Q&A with
Kevin Werbach on Open Spectrum

Werbach recently spoke about some of the ideas behind open spectrum, the decentralization trend in technology, and, of course, how he thinks last week's mid-term elections might affect tech policy.

by Erin Joyce of internetnews.com [November 11, 2002]

Attorney for the Federal Communications Commission. Editor-in-chief of tech visionary Esther Dyson's influential newsletter, Release 1.0; Organizer of the annual PC Forum; devoted Webblogger; "Open Spectrum" player; organizer, "Supernova" conference.

How else to describe Kevin Werbach? We can now add new parent and newly-independent consultant, now that he's left Release 1.0 to start his own technology consultancy.

Among his expertise and focus: the nascent Open Spectrum movement, which, put simply, seeks to use the spectrum as a common platform (kind of like Internet Protocol) in order to free-up a precious resources. Sound radical? You can read more about it on Werbach's site where he posted a working paper called "Open Spectrum: The New Wireless Paradigm."

In it, Werbach writes: "Despite its radical implications, open spectrum can coexist with traditional exclusive licensing. There are two mechanisms to facilitate spectrum sharing: unlicensed parks and underlay. The first involves familiar allocated frequency bands, but with no user given the exclusive right to transmit. A very limited set of frequencies have already been designated for unlicensed consumer devices, such as cordless phones and wireless local area networks, but more is needed. The second approach allows unlicensed users to coexist in licensed bands, by making their signals invisible and non-intrusive to other users."

Werbach recently spoke about some of the ideas behind open spectrum, the decentralization trend in technology, and, of course, how he thinks last week's mid-term elections might affect tech policy.

Q: So you've left Release 1.0. Why?

I'd say the timing was right and professionally, I was ready to move on. I loved working with Esther, but there were various things I wanted to do on my own. I'm still a contributing editor to Release 1.0, and I may have some role in the PC Forum, but basically I'm an independent analyst.

Q: Will you be revisiting your FCC/regulatory roots in D.C.?

I've always straddled different domains of expertise. Before I went to work for Esther, I was in charge of Internet policy for the FCC. While at Release 1.0, I would stay involved in policy issues, sometimes on an informal basis, and sometimes when I would write in Release 1.0. Now that I'm on my own I have some more flexibility to be more active in that world. I think there's a set of policy issues that are more important than ever. And there aren't many people who can talk to technology companies, talk to entrepreneurs, and also talk to politicians and regulatory people in Washington. I found as I went out on my own a great deal of interest in bringing together those groups.

Q: Can you talk about the Open Spectrum movement?

I've followed this for a while. It's an argument that a motley assemblage of engineers and entrepreneurs has been making for some time. And that is you don't need to license spectrum the way we do, that technology allows devices to share the same spectrum. You could actually have tremendous gains in innovation and the level of services that could be provided, and in pricing and democratic access to the airwaves, by implementing this new model. I wrote a piece about it a year ago in Release 1.0, and readers hadn't been aware of these arguments. I'd been active in advocating for this change. In recent months, interest has picked up.

Q: Deregulation of spectrum? Sounds like something the Republican-controlled Congress could like.

The interesting thing about a lot of tech issues is that they appeal to some elements of what both parties like. There are, in some cases, differences of opinion that go down to party lines, but at least on telecom issues, much of the time there are large corporate issues on both sides of the debate, which means this is not a classic big business versus unions and environmentalists or poor people kind of debate. It's a debate between different powerful interests, such as competitive local exchange (CLEC) interests versus incumbent providers and cable companies. And those interest tend to align with different political players.

The interesting thing about the open spectrum issue is that it really transcends party ideologies. It's an argument for creating a free market in a way that opens up opportunities for anyone to have access to the airwaves. It simultaneously addresses the traditional conservative goal of getting the government out of the regulatory business in markets and the traditional liberal goal of ensuring access and diversity.

The technology is there. I'd say we're somewhere around where we were in the 1980s with the Internet. There's no question that the concept of open spectrum works, and we have one example of proof with Wi-Fi (a protocol built on unlicensed parts of the spectrum) adoption that shows even in a limited way and under strict conditions, that sharing the spectrum can lead to tremendous innovation and growth in activity.

But there's more research that needs done to commercialize these technologies and figure out a way to implement them. People are vaguely aware of what's out there, but the full commercial impact hasn't been felt because the regulatory environment isn't quite there and the industry hasn't realized how transforming this concept can be.

