WASHINGTON-Conventional wisdom in Washington is that spectrum is scarce, while in reality 60 percent to 80 percent of the prime spectrum in Washington is not being used, said Michael Calabrese, vice president and director of spectrum programs at the New America Foundation.
Calabrese was a panelist at a luncheon forum Thursday to unveil “The State of the Commons 2003/2004,” a new report by the Friends of the Commons. The luncheon was hosted by the New America Foundation.
“The airwaves are a gift of nature that modern technology has turned into a valuable economic resource,” reads the report. “Today, spectrum policy is at a crossroads. New digital technology makes it possible for ‘smart receivers’ to pick out only the signals they need. Signal interference thus is, or soon will be, a thing of the past-which makes exclusive licenses unnecessary. The airwaves could be an open access commons.”
The report hopes to educate the public about how the airwaves are a part of a common wealth that should be protected and maintained for the common goal.
The commons report is fashioned after a corporate annual report, “but it is quite critical of the management,” said Peter Barns, co-founder of the Working Assets think tank and one of the authors of the report.
Airwaves are one of six sectors examined in the report. The next report-due in 2005-will look at other common sectors. The other sectors examined are water, culture, science, quiet and the sky.
Calabrese has long advocated a system of leasing spectrum rights and using the process for educational purposes. On Thursday, he suggested that the money could be used to develop content for education.
The spectrum-usage statistic Calabrese highlighted came from an experiment New America conducted this summer with the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, where it tested the use of the spectrum between the roof of its building in the Dupont Circle neighborhood and the White House. Calabrese said that DARPA estimates that more than 90 percent of the prime spectrum-below 3 GHz-is not in use nationwide.
A participant at the forum suggested that the concept of the commons was anti-market, but David Bollier, co-founder of Public Knowledge, disagreed.
“Insisting on limits is not anti-markets any more than building limits in Washington are anti-market,” said Bollier. By law, no building in Washington can be taller than the Washington Monument.
