The short story is that we got some of what we wanted, but not enough. While there are some open access requirements on a piece of the spectrum, the rules aren't strong enough and there's a lot of room for cheating. Google might still bid, of course, though that's somewhat unlikely.
There will not be a wireless third pipe through this spectrum, but key concepts have been advanced and conceded in public discourse, like open access. There was a potential 3-2 majority for what we wanted, but the strong pressure from Congressional Republicans and relative silence from Congressional Democrats meant we just weren't able to get there. Significant exceptions were Byron Dorgan, Chip Pickering, Ed Markey, and John Dingell. Both the Clinton and Obama campaigns were silent, while Edwards was great.
The telecom and cable companies have longterm relationships with lots of members, and they own the Republican Party. The free media movement is getting there, but it takes time to build a network of staffers, members, and regulatory allies. The other side had eighty years, but the logic and coalition for this kind of eventual policy change is too strong, and the business case for openness is clear.
As a progressive institution that has generated over $50 million in new funding to our movement by running an independent telecommunications company, Working Assets knows how communications media - and the rules that govern them - can launch a movement or threaten to snuff it out.
The FCC is in the process of planning one of the most significant auctions of wireless spectrum in history. Tomorrow it will set forth rules for how an important slice of the wireless spectrum - the 700 MHz frequency - will be sold off. While little known and less understood, this auction promises more massive impact on the progressive movement than perhaps even media ownership rules. And depending on what happens in the coming weeks, the aftermath will bring either harsh repercussions or fantastic opportunities for our movement in the years to come.
What's at stake in this auction is more than encouraging competition and innovation in the broadband and wireless phone industries. It's about making sure that the principle of network neutrality - freedom of speech on our communication networks - applies to our mobile and wireless networks as well as to the internet.
In early June 30,000 members of the Working Assets activism network contacted the FCC urging them not to set rules for the auction that essentially giveaway this part of the public spectrum to big telecom companies like AT&T and Verizon.
Health insurers block progress toward universal health care. Big Oil corrupts our energy policy. Banks and lenders make money on the backs of college students forced to repay huge loans. Agribusiness benefits from government subsidies at the expense of small farms.
This was Barack Obama's populist message this morning at the Adeline C. Marston Elementary School here, one of three public campaign stops in the last two days in New Hampshire. To Republicans, casting business as an enemy of change may sound like a tired trope of the left. But Obama laid the blame for inertia on health care, energy independence, and other issues squarely at the feet of select industries and their lobbyists.
On health insurance, for example, Obama repeated his pledge to sign a universal health care bill by the end of his first term, saying, "I shouldn't have better health insurance than you since you're paying the bill for my health insurance."
This is very different than the call for universal health care in January. Today, he's directly blaming the lobbyists and industries. In January, he was blaming cynicism and unnamed skeptics. Here's a representative passage:
Google just committed to spend $4.6B on spectrum licenses auctioned by the FCC if they attach conditions on openness in the bidding process. Susan Crawford has the details on what this means. This is a big deal, and I'll try to explain in simple terms.
Right now, our public airwaves are controlled by Sprint, Verizon, ATT, and T-Mobile. You can't do anything if you don't go through those four companies, which leads to crappy service, early termination fees, high costs, low competition, and locked our entrepreneurs. The FCC is set to auction a huge chunk of our public airwaves this summer, and is trying to figure out what conditions to attach the sale. Public interest advocates have been saying that a series of open rules, which allow for innovation on these networks by outside groups (either phone makers or wireless entrepreneurs), need to be a condition of the auction. Right-wingers have been arguing that this will reduce the value of the auctioned spectrum, which means that the government won't bring in enough money for what they are auctioning off if they attach these open conditions to the spectrum. In other words, AT&T said to Google, put up or shut up.
And Google just put up. They said, well, we'll bid a minimum of $4.6B for an open public airwaves. The FCC can now make rules on open access without worrying about receiving cash from the sale, since the cash is there.
All of this follows a reversal of AT&T's position on open access. After FCC Chairman Kevin Martin made moves for an 'open access lite' in response to our pressure and Ed Markey, Chip Pickering, and John Dingell, AT&T threatened to sue the FCC. A few days later, chief AT&T lobbyist Jim Cicconi denied it had ever considered opposing Martin's plan.
This has been a huge few months in the net neutrality and public airwaves fight. It's hard to understate the progress we've made towards an open and universal internet. But this is also a model for a new political coalition. As Crawford notes, Google is going to make a lot of money here, seeking to create a dynamic auction system for spectrum much as it does for advertising. That's a new business model, and one that is both very exciting and a potentially very important driver for innovation in our economy.
Back in April, I wrote a post on MyDD titled 'Why You Can't Get Your iPhone', basically laying out the dynamic that's at work in the spectrum fight I've been blogging about since then. My interest in telecom policy comes from 2000, when I first read Larry Lessig and his work on free culture. I started blogging on net neutrality in 2005, and working against the COPE Act in the House led to a much richer understanding of how the right exercises power. It also led to the primary campaign against Al Wynn by progressive challenger Donna Edwards.
There's lots and lots of stuff that happened over the last few days with regards to spectrum. Apparently today in the hearing Dingell, who just bought an iPhone, got angry when he learned he's locked into AT&T. Nothing is better for your position than when a Chair of a powerful House Committee gets mad on behalf of your position due to personal experience with a policy outcome, so it shouldn't surprise you that the hearing today was spectacular for our side. Tim Karr has a good update. The big news is Bush appointee FCC Chairman Kevin Martin's supposed embrace of some form of openness in the wireless spectrum. It's entirely unclear to me what kind of game he's playing. This post at Obsidian Wings has a very cynical but credible view, one Art Brodsky explains in simpler language. And if you want a less cynical but very good explanation of all the dynamics, Harold Feld has a great post.
Basically, the gist is that Martin is making some tentative moves towards openness in devices, which is far from openness in the network itself. But that is huge progress and much further than the smart money thought just a few months ago. Rick Whitt at Google and Susan Crawford have more.
I know this is a bit wonky, so I'm going to have Ben Scott stop by tomorrow to explain what happened. His video generated around 3000 views, and was featured on Youtube, which is remarkable for a video blog of a lobbyist discussing telecom policy details for four minutes.
I'm honestly kind of stunned how much progress we've made. The massive grassroots campaign to the FCC put this issue on the radar for the Commission and for Congress, leading to John Kerry's statement. Both Google and Citigroup have played huge roles in this, as have a number of other large corporations, or so I'm told. Lots of Republican Senators and House Commerce Committee members are fighting us publicly, and our Presidentials have been rather weak, with the significant exception of John Edwards.
So to those who participated in this campaign, you are part of a massive coalition with large businesses, intellectuals like Tim Wu and Susan Crawford, public interest groups like Public Knowledge and Free Press, progressive companies like Working Assets, and advocacy groups like Moveon. This is a multibillion dollar fight over the nature of democracy, and you're having a real impact.
This internet's pretty wild. Stay tuned for some more Ben Scott tomorrow.
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