&gt; Even then there is a case to be made for keeping some spectrum &#x27;open&#x27; and unlicensed lest we see it all end up owned by a handful of corporations.<p>I think this is the important point. Let cell carriers in and they will subscribe as many people as necessary to fill the available bandwidth. After all, that&#x27;s pretty much what they are paid for.<p>It&#x27;s like road congestion - the amount of suffering depends on people&#x27;s tolerance to endure suffering, not on the amount of available resource. There will always be more people willing to watch lolcat videos on their phones if they don&#x27;t stutter <i>too badly</i>.<p>Keeping some spectrum aside from big operators allows at least small LANs to operate reasonably, while opening it to them may easily end up bringing suffering to everyone.