Transcripts For CSPAN2 The Communicators 20150112 : vimarsan

Active in Spectrum Management, in fact, serves on two Advisory Committees, one for the fcc and one for the Commerce Department. What is your role on the Spectrum Management Advisory Committee, sir . Guest well, both of these committees advise their respective organizations on what to do about spectrum in the future. They have, each of them have subcommittees, the subcommittees face very specific problems, things like receiver specs the internet of things. But various issues on which these fcc and department of commerce are looking for input. Host whats your reaction to the 40 billion or so thats currently auctioned on the aws3 auction, spectrum auction . Guest well, i have some strong opinions about that. I think that the people that buy that spectrum, on the one hand, are getting a bargain because the spectrum will be so valuable for the long term, but i think the auctions are really the wrong way to do it. Host why . Guest because the auctions dont really reflect the fact that we, the public own the spectrum, ask when we auction and when we auction the spectrum off, the people that buy it really just get a license to use it. And theyre supposed to use it in the Public Interest, but nobody ever takes the spectrum back again or very rarely. And its that issue using the spectrum in the public enter that the Public Interest that is the most difficult problem we have, in my view. Host do you agree with the idea of getting taking some of this excess government spectrum and getting it into the public air waves . Guest no, i dont. I think i have a very simple issue that i just repeat over and over again. If the spectrum is used efficiently, if the people who use the spectrum use the most modern technology there wont be any question of having enough spectrum. There will be much more than we require. But the congress has crypted an environment in which has created an environment in which theres not a lot of motivation to use the spectrum efficiently, and for that reason we have this myth of the spectrum scarcity, spectrum shortage. Host well, that goes to coopers law, doesnt it . Guest well, it does. The history is technology has always just moved our ability to put bandwidth through the spectrum doubled it every two and a half years for 110 years, and we know enough now to know we cannot only continue that, but maybe even go faster than that. So there is really the potential to have more than enough spectrum. Host well, lets bring paul kirby into our conversation Senior Editor at telecommunications report. Isnt that one of the problems with spectrum, a lot of the federal agencies dont always have the latest because they rely on the federal budget, and its a bit scarce itself . Guest well, of course paul. And thats the case im not sure its in the Public Interest to take that spectrum away from them. All these entities both the government and private ought to be motivated to use the most modern techniques, to use the most Cost Effective techniques. So for these Government Agencies maybe the latest spectrum is not in the best interest of the public. But that ought to be the issue. Any business and, of course these are all businesses, we ought to optimize. You ought to use whatever gets the end job done right. And im not sure that we do that now. There are a lot of other motivations. So i think all these things have to be done on an issuebyissue basis. Well, lets get into specifics. Smart Antenna Technology is something you have been pushing for many years. Give us some specifics for those who havent seen you before of what can allow folks to use spectrum more efficiently. Guest oh, we started the Smart Antenna work over 20 years ago, paul, and that technologies has already been proved. There are systems all over the world using them. Lte, amazingly lte, the standard that is the cellular standard today is just starting to accommodate what they call measuring imo know mimo now which is the latest word for smart Antenna Technology. So thats the first step. The ultimate in the spectrumefficient technology is whats called dynamic spectrum access. And that includes a whole bunch of things. It includes mimo but it also includes cognitive radio, and i know youve heard a lot about that, and it includes some new technology thats just starting to become laboratory available where we can use satellites to actually create a model of the world so that when somebody transmits, they will know whether they are going to interfere with somebody else. You put all these things together i hesitate to tell you how much more efficient were going to be because you would laugh me out of this room. But were talking not about tens of times improvement or hundreds or thousands but millions of time improvement. And thats not as crazy as it sounds, because from the time of mar coney til now, we are a trillion times more spectrally efficient than we were in marchcones time marcones time. So its not as crazy as it sounds. Now, wireless carriers would say dynamic spectrum access is good, particularly it allows folks to share spectrum like Government Agencies and wireless carriers. They would contend its not ready for prime time on a wide scale basis. You have to, perhaps, test that over some time. What would be your reaction to that . Guest of course. None of these things happen quickly, and thats why this observation that i made that there has been a continuous improvement, there hasnt really been a smooth improvement p. It happens in spurts. Cellular was a big improvement in spectrum efficient city. Efficiency. But the smart Antenna Technology we talk about is available today. And, in fact, the people that are writing the standards for lte have announced that this month the standard will include enough technology to improve spectral efficient city by at least efficiency by at least 37 times. Thats nod thats not the future. So it makes you wonder why we make a big fuss about these auctions that youve mentioned peter, when they add a few percent onto