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The Backbone of VHF Amateur Radio May Be Under Threat

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Re: The Backbone of VHF Amateur Radio May Be Under Threat

#61

Post by tlrobinson »

kylehotchkiss wrote: post #19

I can't help but feel the amateur radio community could have used a rebrand for the internet age. I understand there's a lot of history but it's hard to get young people interested in being _hams_, a word that has not aged well. I got my licence about a decade back and really loved the technical pieces - learning about how radio waves worked, propagation with different bands, the ability to (try) to build your own mo…

I think the rebranding is happening slowly.

There are really two amateur radio "communities" (though with a fair amount of overlap): the older "ragchewing" generations that didn't grow up with the Internet, and the newer generations that care more about experimenting with shiny new technology.

As the former generation "retires" and new licensees join it will continue to shift.

There have been a record number of new licenses granted in recent years (though that doesn't necessarily translate to actual engagement in the hobby) http://www.arrl.org/news/another-outstanding-year-for-amateu...

Re: The Backbone of VHF Amateur Radio May Be Under Threat

#62

Post by tlrobinson »

There are millions of these radios in the hands of both licensed hams AND unlicensed preppers/airsoft players/etc who bought their $25 BaoFeng radio on Amazon.

Thales wants to reallocate the band for autonomous drone operations.

What could possibly go wrong?

Re: The Backbone of VHF Amateur Radio May Be Under Threat

#63

Post by 18pfsmt »

tlrobinson wrote: post #60
Jach wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Two better ways: remove the need for a test or license at all, at least at many more frequencies and below energy levels well above current limits (which say you can transmit around 2.4 Ghz for example up to some power license-free). Second is to remove any restrictions on what is transmitted, which lets you have purely digital frequency modulated end-to-end encrypted signals meant for amateur computers to decipher.…

As much as I'd love to have more people in amateur radio, and the ability to use encryption, I think both the licensing and prohibition on encryption are fairly critical to keeping things running smoothly. The test includes lots of useful information such as requirements to transmit your callsign and using minimum power necessary. The prohibition on encryption is pretty critical to enforce other rules such as only us…

My comments are limited to the US because these things are managed differently in different countries.

Given how much the spectrum landscape is changing (i.e. 5G), I think we should rework how strictly we allocate spectrum, especially lower-power/ lower frequency stuff. I should be able to create a broadcast radio station with X mile radius pretty easily. Is X=30mi? I cannot say, but the intense regulations are onerous, and I think the recent decline in local journalism might be reversed by an increase in local broadcast radio.

Re: The Backbone of VHF Amateur Radio May Be Under Threat

#64

Post by tlrobinson »

xxpor wrote: post #14
rsuelzer wrote: post #9

as an aside, I got my ham radio licence because of my interest in long distance microwave mesh networking. there is a group called aredn http://www.arednmesh.org which uses wifi devices modified to run in the Amateur portions of 2ghz and 5ghz to create massive mesh networks. The lack of noise on our allocations means we can make really long connections. I personally have a 50 dollar Microtik dish that makes a 25 mile…

There's something similar in the Seattle/Victoria area. https://hamwan.org/ It's really fun to play with. It's not strictly a mesh, but that's OK. It's used heavily for EMCOMM as well as internet linking repeater sites on the tops of mountains where there's no other internet.

If anyone is interested in setting up one of these in San Francisco I've got a line of sight to much of downtown and maybe East Bay.

Re: The Backbone of VHF Amateur Radio May Be Under Threat

#65

Post by logfromblammo »

justin66 wrote: post #57
logfromblammo wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You would use it to talk to other amateur radio operators about amateur radio operating and amateur radio equipment, obviously. The prohibition on encrypted content is a deal-breaker for me, and a lot of other people, who might otherwise want to experiment with connecting to the Internet from difficult locations. But since the Internet runs on encrypted protocols now, using unencrypted amateur radio transmissions pot…

> And since hams are very likely to narc, snitch, or grass You forgot rats and stool pigeons. It really detracted from the extremely important point you were making.

Nevertheless, it is one of the unpleasant traits that turned me off from a hobby that I'd otherwise be interested in. The technical aspects are appealing, but it's the outdated rules regime and the people in the community that drove me off.

It may be different in your locale, but the hams around me are mainly older white men, and the voices that can be heard on the air are frequently strongly biased against my moral and political opinions. And they have no "block" buttons.

Re: The Backbone of VHF Amateur Radio May Be Under Threat

#66

Post by jmwilson »

tlrobinson wrote: post #60
Jach wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Two better ways: remove the need for a test or license at all, at least at many more frequencies and below energy levels well above current limits (which say you can transmit around 2.4 Ghz for example up to some power license-free). Second is to remove any restrictions on what is transmitted, which lets you have purely digital frequency modulated end-to-end encrypted signals meant for amateur computers to decipher.…

As much as I'd love to have more people in amateur radio, and the ability to use encryption, I think both the licensing and prohibition on encryption are fairly critical to keeping things running smoothly. The test includes lots of useful information such as requirements to transmit your callsign and using minimum power necessary. The prohibition on encryption is pretty critical to enforce other rules such as only us…

> Encryption isn't actually necessary for any of the stated purposes of amateur radio (experimentation, recreation, training, contesting, emergency comms, etc)

It is, or will be, needed for experimentation. Wireless security cannot be an afterthought anymore; communication modes and protocols need to be built with security in mind from day 1.

