Year: 2007

My Impossibly Long Field Guide for the 700 MHz Auction (It's Really Important, Even If You Haven't Heard About It Much In The Main Stream Media)

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Few events in the wireless world matter so much, yet get so little coverage, as the upcomming 700 MHz wireless auction. Why? Because they’re hard, and the mainstream media (MSM to us “bloggers”) are afraid you will get all confuzzled and bored. Besides, isn’t non-stop coverage of Anna Nichole Smith more satisfying? (Hint: She’s still dead.)

Small wonder that even if you are in the minority of folks who have heard about the “digital television transition” and the “return of the analog spectrum,” you have not heard about the huge policy fights over how to auction off the single most important block of spectrum for the foreseeable future. Which is, of course, how the big carriers like it.

You can find a pretty good 12-page summary prepared by some investment analysts over here. But, being the highly-opinionated public advocate and believer in democracy that I am, I also provide a hopefully helpful guide for de-mystifying the swirl of players and activity attracted to the distribution of this multi-billion dollar block of spectrum licenses. Issues include network neutrality, open access, wireless competition, the future of broadband competition, and a whole lot of public safety stuff. It includes a cast of thousands from Frontline to Cyren Call to the Ad Hoc Public Interest Spectrum Coalition (I thought up the name myself! O.K., I was in a rush . . . .) and an army of incumbents that like the universe just the way it is, thank you and do not look kindly on those of us trying to shake things up.

I warn you, this is extremely long (13 pages, I probably should have broken it up into more than one post), and complicated, and all that stuff that mainstream media figures your pretty lil’ heads can’t handle without getting all confuzzled. So, if ye be readers of courage, willing to risk getting all confuzzled and thinking about how our wireless and broadband future will unflold for the next 10-15 years, read on! Or you can go back to Google News and plug in “Anna Nichole Smith” (yup, still dead).

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Oberlin College, Hamilton College, Foothills Junior College, MIT, Clear Channel

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As they used to say on Sesame Street, one of those things is a little bit different; one of those things is not quite the same.

What Hamilton, Oberlin, Foothills and MIT have in common is that each of them has a nifty way-cool non-commercial radio station (WHCL, WOBC, KFJC, WMBR) that streams on the web. What Clear Channel has, on the other hand, is a bunch of really shitty commercial radio stations that play over the air (I suppose Clear Channel stations may also be available on the web, but if they are, who cares? Who the hell would listen to them? The only reason to listen to commercial radio is if no broadband internet connection is available. Like, say, if you’re in a car. Or at Logan Airport. Stuck for 3 days in a freak blizzard. And World War Three has just broken out and you’re curious about what’s going on. And there is no NPR station because zombies have eaten all the NPR people.(1))

Clear Channel, in addition to owning a ton of billboards and crappy radio stations, also has an awful lot of political clout that it uses in ugly ways. KFJC, WHCL, WOBC and WMBR do not. So that’s another way that one of those things is a little bit different.

By the way, KFJC has been, for quite a while, the coolest radio station on the planet (& so immortalized in my famous novel Acts of the Apostles). WMBR (“the leftmost station on your radio dial”) has its distinct charms; I got hooked on it when I was staying in Somerville 4 days/week a few years ago. I like Bats in the Belfry, the goth music show, and French Toast, on Monday mornings, a French-language show that specializes in cheesey pop but sometimes might sneak in a little Plastic Bertrand. I listen to WHCL not only because I’m a sentimental alumnus, but also ’cause it’s cool. WOBC I found on the principle that small liberal arts colleges have good radio stations. Try it, you’ll see. (I mean, pick any random small liberal arts college and find their radio station. Chances are it will be better than any comercial or NPR station playing on your radio). I especially like WOBC’s bluegrass show. The DJ sounds as if he’s 100 years old, and he really knows his stuff. As I’m witing this, I’m listening to a hip-hop show WOBC. Don’t resist or you might miss Christmas. . .

ATTENTION MEDIA ACCESS PROJECT! HALP! HELP! HALP!

I’m still having a background-process nervous breakdown over the prospect of internet radio being eviscerated by some kind of whacky “copyrights board” that I don’t really understand, but blogged briefly about here. Harold Feld’s preliminary analysis was that the threat is real, and I heard a story on NPR last week that said the same thing. So pardon me while I panic and kind of melt down before right in front of you. If I understand things correctly, the IP Mafia is planning a big-time hit. After which internet radio will be more or less just like commerical over-the-air radio.

