Well, the great idea of auctioning off spectrum to create more competition in wireless services seems to be going by the wayside. Verizon, who had made a big push to provide fiber optic based internet service + cable TV (FIOS) to many homes on the East Coast, seems to have stopped that altogether (too costly, it seems), and instead has been making partnership deals with existing cable TV companies who own the rights to currently unused wireless spectrum. Verizon gets the spectrum rights (for money), making it an even stronger dominating market force, and through partnership agreements it gets access to more homes. The downside? Cable TV companies are giving up on wireless, which may have been a pipe dream to begin with, and consumers will continue to have limited choices for fixed line internet access. Continued expansion of fiber to the home, also, appears to go by the wayside.
See the Op Ed piece here: Verizon's Worrisome Cable Deals.
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