Digital Analogs: Computing, Internet, And Spectrum Lessons For New Space Policy

Entrepreneurs hoping for aggressive growth in space markets cite the commercialization of the Internet as a golden age of market dynamism and enlightened regulation. This study investigates the growth of commercial computing, a business-oriented Internet, and spectrum allocation as historical analogs guiding new space policy. These "digital analogs" share common threads of early military backing that developed many of the technological components, policies encouraging the transfer of technology to the private sector, the discovery of new markets, regulatory flexibility, and the power of venture capital financing to develop new technological platforms and stimulate economic growth.