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hopes is a very different future in the U.S.
“it's my spectrum, But . . . ”
A lot of spectrum in the U.S. belongs to branches of the government
— most notably DoD — and other entities that don't
use said spectrum very often. Wouldn't it be nice if they could
loan it out to others who could use it and then grab it back in
real time when they needed it? Well, the FCC sure thinks so.
The agency envisions that smart folks can develop cognitive
radios that will be able to ask if the spectrum is free, use it
when it is, and leave it behind when the licensee needs it. This
might well happen over the next decade.
Similarly, this technology should allow devices like cell
phones to also query unlicensed bands like WiFi's 802.11 a
and b/g bands to see if they can be used — all in real time [4].
oh, and what aBout your question?
• SMS, aka your text messages: They are tiny amounts of
data, but the network by default also gives them the lowest
possible priority. They are likely to get through, but if a
network is truly slammed, they might fall below real-time
delivery. It's worth noting that as texting has become so
ubiquitous it seems carriers have done a bit of work to
avoid the delays of old and keep texting useful even under
load. Why? Because when calls aren't going through this
keeps customers happy. But I add this last thought anecdotally;
I'm not sure if they are actually increasing traffic
prioritization.
• Voice calls: Most networks try to avoid even completing
these if the call won't work. "I tried you and it went
straight to voice mail." That happens sometimes because
the network doesn't believe you — the recipient — will be
able to hear or talk to the other person. "Believe" here is
not some AI, but rather, the network doesn't find you with
sufficient signal strength or it doesn't have the bandwidth
on voice channels to make the call work.
• Data: on Verizon, in my experience, data never goes
down. But it can get really, really, really slow. In fact, it
can kick me from the 3G network to the old 1X network
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