Spectrum

Spectrum issues, community wireless, muni broadband

Get Ready for the 2022 Season of Spectrum Wars!

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It isn’t the sultry Regency drama of Bridgerton, the action psycho-drama of Moon Knight, or even the, um, whatever the heck Human Resources is. But for those of us in Telecom land, the annual season of Spectrum Wars holds an attraction like no other. This year is shaping up to be a major spectacular, with lots of old plot lines coming back (like 5.9 GHz), sleeper issues (like 12 GHz) and an unexpected new dramatic plotline around the FCC’s overall auction authority — and More! With the FCC close to finally getting a full cast, it’s looking like 2022 could be a total blockbuster (which will, of course, end in the cliffhanger of a new Congress — with Ted Cruz as potential Chair of the Senate Commerce Committee!).

 

Of course, not every potential plotline will work out, and we’ll undoubtedly have plenty of surprises along the way, but here’s a (not so) brief recap of what you need to know to follow along this season. If I missed your favorite show, let me know in the comments.

 

(And no, we’re not going to talk about net neutrality. Or any of the broadband money. This is just spectrum, not wireless service.)

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What the Eff, FAA? My Insanely Long Field Guide to the FAA/FCC 5G C-Band Fight.

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5G has been accused a lot of ridiculous things — causing Covid, causing cancer, causing autism. This article provides a list of 9 separate conspiracy theory/whacky things 5G is supposed to do, from killing birds to depopulating the planet. Today we can add another thing to the list to make an even ten — causing planes to fall out of the sky. Unfortunately, the source of this particular new rumor is the Federal Aviation Authority (FAA). Specifically, the new FAA “Special Airworthiness Information Bulletin” on “Risk of Potential Adverse Effects on Radio Altimeters” (generally referred to as “FAA guidance” by the industry). This has lead to a spate of articles where FAA folks anonymously leak statements about how sister agency the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is outa control and does what she wants, bitch, whatevah! and planes are gonna fall outa the sky and shut down air travel for everyone unless the FCC stops the roll out of 5G in something called “C-Band” (with phased in roll out scheduled to start in December — now delayed until January).

 

If this sounds familiar, it’s because a different agency within the Department of Transportation pulled the same nonsense over the FCC’s efforts to reclaim unused spectrum from the auto industry in the 5.9 GHz band. The Department of Defense has made similar accusations against the FCC wrt its approval of Ligado. I could list several more cases, but they basically boil down to the same thing — the federal government’s processes for addressing spectrum policy is severely broken. Unhappy federal agencies that don’t like the outcome of an FCC proceeding respond by undermining the FCC in the press and trying to wage proxy wars through allies in Congress. But the FAA’s actions here take this behavior to new heights of irresponsibility and danger.

 

As I explain in greater detail below, the technical evidence on which the FAA bases its interference concerns have a lot of problems — not least of which that about 40 other countries operate similar 5G deployments in the same C-Band without any interference showing up. Either physics works differently in the U.S., or the report at the center of this controversy needs to explain why this hasn’t shown up in any other country where deployments are either authorized or have already taken place. What is worse, the FAA has basically been playing “chicken” with the FCC by failing to turn over needed information to verify the report or replicate the results until literally the day before FAA staff leaked the “planes are gonna fall out of the sky” story to the Wall St. J.

 

But more importantly, we need this inter-agency warfare over 5G spectrum policy to stop. Things have always been difficult That we now have an FAA that would prefer to actively undermine confidence in the safety of air travel than actually work with the FCC (and trust the FCC to do its job) underscores just how bad this problem has become. Congress can help by swiftly confirming Alan Davidson as head of NTIA (the federal agency that is supposed to mange the spectrum management process on the federal side) and Jessica Rosenworcel and Gigi Sohn at the FCC.

 

More below . . .

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We Will Have a Dream Team FCC (and NTIA) — But You Still Have To Fight For Your Right To Broadband!

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President Biden has finally made his critical telecom appointments to fill out the Federal Communications Commission and the National Telecommunications Information Administration (NTIA). As expected, Biden named Acting Chair Jessica Rosenworcel to serve as full chair and renominated her to fill her expired term. As hoped, he also nominated my former boss (and all around Telecom Boss) Gigi Sohn to be the third FCC Commissioner. In addition, Biden nominated Alan Davidson to serve as Administrator/Assistant Sec. for NTIA. In addition to the critical role NTIA plays in spectrum policy, NTIA will also be the agency running the multi-billion broadband infrastructure program in the Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill (assuming that passes).

