Robert Horvitz's blog

Press release | May 2010

Silver Jubilee of the rules that enabled Wi-Fi

On May 24, 2010 it will be exactly 25 years since the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), the regulator of the radio spectrum for public use in the USA, released the decision to permit unlicensed access to the radio spectrum for communications, provided the devices use “Spread Spectrum”.

That paved the way for the IEEE 802.11 committee to start developing “Wi-Fi” – an interoperability standard for Wireless Local Area Networks (WLANs) – which encouraged regulators in other countries to adopt similar rules. Canada and the European countries agreed first, then dozens more governments allowed license-free use of the radio spectrum by WLANs.

Attached is our response to the European Commission's consultation which ended 7 May 2010.

The attached file was submitted last night.

Folks, this is last minute, but please take a look at the attached draft file, which I think is ready to go unless you have further changes to suggest. SE43 will meet 20-21 October and we should have input to that meeting if we want to be involved in the standards setting. Post your comments here, or to the email list, today if possible. Thanks. >BOB<

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