Q: This would be a threat to the regulatory environment, not to mention the entrenched interests of the telecommunications and broadcasting industries?

There certainly will be, and is, opposition. But the biggest limitation right now is getting people to realize that (technology) has come a long way since the 1920s when the (current) regulatory structure was put in place.

One very positive development about this is that the FCC is listening to these arguments. Michael Powell, the chairman of the FCC, gave what I think was an extraordinary speech about a week ago in which he said this concept of open spectrum is something the government should look at very seriously as a fundamental element of reforming spectrum policy.

And there's no question there's a need for limited rules of the road (with Open Spectrum). Another issue is that standards bodies need to think about how to design protocols that are efficient in how they use the spectrum. We need to go forward and think of what the rules should be, what the standards should be, either by setting aside new "parks" for unlicensed use, or allowing for what's called underlay, where deploying some spectrum that's already licensed (and not interfering with the licensee's use).

Q: Would the military be opposed to this?

No one has any desire to interfere with national safety, that should be paramount. The question is whether you let engineers do their job and see if there won't be any interference (with use of the spectrum where military communications take place). But again, we're at the stage where there are no showstoppers, there are just a number of specific issues that need to be worked out, some by technology, some by regulators, but we're at the stage where most people don't have the idea that this (spectrum-sharing) technology is out there. We're at the age of where the Internet was before it became commercial. I think the same thing could happen with spectrum.

Q: Let's talk about this Supernova conference and its decentralization theme. What sparked the idea?

What has struck me in the past couple years is there are some common themes across technology and business development in seemingly unrelated areas. If you look at some trends in tech that are doing surprisingly well in a difficult economy, you find things like Wi-Fi, Web Services, all the excitement around Weblogs.

You also find a number of extremely smart, successful software entrepreneurs like Ray Ozzie, who created Lotus Notes and others building collaborative business applications.

When you look at all those developments, the common theme is decentralization. In communications, software, in media and entertainment, everyone is being forced to wrestle with forces that are pushing intelligence out to the edge of the network.

Companies are dealing with the fact that no longer is everyone based in one physical location. They're working in teams that cross many boundaries. They're outsourcing all sorts of services to different organizations. They're trying to tie themselves more closely with their supply chains, and also with their customers. And all of their systems are built on a client-server model of centralized control. So there's a need to figure out how to build software that provides all the necessary robustness, reliability, security and features, but that is not heavily centralized.

SuperNova is an attempt to bring together these developments in different areas and try to identify what the business impacts are and how they will impact and affect people today.

I think we're at something of an inflection point where the technology is decentralizing because it has to. You simply cannot for example build (computer game) 'Everquest' and serve billions of people in online gaming on one computer. It just doesn't work. So you need to go to clusters and that leads you to a full set of questions about how you distribute the workload, how you get it out to people. Every enterprise is now on a path towards making their computing infrastructure meet the same demands that Sony has to meet today for supporting millions of players on Everquest.

Q: What tech initiatives/legislation/policy do you expect to see in the new Congress next year?

I think there will be some sort of broadband legislation passed, it might involve a combination of providing incentives and removing some regulatory restrictions. It will be over-hyped by proponents as a key to unleash the broadband market, and denounced by opponents as the death of motherhood and apple pie. Overall, it will have a relatively minor impact because the (broadband) market is not dependent on some of these particular decisions.

I think we're going to have to do some action with intellectual property, and that depends on how the Eldridge Case comes out that is currently before the Supreme Court, in which the Copyright Extension Act is being challenged.

I don't know whether something will get passed next year, but clearly no one is terribly happy with the state of digital intellectual property. Then there's the usual litany of issues that won't go away. Privacy is always an issue. We might see some spam legislation because spam is getting so out of hand.

Q: What about overhauling the 96 Telecom Act? Do you see any chance of that happening in the new Congress?

Independent of this election, my view for the past year or so has increasingly been that there are a bunch of things that should happen in the near term to improve the situation of the telecommunications industry. But if we're talking about getting the policy right, the problem is that we still even after the 96 Act, have a regulatory structure that's decades old and that's totally out of step with where business and technology are.

So what we really need is a new telecom act. But it's not going happen overnight. I talk about it as the Telecom Act of 2010, or somewhere in that time frame. But I think we should start working on it now. The big question is what's the foundation for economic growth and innovation for the rest of our lifetime.

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