FCC Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel… is one official advocating for a more comprehensive approach toward spectrum policy. “To successfully solve this puzzle, we must look at the whole picture. We must address these pieces together,” she said.

Rosenworcel urges an open process, including public hearings, to set rules for the incentive auction in which TV broadcasters who choose to participate will say how much spectrum they will give up and at what price, so the FCC can then resell that spectrum to wireless providers.

She also called for speed and a clearly stated timetable so that wireless service providers can plan their spectrum strategy, TV broadcasters can make final decisions about giving up some of their spectrum, and consumers can be confident that wireless services will be reliable.

“All good deliberations must come to an end,” she explained in calling for a traditional auction of 65 MHz of spectrum in the third quarter of 2014 and the larger incentive auction in the fourth quarter. To make that happen, she said a “bandplan” for assembling the auctioned spectrum must be in place by the third quarter of this year. She has proposed a new approach for spectrum now in the hands of federal government agencies, which control approximately 60 percent of the critical asset.

You can read Boucher’s full op-ed at Roll Call.

In March, 37 senators urged President Barack Obama to appoint Jessica Rosenworcel to chair the Federal Communications Commission. The president instead named the well-qualified venture capitalist and industry veteran Tom Wheeler. Rosenworcel is sure to continue contributing mightily to the FCC as a commissioner, but perhaps the president should consider her for another job—attorney general.

This is not another criticism of the controversies embroiling the Department of Justice. Rather, Rosenworcel’s real contribution would be to offer a breath of fresh air in economic policy in the department, especially with regard to the dynamic tech marketplace.

The Justice Department doesn’t get it. Rosenworcel does. And the department’s anachronistic worldview threatens to delay our mobile broadband future.

You can read the full op-ed over at the Mercury News.

As my colleague Rick Boucher has already stated, the spectrum-related initiatives President Obama announced this morning are a “great step” toward getting mobile broadband providers the airwaves they need in order to meet the demands of their customers. That’s the first nugget of good news.

The second nugget of good news, which was also included in this morning’s announcement, is the White House’s report on the state of broadband, which highlights just how far our country has come in providing high-speed Internet access to citizens. Some bullet points from the report:

• In the year 2000, 4.4% of American households had a home connection to broadband; by 2010 that number had jumped to 68%.

• Broadband networks at a baseline speed of >10 megabits per second now reach more than 94% of U.S. homes.

• Overall, average delivered broadband speeds have doubled since 2009. In 2012, North America’s average mobile data connection speed was 2.6 Mbps, the fastest in the world, nearly twice that available in Western Europe, and over five times the global average.

• Annual investment in U.S. wireless networks grew more than 40% between 2009 and 2012, from $21 billion to $30 billion, and exceeds investment by the major oil and gas or auto companies; investment in European wireless networks remained flat during this time period, while wireless investment in Asia (including China) rose only 4%.

• There are over 500 million Internet-connect devices now in American homes and businesses.

Those are some impressive numbers, especially on the investment front, and they underscore just how vibrant and competitive the U.S. wireless market really is.

The numbers also tell us that in order to keep the party lights on, the Federal Communications Commission must pursue policies that encourage investment and innovation. Currently the FCC has two issues burning up its docket. The first is the upcoming spectrum incentive auctions, which need to be transparent and open in order to get the most out of those airwaves. Competition is important – which is already occurring in the telecom market – and so is raising as much money as possible for the U.S. Treasury. Also, we need to ensure companies that can quickly put new spectrum to work powering mobile broadband are in the mix.

The other issue facing the FCC is the upgrade of America’s wired networks so they are better suited for the Internet age. While the baseline speed of >10 megabits per second cited in the White House’s report is good, we can do better. The upgrade to all-Internet based networks will mean substantially faster broadband in more places, but getting there will require substantial investment. It will also mean a close examination — and potential overhaul — of regulations currently governing our nation’s networks.