 

This makes lots of important things possible. Not just headline items like reclassifying broadband as Title II (which one would expect any Democratic FCC to do at this point). It includes developing smart and innovative policies to close the digital divide, enhance competition, put consumer protection front and center, and advance new spectrum management technologies that move us from scarcity to abundance. This trio (combined with already serving FCC Commissioner Geoffrey Starks, a champion of privacy and inclusion) are as potentially transformational in telecom policy as the appointment of Lina Kahn and Alvaro Bedoya to the Federal Trade Commission.

 

The Key word here is “potentially.”

 

One of the biggest mistakes that people keep making in policy and politics is that you can just elect (or in this case, appoint) the right people and go home to let them solve the problems. Then people get all disappointed when things don’t work out. Incumbents are not going to simply surrender to new policies, and political power has limits. This will be especially true if Congress flips in 2022. So while this is definitely cause for celebration, we are going to have to fight harder than ever to get the policies we need to create the broadband (and media) we need — starting with the fight to get them confirmed over the inevitable Republican resistance.

 

Happily, fighting to achieve the right thing is much more enjoyable than fighting to prevent the wrong thing. But no one should think we can just go home, problem solved. As I have said for over 15 years, you can’t outsource citizenship. Citizen movements are citizen driven, or they either get co-opted or die. We are going to need to support (and occasionally push) the new FCC and NTIA in the face of unflagging industry pressure and political obstacles. The laws of political reality have not been repealed — but we have a unique opportunity to use them to our advantage.

 

A bit more about who these people are and the policy opportunities below. . . .

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We Can #ConnectTribes to Broadband, and YOU Can Help!

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One of the unusual plot twists of this season on Spectrum Wars has been my agreeing more and more with FCC Chairman Ajit Pai. For those familiar with Babylon 5, this is rather like how G’Kar and Londo started working together by the end of Season 4 despite attacking each other’s home planets at various points in Seasons 1, 2 & 3. But as I like to say: “Always prepare for the best possible result.” Mind you, this doesn’t change all the things on which I vociferously oppose the current FCC. But I’m hoping to extend the spectrum streak into August.

 

Which brings me to one of the most important developments for connectivity for Native American Tribes, Alaskan Native villages and Native Hawaiian communities: the 2.5 GHz Rural Tribal Priority Window (TPW). This gives federally recognized Tribes on rural Tribal lands the opportunity to apply for free spectrum licenses in one of bands best suited for 5G. Tribes that receive these licenses will have the capability to build out their own 5G networks, bringing real, reliable and affordable broadband to communities that have the worst broadband access in the United States. Unfortunately, the application window closes on August 3. Because of the horrific impact of COVID-19 on Native American communities (rural Native American Communities have suffered worse economic and social impacts of COVID-19 than any other community in the United States, aggravated by the severe lack of broadband access), hundreds of eligible Tribes will not be able to meet the August 3 deadline to apply (less than 20% of the approximately 515 eligible federally recognized tribes on rural Tribal lands are expected to be able to apply under the current deadline, based on an estimate by MuralNet.org).

 

Tribal organizations such as National Congress of American Indians, The Southern California Chairmen’s Tribal Association, Native Public Media, and AMERIND Risk Management (a Tribal owned corporation chartered under federal law) are working with my employer, Public Knowledge, to request the FCC to extend the window until February 3, 2021. As I explain below, this will benefit hundreds of Tribes and their communities, while harming no one. But best of all, you can help! Here’s how:

 

Tell your member of Congress to tell the FCC to extend the 2.5 GHz Tribal Priority Window. You can do that by going to the Public Knowledge #ConnectTribes action tool here.

 

Tell the FCC to extend the 2.5 GHz TPW. The Docket Number for this proceeding is 18-120. Simply head over to the FCC Express Comment page and tell the FCC in your own words that Tribes deserve a real chance to apply for wireless broadband licenses on their own sovereign Tribal lands so they can provide Tribal households and businesses with the broadband they need and deserve.

 

Participate in the #ConnectTribes Day of Action on Thursday, JULY 23 (TOMORROW!). One of the biggest problems is that no one outside of a very small set of telecom wonks and Native activists knows about this situation and why the FCC needs to extend the TPW until February 3. Tweet or otherwise use social media with the hashtag #ConnectTribes to raise the profile of this issue. We are planning a “Day of Action” this Thursday, July 23 to get this trending — but please keep using the hashtag to support Tribal connectivity until August 3.

