I'm A Telecommunications Masochist

I'm reading the CRTC's latest report on telecommunications in Canada. For no particular reason. However, there are some interesting facts.

• 64% of Canadian residences which subscribed to Internet access use DSL or Cable in 2003, up from 17% in 1999. This is a much larger share than I would have predicted.
• Something like 85% of the population has access to broadband, but a much smaller share (46%) actually subscribe.
• Three companies (Rogers, Bell, Telus) control 93% of the wireless industry in Canada.
• Canada's subscription rates for Broadband are 2nd in the OECD countries, narrowly ahead of Iceland and miles ahead of the United States (Canada: 15 subscribers per 100 inhabitants. US: Just under 10.) South Korea is killing us all, with 23 subscribers per 100 inhabitants.

The reason I'm reading this in the first place is that I've been thinking that we should get rid of television. Not the actual content, you understand, but rather the radio-broadcast version of television. 87% of Canadian get their television from Cable or Satellite, meaning only 13% of Canadians get their TV from old broadcast-antenna anymore.

Meanwhle, TV networks sit on incredibly valuable real estate in the radio spectrum. This has in fact gotten worse in the recent past as the CRTC has allowed the major networks to double their channels for the transition to HDTV. Essentially, Global (for example) will occupy it's old analog channel as well as an HDTV channel higher up in the spectrum until the transition is complete. But guess what? Because we can't have big government tell the little guy what to do, there's no deadline for the transition. This is moronic. If you're going to make an industry change, then make them change. Germany switched it's broadcasts from analog to digital (though not HDTV) in one year. One. Japan, of course, has had HDTV for a long time. The problem in Canada is that the big broadcasters have far too much power.

So here's a proposal. We eliminate legacy television broadcasting. This doesn't eliminate the broadcasters, who still have market access with cable and satellite. What it does is free up a large swath of spectrum in the extremely valuable VHF and UHF frequencies. The government makes a deal with the satellite providers - Bell and Starchoice. The Satellite providers offer free, unencrypted access to the basic broadcasters - CBC, Global, CTV, etc to anyone who gets cut off. If we want to get really crazy, we might be able to cut a deal with satellite radio providers and eliminate AM radio while we're at it. In exchange, the companies get their "foot in the door" of the 13% of the population that currently doesn't get cable or satellite.

Why bother? Well, one of the primary limitations on the deployment of wireless Internet technologies has been the frequencies they've been banished to. Wifi is great, but it could be even better at lower frequencies where the power requirements are lower and the equipment can be less complex. But the success of WiFi does teach us one thing - unlicensed areas of the spectrum can be extremely valuable. The reason we can all afford Wifi routers is because we don't have to pay a licensing fee to broadcast on them. So I propose we eliminate legacy TV (and AM radio while we're at it) and create new unlicensed parts of the spectrum in the MF, VHF, and UHF bands for wireless ISP's to use.

Eventually, of course, wireless IP could probably replace almost all the services that we currently use regulated spectrum for - telephones, television, radio, everything. No doubt this will be resisted (Rogers and Bell would go nuclear, I'm sure) but given the possibilities for Canadians, I think we should push for this. Now if only I could find a party that would elect a schmuck like me.