Neither of these issues is insurmountable, but it will take continued partnership between the government and private industry to keep America at the forefront of both wired and mobile broadband. The numbers in the White House report are encouraging. The President’s push to free up more government spectrum is inspiring. Smart policies when it comes to spectrum auctions and network upgrades will help us hit the trifecta.

This morning, the White House announced a new series of initiatives aimed at freeing up much-needed spectrum for mobile broadband. From the official White House release:

Today’s initiatives include a Presidential Memorandum directing Federal agencies to enhance the efficiency of their use of spectrum and make more capacity available to satisfy the skyrocketing demand of consumer and business broadband users. The Memorandum directs agencies to increase their collaboration and data-sharing with the private sector, so a full range of stakeholders can contribute its collective expertise to maximizing spectrum efficiency, including through greater sharing of spectrum between Government and commercial users. These efforts will provide access to more spectrum for wireless broadband providers and equipment vendors as they respond to increasingly rapid consumer adoption of smartphones, tablets, and other wireless devices.

The Memorandum also calls upon Federal agencies to increase public-private research and development (R&D) activities, emphasize spectrum efficiency in Government system procurements and spectrum assignments, and improve the accuracy and scope of their reporting on spectrum usage. It empowers a White House-based Spectrum Policy Team to oversee implementation of the Memorandum and make further recommendations. At the same time, the Memorandum requires appropriate safeguards to protect Government systems that rely on spectrum to keep Americans safe.

For spectrum-strapped providers — and the millions of customers they serve — today’s announcement is a great step toward keeping up with demand. But it’s just that, a step. What is urgently needed is a concerted effort to have large swaths of government owned and underutilized spectrum repurposed for commercial auction. Hopefully these new initiatives set us on a path to get there.

We’ll have more on the President’s announcement later on today.

The number of LTE subscribers in the United States will continue to increase markedly over the next few years, with the total number of LTE customers representing 70 percent of all U.S. mobile subscriptions by 2017, according to a new report from research firm Pyramid Research.

According to an excerpt of the Pyramid report, “USA: Operator Need for LTE Spectrum and Scale to Reshape Telecom Market through M&A,” U.S. LTE subscriptions are expected to reach 262 million by 2017.

The good news, spectrum-wise, is that LTE is more efficient when it comes to airwaves usage. The troubling news, however, is that as more people jump on the mobile broadband bandwagon, that spectrum efficiency will likely be canceled out by the millions of new users.

Android has convincingly overtaken Apple as the most popular OS in the smartphone industry both in terms of sales and overall penetration. But when it comes to how much wireless devices are actually used on cellular networks, those who own Apple handsets are disproportionately the biggest users of apps and the mobile web.

All told, users of the iPhone 4, iPhone 4S, and iPhone 5 account for more than half of all 3G traffic. That’s a lot of iPhone owners online.

General Electric Co. Tuesday said it is investing $2 billion over the next five years to build software that could improve operational and clinical processes in the health care industry.

Hundreds of millions of dollars are at stake as hospitals upgrade their computer systems in order to mee new federal guidelines mandated by the Affordable Health Care Act. GE is hoping to cash in on some of those upgrades by jump-starting the development of health care systems and applications.

There is still an important role for the FCC in regulating wireless, but it is limited. The first priority should be making more spectrum available to the highest bidders by accelerating the pace of government auctions. Once spectrum is sold, owners should be free to resell it to other wireless carriers (or to other industries that value it more). For without more bandwidth (and free-market allocation of privately controlled spectrum), access to data-hungry services like HD video will be undermined, along with the incentives to develop the next generation of wireless devices.

There’s no denying the temptation to intervene on behalf of the underdogs in the marketplace. But the lessons from the long, checkered history of economic regulation are painfully clear: The cures are often worse than the disease.

For similar thoughts, see this blog post from our Honorary Chairman Rick Boucher.

Imagine being able to control a flying robot with your mind.

Sounds like a flight of fancy, but researchers at the University of Minnesota have fashioned an electrode-studded cap that records brain waves and uses them to control a “quadcopter” via wi-fi.

