« BACK  |  PRINT

RS

FRONT PAGE CONTRIBUTOR

Tech at Night: FCC reform, Protecting buggy whip makers, Spectrum, Democrat hacks website

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  May 26th, 2012 at 04:00 AM  | 

RESIZE: AAA

Tech at Night

Imagine if we’d banned automobiles because all the old business models that were destroyed by them got government protection. Imagine a government that unfairly killed innovation in order to give well-connected businessmen a leg up on upstart competition. That’s what big media outlets are asking for when they come after Dish Network’s innovative DVR service. And of course, given the Obama administration’s track record of unfairly picking winners and losers, they might get what they want.

Cybersecurity update: New Jersey Democrat Felix Roque arrested for trying to break into a website trying to recall him.

I again am thankful that Joe Barton got term limited out of being Chairman when I see him being a big bully against private business. For shame. Stearns has done good work, and I can forgive an occasional mistake. But big government all the time is the norm for Barton this Congress. Primary this man please.

Another person I can forgive for his transgressions is Mike Lee, who’s making sense on spectrum on Verizon/Comcast. I wish he’d give up his Jihad against Google, but we’ll work on that.

A name that looks to become a regular in Tech at Night is Steve Scalise, who’s apparently taking Darrell Issa’s lead to reform the FCC by suspension.

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Get Alerts

COMMENTS

POSTING RULES  |  LOGIN TO COMMENT  |  REGISTER TODAY
  • trutexan

    would carry as much weight as the legal argument FOR Obamacare. None. Crying whiney babies.

  • Dave_A

    The original commercial skipping (dial-up powered) DVR…

    The manufacture of THAT was sued too, but went bankrupt before the case could reach a verdict…

    ReplyTV ended up getting bought out by DirecTV, so we’ll probably see THEM offer a ‘hopper-style’ service too…

  • Dave_A

    for terrestrial use, like they did with LS…

    Somehow I suspect this is what Verizon is trying to do (use satellite frequencies for terrestrial LTE)…..

  • http://www.THATAmyMiller.com Amy Miller

    “Dish is undermining legitimate consumer choice by undercutting authorized on-demand service and by offering a service that, if not enjoined, will ultimately destroy the advertising-supported ecosystem,” Fox lawyers wrote in a complaint.

    What does this even mean? It’s barely a sentence. Here, I fixed it:
    “Dish is undermining legitimate consumer choice by allowing consumers to do what they want.” OH, THE HORROR.

  • http://www.hakubi.us/ Neil Stevens

    Oh right, we all do.

  • civil truth

    And of course, given the Obama administration?s track record of unfairlyingly picking whinners and losers…

    Much better now.

  • http://www.hakubi.us/ Neil Stevens

    I often do need actual editing. :)

  • Dave_A

    Competition is great… I’m all for it…

    But I am not for bulldozing over existing RF spectrum users in the name of more cell-phone/wireless-data coverage.

    Satellite-based technologies (none of which compete with or are even in the same market as cell-phones) are very interference/cross-talk sensitive, and if the FCC lets cell carriers start using adjacent bands it will have a negative impact on the EXISTING users of various satellite based technologies…

    That’s why I wasn’t ‘for’ LightSquared in that past situation (The bought-and-paid-for WAAS GPS installed-base should trump ‘I want to start a new wireless-data carrier’), and why I’m wary of this situation (I say wary because unlike LS, there is a possibility that the spectrum in question could be used without interfering)…

    One of the legitimate roles of the FCC, is to de-conflict spectrum usage, so I don’t see this as an overstep.

    I agree with your view of broadcast TV (dinosaur), but I don’t agree that expanding wireless data availability & competition should trump all other spectrum uses… Especially when we’re talking about stuff used for aviation navigation (which isn’t an issue this time, but was for LightSquared).

  • Dave_A

    When they refer to ‘consumer choice’ they refer to the ability of consumers to ‘choose’ to get OTA TV instead of subscribe to Dish/Direct/Cable… They really don’t care about the ‘choice’ to watch without commercials, as they consider skipping the ads no better than downloading the show from Pirate Bay….

    Hence suing ReplayTV last time, and suing Dish this time…

  • http://www.hakubi.us/ Neil Stevens

    How is any of this relevant to your claim above?

    You’re digressing badly here.

    What specific sat spectrum are you saying conflicts with that specific terrestrial spectrum that you expect to be approved?

  • Dave_A

    As we don’t need any more repetitions of LightSquared (which should never have been approved in the first place)….

    The only spectrum that cable companies logically would have licenses for, is satellite spectrum – unless they happen to be holding onto bits from failed terrestrial-microwave experiments back in the 80s…

    Licensing that to VZW for mobile-data use, would put *mobile* terrestrial trancivers all over the place, possibly interfering with other satellite services.

    Since we’ve seen what happens once a company is granted a license, and it’s later found out that the method by which they intend to use it will interfere with other (rather important) services…

    I’d like to see the FCC be absolutely sure that giving Verizon this spectrum won’t harm other non-cellular-related RF services…

  • http://www.hakubi.us/ Neil Stevens

    Hmm

  • PowerToThePeople

    of any branch of the government giving their “approval” before a private company can make the decision to grow, expand, add business, buy another company, etc. I do not claim to be an expert in this whole mess and that is why I try to keep up with these tech at night posts, but I get the feeling the whole Verizon issue is just another way for the FCC to keep control on how the private company Verizon conducts their own business.