A spokesperson for the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) discussed plans for what the country is going to do with the spectrum currently in use by analog TV. The official cutover date to digital is in 2009 and NTIA would like to host an auction sometime in 2008 to decide in advance who gets what.

It looks like the spectrum (which is in the 700Mhz band) will be used for wireless broadband, possibly WiMAX.

The U.S. is moving to open up WiMAX spectrum on several fronts, including the 700-MHz frequency band, said Michael Gallagher, assistant secretary of Commerce for Communications and Information. Gallagher also serves as administrator of the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA).

There are already auctions scheduled for this year and 2007 to sell off space in the 1,710- and 2,110-MHz frequency bands for WiMAX.

[via FierceWireless]