Here’s video of the potentially terrifying robot in action:

Rosenworcel articulated how reforms to the FCC’s wireless licensing policy — which allows us to use devices like cellphones and tablet computers — can help millions of consumers and drive job growth in one of the most dynamic sectors of our economy. But her approach should not be limited to telecommunications policy.

Goodfriend goes on to highlight what he’s calling the “Jessica Principles” for crafting spectrum auctions. Among them is putting consumers first, making the process open and transparent, adhering to simplicity:

Well-intentioned, bright people in government often come up with ridiculously complex answers to difficult questions. Every good manager will tell you, though, that simplicity is its own virtue. We should pursue it wherever possible. Rosenworcel addressed one of the most complex tasks facing the FCC today: how to design a license auction where broadcasters have an incentive to sell their licenses back to the public and wireless providers have an incentive to buy those licenses and turn them into useful wireless broadband services for the public. Complex recommendations abound. Rosenworcel’s call for simplicity should be heeded.

The U.S. secretly traced a massive cyberespionage operation against the 2008 presidential campaigns of Barack Obama and John McCain to hacking units backed by the People’s Republic of China, prompting high level warnings to Chinese officials to stop such activities, U.S. intelligence officials tell NBC News.

The disclosure on the eve of a two-day summit between the U.S. and Chinese presidents highlights what has become a persistent source of tension between the two global powers: Beijing’s aggressive, orchestrated campaign to pierce America’s national security armor at any weak point – in this case the computers and laptops of top campaign aides and advisers who received high-level briefings.

As for China’s response to being caught, Isikoff reports:

The 2008 attacks, for example, prompted U.S. intelligence officials to sternly warn the Chinese that they had “crossed the line,” says one former senior U.S. official who was directly involved in the investigation.

“We told them we knew what they were up to – and that this had gone too far,” said the former official. Chinese officials listened politely and denied they had anything to do with the attacks on the campaign, the former official said.

• Basic Availability: Ninety-eight percent of Americans have access to wired or wireless broadband at combined advertised download speeds of 3 Mbps or greater and upload speeds of 768 kbps or greater (referred to as 3/768 here).

• Wireline: Just over 93% of Americans have access to advertised wireline broadband at speeds of at least 3/768, and almost 93% of Americans have access to at least 6 Mbps. Ninety-one percent of Americans have access at 10 Mbps, but access drops to 78% at 25 Mbps.

• Wireless: Approximately 81% of Americans can access mobile wireless download speeds of 6 Mbps or greater. Nearly 26% of the population can access fixed wireless download speeds at 6 Mbps.

While most Americans now have access and better speeds, the report concludes that more investment will be needed in order to meet the demands of consumers going forward:

Broadband service at basic speed levels is now widely available, but even for basic speeds, gaps still persist between rural and urban communities. These gaps between rural and urban broadband availability become larger as speeds increase; and as speeds increase, the overall level of broadband availability decreases, regardless of whether the user is located in an urban or rural area. Similarly, far more providers compete for customers when the service offering is at the lower broadband speeds tiers. Cable dominates the provisioning of broadband service at the higher speed tiers, followed by fiber to the premises. The implication of this finding is important because in areas where the technology deployed today is not capable of providing broadband service at speeds of 50 Mbps, 100 Mbps or a 1 Gbps, most companies or communities will need to significantly upgrade their infrastructure to offer these speeds when consumers, businesses or institutions demand them.

The full report is available at the NTIA website.

An item from reporter David Jackson of USA Today, about President Obama’s plan to stump for education around the country, caught my eye this morning. Specifically, this line:

Obama is likely to call on the Federal Communications Commission to expand a program to bring high-speed Internet connections to 99% of the nation’s students within five years.

That’s an aggressive call to action. It’s also long overdue, given the profound effect high-speed Internet access has on education. The FCC’s bold National Broadband Plan, launched way back in 2010, has been slow to gain momentum, so any sort of kick-start the president can give it is more than welcome.

