[CWN-Summit] Urgent Alert on White Spaces

[Harold Feld]

This from Wally Bowen out at MAIN.  Please spread far and wide.  More 
importantly: please take action!

If you are in the U.S., call you Senators and Representative!  Ask 
your subscribers (if applicable) to make calls.  The broadcasters are 
making an incredible last-minute push here.  If they can get a delay 
on this vote, they have an excellent chance of derailing the entire process.

It all comes down to the next two weeks.  If we can get this to an 
FCC meeting for a vote on November 4, we believe we have the 
votes.  But it is getting to that Nov. 4 vote that is the tricky part.

Harold

>Friends -- Will we look back to Oct. 16, 2008, as the day the
>Internet was saved?
>
>One week ago, FCC Chairman Kevin Martin announced that the agency's
>engineers concluded that vacant TV channels -- known as "white
>spaces" -- can be used to extend high-speed wireless Internet access
>to hard-to-reach rural areas and underserved urban neighborhoods,
>without harming over-the-air TV signals.
>
>http://www.internetnews.com/mobility/article.php/3778381/FCC+Says+White+Spaces+Can+Work+for+Net+Access.htm
>
>Opening this new spectrum is the Holy Grail for those of us who
>have been working to:
>
>1.  solve the rural broadband and low-income/urban Digital Divides;
>
>2.  create the "third pipe" alternative to the cable/telco
>"duopoly," in order to preserve Internet Freedom and to create a
>competitive broadband marketplace.
>
>Martin said that the FCC would vote on opening the "white spaces" on
>Nov. 4, less than two weeks away.
>
>But then, last Friday, the National Association of Broadcasters
>(NAB) filed an emergency appeal to block the Nov. 4 vote!
>
>WE NEED YOUR HELP!!  The NAB is pressuring key members of Congress to
>force the FCC to delay its Nov. 4 vote.
>
>Please tell your representatives in Congress to reject the
>NAB's desperate delaying tactics -- and let the FCC vote!!
>
>It's been nearly SIX YEARS since the FCC began studying this issue.
>
>That's how long the NAB has been able to delay this important
>Rural Broadband/Internet Freedom vote!
>
>If the NAB succeeds, the issue will be kicked into next year --
>to a new FCC, a new Congress, and a new Administration.  We can't
>let the NAB re-set the clock!  Six years is enough!
>
>Rural America -- and our urban, low-income neighborhoods -- have
>suffered long enough without access to affordable high-speed
>Internet. Enough is enough!!
>
>It's time to act!  Go to:  http://www.main.nc.us/whitespaces
>
>Click on the "Action Alert" and use the Free Press "Open White
>Spaces for Everyone" link.  By typing in your zip code, the secure
>site will give you the local phone number for your members of
>Congress.
>
>Please share this with your friends and neighbors ASAP!!  Thanks!
>
>*  Rural residents:  Check out the "ex parte" letter which 10 rural
>organizations filed with the FCC earlier this week:
>http://main.nc.us/whitespaces/files/fcc-letter.html
>
>With your help, we can make Nov. 4 the date of TWO historic votes!
>
>Wally Bowen, Executive Director
>Mountain Area Information Network (MAIN)
>Asheville, N.C.  28801
>http://www.main.nc.us
>WPVM-LP  103.5 FM
>http://www.wpvm.org
>IndyLink Access & Webhosting
>http://www.indylink.org
>828.255.0182  ext. 109
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