[opendtv] Microsoft Nudges FCC to Wrap White Spaces

From: "Manfredi, Albert E" <albert.e.manfredi@xxxxxxxxxx>
To: "opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" <opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Wed, 22 Jun 2011 19:41:14 -0500
Here's some well-deserved irony:

"Such devices likely would communicate their position to the database through 
integrated GPS technology, which is now the subject of interference from 
LightSquared, ..."

EXACTLY.

Bert

---------------------------------
http://www.tvtechnology.com/article/122012

Microsoft Nudges FCC to Wrap White Spaces
06.22.2011.

WASHINGTON: Microsoft is leaning on federal regulators to finalize the rules 
for operating unlicensed devices in unoccupied TV channels. A select team of 
Microsoft executives met with staff at the Federal Communications Commission 
last week to exalt the use of so-called "white spaces" for long-range 
Wi-Fi-like connections.

Dan Reed of Microsoft "described a range of the potential white spaces 
applications, including whole-home or whole-building wireless networking; 
campus-wide networking; entertainment and gaming; municipal operations such as 
environmental monitoring and security; rural broadband access... educational 
networking; machine-to-machine communication; and inventory and logistics," the 
ex parte FCC filing documenting the meeting stated.

Reed, corporate vice president of Technology Strategy and Extreme Computing, 
described Microsoft's white-space trials at its Redmond, Wash., campus, and one 
expected soon in the United Kingdom using the company's SenseLess TV channel 
database technology. U.S. regulators are requiring that unlicensed devices ping 
a TV-channel database in order to locate unused frequencies and not interfere 
with TV signals.

Microsoft is one of 10 companies proposing to manage such a database. Its 
SenseLess technology "combines knowledge of every licensed TV signal in the 
U.S. with detailed topographic maps and models to determine how signals 
dissipate over distance and terrain," according to MIT's Technology Review. 
Microsoft is also expected to build some sort of unlicensed device, since it 
supplied prototypes to the FCC for testing.

Such devices likely would communicate their position to the database through 
integrated GPS technology, which is now the subject of interference from 
LightSquared, an emerging satellite broadband initiative It's not yet clear how 
the LightSquared factor would affect the efficacy of a white-space database in 
preventing unlicensed-device interference with TV channels and wireless mics, 
which operate in the TV band.

The Microsoft detachment urged the FCC to rule on pending petitions for 
reconsideration and to determine the white-space database managers. They also 
asked the FCC contingent to resolve a recommendation in the National Broadband 
Plan to establish "a new contiguous unlicensed spectrum band."

~ Deborah D. McAdams , Television Broadcast

 
 
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[opendtv] Microsoft Nudges FCC to Wrap White Spaces

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