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LARIAT.NET's Spectrum Travails

  • First 10 years were great.... With only a few easily resolved conflicts over spectrum (e.g. with Metricom, which sought to monopolize 900 MHz)

  • Now being affected by "tragedy of the commons" on unlicensed bands

  • While LARIAT.NET does what it can to engineer superior unlicensed solutions, it is now being crowded off the unlicensed bands by everything from cordless phones to baby monitors

  • Many gigahertz of unused spectrum in our area, but we cannot use it

  • Other potential bands, such as 3650 MHz, tied up in political red tape

  • Our analysis shows that licensed spectrum -- even at FCC's minimum bid (5 cents per MHz per unit population) -- is so expensive that a savings account has better ROI than broadband operation on auctioned spectrum

  • Most other providers are in same situation: Spectrum scarcity hinders deployment of reliable services that people want and need

  • How did we get into this mess? Is there a way out of it?