After years of trying, FCC reallocates bits and pieces: the FCC, after years of being mandated to work with other governmental agencies to free a few hundred MHz of bandwidth below 3 GHz, released another 27 MHz today. It's not the FCC's fault that it's small and scattered; it's a real victory. But it highlights the problems in having pre-allocated so many bands with such abandon up into the 90s, and then having policy set by legislation instead of by interested parties in the public and privates sectors, as they Europeans do.
In Europe, the World Radio Conference (WRC), which hardly represents the whole world, sets harmonization of frequency use to ensure commercial, military, and interests in the public good are all served from country to country in the same way. In the US, we have no such coordinating agency. The NTIA (National Telecommunication and Information Agency, part of the Department of Commerce) is the closest thing: it's an advocacy group, though, not a policy or regulation setting one. The FCC tries to cut the baby in half by facilitating interests in the Congress, Administration, and elsewhere, and the baby winds up in neatly diced cubes on the floor.
Until such point as Congress has the will to either join the WRC (if they'll have us), or set up a group with teeth, we'll have a disastrous frequency policy that may have consequences for American competitiveness. The head of the CTIA (Cellular Telecommunication and Internet Association) said, for instance, that the failure of the U.S. to execute a coordinated 3G (third generation) frequency policy with Europe and Asia assures huge advances and cheaper equipment outside the U.S., costing consumers and businesses extra billions. (This is somewhat in question as the whole European and Asian 3G strategy now appears to be near financial ruin, but the point is well taken.)
As long as Congress tries to legislate bandwidth by meeting in closed rooms late and night and inserting auction and spectrum requirements in budget bills (1997, 1999, 2000, etc.), our spectrum managemet will be poor. As long as we pursue pipe dreams in order to free up spectrum (digital television being primary among them), we'll be in short supply as interesting services develop and we can't take advantage of them.
Meanwhile, the FCC apparently is about to approve ultra wideband (UWB) technology. UWB makes a bet that extremely short and frequent bursts across large swaths of bandwidth in use by others won't disrupt those other users. We'll see: it hasn't been tested in real-world applications yet, but it has remarkable potential to vastly increase bandwidth, penetration, and range.