 

More below . . .

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The Trump Administration Goes to War over 5G, with Itself

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(A somewhat sorter version of this appeared on the blog of my employer Public Knowledge)

If you have followed anything in the wireless world, you will have heard about 5G – the next generation of wireless technology. Technologists promise it will revolutionize our lives by enabling everything from gigabit mobile downloads to self-driving cars. Conspiracy theorists falsely warn it causes coronavirus and kills bees. Perhaps most impressively, however, 5G bridges the hyper-partisan divide in Washington, D.C. Ask anyone who does wireless policy and they will tell you that America absolutely needs to roll out 5G as quickly as possible, usually with dire warnings added that if we don’t move quickly, China will end up “winning the race to 5G.” President Trump himself has repeatedly emphasized that he wants the United States to lead in 5G and even 6G. True, 6G doesn’t actually exist, but this enthusiasm shows how seriously the Trump Administration takes moving forward on the Federal Communications Commission’s “5G Fast Plan” to open huge swaths of wireless spectrum necessary to support 5G technology.

 

It may therefore surprise you that the one discordant note in the 5G chorus over the last three years keeps coming from within the Trump Administration itself. Federal agencies have mounted an increasingly public campaign against the FCC and the wireless industry. It’s to the point that every FCC announcement of new 5G spectrum is now met with a different federal agency’s announcement that the FCC’s decision will interfere with vital life-protecting services. For example, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) claims that 5G will cause serious interference to weather prediction (it hasn’t). The Department of Transportation claims that 5G will interfere with collision avoidance systems (again, despite recent FCC authorizations for use of this spectrum to boost connectivity during the COVID-19 lockdown, it hasn’t). 

 

Things have now come to an all-out war between the Department of Defense and the FCC, with the Defense Department claiming that a recent decision by the FCC (on a 5-0 bipartisan vote) resolving a decades-long dispute with a company now called Ligado will interfere with vital GPS operations. (The DoD runs the nation’s GPS satellites for military operations, despite the public’s ubiquitous use of GPS.) While the Ligado decision is only a small part of the “5G Fast Plan,” it has split the Trump Administration at the Cabinet level – where Secretary of State Pompeo and Attorney General Barr have supported the FCC and Defense Secretary Esper has attacked the decision. This turf battle has spilled over into Congress, with members of the Senate and House Armed Services Committee issuing dueling statements with members of the Commerce Committee (which has jurisdiction over the FCC). Unless contained, this 5G civil war threatens to paralyze the FCC spectrum process and the rollout of new spectrum for 5G.

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Auctioning a Chunk of 6 GHz Would be Phenomenally Bad Policy.

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Spectrum has once again become a hot topic in telecom. And in what is perhaps the oddest twist in this season’s telenovela Spectrum Wars is that on most of these items I’m in agreement with FCC Chairman Ajit Pai. Hey, gotta mix it up or the ratings are going to sag.

 

Specifically, we have 3 fairly big items on the table to resolved over the next month or two (hopefully!) as part of Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Chairman Ajit Pai’s “5G Fast Plan.” While I am less than persuaded by the 5G hype and the “OMG! China! We must deploy NOW!!!!” these issues have lingered long enough that we bloody well should resolve them and get moving and deploying.

 

If you follow spectrum policy at all, you will have heard about the C-Band Auction and the 5.9 GHz fight. Hopefully I’ll have time to blog more about them. But you would be forgiven if you hadn’t heard much about the fight over opening the 6 GHz band for an unlicensed underlay. “Underlay” means you allow unlicensed users to operate in the same band as licensed users on a non-interfering basis. While this may seem odd to you young ‘uns, underlays used to be the entirety of unlicensed spectrum. The first authorization for unlicensed was entirely an underlay. No one dreamed of providing a band entirely for unlicensed. Remember Mr. Microphone or your iTrip that let you play your iPod over your FM radio? That’s an underlay in the FM band.

 

Opening the 6 GHz band is incredibly important for the future of WiFi, particularly WiFi 6. that makes it super important for its own sake. But if you believe we need to “win the race to 5G,” then getting the 6 GHz unlicensed underlay up and running as quickly as possible is outrageously super urgent. As we keep discovering every time we “G up,” we need a new allocation of unlicensed spectrum alongside the new allocation of licensed spectrum to create space for the new stimulated demand. Despite spending the 00s bashing each others’ brains in (and still finding some die hards who hate either licensed or unlicensed), most folks now agree that licensed and unlicensed spectrum are synergistic, and you need a good allocation of both to keep winning (for whatever value of winning) the spectrum race. USA! USA!

