FCC Says No To Half Of Google’s Wireless Auction Conditions
by
Randy Mears
Over the past couple of weeks I have written about Google looking into getting into the wireless airwaves business. Google’s interest and willingness to spend $4.6 billion to purchase bandwidth in the 700MHz had a catch; four consumer and small-business oriented provisions needed to be included in the auction rules to guarantee Google’s participation. In the final FCC announcement on the topic, released on July 31st, only two of Google’s four provisions were included.
For those of us hoping that this new bandwidth would open the door to real competition in wireless communications, I think we got part of that wish, device and software independence. The provisions that would have opened the door for start-ups to compete with the big communication companies (by forcing the big players to open their networks) didn’t make it, and that’s a real disappointment.
Still, I have to ask, had Google not entered the fray, would the consumer have gotten anything? Just in case I haven’t said this before, I’ll say it now; thank you Google.
