Ancillary Terrestrial Component
Ancillary Terrestrial Component (ATC) is a U.S. Federal Communications Commission-approved[1] technique for using a "terrestrial" network of cell-phone towers to supplement a Mobile Satellite Service (MSS) provided by orbiting communications satellites. Satellite communications can be degraded by various factors, including attenuation in urban areas due to buildings etc. ATC allows the operators to reuse the same satellite spectrum in a terrestrial network to increase coverage and performance for their customers in highly shadowed regions e.g. within houses. In Europe ATC is known as complementary ground component (CGC).
Notes
gollark: *Is* homosexuality actually genetic?
gollark: It's... probably just neutral for humans, I guess.
gollark: It simultaneously does some really intelligent and really stupid things. Like how biochemistry is incredibly well-optimized for, well, biochemistry things and does things non-biochemists would probably really like to do, but also we have the appendix and eyes are the wrong way round.
gollark: Don't anthropomorphize it, it's a blind optimization process.
gollark: Evolution DOES NOT go around selecting for "the good of the species" or something.
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