But as with anything, the devil will be in the details. Funding — especially in cash-strapped municipalities — will be a significant challenge, which means hitting the mark of 99% of students will require a massive amount of private investment.

The good news is, providers are willing to make that investment. The upgrade to all Internet-based networks will greatly expand the reach of broadband access, especially in rural areas. And the FCC’s upcoming spectrum incentive auctions will hopefully deliver much-needed capacity for mobile broadband providers so they can both keep up with demand and connect new customers.

While the FCC can certainly expand its program for deploying high-speed Internet, its true effectiveness in achieving President Obama’s goal will arguably be on the regulatory front. The upgrade to all-Internet based networks and the allocation of more spectrum for wireless face hurdles. For the former, it’s a phone book of regulations enacted way back in 1996, if not decades before. For the latter, it’s the issue of whether certain wireless providers should be limited in participating in spectrum auctions — an unwise move, given the billions the FCC would leave on the table from auction proceeds.

Connecting every student in America to high-speed Internet is certainly achievable. But it will take the government and private industry working together to negotiate the regulatory minefield.

President Obama is setting the target. Now we just need to make sure we can hit it.  Every student in America deserves nothing less.

The desire to increase equal opportunities for all Americans is a noble one. But the process of achieving this worthy goal is complicated, and it requires a variety of approaches—each tailored to meet the different needs of different communities. 

For example, the Asian-American community is incredibly diverse, comprised of some groups that traditionally have achieved higher levels of education and economic stability. But their success doesn’t tell the whole story: The Asian-American community also includes many that continue to struggle with poverty, language and educational barriers, as well as health disparities. Their struggles mirror the challenges that affect many other minority communities in America. 

It turns out that one way to increase equality of opportunity for these communities and for virtually every American is through increased access to high-speed broadband service. This service provides improved access to additional educational, professional, and social opportunities, in addition to opportunities for better health care and civic engagement. President Obama, recognizing the importance of broadband access, set a goal for providing 98 percent of all Americans with access to high-speed broadband by 2016.

Unfortunately, the availability of high-speed broadband is still limited in many parts of the country and within many minority communities, for a variety of reasons. This is a problem because in our modern, digital age, broadband access is now a necessity, not a luxury. Broadband service can strengthen communities and families, present new possibilities that lead to a better quality of life, and even act as a bridge to a brighter future. 

In addition, too much of today’s communication regulatory and legislative decision-making processes are incorrectly based on yesterday’s communication network of wired connectivity. This has slowed the expansion of high-speed broadband and thus contributing to widening the inequalities we face today.

For example, distance learning has become both a viable alternative and a valuable supplement to traditional classroom learning for students at all levels and at any age. Online classes and job training can even make it possible for people to learn on their own time, a particularly important benefit for workers and families. With broadband access, non-native English speakers can choose from several language applications and programs to help them achieve proficiency in English. 

Additionally, broadband-enabled applications in telehealth and mobile health (mHealth) offer better access to quality care and increased options for improved wellness and health. These health technologies also offer improved management of chronic diseases, including those that affect minority communities (including Asian-American communities) at disproportionately higher rates. 

Conversely, lack of broadband access constitutes more than just an inability to get these and other benefits. In our modern time, it puts people at a tremendous disadvantage. For those without access—including many Asian Americans (in particular, our Pacific Islander and Southeast Asian communities), as well as many African Americans, Hispanics, and rural Americans—a fast solution is needed. Many minorities and other underserved groups face a real risk of falling behind and missing out on all that these exciting technologies have to offer. 

That’s why it’s so important to upgrade our nation’s communications networks to Internet Protocol (IP)-based networks. Transitioning to such an infrastructure will bring increased access to next-generation, high-speed broadband networks with new capabilities and applications. These modern networks deliver faster speeds and enhanced connectivity. Moreover, unlike outdated networks, they support a variety of devices while also offering new options for services and technologies. The IP transition can transform and improve health care and education as well as provide more opportunities for civic engagement, professional development, and economic growth for us all. 