 

Unfortunately, two things invariably happen when the FCC is considering spectrum for unlicensed use. First, all the existing users show up and say: “no no NO! No changes in our spectrum neighborhood! We don’t care how much engineering you do. Allowing unlicensed devices will mean terrible, terrible things and our vital services will crash and burn and everyone will hate you forever.” The other thing that happens is that CTIA, which represents the major wireless carriers and a good chunk of the rest of the industry, shows up and says “hey! If you can use that for unlicensed spectrum, you can use it even better for licensed spectrum!”

 

So no surprise, CTIA has shown up in the 6 GHz band proceeding to demand a chunk of the 6 GHz band get auctioned as well.  Setting aside that CTIA took half the CBRS band away for auction in 2018, gobbled up the remaining 2.5 GHz band from the non-commercial community in 2019, and is now getting over half the C-Band from the satellite community, they insist that a “fair” compromise would be to take half the 6 GHz allocation necessary for WiFi 6 and auction that as well. While CTIA’s voraciousness has a charming consistency to it, taking half the 6 GHz band for auction would be a phenomenally bad idea for a bunch of reasons. Aside from destroying a substantial amount of the utility of WiFi 6 by eliminating half the channels space (the gain/loss is exponential, not arithmetic; losing channels degrades you much more than simply subtracting the individual channel capacity), it would require relocating the existing 6 GHz licensed users (utility companies) and reorganizing the proposed new home for the existing utility company services — the neighboring 7.125 GHz band. That band currently houses lots of complicated top secret DoD operations, which makes the subsequent reorganization and repacking a tad difficult.

 

CTIA’s chief argument to Congress is — no shocker here — money. Spectrum auctions generate cash, although the history of spectrum auctions shows that trying to predict how much cash is almost impossible in any rational way. But for the reasons I will explain below, even if we take CTIA’s estimates of a 6 GHz auction generating $20 billion or so, the government would not actually receive anything close to that revenue. Unlike the C-Band auction, which has fairly predictable costs for relocating the existing users (and some extra revenue to compensate/bribe the satellite guys), relocating the existing 6 GHz users would cost some unpredictable amount of billions which will seriously reduce the net revenue of the auction available for deficit reduction or rural broadband or whatever. this assumes, of course, that the military even can reconfigure its systems to share with licensed use by utilities.

 

I get into all the reasons trying to squeeze in a last minute auction of 6 GHz is a bad idea below. . . .

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I get to deflate the 5G Hype Bubble a Bit at an Unusually Good Senate Hearing.

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Official Washington is generally consumed with all things impeachment — especially the Senate. Nevertheless, other business does go on. So while it surprised many, Senate Commerce Committee Chair Roger Wicker (R-Miss) and Ranking Member Mariah Cantwell (D-WA) scheduled a hearing this morning (Wed. 1/22) on “The 5G Workforce and Other Obstacles to Broadband Deployment.” (Warning! The video of the hearing doesn’t actually begin until about 15 minutes have passed after you hit “play.” Hopefully this will be corrected in the future.) And, in what will no doubt be to the surprise of many, it was actually a pretty good hearing.

 

It was a fairly good hearing. Sparsely attended (members, including Wicker, joked about holding a morning hearing after impeachment proceedings ran until 2 a.m.), but the members who were there were actually trying to find out facts rather than just score some points. Because it was sparsely attended, members had lots of opportunity to ask their questions and get thoughtful responses. It was cordial and substantive. You know, the kind of thing everyone claims they want to see and laments we never have but is actually reasonably common on technical stuff and when it does happen everyone zones out because, lets face it, actual substance on important issues bores the pants off nearly everyone.
 
I was there primarily to address the “barriers to deployment” piece (although I had some things to say about workforce training, which is critically important and a fantastic opportunity to promote digital equity in urban and rural America — hopefully I will be able to write that up in a separate blog post). In particular, I focused on ‘why we should stop stomping on local governments just because carriers repeat over and over that if we don’t give them what they want then China will win the “race to 5G” — whatever the Hell that means.’ (No surprise, but I also put in a plug for opening up the 5.9 GHz band and 6 GHz band for unlicensed use on a non-interfering basis as quickly as possible.)
In addition to everything else, I must add a personal note. In these times, I feel enormously grateful for the opportunity to wear my kippah when testifying before Congress. I am not there as a Jew, or to testify about Israel or some other issue people think is particularly a “Jew thing.” I am there as an American. Proud of my religion and ethnicity, but fully integrated into the world of policy and national affairs. I don’t dress like either of the two Jewish stereotypes you see on television: a Hassid or a Woody Allen clone. I’m a real person. So are all the other Orthodox Jews I know.
Anyway, t get back to the subject at hand, you can read my testimony here. I am reprinting my opening oral statement below.
Stay tuned . . . .

