Congress Lets The FCC’s Spectrum Auction Authority Lapse For No Good Reason
from the bang-up-job dept
Last week, Congress failed to shake off corruption and buckled to a telecom industry’ smear campaign to scuttle the nomination of Gigi Sohn to the FCC. This week, the government body shifted from corruption to ordinary incompetence, after it failed to renew the FCC’s Spectrum Auction authority for no coherent reason.
The FCC is in charge of managing our scarce wireless spectrum troves on behalf of its technical and rightful owner, the American public. For the last thirty years, like clockwork, Congress has renewed the agency’s authority to manage and auction this important resource. Until last week when Congress just… couldn’t be bothered to get around to it:
“Yesterday, for the first time since the agency gained this authority 30 years ago, Congress failed to extend it when the Senate refused to act. The House did its work – we unanimously passed a bipartisan bill introduced by me and Chair Rodgers last month to extend the spectrum auction authority to May 19th. Our legislation would have prevented this lapse in authority.”
Unlike the Sohn scrum, which was basically just Congress being too fucking corrupt to function in the public interest, nobody, anywhere (including industry), actually wanted the FCC’s spectrum auction authority to lapse. Yet it did thanks to what appears to be dumb, pointless wrangling:
Sens. Mike Rounds, R-S.D., the sponsor of legislation that would extend the FCC authority until Sept. 30, and co-sponsor Mazie K. Hirono, D-Hawaii, sought unanimous consent to pass their legislation Thursday, but Sen. Peter Welch, D-Vt., objected.
Welch supported an extension through May 19, the date included in a bill the House passed last month, spokeswoman Emily Becker said. She said the longer extension would have been a disincentive to a swift agreement on behalf of consumers, saying the public interest would be better served if Congress and stakeholders arrived at an agreement as quickly as possible.
So, as it currently stands, the FCC still lacks a voting majority to do much of anything meaningful or controversial because Congress buckled to a bad faith industry smear campaign against a popular reformer. Now the FCC lacks the authority to manage wireless spectrum because a dumb, pointless dispute by a handful of Senators.
Consumer groups were quick to note that this is a bit of a pattern when it comes to federal telecom oversight and regulatory competency lately. Government continues to throw billions of dollars at a “digital divide” lawmakers claim is a top priority, yet lawmakers can’t seem to do basic things to ensure the nation’s top telecom and media regulator has the staff or authority needed to do its job.
Filed Under: congress, digital divide, fcc, high speed internet, spectrum, telecom, wireless
Comments on “Congress Lets The FCC’s Spectrum Auction Authority Lapse For No Good Reason”
Wait does this mean the FCC no longer has the authority to manage spectrum?
So does this mean we can all get down the the business of building tons electronic devices the interfere with anything and everything (and harmfully at that)? Or does it just mean they lack authority for new regulations?
If the answer to the previous to the previous question is “current regulation is also no longer applies”, where are we with the distribute-ability of electronic devices? Can no devices (that emit radiation… which is all electronic devices) be sold? Or is it that all devices can be sold?
Re: Funny that
FCC Just paid off the High UHF channel holders to go DOWN to VHF.
Would you like to figure that?
OR how about ATSC, and WHY its not included in every TV, for USE on Local Broad cast TV.
Strange Things are happening out there.
Re: Re:
Seriously doubt that anyone still mass produces TVs with NTSC analog tuners these days, considering ATSC 1.0 has been the broadcast standard since the 2009 digital transition and low-power stations stopped transmitting in analog several years later.
The only ATSC tuners that have yet to be included on every TV are those capable of receiving 3.0 signals, and that’s because there’s no required 3.0 transition yet nor has every manufacturer begun producing TVs or set-top boxes with tuners supporting 3.0 signal reception.
Re: legalities
…you need a much longer time perspective than 30 years
Congress and FCC have no Constitutional authority at all to control the radio frequency spectrum
American radio frequency airwaves were originally open & free to everyone, similar to the internet.
But the Federal Radio Act of 1912 blatantly & illegally seized half the useable RF spectrum solely for the government/military.
A shameful pattern of Federal bullying and special-interest corrupt regulation of the remaining spectrum followed … resulting in the ‘Radio Act of 1927’ establishing the Federal Radio Commission bureaucracy (now the FCC).
The airwaves were simply declared Federal property under Commission control.
There is no legal reason why the Feds should decide who gets to use the RF spectrum (and how), any more than the Feds have legal power to control use of the Internet.
Re: Re:
Yeah, whoever has the most effective radiated power everywhere should have control. Stupid government!
Re: Re:
The alternative would be preferable I suppose. The wild wild west in frequency disputes, outright jamming and airwaves so polluted that it’s completely useless like so many other things.
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Still super glad Sohn is gone.
Nothing corrupt about it, she just sucks.
Re:
So stupidity rather than corruption. Got it.
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Re: Re:
it’s not even your country, what the fuck do you know about it?