Investment in modern networks is good for our economy, too. A study by Deloitte estimated U.S. investment in modern networks to be between $25–53 billion during 2012–2016; this corresponded to a conservative estimate of $73–152 billion in GDP growth and 317,000–771,000 new jobs for that same period. That investment presents many opportunities for our country and for all Americans. 

The transition to next-generation networks will increase broadband access and result in economic growth and countless benefits for Americans; therefore, it must become a national priority. I believe that this transition can be achieved if our policymakers focus on encouraging private sector investment and creating a modern regulatory framework. Achieving rapid deployment of modern communications networks is the key to achieving the President’s national broadband goal and to creating true equality of opportunity.  All Americans, regardless of background, should have access to broadband and to the brighter future it can deliver. 

— Floyd Mori

The Federal Aviation Administration’s (FAA) ban on the use of electronic devices during flights is costing the U.S. 105 million hours of productivity, according to a recent study.

The findings, from the DePaul University Chaddick Institute for Metropolitan Development, come as the FAA is nearing a decision on relaxing its rules prohibiting the use of electronic devices during take-offs and landings of airplanes.

This year, consumer spending on Internet-connected smartphones, tablets and other devices will surpass home broadband service fees for the first time, according to PricewaterhouseCoopers’ “Entertainment & Media Outlook 2013-2017” report. In four years, nearly 286.7 million in the U.S., or 87% of the population, will have mobile Internet devices, while about 85% of homes will have broadband.

Mobile Internet access spending will top $54 billion in the U.S. this year, compared with $49.6 billion in home Internet spending, the consulting firm estimates in the report, out today. In 2012, home Internet spending ($46.5 billion) slightly outpaced mobile ($44.5 billion).

“We see mobile growing at a much more pronounced rate than broadband, because we are getting toward the saturation point (on home broadband),” says PwC partner Sean De Winter. “Mobile Internet penetration is screaming through the roof.”

All the more reason for the FCC to ensure their upcoming spectrum auctions are designed to be as successful as possible — for providers, the federal government, and consumers.

On the pressing need for more spectrum, Thune said:

“Without enough spectrum, the private sector will not be able to keep pace with consumer demand, which is growing exponentially. We must make it a priority to increase the availability of spectrum for commercial use, both licensed and unlicensed, as quickly as possible.”

As for how the FCC’s upcoming spectrum incentive auctions should be crafted:

“Getting more spectrum into the marketplace, to the parties that value it most, is ultimately the best way for Federal policymakers to encourage new services and spur competition. Unfortunately, some voices, including the Department of Justice, are calling for the Federal Communications Commission to micromanage the allocation of spectrum among wireless carriers. I stand with Chairman Upton, Chairman Walden, and my other colleagues in the House who challenged this perspective in a letter to the FCC in April. I believe the Commission should not pick winners or losers among individual companies, but instead let all interested participants freely compete against one another in the open market.”

Sen. Thune’s full remarks are definitely worth checking out.

At least seven suitors are said to be vying for Hulu, which went back on the auction block after previous attempts at a sale and initial public offering both failed. A deal would hinge as much on terms as sheer dollar value, as the length of Hulu’s content licenses - and what control the site’s trio of owners have over content available to subscribers - will be part of any negotiations. Hulu’s days of exclusive rights to popular television content could be drawing to a close as networks see the financial benefit in licensing online rights to multiple players including Amazon, Netflix and YouTube/Google.

The current price for Hulu is rumored to be north of $1 billion, with players Yahoo! and DirectTV reportedly in the lead.

There’s no question that we spend a lot of time staring at our phones, but just how much?

Well, on average, it’s about an hour, according to a new study from Experian.

So what are we doing with our phones? According to the Experian, Fried reports, we’re doing a lot of talking and texting, with social networking and surfing the web close behind. Also of interest: iPhone users spend more time with their device than people with Android phones.