In what will likely be the last major opinion of the Kevin Martin-led Federal Communications Commission, the FCC issued a decision earlier this week opening up the so-called ‘white spaces’ in the portions of electromagnetic spectrum currently used by analog television.  Spectrum is highly controlled, both nationally and internationally, to prevent the bleeding of signals (so you don’t hear radio when you turn your TV on, or other unfortunate overlaps).

The issue with white spaces is that they are the spaces between channels of TV spectrum.  While it should be possible with current technology to broadcast the signals tightly enough to avoid the problem, not all are agreed on the likelihood of this happening if white spaces were opened up to broader use.  Organizations relying on heavy wireless microphone use have argued against the proposal on those grounds.  However, with the pending transition of all television signals to digital, the potential for overlap will be further reduced.  It will not be eliminated, but since digital signals can take up much less space, there is more room for other applications – both public (first responder signals) and private (more hotspots for Internet access).

You can read the full FCC decision online (scroll to the November 4 entries to find the material on Rules For Unlicensed Use of Television White Spaces.

What this means is that large amounts of resources can now be used for transmissions like mobile broadband access.  The nature of white spaces, and their unlicensed status, will mean that their availability will vary by locality and the range will be limited.  If this succeeds, perhaps the current models for spectrum rationing can be revisited to make more efficient use of this common resource.