special events.

The information program is provided by Applied Response Systems (ARS), a private company that specializes in information services. "The Star Info service provides excellent advertising and marketing opportunities for local businesses," said Ron Lee, owner of ARS. "They can effectively reach a very specific target audience to sell their product," he added.

Here in DC we're gearing up for One Web Day and it's looking to be the most extravagant OWD party I've helped organize yet! Want to learn more -- check out:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

CONTACT
Nathaniel James
DC OWD Ambassador
Campaign Coordinator, Media and Democracy Coalition
njames@media-democracy.net
p: 202 736 5757
c: 206 954 3040

Morgan Weiland
DC OWD Ambassador
morganweiland@gmail.com
c: 202 256 7480

DC ONE WEB DAY: BLOGGER PREVIEW
Teleconference with One Web Day founder, ICANN Board Member and cyberlaw scholar Susan Crawford, and DC ambassadors

Wednesday, August 20, 3:30pm and 8pm.

Washington, DC—OneWebDay (OWD) is a global event held September 22 celebrating the Web and highlighting key issues about the future of the Internet, with a focus in its third year on online political participation. To celebrate and document the recent flourishing of online political participation in what has become a new "town square," the DC OWD Planning Committee is creating an E-Democracy Time Capsule that will go live online on August 22, one month before OWD. We are building a site where anyone, from all corners of the United States and the world, can mark history by contributing text, images, sound, and video to a tricked-out WordPress blog describing their favorite E-Democracy tools, letters to the future about their hopes for Web-powered politics, and profiles of E-Democracy Heroes.

We stand at a crossroads in the history of online political participation, and the future is uncertain. Policy decisions concerning digital inclusion, net neutrality, and online privacy and security will be made in the coming months and years. We all have a stake in ensuring that when the virtual Time Capsule is reopened on OWD in 2020, the new town square delivers on its promise to become a thriving marketplace of ideas where anyone can participate unhindered by illegitimate gatekeepers and a lack of access to the tools and skills they need to add their voice the dialog.

Join us August 20 for a teleconference with One Web Day founder, ICANN Board Member, and cyberlaw scholar Susan Crawford, and DC ambassadors Nathaniel James and Morgan Weiland to learn about how the E-Democracy Time Capsule can promote the work you do and what role you can play in helping to make this year's event a success. We welcome all bloggers interested in the promise of online political participation. To ensure maximum participation, we will host two calls, one at 3:30 PM ET and a second at 8:00 PM ET.

Teleconference details:

Who
----------------

Susan Crawford
One Web Day founder
ICANN Board Member
and cyberlaw scholar at Michigan University

Nathanial James
DC OWD Ambassador and Campaign Coordinator
Media and Democracy Coalition

When
----------------

Wednesday, August 20, 2008

Times
----------------

3:30 PM ET / 12:30 PM PT
8:00 PM ET/ 5:00 PM PT

Dial-In
----------------

(218) 339 4300, password: 425 755

Please dial in 5-10 minutes before call so we can start on time.

More information about OWD is available at www.onewebday.org.

Since posting several concerns with the future of Meraki's pricing structure I've heard that Meraki is planning discontinue their Meraki Mini $49 mesh router on August 12, 2008. If true (I've now heard it from a few different sources), this means that Meraki users have only a few more days to buy hardware before the minimal price goes up by 300%.

[UPDATE01]From Meraki on the evening of the 12th:

Standard Edition Transition

We are also announcing the end of life of our Standard Edition (ad-supported) products, which will no longer be available to new customers after January 31, 2009. Over the past year we've seen rapidly increasing demand for the features and functionality of the Pro Edition line of products and have decided to simplify our offerings and focus our development efforts.

As an existing Standard Edition customer, your networks will continue to operate normally and Meraki will continue providing hosted services for the lifetime of the product. In addition, as part of our streamlined product offering, your networks will have certain features enabled in Dashboard which were previously only available in Pro Edition, including custom images on splash pages and unlimited device whitelisting. You may optionally upgrade to the complete Pro Edition for $100 per node by contacting sales@meraki.com.

Network operators planning to expand Standard Edition networks can continue purchasing the Meraki Mini for $49 and Meraki Outdoor for $99 through January 31, 2009 through the "Standard Edition Store" link under the "Support" tab in your Meraki Dashboard. The Meraki Indoor is available in the Pro Edition, but can be added to existing Standard networks.

Back in March 2007, I wrote that "the worst state franchise bill I've ever read has just been introduced in Illinois". At the time, there was a united front among community activists and community media producers to kill this bill (HB1500). As I wrote, "In taking away home rule power for local communities [HB1500] creates situations whereby local disruptions (e.g., digging up streets, sidewalks, front yards, etc.) are taken completely out of local hands."

And then a remarkable thing happened -- on May 30, 2007, AT&T holed up with legislators to create a "compromise" bill. The plot seemed straight from a Hollywood movie:

I've just learned that AT&T lobbyists are holed up in state legislators offices and are rewriting state laws that they will attempt to get passed in the dead of night. One might think that this is some sort of nefarious plot to some Gotham City corruption scandal, but it's happening right now in the State of Illinois. With massive public opposition to HB1500, it appears likely that AT&T and it's legislators will attempt to attach amendments to SB 678.

