I think that in practice the idea of privately owned spectrum really came into its own with the original scheme used for analog cell phone service. The incumben

I think that in practice the idea of privately owned spectrum really came into its own with the original scheme used for analog cell phone service. The incumbent phone companies were given their own exclusive spectrum and the competitive cell phone company (originally there was only one) got their own exclusive spectrum. This A band, B band system actually worked fairly good compared to the sort of thing happening with the landline monopolies. Obviously the system couldn't be expanded to a market with more than two entities without causing a lot of inefficiency. The regulators did this expansion anyway and that led to the insanity we have today.