Washington – Part of the public airwaves should be reserved for “open access” so cellphone users could choose any device, not just what their wireless carrier offers, the nation’s top telecommunications regulator said Tuesday.
“Consumers would be able to use the wireless device of their choice and download whatever software they want,” Federal Communications Commission chairman Kevin Martin said at a House telecom subcommittee hearing.
The panel called Martin and four other commissioners to discuss auctioning off a big chunk of airwaves in January. Those airwaves formerly were used by analog TV broadcasters, but are being freed up as television moves into the digital age. Emergency first responders and wireless carriers are eager to get access to more frequencies.
In general, Democrats want the FCC to set auction rules that help consumers. Republicans want few rules in order to attract more bidders.
Although Martin wants to reserve some airwaves for open access, he rejected a much more far-reaching proposal made last week by Google Inc., the Internet-search engine giant from Mountain View, Calif.
Google CEO Eric Schmidt told Martin in a letter that his company would be willing to spend $4.6 billion at the auction, but only if the FCC were to force winning bidders to set aside a third of their spectrum for resale on a wholesale basis.
By forcing companies to offer spectrum wholesale to others, the FCC would increase competition, the argument goes.
But typically, spectrum buyers want to keep it for themselves to attract customers to their wireless services. AT&T strongly objects to Google’s proposal, which it says would rig bidding in Google’s favor. Republicans generally view Google’s idea as too much government interference.
