Closed and open

Closed and open

This week, the news is an interesting combination of closed and open technologies. On the closed side you have the iPhone, with its proprietary technology and quite distinct development methodology. The closed nature of the product isn't keeping companies from developing applications for the newest smart phone--runaway initial success will do that for a product. I think open standards are desirable and important, but it's hard to argue with the public demand for the very closed iPhone.

An open platform is one thing--open network access is something else. New RF spectrum is coming, and big players are starting to wrestle over whose vision will win out in the new space. The incumbent cellular telephone providers want 700 MHz to look just like the spectrum in which they've found tremendous success. Other players, like Google, want a more open, free-wheeling marketplace for the coming bands. The FCC chairman says he wants open access regardless of how the spectrum is auctioned, but there are obviously more and less open options for the frequencies freed when television moves forever to digital modes. The debates between proponents of the different allocation methods bear watching, though, because it's likely that this will be the last major piece of RF territory opened up for the foreseeable future. -Curtis