Broadcasters, advocacy groups and nonprofits weigh in on Microsoft's magical broadband On Tuesday, Microsoft announced it will pay third-party ISPs in the US to offer wireless broadband on unused TV spectrum, or "white space." As The Register's Kieren McCarthy argued, the financial logic behind this choice is questionable at best – and Microsoft hopes to take a share of revenue spoils. Advocacy groups and …
The current US TVWS rules are very difficult to deal with because the NAB has too much say. TVWS must be absolutely certain to never, ever potentially cause one whit of inteference to any TV broadcast channel, ever, even if the TV owner misconfigures his antenna. It's ridiculous. And yet the NAB continues to try to make it even harder. Then along comes the fool Dampier who thinks that everyone should have fiber, only not on his dime, since in rural areas fiber can cost >$10,000/home while fixed wireless is a fraction of that. TVWS is especially useful for wooded areas where the higher frequencies more often used by Wireless ISPs are blocked by foliage.
In the US cable was originally found in small towns out in the hinterlands to improve broadcast reception. The basic problems faced in the many areas of the US is distance and terrain. Some areas will always have poor signals because of the distances involved which is aided and abetted by the roughness of the the terrain. There are places in the US where there are no radio, TV, or cell phone signals. In these areas the 'last-mile' costs can be horrific no matter what the technology.
The problem of interference should not be discounted because in these areas broadcast signals are often rebroadcast by repeaters on other channels. The channels are assigned to minimize interference with signals from neighboring areas. Start using up all your channels and someone will be fighting rf interference.
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