5 ms·

Cell service would be worse off if anyone could decide to broadcast on any frequency; just like the tragedy of the commons[1], putting more emitters in the same

by jfim 14y ago

Cell service would be worse off if anyone could decide to broadcast on any frequency; just like the tragedy of the commons[1], putting more emitters in the same frequencies raises the noise floor until it's simply impossible to get a good signal to noise ratio. Fixed spectrum allocations might not appear to be the best solution, but the alternative is just much worse. While ISPs in Canada suck, here, last mile infrastructure owners are forced to lease their infrastructure to competitors; it means that if I am unhappy with my cable provider's internet service, I can get cheaper service provided by someone else over the same physical infrastructure. As you mention, that competition is healthy, even though the infrastructure owners try to gimp their competitors in every way allowed under the law. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons

zanny 14y ago
It is a short term problem though. in the long run, free spectrum would mean that in the best interests of all parties involved, they would minimize the interference. It isn't profitable for your stuff to be unusable because everyone else is using the same spectrum. I believe the free market would naturally orient itself to correct for interference. Overused bands would be fled from, and the balance between saturation and diversity would be manifest by customer satisfaction. There would be frequent, instantaneous (in long run terms) moments of conflict where problems arise, but as a whole it wouldn't be a rigged, exploitable system by the corrupt that govern it. But we have to argue in ifs, because we have the product of one chain of events. Maybe a system would have arisen with a benevolent market controller who charitably gave their artificially limited spectrum to use. Maybe we would have descended into chaos when our cell phone service got choppy. We don't know because we never tried the alternative. We assume it is bad because in theory it sucks in the beginning, so we stick with what we know to be inherently flawed because we don't have the incentive to try to fix it.
- PeterisP 14y ago
  ".. the best interests of all parties involved, they would minimize the interference." is not really true - this scenario is well researched, and the usual expected result is 'tragedy of commons', where all parties suffer and ruin things for everyone until either (a) consolidation causes an effective monopoly or a strong cartel, or (b) regulation.
  - zanny 14y ago
    It has never been tried in practice. If we take the violent enforcement of artificial limitation on a non-scarce concept (radios can broadcast at frequencies and do so at variable frequencies fairly well) off the table, and the reality that in the absence of such forced regulation a major monopoly is prohibitive because, in the case of the radio industry, because there is no scarce resource here (radio waves can be produced for nigh-nothing after the investment in a radio, which is a markedly low barrier to entry) you can't have a cartel enforce dominance either without expending excessive amounts of resources to deny competitors, and they would bankrupt themselves trying to maintain dominance without actually providing anything useful and unable to extort because the ability to enter the market is too low, and without regulation, they can't create false barriers to entry. Also, actively attacking someones broadcasts for the sole purpose of disruption is still extortion. I'm not nutty enough to think you can go total anarchy, just that artificially constructed scarcity is bad for everyone.
    - jamespo 14y ago
      Has your proposed scenario been tried in practise either? Saying "they would bankrupt themselves" is just supposition with no timeframe - in the meantime everyone suffers.
      - zanny 14y ago
        People are not absolutely predictable, for one, so no one can say what would happen with certainty. I can say what I think would happen. And that is because without the violence to protect them, they are nigh powerless to control the entire electromagnetic spectrum emissions range that can safely transmit signals. In the meantime, right now 300 million plus people are suffering under an artificially controlled market for a resource that has no inherent scarcity. They are crushed by the very rent seekers this article speaks of on goods they can't truly possess without the violence of law to protect their interests, and they are given artificial advantage to abuse the regulations giving them the power to extort others.
    - PeterisP 14y ago
- jfim 14y ago
  Actually, we have the alternative. The 2.4GHz ISM band is unregulated, which means that my old analog cordless phone causes the Wi-Fi to disconnect in half the house(and maybe my neighbors') and my microwave causes a major signal/noise ratio drop. Sure, it somewhat works and if necessary, I can just go sit right next to the Wi-Fi router to watch some cat videos while warming some food. I'd rather have my cell phone always working, though. Besides, if spectrum is unregulated, what prevents company X from interfering with routers from company Y, so that Y's products are perceived as flaky? I mean, even with regulated spectrum, there were still issues between LightSquared's planned broadband network and GPS[1], for example. [1] http://www.gps.gov/spectrum/lightsquared/ http://www.gps.gov/spectrum/lightsquared/
  - zanny 14y ago
    > what prevents company X from interfering with routers from company Y, so that Y's products are perceived as flaky That is still sabotage and possibly extortion if they try to bribe the company. If they weren't providing a real good with the bandwidth they use I would imagine no court would find them not guilty of attacking the company they are targeting.
    - jfim 14y ago
      Doesn't mean that it wouldn't happen in your scenario, though. Corporations can and will skirt the law if they think they can get away with it and derive sufficient benefit from it. In a free for all spectrum, it is much harder to prove that a device is interfering with another, making prosecution lengthy and complex. In the current system, if a device emits outside of its regulated band, its certification or authorization is revoked and the device becomes illegal to sell and operate. The criteria to do so are clear and evaluable from an objective standpoint, unlike interference in a shared spectrum that may or may not be willful and debatable in court. Besides, it's not as if spectrum being freely available will magically make anyone a wireless carrier; there is still a significant up front capital expense to erect cell phone towers, routing calls to the PSTN, handling billing and support. A further proof would be that a corporation could create their own wireless carrier over the unregulated 2.4GHz ISM band by installing Wi-Fi APs and delivering VoIP over that for much less than the cost of erecting cell phone towers over an entire city, yet nobody did that.

