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Radio users reminded not to use radios in crimes

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Re: Radio users reminded not to use radios in crimes

#161

Post by sbierwagen »

nimbius wrote: post #126
blhack wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Strong disagree, and wish this sort of gatekeeping wasn't present. Go get one of these things. They're $20, and ham radio is a fun and useful hobby. I have many baofeng radios which have been in many forms of being thrown into boxes, backpacks, filled with dust, rained on, abused by drunks, dropped, etc. and they ALL are still working fine, albeit some with dest behind the LCD cover.

Oh its not gatekeeping. You get what you pay for. My baofeng 5 died two hours into a 12 mile backpackign trip across catalina island. It couldn't do a quarter mile line of sight with an airport 2m amateur tower and when turning on the flashlight feature in my tent it died entirely and would not power back on. I was entirely reliant on it for ranger station as well as general comms and phone patch/weather. Packing thi…

As a fun ham toy, it's fine. For critical safety-of-life communication... do you want to be using any amateur radio? Maybe you'd want a Motorola or ICOM cop radio.

Re: Radio users reminded not to use radios in crimes

#162

Post by mhh__ »

Lammy wrote: post #155
mhh__ wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No amount of "economic anxiety" justifies an explicitly undemocratic coup attempt where people were running around looking to scalp democratically elected leaders. There are real ills in society, but - ignoring that republican voters are significantly uninformed about things like the party's support for healthcare, e.g. Efforts to scrap Obamacare largely hurt poor Trump voters - that doesn't excuse them from the fact…

Why are you and another reply quoting "economic anxiety" when that was never a claim I made? I'm talking about the total contempt you and others seem to have when talking about these people. If you think they are misinformed and have been misled, cool, let's reach out and try to help get them back on the golden path, but all I see is insult-slinging and you're still doing it.

They're supposed to be scare quotes rather than a direction quotation.

Economic Anxiety is often bandied around by people trying to justify often beyond-fascist behaviour as if morality is solely determined by money.

Re: Radio users reminded not to use radios in crimes

#163

Post by irscott »

damnyou wrote: post #75
chociej wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Concealing the meaning of transmissions is contrary to the purposes of the amateur radio service. There are perfectly serviceable radio bands, modes, and services for those wanting to transmit encoded messages, just like there are for those wanting to broadcast, transmit music, engage in commerce, etc.

Personally I think private individuals should have a fundamental right to encryption regardless of the medium.

The idea is that the amateur bands are a commons of sorts for everyone to use and enjoy. As somebody else said you're perfectly welcome to transmit encoded messages on nets designed for that.

Re: Radio users reminded not to use radios in crimes

#164

Post by EhhhhSql »

numpad0 wrote: post #27

> The Bureau has become aware of discussions on social media platforms suggesting that certain radio services regulated by the Commission may be an alternative to social media platforms for groups to communicate and coordinate future activities. “Stop discussing plans for a revolution on amateur radio bands like if we aren’t listening to them, we are, stop believing everything they say on Facebook. I mean, we do enco…

> if you’re going to collude on terrorism over the radio we will hold you responsible for that

Ironically, the FBI has a history of not investigating police abuse of power.

Re: Radio users reminded not to use radios in crimes

#165

Post by jMyles »

some_random wrote: post #115

I'm sure I'll get a lot of hate for this, but honestly FCC regulation of ham radio is at best antiquated cold war bullshit (ie, crypto bans) and at worst gatekeeping for a bunch of old men who can dox themselves in order to get exclusive access to some bands. Every single person here uses high powered encrypted communication without a license, it's a cell phone.

> I'm sure I'll get a lot of hate for this

My experience in the amateur radio community is that hate is exceedingly rare, although disagreement is common.

> Every single person here uses high powered encrypted communication without a license, it's a cell phone.

So let's have a discussion: do we really want these kickass bands to become another cell phone band? I think it's useful to have a part of the spectrum on which deafening corporate rent-seeking cannot hide.

I work full-time on cryptology, so I'm no stranger to the benefits of developing network protocols with cryptographic primitives in mind.

However, the radio spectrum is a great place to let many flowers bloom, and the amatuer bands appear to be experiencing a lovely, overdue bloom right now.

I bought an Icom-7100 last year, and the rapid growth of linux support for hacking on low-signal modes is wonderful to see, and I think it's happening because this band is the way that it is.

> FCC regulation of ham radio is at best antiquated cold war bullshit

Listen: I'm all for completely abolishing the FCC. However, I also recognize that the amateur radio licensing program plays a very important role in society: it allows us to stand and be counted in favor of tinkering and experimentation in the mainstream of some of the best bands on the spectrum. It prevents the government and its cronies from claiming that these bands are fallow and better utilized as even more centralized, profiteering, plastic bullshit.