There’s still time to appeal the ruling (I think?), and I sure hope that the Media Access Project or Harold or somebody can give us a plan for how to stop this looming travesty. Between college radio stations and Pandora, I listen to internet radio about 50 hours each week. Only seldom, very seldom, do I hear stuff that gets played on NPR or commercial stations. Truly, internet radio is a wonderful, glorious thing. To destroy internet radio in the name of some bogus RIAA copyright horseshit would be vandalism on the scale of burning the library at Alexandria.

Anybody with any guidance about how to avert disaster, please speak up. Anybody whose name is Harold Feld of the Media Access Project who has any insight into how to mobilize to save internet radio, your advice is earnestly sought.

(1) And you don’t dare go near the TVs because the zombies are all watching CNN and FOX!

rock shows then and Can You Hear Me Now?

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I went to my first rock concert in years last night. Wife and I took our oldest daughter to see Snow Patrol.

The base player for opening opener Silversun Pickups had an amp with a GREEN LIGHT on it instead of a RED one. What’s up with that? Kids these days…

Seriously, it wasn’t very different from years ago. OK Go (the middle band) had a a screen behind them with their music videos playing. The music was pretty much like early U2 with a maybe a little Iggy Pop thrown into the first two.

One thing that was kind of weird: no lighters in the air. There was enough cigarette smoking to make my hair stink, but not very much. No pot. Instead of lighters, people held up their cell phones!

Some of that was for taking pictures. It’s kind of interesting that where they used to ban recording devices (they may still do so, officially), there’s no freakin’ way that they can effectively stop that now. (The drummer for one of the bands actually whipped out a little camera to take pictures of his bandmates on stage taking their bows. From behind. Probably included a lot of the audience.) I wonder why they don’t have a live Web site on the screen to which the audience can upload their pictures while the show is in progress. More participatory and all…

Anyway, seeing all those cell phones being held up in the air was pretty weird. It was like some sort of bizarre Verizon ad.

It occurs to me that one of the reasons that we are all so accepting of government abuse is that we came of age going to concerts where we would be searched for alcohol (and recording devices), and then be served alcohol on the premises. There’s no flipping principle of safety or law at work there — it’s simply the exercise of commercial power. We accept it when it’s convenient enough to do so, and don’t accept it when it irks us enough. For example, we’re not going to throw away our cell phones during the entry search. And the “them” accept that, and only try to enforce the abuse of power that they can get away with. So as long as the government keeps the planes running without TOO much delay, and doesn’t send us personally to Iraq, we acquiesce.

Dr. Evil to create virtual people

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using government money:

EVL will build a state-of-the-art motion-capture studio to digitalize the image and movement of real people who will go on to live a virtual eternity in virtual reality. Knowledge will be archived into databases. Voices will be analyzed to create synthesized but natural-sounding “virtual” voices. Mannerisms will be studied and used in creating the 3-D virtual forms, known technically as avatars.

Leigh said his team hopes to create virtual people who respond with a high degree of recognition to different voices and the various ways questions are phrased.

Hope it does not cost ONE BILLION DOLLARS!

What’s that you say? Electronic Visualization Laboratory, EVL, not Dr. Evil, the archvillain?

Oh. Nevermind

Correction: Matt Drudge is not a Pedophile! Sorry for the Confusion!

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According to this “developing” story, it may be even worse than you think. Shocking, but hardly surprising.

UPDATE: Well, it looks like Kos has taken down the story. Matt Drudge’s reputation, such as it is, will carry on another day, safe from snarky satire on DailyKos. For any who are curious, the linked to story was a satirical piece like you might see in The Onion that used Drudge Report-style innuendo and unsourced quotes to hint that a big story was about to break that would implicate Drudge in sleaze. At no point did it say that Drudge had been caught with child porn; rather it used weasel-wording like “sources say that Drudge will be caught with. . .” etc. This is a technique that Drudge has perfected for sliming Democrats, liberals and progressives, and the corporate media frequently runs with whatever nonsense he promotes. I thought it would be fun to give him a little taste of his own medicine (although a very small dose. Tens of mllions of people get news from Drudge directly or indirectly; Wetmachine’s readership is a tad smaller.) It was intended to be obvious satire, although at least one Wetmachine reader (see comments) didn’t realize that I knew what I was doing. And actually, it *was* fun.

UPDATE April 4

Reader JG makes a good point in the comments, that is, and I quote: “Spreading lies about someone in order to damage their character is wrong.” So, we agree upon that, and accordingly I’ve edited the headline of this story to reflect all that is currently publicly known about Matt Drudge’s possible pedophillic predilictions. I have no reason at all to suspect that Matt Drudge is a pedophile. So we’re clear on that. I was just “making shit up,” in the Matt Drudge way. (Although, in homage to Drudge, I have let stand the innuendo of the “all that that is currently publicly known” bit. Here, obviously, I’m merely demonstrating the technique of innuendo, the hinting without saying, of something nasty.) Now, when we get to the point we JG realizes that “spreading lies about someone in order to damage their character” is Matt Drudge’s stock in trade, a regular part of what he does for a living, when JG will admit that innuendo is a regular part of Drudge’s schtick, then we’ll be getting somewhere.

