Spread Spectrum

Spread Spectrum

This technology will allow wireless transmissions to operate without scarcity and thus also without legalized monopolies.

"Even greater improvements in spectrum usage will come from a family of technologies that use the computational intelligence of today's wireless devices to allow multiple systems to "share" the same spectrum. The first of these, spread spectrum, replaces ancient high-power, undifferentiated narrowband transmissions with modern low-power, coded wideband. First described during World War II, spread-spectrum technology is already used in many cellular phone networks and in Wi-Fi, but newer systems promise even greater capacity improvements. A newly permitted method of using spectrum, ultrawideband, takes spread spectrum to its logical conclusion, operating at such low power that, subject to appropriate safeguards, it can underlie existing licensed services. That is, preexisting users of the same spectrum bands won't even know the ultrawideband transmissions are there. It will be as if we figured out a way for freight trains to travel on highways, with cars being none the wiser. Standards work is already under way to make ultrawideband the core technology for home entertainment networks, transferring video, audio, and photos among home PCs, stereos, high-definition televisions, and DVD players. And this is only the beginning."

(The summary is by David Reed for the IEEE Spectrum magazine, but the article is no longer available at the original URL, http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/WEBONLY/publicfeature/mar04/0304scar.html)