T.0. Morrow wrote:
>>>...It makes little sense to say that the FCC has no claim over *one*
>>>frequency of radiation that I use solely on my property . . . while
>>>it does over another frequency . . . .
>
>>Consider the analogy of altitude. Just because people have long had control
>>over the space a few meters above and below the ground, does that imply
>>that they have absolute rights to the space hundreds or thousands of kms
>>above and below the ground? By the same argument you make against spectrum
>>rights granted by the FCC it would seem you should complain that the FAA
>>granted airplanes the right to fly high above ground properties
>
>... the question becomes, if we want to pursue your analogy, whether the
>early Federal Aviation Administration would have violated property rights in
>saying to someone who had been peaceably enjoying a 1000m tower before the
>advent of air travel, "We claim all airspace above 100m. Tear down your tower."
>>>I have throughout argued *against* establishing property rights in
>>>the spectrum.
>>
>>I'm not sure what you mean by "establish." Would you object if people
>>who owned property of the form you approve of wanted to contract to redivide
>>their property, creating "property" in spectrum in the process?
>
>I have yet to hear a description of such a process that would, absent
>agreement between all owners of all property in a broadcast area, recreate
>something analogous to trademark rights in the spectrum. At any rate, it
>seems like an awfully painful and utterly impractical way to reach the same
>result and carries little weight in terms of justification. Otherwise one
>could argue for, say, regulating the peaceable enjoyment of blue bottles on
>grounds that *if* all property owners in North America agreed to limit the use
>of blue bottles on their property then they *might* thereafter contract to
>make that right alone transferable. What is the point of such an argument?