And one final update (April 4): Please note that *I* never said Matt Drudge was a pedophile. I certainly implied it, which was the point. My original headline was Matt Drudge, Pedophile. That sentence [] no verb. It’s just a list. If I had a headline “Octopus, banana” would it mean that I was asserting that an octopus was a banana? No, of course not. I do admit that when a noun follows a proper name set off by a comma, it’s usually an instance of apposition, and the verb is implied. However, if one wanted to be weasely, one could deny that any implication had been intended. These are the rhetorical tricks and techniques of slimeball “journalism,” of which Drudge is an exemplar.

KAT positioning

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I don’t get to spend as much time as I’d like on the Collaborative for Croquet, but I’m still pleased with progress on our software. A lot of people are trying it out from all around the world (ain’t the Internet grand?), and it’s standing up pretty well. Time to clarify expectations. (The punchline at the end is that you have use the latest version.)

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Independent Musicians Launch “Rock The Net” Network Neurtality Campaign

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My good friends at Future of Music Coalition (FMC) launched a major campaign today for net neutrality. Called “Rock the Net” (a name whose lameness caused some modest embarsement at the begining of the call, but sometimes you gotta grab that cliche by the horns so you can trample the wolves while swimming from the sharks), the campaign brings together major music groups to raise awareness of the net neutrality issue and press for network neutrality legislation (such as the Dorgan-Snowe bill pending in the Senate).

Why do musicians care about network neutrality? And who are Future of Music anyway? See below….

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My Academic Article on Unlicensed Spectrum Gets Published

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Every now and then, I take a break from the delightful and snarky world of blogging to dash off the odd researched piece for an academic journal. This is always an annoying and painstaking process, because academic journals want footnotes not just the occassional link. They also dislike articles that use terms like “incumbent whankers.”

Still, the effort (when I can find the time for it) is usually worth it — at least from my perspective. You can judge for yourself by following the link to the Commlaw Conspectus website and downloading From Third Class Citizen to First Among Equals: Rethinking the Place of Unlicensed Spectrum in the FCC Hierarchy.

For those unsure if its worth slogging through 39 pages of lawyer writing, here’s a summary. The FCC has a basic hierarchy of licensed spectrum, licensed by rule (family radio service and a few other things), and unlicensed spectrum. From a wireless perspective, the FCC exists for licensed spectrum, has a few oddball things licensed by rule, and has a few slivers of space open for unlicensed spectrum. Unlicensed spectrum is the “third class citizen,” required to shut off if it causes the least interference to licensed services while accepting any interference that comes its way. When the FCC allocates spectrum rights, it does everything possible for licensed services while looking with askance at the free-wheeling unlicensed poor relation. As a result, licensed services get choice spectrum and unlicensed services get the leavings — and that on sufferance.

In my article, I argue that the First Amendment calls for standing this on its head. Licensing of spectrum came about because old technology couldn’t handle everyone using this all at once we call this the “scarcity rationale,” because the need to license spectrum to avoid interference made licenses ‘scarce’). But because the FCC must give the approval for any new technologies, the technology to eliminate scarcity (and thus eliminate the need for exclusive licensing) will never come about. This circular reasoning offends the First Amendment. Accordingly, when the FCC considers whether to permit unlicensed uses, it should need to justify its decisions under a higher Constitutional standard than it does in other licensing cases (“intermediate scrutiny” rather than “rational basis” for all you legal types out there).

Besides, I argue, it’s also better policy.

While I hardly expect the FCC and the federal courts to read my piece and exclaim: “At last! What perfect wisdom! What fools we have been!” I do hope this helps advance the debate some. As with everyone else who publishes in a field where the debate has simmered for a few years, I argue for a “third way” between licensing and commons. Rather than eliminating exclusive licensing altogether, or proposing we split the spectrum down the middle, I propose allowing a gradual evolution in technology and until exclusive licensing will gradually wither away, with perhaps a handful of truly sensitive services still licensed exclusively.

Of course, if that happened, your cell phone bill would drop like a rock, ubiquitous wireless broadband would become too cheap to meter, and television and radio conglomerates would lose their precious monopolies on the airwaves. So don’t hold your breath.

Stay tuned . . .