Norway to Become First Country to Switch Off FM Radio in 2017

[hunter]

18. I wouldn't "auction" the spectrum at all.

The negotiation process for "homesteading" spectrum would be handled automatically by the broadcasting devices, no money changing hands, with a two-thirds local content rule that would be strictly enforced, and a requirement that all commercial advertising be local, with one radio station per individual or corporate entity, and a use-it-or-lose-it rule.

Big corporate broadcasters as we know them today would be exiled to geosynchronous orbit and the internet. Every terrestrial broadcaster would be a local entity hosting at least sixteen hours of local content each day.

With modern digital technology and a wide enough assigned radio spectrum, then anyone who could find an audience could be a broadcaster. In cities the coverage areas might all shrink to community size if there were many broadcasters. In rural areas the size of the broadcast area might be as large as the broadcater was willing to pay the electric bill and build a high antenna for.

Nobody would be excluded from broadcasting by big money, and terrestrial broadcasting licenses could not be bought and sold.