FCC Pitches Free, Bowdlerized Wireless Internet Access

Aidtopia writes "FCC Chairman Kevin Martin is proposing auctioning off an unused part of the 25 MHz spectrum on the condition that the winner provide free wireless Internet access. The proposal sets coverage targets that ramp up to 95% of the population within 10 years. The catch: the provider must filter out obscene content." I wonder what definition of "obscene" the FCC would like to use.

eww

[norkakn]

Fuck that.

Re:Misspelled

[Intron]

Actually, they misspelled bowdlerized.

Re:Misspelled

[Anonymous Coward]

FCC Pitches Free, Bowlderized Wireless Internet Access... The catch: the provider must filter out obscene content.

You misspelled bastardized.

No, he misspelled Bowdlerized [wikipedia.org].

For example, your original potty-mouthed post might be offensive to sensitive ears, and I've therefore taken the liberty...

You misspelled illegitimized

...of bowdlerizing it.

Either that, or I missed the ironic possibility of your post; that you, like me, regard the act of bowdlerization as an even greater offense than the use of the word "bastard". In which case, IHBT, IHL, and I'll HAND :)

Re:Obscenity has a clear meaning

[bugnuts]

I can't give a definition, but I'll know it when I see it! [wikipedia.org]

What's interesting is that, by obscenity laws, porn would be fine. It really would not be hard for a provider to say "When we're made aware of material that's clearly obscene or illegal, we'll take technological steps to filter it."

But like pirate radio, they will never be able to stop it.

Email the FCC!

[TRAyres]

On the FCC front page, there is a link to all the members of the board, and their emails.

I say we email them.

Lets turn the ./ effect upon our government, and see if maybe, just maybe, we can convince them not to make the same dumb ass mistakes they make every 30 years trying to censor new formats.

Wrong Wrong Wrong

[tweak13]

This isn't the 25MHz spectrum, it's a 25MHz block of the 2.1GHz spectrum. Realizing that makes this story make a whole lot more sense. There's no possible way this would work in the HF range.

Re:50 kHz spectrum at 25 MHz?

[jcgf]

I agree with your concern. If we assume an S/N ratio of 20db (about 3 S units on my HF rig or noise at S6 and signal at S9 which I consider a good copy) then Shannon-Hartley's theorem says that they will get at best 333kbps. I used the example calculation #1 at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shannon%E2%80%93Hartley_theorem [wikipedia.org] and just substituted 50kc for 4kc to get this.

Anyone disagree?

Re:50 kHz spectrum at 25 MHz?

[Gat0r30y]

Federal Communications Commission Chairman Kevin Martin scheduled a vote on rules for another major spectrum auction, one that would encompass 25 megahertz in the 2155-2180 MHz advanced wireless services band and require the winning bidder to offer free broadband service under an aggressive build-out schedule.

The article linked above isn't nearly as good as this [rcrnews.com] one on the details of what spectrum is actually on the block here

Re:Fixed

[jejones]

Sure. "s/obscene/dissenting/g" means "everywhere you see 'obscene', substitute 'dissenting'". It's the syntax of the Unix ed text editor; see this page [die.net] for details.

Re:Obscene Defined

[supersat]

TV and radio are actually held to a higher standard for most of the day: they can't broadcast "indecent" material from 6 AM to 10 PM. In practice, most broadcasters choose not to broadcast "indecent" material at all, possibly for fear of a public outcry or advertisers backing out. Obscenity was defined by the Supreme Court in Miller v. California [wikipedia.org], and is a very tough threshold to meet. Lots of laws prohibit obscene speech, and I'm fairly certain there's a law that prohibits obscene speech from being transmitted on a licensed channel. The FCC is merely upholding the law.

Re:Obscene is easy, its called fun

[Sparks23]

I think the idea is that you buy the wireless spectrum to use it for other things, but are required to provide free internet on part of that spectrum IN ADDITION to whatever your other business plans are.

Re:Obscenity has a clear meaning

[680x0]

Never did anybody other than retarded atheists with nothing else to do claim that christians or jews say the earth is 6000 years old.

Tell that to Archbishop Ussher [wikipedia.org] who, based on following begats and ages listed in Genesis, and other Biblical and historical information, decided that the universe was created nightfall preceding Sunday October 23, 4004 BC, in the proleptic Julian calendar [wikipedia.org].

Re:Obscene is easy, its called fun

[x69]

It's not at the 25 MHz frequency.. It's a 25MHz wide channel in the 2.x GHz frequency.. The /. article was misleading..

It would be almost useless due to noise at 25 MHz frequency..

-G

Re:Obscene is easy, its called fun

[dissy]

At 25 Mhz with a bandwidth of, what? 1 Mhz throughput will be 1 megabit per second shared with hundreds of users. Free wifi in the gigahertz range is already a joke. This system won't have the throughput for (decent) porn, encrypted or not.

That makes it faster than 802.11b!

802.11b only uses 21mhz of the 2.4ghz spectrum.
This auction is for 25mhz worth of the 2.1ghz spectrum, which is More bandwidth, AND in a less crowded portion of the spectrum, which should mean less interference. Ok, granted, I don't know what else uses 2.1ghz currently, but I *do* know how much crap spews out in the 2.4ghz range, and I think its a safe bet to say 2.1ghz won't be as crowded.

If 10mbps isn't fast enough for porn, perhaps you should look to DVDs or magazines instead of using the internet :P