the amount of total spectrum, and yet the standard has the implied availability of 37 times more spectrum. Sounds a little crazy to me. Host well, marty cooper given the fact that these auctions were, they were looking at about 20 billion and its already up to about 40 billion doesnt that say that this is valuable real estate . Guest it says that somebody thinks its valuable. And in the present environment, it is. Because there is no motivation for people to do this 37 times improvement that i talked about. Somehow the way the congress has set these things up, its a lot easier for somebody to buy some spectrum than to worry about the technology and to take the risks that are involved in new technology. So if theres anything that i would do to improve the way we do these things, its for the fcc and ntia to do things to motivate people. Wouldnt it be nice if they said to somebody if you dont use the spectrum more efficiently, were going to take it away from you . You just have a license, you dont have ownership. And thats public property. And if youre using that public property in an inefficient way, then its not in the public enter, were going to Public Interest, were going to take it away from you. If somehow that motivation occurred we would be using the spectrum better. And, by the way its not just a matter of solving a spectral efficiency problem. The fact that the spectrum is the glue of commerce it makes things happen better it increases the public good, it increases the Public Wealth thats really the important issue. The congress ought to be getting people to use the spectrum more because its going to solve things, for example, like the poverty problem. The way you solve the poverty problem is by making the total gnp bigger so theres more to share among everybody. So the whole issue of spectrum efficiency, to me, is making everything more efficient making commerce more efficient making government and education and medicine. All of these things use wireless spectrum in ways that make the result come out better. Host are you an outlier on the committees you serve on at ntia and fcc with your opinion . Guest well i think everybody has good intent, but im not sure that there are other people who think, who are prepared to criticize the fcc and the government. The only advantage i have is i dont have any other associations. I dont have a company. I only have to worry about what marty says and im old enough now so i dont worry about that too much, as youve already noticed. So ive covered the [inaudible] for a number of years and you often seem frustrated, for instance at the direction of the csmac. They spent about a year in working groups. So was that process, should those energies have focused more on the technology and not freeing up spectrum for more auctions . Guest well, i dont want to blame the committees, in fact i wouldnt even blame the Commerce Department because youre exactly right, that is what they are doing. But the committees take their direction from ntia. The specific issues of both the fcc and ntia is there are specific assignments made to the various committees so they dont have much choice in what theyre doing. And the ntia is following the instructions of the to administration. If you were king for a day, how would the csmac have spent that year and a half . Guest well, you know that im a techie, paul, and i think that the engineering profession, the ability to do technology is not represented adequately, certainly not on the csmac. These are because of the nature of what the assignments have been, these are in general not technicallyoriented people. And thats not a criticism. They are expert in responding to the questions that were brought up. The fcc Advisory Council is more technically oriented, but theyre also, they are responding to the questions brought up by the fcc. There are some committees on the fcc that are facing the spectrum problem more directly, but in my view knobs doing enough nobodys doing enough. Host marty cooper, what about the verizons and the at ts . Are they using their spectrum efficiently or more efficiently than they were ten years ago . Are they looking at this issue as well or simply buying more spectrum . Guest all of the above. They are absolutely, using the spectrum more efficiently. But theyre operating businesses and they are trying to optimize in the environment that the government has created. And thats why i dont fault them, but i do believe that they properly motivated, could be ten times better at least in how they use the spectrum today and they dont really need that additional spectrum. And, in fact, the government shouldnt make it that easy for them to get it. They ought to be motivated to use what they have got more effectively and new concepts be brought into play with this additional spectrum. The biggest problem, in my view, about the existing carriers, they dont have any competition. Lte doesnt have any competition. And i believe theres an opportunity given the right environment to create a competitive, widearea coverage system. Now, wouldnt that be of the right motivation to get people to use their spectrum more effectively . So, and i could describe it to you. And by the way, im not trying to solve the problem myself im just giving you an example. But suppose you took wifi and made integrated all of the wifi that exists . Well, if you think about it, almost everywhere that you go with your wireless devices wifi is available. If you could integrate all of those wifis and make them available, you would have an alternate white area coverage. Wouldnt be available everywhere, but then, you know, verizon and at ts are not available everywhere. And that could be a much lower cost system than exists today, and it would have advantages and disadvantages. But existing carriers would have some competition. Now theyve got some motivation to use this other Technology Get their prices down, and thats got to happen. Wireless broadband is just too costly today, and if there is a spectrum problem, that is where it