[Boing Boing Blog] QUOTE
Open spectrum explained for the laity. Seattle Times has run a great story on the group of "lawyers, engineers and telecommunications analysts" who are lobbying the FCC for cognitive radio and open spectrum.
In an ideal world, the FCC would treat the airwaves like a highway system nobody owns and enforce rules governing how people use its lanes without crashing into each other, the group says. And in cases where this isn't possible, the FCC would allow people to drive across other people's "property" as long as they keep a low profile and don't do any damage.
Given this freedom, inventors and entrepreneurs would invent new vehicles and new ways of using the highway, the thinking goes. Consumers would finance the development of the airwaves by buying the devices that suit them best and abiding by the rules of the road that prevent nasty accidents.
But to make this vision a reality, the devices need a slice of the spectrum that would form a virtual park or an airwaves commons where equipment makers and others could experiment. In addition, common protocols — industry standards that allow devices to understand each others' communications — and rules are needed to prevent accidents and to make sure everyone gets a fair shake.
Link Discuss (Thanks, Howard!) [Boing Boing Blog]
Let's hope the FBI crew that's checking up on War Chalkers, also reads this perspective. I also think there may need to be some standards to avoid electronic smog, where equipment is controlled by signals delivered by wireless, but the wireless can also pick up signals from unrelated activity that is sharing the same spectrum. If the controller cannot tell the difference between the authorzed control signals and the unrelated traffic, then something can crash, which can be very dangerous if that something is robotoic, transportation, medical, public services, etc.
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