Tuesday, August 19, 2008

Google Wants To 'Free The Airwaves'

Google has launched the "Free The Airwaves" campaign today in an effort to utilize unused airwaves between broadcast TV channels for broadband wireless service.

Also known as the "white spaces", Google along with Intel, Microsoft and Motorola, have been trying to convince the FCC to make the spectrum available for unlicensed use--mainly concerning next year's digital broadcast transition from analog. Google has been pushing this request on their public blog, describing the spectrum as "Wi-Fi on steroids," by co-founder Larry Page.

However, aside from the FCC hurdle, the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) are claiming that the "white spaces" could possibly interfere with their broadcast quality. We'll see what the FCC thinks about Google's plans when they release some results during the test.

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