is. There are some of the new services that are arising that are being served by wireless mainly in education, in medicine that are essential services. They are not conveniences theyre not things that make our lives smoother but they are as an example in education, we have now determined that people who are challenged more than others actually have their brains grow faster. Weve got some new techniques that are internetenabled that challenge students much more effectively than lectures and classrooms do. Now, could you imagine a world in the future where weve got one class of people who have internet wireless internet available, have their minds challenged, have bigger brains and another class who dont have that advantage . Thats not acceptable. We cant have a society with two classes like that. Somebodys got to figure out a way to make the wireless internet available to everybody at a that everybody can afford. Would you aggregate these networkses . The cable industry has consortium to deploy across the country, how would you aggregate them into one competitor, if you will, to the Large National wireless carriers . Guest oh, good question, paul. There are actually some people doing that today in specific areas. What they do is take the Access Points that people have in their homes and businesses, and they split em into two accesses, if you will. One for the local person person whos got it in their home or business, and another one thats available to other people. And the one thats available to other people is based upon subscribing to a general service, and those, that service is an integrated wide area service. And thats being done today in some areas. Not in a large scale, but they have actually created cell phones that are primarily wifi cell phones, but that will go off into the Wide Area Network only when theres no wifi service available. Which is kind of the opposite of a lot of phones guest exactly. Where theyll seamlessly go into wifi networks. Guest youve got it. And i dont know they havent done it yet but why not just have a wifionly radio and have a service with a more inexpensive cell phone and a service cost of a quarter or a tenth of what the existing service is. I love competition, if you havent got that message. Host well, marty cooper, when you give this message at the fcc as part of Advisory Committee that you serve on, does tom wheeler, do the other commissioners hear you . Whats their response . Guest well, i havent had much opportunity to do that because we, first of all i have enormous admiration for the fcc. They are trying to satisfy everybody, and when you try to satisfy everybody, its a hopeless task. Whatever they come up with on Net Neutrality you know there are going to be a bunch of unhappy people. So theyre doing a superb job, but they have not yet accepted the fact that they should take on some harder problems. And the one example is when you tell people they should use the spectrum more efficiently, you say, well how do you measure efficiency . Thats a really hard problem. And my answer to that is, first of all, just because a problem is hard doesnt mean you shouldnt attack it. And the second is look at what happened when they attacked the efficiency problem in automobiles. We have standards now for miles per gallon. They are not precise they keep changing them all the time. Very hard problem, but they solve toed it, and look what happened to our fuel efficiency. I think the same thing could happen to spectrum efficiency. Something else which the fccs Advisory Committee has looked at is receiver standards and that would allow the fcc doesnt really have jurisdiction, but the receivers could basically not get the interference, in other words filter that out, then spectrum would be used more efficiently, and its come up more and more in washington lately in proceedings. Tell us what you think about the fcc or what you would like at least a Multistakeholder Group or someone to do on receiver standards. Guest well, remember now the fcc doesnt create the technology, and they are primarily focused on interference to other people. So i think theyve got to go to the essence of the problem which is showering the spectrum or sharing the spectrum. Working out techniques that allow people to use the spectrum in ways that dont interfere with other people. So what theyve done with the receiver standard so far has been excellent, but they havent yet gone into the dynamic spectrum access area and that is what has to happen. The interesting thing thats going to happen when you have this ultimate dynamic spectrum access no more licenses. Think about a world where anybody who follows a set of rigorous rules can just come in and operate. No licensing no auctions and a spectral efficiency that is millions of times better than what we have today. And those are numbers. Thats technology not wild statements. Host marty cooper, you mentioned Net Neutrality and the fccs current deliberations in that area. Whats your take on Net Neutrality, and should wireless be treated differently . Guest well, im glad you said the wireless part because i have no idea what tom wheeler should do about Net Neutrality. I know that the longterm solution is not regulation because anytime you regulate, imperfect. The only systems that are optimal are selforganizing systems where everybody is motivated to do the right thing naturally. My issue with wireless is a question of prioritization. And having the only prioritization be how much money you have doesnt make a lot of sense to me. So somehow or other we have to create a neutral system that allows us to solve the education problem, that allows medical applications to come in in ways that everybody can afford them. And thats a really hard problem. So i really sympathize with tom and i know that whatever hes going to do is going to be the best that can be done. One of the things that i think that the fcc should do with regard to Net Neutrality is to use the threat of regulation to get people to operate more efficiently. So if the fcc, for