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Assignment 6
The 700-MHz auction drew some mixed reviews. Sascha Meinrath, the research director for the New American Foundations’ Wireless Future Program says the 700-MHz auction went “exactly as expected,” with big carriers Verizon and AT&T scoring big wins on the so-called “C” and “B” blocks of the spectrum, respectively. Verizon bid more than US$4.5 billion for the 22-MHz C-Block they now have the rights to operate.

The C Block was so valuable because it provided the broadest range of coverage over any spectrum available in the auction. It also potentially holds the key to the building out of a nationwide open-access wireless network. Meinrath also declared that, “while the open-access rules have the right intent behind them, they are broadly written and can be open to different interpretations.” The FCC will have the responsibility to determine just how open the C-Block spectrum really is.

Google, which did not win any actual spectrum in the auction, has shown their optimism toward the results and the consumer advocacy groups involved. Google’s attorneys, Richard Whitt and Joseph Farber, posted on Google’s blog that they called the auction “a major victory for consumers” and predicted “consumers soon should begin enjoying new, Internet-like freedom to get the most out of their mobile phones and other wireless devices.”

Tim Karr, the campaign director for the media advocacy group Free Press, says Verizon’s past opposition to open networks means that they carrier should be trusted and that the consumer groups will have to pressure the FCC to strictly enforce its own rules.