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My Insanely Long Field Guide To The C-Band Spectrum Fight, And Why This Won’t End In December.

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Like most everything else at the FCC these days, problems that have relatively simple and straightforward solutions turn into horrible complicated messes. Take the C-Band, a slice of spectrum that in the U.S. lies between 3.7 GHz and 4.2 GHz. When first authorized for commercial satellite use back in the day, these frequencies were considered far too high to have much value for terrestrial use. These days, of course, 3.7 GHz is considered prime “midband” spectrum perfect for mobile 5G deployment, and sits right on top of the CBRS spectrum the FCC intends to auction next June. So wireless carriers want the FCC to repurpose some or all of it for 5G. In addition, a bunch of folks (including my employer Public Knowledge) support opening up portions of the band in rural areas for point-to-point backhaul (on a secondary basis, which means the backhaul guys need to protect the incumbents from interference).

 

The logical and straightforward thing to do would be to treat this like we did the 700 MHz auction/DTV transition over ten years ago. Tell the C-Band guys “sorry guys, we’re shrinking your available spectrum from 500 MHz to 200 MHz and taking back the other 300 MHz for auction. We’re also going to allow point-to-point backhaul on a non-interfering basis because that will really help rural ISPs. Don’t worry, we’ll set aside some of the auction money for a transition fund.” Sure, the incumbent licensees would scream (they always do), but this is a fairly proven solution that worked well to get us spectrum for 4G (and raised $20 bn for the Treasury) so why not do it again?

 

Or, if you really want to bribe the incumbent licensees, we could do an incentive auction. I’m not a fan, especially when it’s folks who got their licenses for free. But fine. We crossed that bridge awhile ago with the broadcasters, the authority for incentive auctions is now part of 47 U.S.C. 309(j), let’s just use it.

 

But nooooooo . . . . . This FCC in particular seems to love delaying everything while it rethinks all the options so it can come up with its very own wrong decision. Just as the FCC delayed deployment of the CBRS spectrum by 2 years by reopening that proceeding to redo the rules at the behest of the big carriers, now the FCC apparently wants to try a “private auction” under which the current holders of the satellite licenses (as represented by a group of licensees called “C-Band Alliance” or “CBA”) will go off behind closed doors, “auction” the public spectrum themselves, and then promise to give a piece of the money back to the FCC.

 

After snoozing through this for over a year, members of Congress have suddenly woken up and made this all interesting. Why? Analysts estimate that an auction of 300 MHz of C-Band spectrum would yield $50-60 billion in revenue. If the government conducts the auction, then it gets to credit $60 bn as a “payfor” to the budget for things like rural broadband or Trump’s border wall (assuming the Congressional Budget Office, aka CBO, agrees with the estimate). Notably, Senator Kennedy (R-LA) of the appropriations Committee had a little hearing with Chairman Pai where he politely but firmly made it clear to Pai that he thinks a private sale is a dumb idea and he wants a public auction. When that apparently did not work to move the needle, Kennedy jumped over Pai’s head and took the matter to President Trump, although there is no indication that Trump has decided to do anything on the matter.

 

Meanwhile, in the House, Rep. Mike Doyle (D-PA), Chair of the House Telecom Subcommittee, dropped a bipartisan bill, the C-Band Act, that would require the FCC to do an auction. Doyle followed this up with a hearing where the majority of the Members in attendance made it clear they wanted the FCC to run an auction so they could use that money to pay for rural broadband.

 

To understand why the distinction between private sale and public auction matters so much to Congress, you need to understand one of the peculiarities of how Congressional budgeting works and and terms such as “CBO score,” “paygo” and “payfor.” To state the matter quickly, if the FCC holds an auction, CBO can score the projected revenue of the auction as part of its annual budgeting process and that projected revenue can be used to “pay for” other projects under Congress’ “pay as you go” (aka “paygo”) rules. But if the licensees have a private auction, there is no CBO score even if the licensees make a voluntary donation to the FCC. So from the perspective of Congress trying to find money to do stuff, the difference is not between $60 bn and something less than $60 bn. The difference is between $60 bn and zero. Granted, no one in Congress appears to worry about deficits these days, but as Senator Kennedy observed, that money could fund “several other government projects (including the wall),” and $60 bn is not a small amount of money whether you want to fund the wall (like Kennedy) or rural broadband (like the House E&C).

