The topic of the day at the House Subcommittee on Communications and Technology was a status report on the upcoming incentive auction. But Committee Chairman Greg Walden (R-OR) worked in a question on the status of FM on cell.
He essentially received the same answer that was delivered to another committee by FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler.
Roger Sherman, Chief of the Wireless Telecommunications Bureau, referenced Wheeler’s remark that the issue was being addressed in the market.
RBR+TVBR observation: It’s being addressed by the market all right, but at a snail’s pace as smartphone manufacturers refuse to activate FM chips that are already built into phones.
In following this course of inaction, they are denying the public access to a service that has been hailed by FEMA as a potential life-saving public safety device.
In the opinion of many, including this publication, they are more concerned about losing streaming fees than they are about public safety. So much for market forces.
We note that the NAB has not asked for an FM on cell mandate.
However, it would make sense for Congress and the FCC to work to make FM on cell a ubiquitous service. Instead of sitting there with their teeth in their mouth, both entities could be issuing statements in support of the service purely on public safety grounds and appeal to the better angels of the smartphone manufacturers that are standing in the way of equipping untold millions of Americans from being better equipped than they are today for the next emergency situation.