example said you lie seen see licensees, were not going to regulate you at this moment, were going to let you run with certain reasonable requirements and thats the word that people have been using for five years. But at the end of that five years, we expect you to be x times more efficient than you are today, i think maybe we would make some progress. I dont know if thats a practical thing but the fcc does have some weapons that they can use, and it would not make them totally popular with everyone but it would move us forward. Host when you picked up that tenpound brick of a phone in 1973, i think it was, and called the at t engineer making the first cell phone call, the official first cell phone call ever, did you ever did you foresee these problems that you were creating . [laughter] he just blamed this on you, i think. [laughter] he just blamed all this on you, i think. [laughter] guest you cant do that. We had a very narrow issue then and that was to make sure that there was a competitive and handheld business. We knew that everybody was going to have cell phones someday. You remember, there was no internet in 1973, and there was no large scale integrated circuits, no digital cameras. So, no we did not have that kind of vision in those days. Host does it surprise you that there are more cell phones today than there are people . I mean, everybody has a couple different devices for the most part . Guest that doesnt surprise me at all. In fact, i think weve only begun. I think at some point in the future you will be, have several devices on your body to do various different functions, all of them connected efficiently and all of them serving you in some really important way. So weve only begun. Its a shame hen you made when you made that first call that you couldnt have tweeted about it. [laughter] guest thats right. Looking at, weve been talking about spectrum efficiency and ways to use spectrum thats currently used in a better way. The fccs looking at can we take spectrum above 24 gigahertz, and can we start using that for mobile broadband which to date is thought to be not usable for that. Give us a sense of what you think realizing you want to make better use of the lower spectrum that people are currently using what is the spectrum frontier, which is what they call it, for that spectrum, do you think . Guest well, i just think, paul, the way we use the spectrum today we assign somebody a block of spectrum and they do everything in their block of spectrum. Well, does it make sense for somebody in a city whos communicating to a person across the street to use a piece of spectrum that has the capability of talking 10 miles . So part of dynamic spectrum access is that you use the optimum piece of the spectrum for each conversation. So if im talking to to somebody 10 miles away i might be talking at 150 megahertz. And if im talking to somebody across the street, why not 28 gigahertz . Or 50 gigahertz for that matter . Because people do that. They talk in the same room to each other and use longrange frequencies. So dynamic spectrum access is a very, its a catchall term that includes all of these techniques. But thats the way this new spectrum should be used trying to make each piece of the spectrum do everything doesnt make a lot of sent easter. A lot of sense ether. Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel has given you credit for an idea, she calls it the race to the top where you would basically incentivize someone to come up with a way to use spectrum, perhaps 50 or 100 more times better and then if they do that, they would get a license for some spectrum. Can you is this something youve proposed, and give us a sense for what you hope this would accomplish . Guest well, the issue is to motivate people to use this new spectrum and what commissioner or rosenworcel and i suggested is literally a contest. Its a process that would take perhaps ten years because we have to have various steps. But were suggesting the objective is to demonstrate that you can operate the spectrum at least 100 times more effectively than is being done today. I now think that we were much too soft. It ought to be more than 100 times. But just think of what happens. If you go through this process, you ask people to demonstrate on paper that they can do this, and you sort out the people who have the best solutions, and then you go to the next step, and they have to demonstrate in a laboratory. And then you go on to that each time calling out people. In ten years you could have two people left each of whom, by the way, has probably spent a billion dollars. But you might be prepared now to give each of them ten megahertz. Now, you say ten megahertz thats nothing. Well, wait a second its 100 times more efficient than was done before, so it is the equivalent of a thousand megahertz. More than any carrier has today. So it would be worth a lot more because of what they did. Guest you got it. Host marty cooper what are you thinking about today besides spectrum . Whats on your agenda . Guest well, if you think about spectrum as a are techie thing as a very techie thing, and what has happened this my search for getting people to use spectrum more efficiently, ive discovered all kinds of ways people are improving humanity. And when i look at what is going on in the medical community, we have the potential using Wireless Technology along with a whole bunch of other stuff, genomics and other things, to virtually eliminate disease. Now, talk about objective thats a lot more real than trying to get, be more spectrally efficient. The one that really excites me the most is whats going on in education, and ive touched on that before. We tend in almost everything we do to treat people as classes. People are not a class, they are individuals. And if we can have an educational system that is tailor made to each individual and the example that i give when i describe how this could evolve is the way Children Play games today. I dont know if you two are game players, but these games are intricate,