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Google Urges Washington Action On White Spaces

As we've noted before, Google, Microsoft, Dell, Motorola and others want to use television "white spaces" to provide high-speed wireless service to mobile devices and laptops. These "white spaces" are the unused frequencies between television channels, which are said to be very powerful and can penetrate walls and travel long distances. On Wednesday, Google co-founder Larry Page urged the Federal Communications Commission to give companies unlicensed access to the white spaces prior to November's election.

Broadcasters, of course, are opposed to the idea. They think that opening up the TV white spaces for use by mobile devices could interfere with their signals. "All the FCC needs to say is that we will allow people to use the spectrum in an unlicensed way if their devices don't interfere," Page recently said in Washington. In a test earlier this summer, FCC engineers found that prototype white space devices did create some interference with broadcast signals.

The so-called White Spaces Coalition, which Page is representing, includes Microsoft, Dell, and Motorola, HP, Intel, Philips, Earthlink, Samsung and various civil-rights groups and rural organizations that think opening the channels could make the Internet more accessible in remote areas.

Read the whole story at The Wall Street Journal »

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