Here's the kicker, however, AT&T and its political cronies wouldn't have been able to pass this bill without the avid support of community media producers. While folks like myself were writing:

The amendment that AT&T's lobbyists are working on would lower buildout requirements while granting this telecom giant unprecedented power to ignore local concerns. Meanwhile, consumer protections are gutted, and network neutrality has been entirely eliminated. Back when I wrote about the worst telecom bill I'd ever seen i hadn't realized that AT&T, still wanting more, would attempt a late-night assassination of consumer- and municipal-rights and that government officials in Illinois would be so corrupt as to go along with this farce.

Community media producers were busy working to help pass this franchise (220 ILCS 5/21-601). This break in the ranks was difficult to understand -- prior allies explained it as the best of a bad situation -- but it still meant that the public interest coalition was splintered and PEG producers did provide the political cover necessary to ensure a smooth passage of this bill.

One summer later, I've started receiving dire e-mails from the very PEG channel folks who helped pass the AT&T state franchise bill who are now angry that AT&T is not living up to its promises and expectations. I have to wonder, are these people daft? What did they expect would happen? When telecommunications experts are issuing dire (public) warnings about the gutting of consumer rights, local authority and control (language like, "a late-night assassination of consumer- and municipal-rights" is a fairly clear warning), what did people think was going to happen?

It pains me to see incredibly smart and talented people either hoodwinked or naively trusting that they, somehow, weren't going to end up on the wrong side of a Faustian bargain with AT&T. Meanwhile, here's the latest assessment of just how bad things have gotten with AT&T's Illinois State franchise:

Recently, Keep Us Connected circulated Loyola University professor, Dr. Diane Schiller’s Chicago Tribune letter to the editor on the sub-par treatment of PEG programming on AT&T’s U-Verse system. Over the past two decades, Dr. Schiller and her colleagues have demonstrated the public benefit of community access through Countdown, a live, call-in math instruction program for elementary school students across the city. Loyola professors introduce student viewers to a different math concept each week on Countdown.

Dr. Schiller fears those years of work will be undermined with the deployment of AT&T’s inferior U-Verse system. In her letter to the Tribune, Dr. Schiller says:

AT&T's planned system for PEG programs like Countdown fails the test by removing those programs from its television line-up. PEG programs will be hard to find, channel surfing between commercial channels and PEG channels won't work, and channel listings for programs like Countdown will disappear. It doesn't take an educator to know that "out of sight" can easily become "out of mind."

In response, AT&T Illinois President Paul La Schiazza claims, "All PEG content is easily found on U-verse’s Channel 99, which is absolutely acceptable under state law…"

While AT& T Illinois President Paul La Schiazza publicly dismisses criticisms of U-Verse, other company representatives have repeatedly acknowledged deficiencies in the system, both in local and national demonstrations of the PEG product.

Contrary to La Schiazza's assertion, it is clear the U-Verse system fails to comply with Illinois law.

---

The law says:
Companies operating under Illinois’ Cable and Video Franchise law of 2007 "shall provide to subscribers public, educational and government access channel capacity at equivalent visual and audio quality and equivalent functionality, from the viewing perspective of the subscriber, to that of commercial channels carried on the [provider]’s basic cable or video service offerings…"

PEG channels on AT&T's U-Verse system:

• are cumbersome to find and slower to load than commercial channels
• have inferior picture and audio quality compared to commercial channels
• cannot support closed captioning
• cannot support second audio programming
• shut down after 2-3 hours of viewing
• are incompatible with programmed recording devices like Tivo
• are excluded from program guides and listings

---

The law says:
Public, education and government channels shall all be carried on the holder’s basic cable or video service offerings or tiers. Basic cable or video service is defined as "any cable of video service offering or tier which includes the retransmission of local television broadcast signals."

AT&T's U-Verse system:
Segregates PEG channels from all other channels by moving PEG channels to a web-like application under the generic heading "Channel 99." PEG channels will not be transmitted in the same way as local television broadcast signals.

---

The law says:
"The holder shall provide a listing of public, education and government channels on channel cards and menus provided to subscribers in a manner equivalent to other channels…"

AT&T's U-Verse system:
Strips away PEG channel identity, only listing a generic Channel 99 on channel cards. Local residents looking for PEG channels are forced to scroll through a menu of dozens of PEG channels from the entire region in order to find what they are looking for.

---

The law says:
"…the [provider] shall provide a listing of public, educational, and government programming on its electronic program guide if such a guide is utilized by the holder."

AT&T's U-Verse system:
Does not list PEG programming on its electronic program guide.

From here on out, I expect that things will get even worse.

[UPDATE02] Once or twice a week I get the question, "I'm thinking about using Meraki's equipment, what do you think?" And I always start my answer much the same way. [As a disclaimer, I've known the Meraki folks since their time back at MIT -- my development teams used to collaborate actively with them.]

Meraki is a great system for quick do-it-yourself networking. The technology is elegant and the graphical user interface (mostly) intuitive. If you want a plug-and-play technology immediately deployed, it's a good solution. But that is far from the whole story.

