Do spectrum rights have the characteristic of property? If you use a fault-tolerant ethernet-like protocol, multiple businesses can use the same frequency. For example, car remote door controllers use unallocated spectrum, and are designed to be very fault-tolerant. Does someone have to be granted exclusive rights to a frequency, in order for it to be efficiently used? Or, can spectrum be a shared resource? I suspect "spectrum is a shared resource" is the correct free market answer.
Saturday, December 6, 2008
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3 comments:
The spectrum supposed to be all divided up into freely sold and privately held pieces. It is not a "common resource". It is not, because it is "squattable". Because of this, there will be de-facto ownership of frequency ranges. Since there will be de-facto ownership, we now need to attempt to establish a system that would guarrantee such private ownership to be attainable fairly and efficiently. Such system is free market.
That is what it supposed to be. Now, about what it is:
Since we do not have freedom, but instead we have a dictature of majority, such free market in radio spectrum is inapplicable. The government must see to it to prevent fair and efficient use of the spectrum. Therefore it dictatorially allocates frequency bands, and reserves the right to dictatorially change the format of transmission or even take back the resource. Do not let the fact that it "sells" (rents) the frequencies to fool you into thinking there is a free market at work. There is a market, but it is not free.
Back to what it supposed to be:
In the freedom, the spectrum would be first squatted, and then privately divided up and sold and resold between all willing to participate forever. Just as with the land. This system insures that a more efficient user or a resource attains more of it to use, meaning that the same resource will be used at it's maximum efficiency at any given time. It also insures that this resource is going to freely compete on it's luxurious qualities as well as on it's productive ones. Meaning that anybody efficient in some other area of the free market and not necessarily in radio, will be able to acquire a band at his/her leisure. This last feature insures that there will always be time for fun, just like there always be time for work.
Back to the mob rule:
None of this is true in dictatorial regime. The government typically reserves the right to initially "designate" the ownership of spectrum bands, and then to "regulate" their use without removing the possibility of confiscation, as if the government "owned" it to begin with, or even "knew" how to judge efficiency.
In actuality, this is done to make sure there is no fairness nor efficiency in use of a given resource under dictatorial powers of majority. This latter is clearly the case, because in absence of free market (unregulated market), the profit can only be made by monopolizing a particular kind of economic action. I.e. I want a license from the thug government, to prevent my neighbor from competing with me. Once established, such order makes more profit by creating shortages, rather than by increasing the quantity and quality of the output. Meaning, that since nobody else has the license on my block, by using my secured resource inefficiently, I will create a shortage of product ad higher profits. This is why a system without freedom must necessarily INSURE that the resource under it's control is used INEFFICIENTLY and UNFAIRLY.
Because the dictature of majority (mob rule) likes to take away private property under the disguise of "voting it away" (as if together we can vote to ourselves something than none of use possesses separately), if schools do not explain this as outright theft, then former children won't be able to recognize the theft occurring when the government blatantly assumes the ownership of a particular resource.
There are actually three separate issues:
1) Does anyone have a right to send electromagnetic radiation through me?
2) Can this right be exclusive?
3) Do I have the right to intercept and use the radiation that is blasting through me?
The first is a health issue. There is no good science left in this world and you cannot trust any studies as they are paid for by the broadcasters. The cancer rates are through the roof, and if it has anything to do with constant exposure to strong electromagnetic fields - your guess is literally as good as mine.
The second issue has to do with ownership. Is radiation property? Clearly no. But the spectrum is limited, and as any limited resourse, can be priced. Does the government own the spectrum, and can it auction off pieces of it? Ridiculous, isn't it.
The third issue really upsets me. In my state, if I point a harmless laser pointer at you, I can be arrested for assault, a felony charge. But if my neighbor points a focused microwave beam at me from his WiFi router, there is no crime. Furthermore, if I connect to his network, I can go to jail.
As far as I am concerned, any radiation going through my property is mine. If you want to run a cable through my land, you have to ask my permission and pay for a right of way. IF you are broadcasting movies literally through me, the difference between me being a free man or in jail depends only on what kind of gadgets I own. That is clearly absurd.
Frankly, the whole thing is crazy, much like EVERYTHING that the government is involved in.
Keep up the good work, and please stay out of trouble!
I enjoy your blog. Thanks for the commentary.
The property you own is your property. A person who transmits his body cells onto your property is trespassing. A person who transmits a bomb onto your property is trespassing. A person who transmit radio waves into your property is trespassing.
Do you think two computers can access a wireless router without degrading the transmission speed?
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