The author assumes that everyone can get sufficient connectivity to be able to stream, or have cell service, or can afford satellite. I'm here to tell you that the United States is a very large country where that is not the case. Broadcast TV serves those people.
It also seems odd to hold up the FCC's spectrum auctions as wildly successful. The FCC made bank, sure, but ATT and the rest assumed a mountain of debt, tied themselves in knots to get over it, and generally speaking consumers are worse off today because of it. We also have a case study in Dish who had a lot of spectrum and signally failed to do anything with it, so it's not clear that more spectrum would help. Selling more spectrum should not be undertaken without very tight guarantees that it is used for the benefit of citizens, and not merely locked up and used to extract rent.
kjellsbells•4mo ago
It also seems odd to hold up the FCC's spectrum auctions as wildly successful. The FCC made bank, sure, but ATT and the rest assumed a mountain of debt, tied themselves in knots to get over it, and generally speaking consumers are worse off today because of it. We also have a case study in Dish who had a lot of spectrum and signally failed to do anything with it, so it's not clear that more spectrum would help. Selling more spectrum should not be undertaken without very tight guarantees that it is used for the benefit of citizens, and not merely locked up and used to extract rent.