As many of my readers know, I've been advocating for open tech for years and years -- so how does Meraki stack up? The core technologies in Meraki are open source -- but they've been smothered in a proprietary wrapper that makes Meraki little different from most "black box" solutions. Users can't easily view the code, change features (or add features, for that matter), fix bugs, or otherwise adapt the technology for their own uses. As a number of open source projects have discovered, even gaining access to information that was covered by existing open source licenses has become increasingly difficult as Meraki has become increasingly proprietary.

Most people think Meraki's back-end is free. They are wrong. In fact, Meraki plans tomay eventually charge for the use of their services. As a recent GovTech article reported, Meraki's founder stated that their solution "includes three years of its data center services in the price of the hardware." For those who forget, Meraki's hardware used to cost $49 for an indoor node, then the cost went up to $149 -- if you wanted more equipment, you had to pay a rate three times as much, and since Meraki's equipment is sole-sourced, you had to pay whatever they charged.

I fully expect that we're going to see the same problem with Meraki's back-end services. Most users (and certainly just about everyone in the general public) thinks that once you buy a wireless access point that it will continue to work indefinitely (or at least until the hardware fails). With Meraki, however, you're getting a package of hardware and software -- and you can't run a Meraki network without Meraki's proprietary back-end. So how much will the service cost at the end of your 3-year "free" period? I have no idea (though if you know, please let me know). [EDIT: As Meraki CEO, Sanjit Biswas, clarified on this blog (see comments), "the cost the hosted backend service is included for the lifetime of the device with the current line of products at $149/$199. We may decide to unbundle the pricing with future products, but it will be clear to the customer and not a hidden fee." So current hardware should remain free to use. And what happens if you've been a Meraki network over that 3-year periodand are now about to get a huge monthly charge? Probably you'll either have to pay whatever they cost or parts of your network will cease to work. I'm not sure that I would agree with Sanjit that this is not a hidden fee -- most Meraki customers are not aware of the possibility that future compatible hardware might carry additional fees.]

Hundreds of projects, organizations, and municipalities are rolling out Meraki-based networks, yet few seem to understand that they're buying a bundled service not just a piece of hardware. Over time, these initiatives will end up paying an unknown amount of money to Meraki just to keep their system running. It is, in fact, the ultimate bait-and-switch paradigm -- you think you have a one-time hardware cost, instead you get vendor lock-in, recurring charges, and path dependencies.

These and other reasons are why it remains so important to support and utilize truly open technologies. The simulacrums are getting better and better -- but inevitably you're getting a worse deal than you think.

The New York Times is now reporting on the hacking of the websites of ICANN and IANA. For many of the folks who've been attempting to conduct research on the Internet and make improvements to its structure, this comes as no surprise. And yet, the scientific community faces a continuing data acquisition crisis -- they're prevented from collecting the information they need to know how the Internet works and how we might improve it. At the heart of the matter is an utter disregard by regulators and policy makers to mandate that companies make information available that had been in the public domain previously, but which they now claim to be proprietary. Until that's done, the security and structure of the Internet will continue to face failures, with the degree of chaos only certain to grow in coming years.

The recent FCC spectrum auctions netted $19.6 billion. In essence a group of companies paid for exclusive licensure of several bands of the public airwaves. Which begs the question, if they have exclusive licensure (guaranteed by law and by the enforcement powers of the FCC), what happens with all those wireless microphones currently operating (both legally, but mostly illegally) in those bands?

The only solution is going to be that they will have to vacate those bands -- thus far, there's been nothing but silence on the issue. Personally, I plan to grab some popcorn and watch how the telcos and FCC deal with the problem. Meanwhile, devices are, even today, being sold that use this band -- basically, it's pirate radio equipment being manufactured and sold by major corporations. This is going to get interesting.

New broadband statistics from the OECD (through the last quarter of 2007) point to the complete and continuing failure of the United States to reclaim its prior successes, much less, even keep up with a growing list of other countries. Even the Wall Street Journal is jumping into the fray:

"Once the undisputed leader in the technological revolution, the U.S. now lags a growing number of countries in the speed, cost and availability of high-speed Internet. While cable and telecom companies are spending billions to upgrade their service, they're focusing their efforts mostly on larger U.S. cities for now."

The Wall Street Journal article contains some real gems -- pointing to historical precedents that mirror today's broadband situation and debates:

Chattanooga's Mr. DePriest compares his agency's plan for high-speed Internet to the rollout of electricity, which came to many parts of Tennessee only in the 1930s as a result of the creation by the federal government of the Tennessee Valley Authority. That was three decades after many businesses and homes in major urban areas like New York were first electrified. The country's electricity at the time was largely provided by private companies, which denounced any government efforts to get into the business as "socialist" -- echoing the debate over municipal fiber networks today.

Meanwhile, if a picture's worth a thousand words, here's a few bloggings worth of data:

Lots more OECD facts and figures concerning broadband statistics are available here. For the truly ambitious, take a look at the OECD report on broadband growth and national policies to read about the documented importance of governmental intervention to supporting the spread of broadband connectivity.