Join our campaign to open the airwaves
Written by Joshua Breitbart Wednesday, 25 March 2009 14:40
We ask all organizations and individuals in New York City to endorse the simple letter below by contacting us directly. Thank you.
We call on the New York City Council to endorse “white space devices,” a new technology that would expand access to the Internet, improve our mobile phones, and stimulate our local economy. As a city with a bold vision for how technology can help all of its residents, New York should urge the Federal Communications Commission to certify low-power, portable white space devices.
White spaces are the unused airwaves between television signals. With the digital television transition, one-fifth of television channels in New York City are not in use. That's 20% of our public airwaves going to waste. We want the FCC to open the unused airwaves in these white spaces to public use.
That's how we got wi-fi and cordless phones and remote controls and microwaves - all from one small sliver of the airwaves that is open for anyone to use with devices that have been certified by the FCC. We want that same kind of opportunity for innovation with white space devices.
Signed:
- Joshua Breitbart, People's Production House
- Abdulai Bah, Nah We Yone
- Valeria Treves, New Immigrant Community Empowerment
- Dan Nuxoll, Rooftop Films
- Chuck Bell, Consumers Union
- Meghan McDermott, Global Action Project
- Dharma Dailey, The Ethos Group
- Hilary Goldstein, New York Grassroots Media Coalition
- Dana Spiegel, NYCwireless
- Juana Ponce de Leon, New York Community Media Alliance
- Michael Lewis, Wireless Harlem Initiative
- Matthew Willse, theCoup
- Reva Golberg
- Trudy Williams
- Paula Zimmerman, Jo Sea Enterprises