There is one area where encryption is expressly permitted in amateur radio: satellite control, for obvious reasons. The future of amateur radio is not people talking to people over narrowband voice channels; it's going to be machines talking to other machines, and being able to control them. This is going to require encryption, or innovation will shift off the ham bands. And if the ARS is just ragchews, contesting, and doing things that have already been done instead of advancing communication, then there's not much defense when someone like Thales comes in and suggests reallocating bandwidth to something new and enterprising.

Re: The Backbone of VHF Amateur Radio May Be Under Threat

#67

Post by vageli »

kylehotchkiss wrote: post #19

I can't help but feel the amateur radio community could have used a rebrand for the internet age. I understand there's a lot of history but it's hard to get young people interested in being _hams_, a word that has not aged well. I got my licence about a decade back and really loved the technical pieces - learning about how radio waves worked, propagation with different bands, the ability to (try) to build your own mo…

> I can't help but feel the amateur radio community could have used a rebrand for the internet age. I understand there's a lot of history but it's hard to get young people interested in being _hams_, a word that has not aged well. I got my licence about a decade back and really loved the technical pieces - learning about how radio waves worked, propagation with different bands, the ability to (try) to build your own modem with two radios and an Arduino, but when it came to actually talking to people on the radio... other people just wanted to talk about radios.

> It is really fascinating what you can do with 2m band radios. For those times and places where your cell phone won't work, digital modes on the new Icom radios look pretty cool. Being able to hook up a radio to a laptop to send something digitally still seems valuable and relevant! But the community branding could use some modernization to push those use cases.

Packet radio is awesome. Long distance, communication unmediated by third parties is awesome. Building gateways for sms/email is possible. I pointed an antenna at a satellite in the sky and received data. If I got to touch this stuff as a kid it would have blown my world apart.

There is so much possibility, if people think ham radio is just old white dudes talking about radios they are not digging deeply enough.

Re: The Backbone of VHF Amateur Radio May Be Under Threat

#68

Post by tlrobinson »

jmwilson wrote: post #66
tlrobinson wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As much as I'd love to have more people in amateur radio, and the ability to use encryption, I think both the licensing and prohibition on encryption are fairly critical to keeping things running smoothly. The test includes lots of useful information such as requirements to transmit your callsign and using minimum power necessary. The prohibition on encryption is pretty critical to enforce other rules such as only us…

> Encryption isn't actually necessary for any of the stated purposes of amateur radio (experimentation, recreation, training, contesting, emergency comms, etc) It is, or will be, needed for experimentation. Wireless security cannot be an afterthought anymore; communication modes and protocols need to be built with security in mind from day 1. There is one area where encryption is expressly permitted in amateur radio:…

A few points:

Encryption isn't typically part of the physical or data link layers, which are the bread and butter of amateur radio. What you send on top of those isn't really the interesting part of amateur radio, from a technical perspective.

The actual rule prohibits "messages encoded for the purpose of obscuring their meaning" which I think most people interpret to mean digital signatures for authentication and integrity are permitted, just not encrypted payloads.

Many protocols have the ability to switch ciphers, including disabling encryption entirely while still performing authentication and integrity checking.

Re: The Backbone of VHF Amateur Radio May Be Under Threat

#69

Post by Jach »

tlrobinson wrote: post #60
Jach wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Two better ways: remove the need for a test or license at all, at least at many more frequencies and below energy levels well above current limits (which say you can transmit around 2.4 Ghz for example up to some power license-free). Second is to remove any restrictions on what is transmitted, which lets you have purely digital frequency modulated end-to-end encrypted signals meant for amateur computers to decipher.…

As much as I'd love to have more people in amateur radio, and the ability to use encryption, I think both the licensing and prohibition on encryption are fairly critical to keeping things running smoothly. The test includes lots of useful information such as requirements to transmit your callsign and using minimum power necessary. The prohibition on encryption is pretty critical to enforce other rules such as only us…

A use case I want out of amateur radio regulation is private anonymous communication traceable only via motivated actors using triangulation etc to a physical broadcast point, which may be moving and not always on.

I want this not for commercial or nefarious reasons (though it would be used for such and I don't care) but because I want some attempt at private-by-default in everything, even just experimenting or recreational. The edge cases where I'd want maximum openness, like in emergencies, are rare, so shouldn't be the default. It's not going to happen I know, but it's what it'd take to bring me into it and I presume more competent philosophical aligned people (there's a few in the overall threads) who could use the lessened restrictions for actual societal innovation (positive or negative).

Re: The Backbone of VHF Amateur Radio May Be Under Threat

#70

Post by Jach »

vageli wrote: post #67
kylehotchkiss wrote: post #19

I can't help but feel the amateur radio community could have used a rebrand for the internet age. I understand there's a lot of history but it's hard to get young people interested in being _hams_, a word that has not aged well. I got my licence about a decade back and really loved the technical pieces - learning about how radio waves worked, propagation with different bands, the ability to (try) to build your own mo…

> I can't help but feel the amateur radio community could have used a rebrand for the internet age. I understand there's a lot of history but it's hard to get young people interested in being _hams_, a word that has not aged well. I got my licence about a decade back and really loved the technical pieces - learning about how radio waves worked, propagation with different bands, the ability to (try) to build your own…

The potential is obvious once you really start to grasp the reality of the electric field and its properties. (A favorite Feynman vid to give laymen a taste: https://youtube.com/watch?v=FjHJ7FmV0M4) I don't see how any worthwhile possibilities can be realized at the amateur level however given just two of the restrictions I pointed out in a sibling thread...
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