I don't disagree with your thinking, I just ask that we apply different thinking to different parts of the spectrum so that we can have a more robust and diverse experimental reckoning of the airwaves with which we're blessed.

Re: Radio users reminded not to use radios in crimes

#166

Post by TheOtherHobbes »

treeman79 wrote: post #142
mhh__ wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No amount of "economic anxiety" justifies an explicitly undemocratic coup attempt where people were running around looking to scalp democratically elected leaders. There are real ills in society, but - ignoring that republican voters are significantly uninformed about things like the party's support for healthcare, e.g. Efforts to scrap Obamacare largely hurt poor Trump voters - that doesn't excuse them from the fact…

But burning cities all summer is acceptable? Or taking over downtown city blocks for months...

Those things happened happened for a reason - specifically yet another public murder by the police which was posted online as a video for the delight of racists everywhere.

There is no justification for the fact that imprisonment and murder of black people by the police happens, and is encouraged, to a completely disproportionate extent in the US.

It's also well understood that imprisonment in the US is run on a for-profit basis not dissimilar to slavery, and some judges have gone to prison for corrupt sentencing.

These police actions are immoral, unjust, and just plain nasty, and the best way to stop having your cities set on fire is to stop them happening.

This shouldn't be hard to understand, but in a country which has areas which are only just getting over Jim Crow and lynchings the connection between institutionally abusing some people and having them fight back seems to be too much of a reach for some of the population.

So these riots occur predictably after every avoidable trigger event. And they will continue to happen until that lesson is learned.

This is completely different to an entitled middle income mob of COS-playing couch heroes storming the political centre of the US and making credible threats against elected representatives inside it - after a speech by the president which inflamed the mob, and after a campaign of lies by the president which threatened the foundation of electoral integrity.

All very possibly at the behest of a hostile foreign power.

That's simple textbook domestic terrorism. It has no excuse or justification, and it's naive and misleading to suggest the two are somehow equivalent.

Re: Radio users reminded not to use radios in crimes

#167

Post by jejkfmgmgk »

Blikkentrekker wrote: post #101
generalizations wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't necessarily disagree with you, but I think you've got that backwards: freedom of speech is a right, that a government ought to recognize. "Protected speech" makes it sound like the only speech we're allowed is what is specifically allocated to us.

Which is the reality. “Freedom of speech”, much like “freedom of religion”, is an empty statement. — no man wants true freedom in either, so one is only free so long as it not thread over the bounds of the law, and it can thus be surmised as “ One has the right to commit legal actions. ”. It's entirely different from such matters as “right to a criminal defence attorney when charged with a crime”, which many do feel…

> it can thus be surmised as “One has the right to commit legal actions.”.

The whole point of the constitution is to put a limit on the law. The government cannot pass a law forbidding a certain kind of speech as it would be unconstitutional.

> One already has the freedom to do whatever one wish, so long as it not thread over the bounds of the law.

You have it backwards. The law can dictate whatever it wants so long as it does not thread over the bounds of the constitution.

Re: Radio users reminded not to use radios in crimes

#168

Post by wiml »

bob1029 wrote: post #140
some_random wrote: post #115

I'm sure I'll get a lot of hate for this, but honestly FCC regulation of ham radio is at best antiquated cold war bullshit (ie, crypto bans) and at worst gatekeeping for a bunch of old men who can dox themselves in order to get exclusive access to some bands. Every single person here uses high powered encrypted communication without a license, it's a cell phone.

Hypothetically, if I were to develop some DSSS technique that operates below the noise floor and utilizes a strong AES2 cipher, who the hell cares how I use it?

If you're "below the noise floor" you may well be under Part 15, which is the "who the hell cares" part of the rules, and you're fine.

If your signal is strong enough to interfere with common uses of the band, well, then that's why people care.

Re: Radio users reminded not to use radios in crimes

#169

Post by Johnythree »

sitzkrieg wrote: post #149
i_am_proteus wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People mostly complain about Baofengs because they leak a bunch of RF interference everywhere. Not obvious to the Baofeng user, but obvious to radio operators on other frequencies.

i have measured several models and not witnessed this

Depends which band they are being used on. Their filtering is barely adequate on ham bands, but very poor when programmed on other frequencies.

Re: Radio users reminded not to use radios in crimes

#170

Post by Johnythree »

sbierwagen wrote: post #160
nimbius wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a pinch of salt... If you can get a baofeng to last out of the box longer than a week, and manage to DX a handheld or a repeater further than a parking space away, you should at least win a QRP award and a discount on your technicians test before you get sent to the klink.

I've had a UV-5R for four years. Receives fine. The handful of times I've used it to transmit on a local net nobody mentioned vomiting in disgust at its poor transmission characteristics. The original battery even still holds a charge, which I really didn't expect, since it's probably spent 3.9 years sitting on the charger being kept at the float voltage.

How would people on the same band be aware that it is radiating harmonics?
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