by jfim 14y ago

zanny 14y ago

It is a short term problem though. in the long run, free spectrum would mean that in the best interests of all parties involved, they would minimize the interference. It isn't profitable for your stuff to be unusable because everyone else is using the same spectrum. I believe the free market would naturally orient itself to correct for interference. Overused bands would be fled from, and the balance between saturation and diversity would be manifest by customer satisfaction. There would be frequent, instantaneous (in long run terms) moments of conflict where problems arise, but as a whole it wouldn't be a rigged, exploitable system by the corrupt that govern it. But we have to argue in ifs, because we have the product of one chain of events. Maybe a system would have arisen with a benevolent market controller who charitably gave their artificially limited spectrum to use. Maybe we would have descended into chaos when our cell phone service got choppy. We don't know because we never tried the alternative. We assume it is bad because in theory it sucks in the beginning, so we stick with what we know to be inherently flawed because we don't have the incentive to try to fix it.

PeterisP 14y ago
".. the best interests of all parties involved, they would minimize the interference." is not really true - this scenario is well researched, and the usual expected result is 'tragedy of commons', where all parties suffer and ruin things for everyone until either (a) consolidation causes an effective monopoly or a strong cartel, or (b) regulation.
- zanny 14y ago
  It has never been tried in practice. If we take the violent enforcement of artificial limitation on a non-scarce concept (radios can broadcast at frequencies and do so at variable frequencies fairly well) off the table, and the reality that in the absence of such forced regulation a major monopoly is prohibitive because, in the case of the radio industry, because there is no scarce resource here (radio waves can be produced for nigh-nothing after the investment in a radio, which is a markedly low barrier to entry) you can't have a cartel enforce dominance either without expending excessive amounts of resources to deny competitors, and they would bankrupt themselves trying to maintain dominance without actually providing anything useful and unable to extort because the ability to enter the market is too low, and without regulation, they can't create false barriers to entry. Also, actively attacking someones broadcasts for the sole purpose of disruption is still extortion. I'm not nutty enough to think you can go total anarchy, just that artificially constructed scarcity is bad for everyone.
  - jamespo 14y ago
    Has your proposed scenario been tried in practise either? Saying "they would bankrupt themselves" is just supposition with no timeframe - in the meantime everyone suffers.
    - zanny 14y ago
      People are not absolutely predictable, for one, so no one can say what would happen with certainty. I can say what I think would happen. And that is because without the violence to protect them, they are nigh powerless to control the entire electromagnetic spectrum emissions range that can safely transmit signals. In the meantime, right now 300 million plus people are suffering under an artificially controlled market for a resource that has no inherent scarcity. They are crushed by the very rent seekers this article speaks of on goods they can't truly possess without the violence of law to protect their interests, and they are given artificial advantage to abuse the regulations giving them the power to extort others.
  - PeterisP 14y ago
jfim 14y ago
Actually, we have the alternative. The 2.4GHz ISM band is unregulated, which means that my old analog cordless phone causes the Wi-Fi to disconnect in half the house(and maybe my neighbors') and my microwave causes a major signal/noise ratio drop. Sure, it somewhat works and if necessary, I can just go sit right next to the Wi-Fi router to watch some cat videos while warming some food. I'd rather have my cell phone always working, though. Besides, if spectrum is unregulated, what prevents company X from interfering with routers from company Y, so that Y's products are perceived as flaky? I mean, even with regulated spectrum, there were still issues between LightSquared's planned broadband network and GPS[1], for example. [1] http://www.gps.gov/spectrum/lightsquared/ http://www.gps.gov/spectrum/lightsquared/
- zanny 14y ago
  > what prevents company X from interfering with routers from company Y, so that Y's products are perceived as flaky That is still sabotage and possibly extortion if they try to bribe the company. If they weren't providing a real good with the bandwidth they use I would imagine no court would find them not guilty of attacking the company they are targeting.
  - jfim 14y ago
    Doesn't mean that it wouldn't happen in your scenario, though. Corporations can and will skirt the law if they think they can get away with it and derive sufficient benefit from it. In a free for all spectrum, it is much harder to prove that a device is interfering with another, making prosecution lengthy and complex. In the current system, if a device emits outside of its regulated band, its certification or authorization is revoked and the device becomes illegal to sell and operate. The criteria to do so are clear and evaluable from an objective standpoint, unlike interference in a shared spectrum that may or may not be willful and debatable in court. Besides, it's not as if spectrum being freely available will magically make anyone a wireless carrier; there is still a significant up front capital expense to erect cell phone towers, routing calls to the PSTN, handling billing and support. A further proof would be that a corporation could create their own wireless carrier over the unregulated 2.4GHz ISM band by installing Wi-Fi APs and delivering VoIP over that for much less than the cost of erecting cell phone towers over an entire city, yet nobody did that.