Google urges FCC to use fallow 'white space' for nationwide broadband

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Google didn’t have to win any spectrum last week to get what it wanted out of the auction—open access to the resulting wireless networks for third-parties. (How Verizon Wireless and AT&T will coöperate in that regard remains to be seen.) But Google isn’t done throwing its weight around. Now the Mountain View-based corp has set its eyes on the unused “white space” that resides between broadcast TV channels 2 and 51. Reason?

Google has dreams of delivering nationwide wireless broadband. Think of the ad revenue.

In a letter to the FCC, Google (and its partners, which include Microsoft and Intel) urged the federal agency to use this “once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to provide ubiquitous wireless broadband access to all Americans,” with Google & Co. doing the providing. That the move would also increase broadband competition in the U.S. is but a happy coincidence.

Given that WiMax still hasn’t gotten off the ground, and may well stink on ice, maybe we should look to Google and other like-minded companies to implement an alternative. And if what Google says is even remotely true, that we’d be incredibly stupid to allow the “white space” to remain unused, what’s there to lose? If nothing else, at least the company’s pleas will rattle the cages, just as it did with the last week’s auction.

Google Pushes FCC to Develop
TV Airwaves for Web Access
[Wall Street Journal]