[Infowarrior] - Google Offers New Plan for the Airwaves

[Richard Forno]

Google Offers New Plan for the Airwaves

By REUTERS
Published: March 24, 2008

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/24/technology/24google-web.html

Google, the Internet search engine company, released plans on Monday for a
new generation of wireless devices to operate on soon-to-be-vacant
television airwaves and sought to ease fears that this might interfere with
TV broadcasts or wireless microphones.

In comments filed with the Federal Communications Commission, Google
outlined plans for low-power devices that use local wireless airwaves to
access the ³white space² between television channels. A Google executive
called the plan ³Wi-Fi 2.0 or Wi-Fi on steroids.²

³The airwaves can provide huge economic and social gains if used more
efficiently,² Google said in the comments.

Rick Whitt, Google¹s Washington telecom and media counsel, said this class
of Wi-Fi devices could eventually offer data transmission speeds of billions
of bits a second ‹ far faster than the millions of bits a second available
on most current broadband networks. Consumers could watch movies on wireless
devices and do other things that are currently difficult on slower networks.

The white-space airwaves could become available in February 2009, when TV
broadcasters switch from analog to digital signals. Mr. Whitt said he
expected devices using white-space spectrum could be available by the end of
2009.

Shares of Google surged $27.36, to $460.91 amid a sharp rise in the stock
market.

Google sees the white-space spectrum as a natural place to operate a new
class of phones and wireless devices based on Android, Google¹s software
that a variety of major equipment makers plan to use to build Internet-ready
phones.

The company also said that, in general, it stands to benefit whenever
consumers have easier access to the Internet. Google¹s primary business is
selling online ads as people perform Web searches.

The filing came less than two weeks after Bill Gates, a founder of Google¹s
rival, Microsoft, urged the agency to free up the white-space spectrum so it
could be used to expand access of wireless broadband.

Google and Microsoft are part of a coalition of technology companies that
has been lobbying the F.C.C. to allow unlicensed use of white-space
spectrum.

The group also includes Dell, Intel, Hewlett-Packard and the North American
unit of Philips Electronics. The idea is opposed by broadcasters and makers
of wireless microphones, who fear the devices would cause interference.

The FCC is testing equipment to see if the white-space spectrum can be used
without interfering with television broadcasts.

In a compromise intended to mollify some interest groups opposed to
expanding use of white-space spectrum, Google proposed a ³safe harbor² on
channels 36-38 of the freed-up analog TV spectrum for exclusive use by
wireless microphones, along with medical telemetry and radio astronomy
devices. In effect, no white-space devices could use these channels.

Google said ³spectrum-sensing technologies² could be used that would
automatically check to see whether a channel was open before using it,
thereby avoiding interference with other devices. It said such technology
was already being used by the military.

A proposal being studied by the F.C.C. would create two categories of users
for the airwaves: one for low-power, personal, portable devices, and a
second group for fixed commercial operations.