On Wednesday, September 24, City Councilmember Gale Brewer and Speaker Christine Quinn introduced a resolution urging the Federal Communications Commission to refrain from certifying white space devices, which the resolution claims would be "devastating" to "the incomparable mystique and excitement of the City of New York’s theatre district" and would "[jeopardize] the health and safety of performers, technicians and stagehands."
People's Production House, which supports opening the airwaves to white space devices, believes the resolution contains multiple omissions, errors, and misrepresentations. The saddest part of the resolution is that it asks us to sacrifice low-income New Yorkers in favor of high-priced musicals, when the white space technology allows us to have both.
White spaces are the unused airwaves allocated to television signals. Even in New York City, with the digital television transition, fully one-fifth of our television channels are not in use, according to a study conducted by Free Press. Engineering tests conducted by the FCC have shown that low-power mobile devices can use these channels without interfering with TV broadcasts and wireless microphones on adjacent channels.
Omissions
The resolution makes no mention of the digital divide. According to a recent study commissioned by the City's Economic Development Corporation, 76% of low-income New Yorkers lack a high-speed Internet connection in their home. By bringing meaningful, cheaper Internet access to mobile phones, the opening up of white spaces would do more to impact that inequity than any other measure the government could take. Disparities in mobile phone use, even with data services like email or web, are much smaller than at-home Internet connections, in terms of class and race.
The resolution makes no mention of People's Production House or the broad coalition of public interest organizations advocating for unlicensed use of the white spaces. Instead, it attributes the pressure for this policy change solely to "an alliance of large technology companies."
While mentioning many of those technology companies by name and separately talking about "the equivalent of over 44,000 full time jobs" that Broadway provides, the resolution neglects to mention that software services alone provide over 94,000 jobs to New York City, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. White space devices would provide an entirely new platform for that industry, giving it a huge boost at a time when our local economy sorely needs it.
Perhaps most importantly, the resolution never acknowledges that Broadway productions are illegal users of wireless microphone systems. Despite deceptive advertising by wireless microphone companies to the contrary, only film and television productions are authorized to use the systems. The resolution is part of a campaign by those manufacturers – including Shure, Nady, VocoPro, Audio2000, Sennheiser, Audix, Electro Voice, Hisonic International, and Pyle Audio – to avoid being held accountable for putting their customers at risk.
Errors
The resolution states, "Testing by the FCC ... has consistently demonstrated that these devices do not accurately detect occupied channels, and therefore can interfere with wireless microphone transmissions." This is wrong. As Sascha Meinrath and Michael Calabrese of the New America Foundation explain, "[white space devices (WSDs)] work perfectly at their intended design specifications. One particularly deceptive tactic [from WSD opponents] has been to 'move the goal posts' by claiming that prototype WSDs should detect very weak and/or distant out-of-market TV signals at threshold levels they were not designed to detect... In fact, WSDs can measure broadcast signals at levels that are 1/1000th the power level needed for a television to actually display a picture."
The resolution states, "If the FCC implements the regulatory changes under consideration, live theatre, the performing arts, film and television production companies will be unable to prevent constant interference with microphone systems, devastating those industries within the City of New York." No one has proposed anything that would harm those industries. As a non-profit cultural organization ourselves, People's Production House would never advocate for anything that would harm cultural institutions. We want the FCC to establish rules for certifying devices that can peacefully coexist on the vacant TV channels. Everyone agrees that if the devices can't follow the rules, they shouldn't be certified.
Misrepresentations
The resolution says that, "White spaces were assigned by the Federal Communications Commission (“FCC”) in order to minimize interference between television broadcast channels." This is true, but it fails to mention that the spaces were necessary for analog signals in a way that they are not for digital. All broadcasts will be digital after the digital television transition in February 2009, making the previous white space allocation excessive.
Finally, by calling on the FCC "to refrain from implementing proposed regulatory amendments," the resolution implies that we should stick with the status quo, where everything is working fine. Leaving aside that the status quo has Broadway continuing to break the law, change is coming to the wireless microphone industry one way or the other. They will have to vacate the 700 Mghz band, which has been auctioned off, and channels 52-69 are reserved for public safety. As it now stands, it is in fact wireless microphone operators who run the risk of interfering with critical public safety communications if they don't make adjustments.