You could have the government do nothing, which would mean there are no exclusive spectrum licenses and everything is wide open. Or you could have the government marketize everything, which would mean you auction everything off to exclusive owners. But either way, that would be a choice and in making the choice you’d be “managing” the development of the communications marketplace. And so once the government is in the business of managing the development of the communications marketplace, there’s no obvious reason why it should be all or nothing. Why not auction some and some some unlicensed? Why not conditional auctions?
From The Limits of First Principles
Interesting point there.
