To spend our precious time here together moaning about how royally screwed up our cellphone companies are here in the States would at this point be too easy. You know the drill: Half-assed handsets, crippled functionality, spotty signals, dumbfounding user interfaces, outrageously priced call plans, incomprehensible outsourced customer service reps from a far-off land, and lets not even talk about the indentured servitude contracts. No, the topic is cliché at this point, so today Id like to take a positive spin on things.
I have to say that by omitting any mention of the FCC's 700 MHz auction, and how Google ensured open access for the C band by petitioning for it through this auction venue, the writer missed a pretty major event in cellular market history. Verizon would never have been strongarmed into open access if it wasn't for Google and Google would never have had its chance without the auction. Plus, the strength of this frequency, which has been turned over to wireless communications, means that we will likely see fewer cell phone towers to support it. isn't that impressive too?
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