 

But what can Congress do, especially with Chairman Ajit Pai apparently determined to give C-Band Alliance what they want (especially now that AT&T and Verizon have supported C-Band)? Funny thing, we had a similar issue back in 2002 when the Powell FCC tried to move ahead with an unauthorized incentive auction, and Congress stopped that cold despite FCC authorization of the auction.

 

I explain below . . .

 

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Will The FCC Ignore the Privacy Implications of Enhanced Geolocation In New E911 Rulemaking?

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NB: This originally appeared as a blog post on the site of my employer, Public Knowledge.

Over the last three months, Motherboard’s Joseph Cox has produced an excellent series of articles on how the major mobile carriers have sold sensitive geolocation data to bounty hunters and others, including highly precise information designed for use with “Enhance 911” (E911). As we pointed out last month when this news came to light, turning over this E911 data (called assisted GPS or A-GPS), exposing E911 data to third parties — whether by accident or intentionally, or using it in any way except for 911 or other purposes required by law violates the rules the Federal Communications Commission adopted in 2015 to protect E911 data.

Just last week, Motherboard ran a new story on how stalkers, bill collectors, and anyone else who wants highly precise real-time geolocation consumer data from carriers can usually scam it out of them by pretending to be police officers. Carriers have been required to take precautions against this kind of “pretexting” since 2007. Nevertheless, according to people interviewed in the article, this tactic of pretending to be a police officer is extremely common and ridiculously easy because, according to one source, “Telcos have been very stupid about it. They have not done due diligence.”

So you would think, with the FCC scheduled to vote this Friday on a mandate to make E911 geolocation even more precise, the FCC would (a) remind carriers that this information is super sensitive and subject to protections above and beyond the FCC’s usual privacy rules for phone information (called “customer proprietary network information,” or “CPNI”); (b) make it clear that the new information required will be covered by the rules adopted in the 2015 E911 Order; and (c) maybe even, in light of these ongoing revelations that carriers do not seem to be taking their privacy obligations seriously, solicit comment on how to improve privacy protections to prevent these kinds of problems from occurring in the future. But of course, as the phrase “you would think” indicates, the FCC’s draft Further Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (FNPRM) does none of these things. The draft doesn’t even mention privacy once.

 

I explain why this has actual and potentially really bad implications for privacy below.

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Why “Wi-Fi 6” Tells You Exactly What You’re Buying, But “5G” Doesn’t Tell You Anything.

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Welcome to 2019, where you will find aggressively marketed to you a new upgrade in Wi-Fi called “Wi-Fi 6” and just about every mobile provider will try to sell you some “new, exciting, 5G service!” But funny thing. If you buy a new “Wi-Fi 6” wireless router you know exactly what you’re getting. It supports the latest IEEE 802.11ax protocol, operating on existing Wi-Fi frequencies of 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz, and any other frequencies listed on the package. (You can see a summary of how 802.11ax differs from 802.11ac here.) By contrast, not only does the term “5G” tell you nothing about the capabilities (or frequencies, for them what care) of the device, but what “5G” means will vary tremendously from carrier to carrier. So while you can fairly easily decide whether you want a new Wi-Fi 6 router, and then just buy one from anywhere, you are going to want to very carefully and very thoroughly interrogate any mobile carrier about what their “5G” service does and what limitations (including geographic limitations) it has.

 

Why the difference? It’s not simply that we live in a world where the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) lets mobile carriers get away with whatever marketing hype they can think up, such as selling “unlimited” plans that are not, in fact unlimited. It has to do with the fact that back in the early 00s, the unlicensed spectrum/Wi-Fi community decided to solve the confusion problem by eliminating confusion, whereas the licensed/mobile carrier world decided to solve the confusion problem by embracing it. As I explain below, that wasn’t necessarily the wrong decision given the nature of licensed mobile service v. unlicensed. But it does mean that 5G will suffer from Forest Gump Syndrome for the foreseeable future. (“5G is like a box of chocolates, you never know what to expect.”) It also means that, for the foreseeable future, consumers will basically need to become experts in a bunch of different technologies to figure out what flavor of “5G” they want, or whether to just wait a few years for the market to stabilize.

More below . . . .

 

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