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Google this week announced the launch of FreeTheAirwaves.com, an effort to rally the public behind the company's efforts to get FCC approval for use of the "white spaces" of spectrum between TV channels.

"Google and several other tech vendors are now engaged in a public-relations battle with TV stations and makers of wireless microphones, who have raised concerns about possible interference from white spaces devices," explains Network World's Grant Gross.

"This isn't the first website Google has set up to fight its corner," notes The Register's Bill Ray. "The Wireless Innovation Alliance was set up to present evidence that making use of the empty spectrum would not interfere with TV broadcasting, but this one looks much more like a grassroots protest than a slick media machine."

Still, BusinessWeek's Olga Kharif thinks it's unlikely to succeed. "Television broadcasters and wireless service providers are dead set against it," she writes. "Devices supposed to work over white spaces keep failing government tests. And Google's publicity campaign doesn't help address either of these problems."

More here from ZDNet ... more here from CNET News ... more here from the Washington Post ... more here from InformationWeek ... more here from TechSpot ... more here from the Wall Street Journal ... and Google's announcement is here.