Re: Re: Re:
More than you, apparently.
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Re: Re: Re:2
Based on previous responses I cannot think of a single thing that is true of.
Re: Re: Re:3
How right you are.
Re:
…said nobody mentally competent, ever.
Re: Ms. Sohn and Mr. Bennett's objections
Mr. Bennett,
Please articulate exactly what, based on verifiably factual evidence in the public domain, exactly what you find objectionable about Ms. Sohn, and why?
Why is it fine with you for AT&T, T-Mobile, and others to purchase RF spectrum for no other reason than to keep in place barriers to competition – isn’t that a case of government (and thus government approved action) regulated monopolies “picking winners and losers”? In fact, they do not use that spectrum. Not at all. Not for one minute in a year.
Why, exactly, can a country like Estonia have ubiquitous cell phone coverage for about 1/10th the price of US coverage, when their costs are largely the same? They buy the same equipment. They pay about the same for their engineers and technicians. And when an Estonian cell plan says “unlimited” – it’s actually unlimited talk, text, AND DATA. No caps, no overage fees, no throttling, consistent 5G speeds. So – are you telling me little old Estonia (wonderful place, I enjoy visiting there) can do something that we, in the USA, cannot?
Next, let us know why it’s fine for AT&T to remove copper infrastructure and force people in small rural towns to go purchase a cell phone because the wired copper network has been ripped out and the copper sold for scrap? In many cases, this copper network was built by the communities, home owners, or general contractors, NOT AT&T or the phone company. At a high cost compared to POTS lines, I will add.
Also, ‘splain to us why it’s fine for Internet companies to collect and sell internet usage data, including what domain names you’ve visited, for a profit to anyone that is willing to pay for it. Sort of like having a 24/7/365 pen register on your phone – which, if you’ve set up WiFi calling because your cell doesn’t offer unlimited talk, the cable company also can capture.
These are things Sohn was going to stop. So, please, let us know what you find objectionable – other than the right wing told ya “She’s a bad, bad woman! BOO! SCARY!”
Re: Re:
They have ubiquitous coverage because they are a small country with no mountains or deserts.
They have an effective regulator, rather than the political football that the US calls a regulator.
Re: Re: Re: Good points, but particularly about the lack of effective regulation
Though let’s not forget that, going by the Telecommunications Act of 1996, the US has had 26 years to build broadband infrastructure in areas with unfavorable geography. Large ISPs have been taking and keeping the subsidies that were supposed to go toward getting over the inconvenience of establishing universal service. They could do it just fine by focusing on breaking even in the long term, especially because the marginal cost of transferring data after the infrastructure is in place is almost nothing.
Re: Re: Re:2
That comes down to point 2, the regulator being a political football, plus campaign contributions buying politicians.
Re: Re: Re:
They have ubiquitous coverage because they are a small country with no mountains or deserts.
I don’t remember off hand which year, but AT&T got a USD 12,000,000,000.00 (12 billion) multi year grant to install fibre in several areas, including the Rocky Mountain and White Mountain area.
Yet not one single inch of fibre was laid with that grant.
They have an effective regulator, rather than the political football that the US calls a regulator.
Well, that explains that quite effectively. However, I was hoping to bring Mr. Bennett to that particular place setting at that particular table.
Even the turtle would have managed to fulfill this obligation. We deserve FAR better than these clowns are providing. DEFUND THE POLITICIANS. They clearly need to be reminded that they are “public servants”, not ROYALTY.
Re:
If only that were possible, but the best that could be done is build some more formidable mass campaign to primary politicans who can’t be bothered to do their jobs (something along the lines of Justice Democrats or Brand New Congress, but with a far wider support reach).
The fact that Congress can’t even agree to renew the FCC’s spectrum auction authority is particularly striking, given anything that benefits industry they usually make an effort to get passed (raising corporate taxes being a minor exception, since Republicans never want to do that and not every Democrat wants to do that).
This is a perfect example of why the idiots who thing all federal programs should expire and have to be renewed every few years should be tossed. Renewing the FCC Authority should have been a no brainer but they could not even do that and some politicians think SocSec and Medicare would be renewed.
Meaning?
“…for no good reason” Doesn’t that apply to pretty much everything Congress does? They have plenty of BAD reasons for doing things when viewed from the perspective of ordinary citizens. They have plenty of GOOD reasons for doing things when viewed from their own perspectives — huge sums of money ensuring almost certain reelection and unlimited power.
The Auction-Spectrum disorder strikes again.
I can’t twist the truth, it knows no regulation
Handful of senators don’t pass legislation
Facts please
No, she gave up.
That’s clear too. They’re busy fighting the first amendment, banning hunting rifles that are used an a fraction of one percent of gun crimes, and bull-headedly attempting to destroy our country by pretending the planet isn’t in the end stages of an ice age and naturally warming. pumping out destructive rules and laws for our country no other country has to follow.
When both parties are stuck in driving for their personal fame and nonsense… this is what happens.