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Low-Tech Cell Phone Blocking
nigelc writes: "This BBC story reports on Japanese work to come up with a low-tech solution to cell phones in cinemas! Hey, if it can stop the person next to me from going 'Hey, dude, guess where I am?,' I'm all in favor of it."
i wonder if it can stop the government from sending radiowaves into my brain, too? maybe then i can stop wearing this aluminum helmet!
I put on my robe and wizard hat.
But what if someone can't call 911 because of the blocker?
I would fear installing these things because of liabilities. What's annoyance compared to the safety value of being able to use a phone anywhere.
I'm sorry, but like most of the /. posters I keep my cell phone on vibrate ALL THE TIME. I'm not going to be rude and talk in the theater, but I HAVE TO GET MY TEXT MESSAGES.
"Dude, the servers are down" is the most important message I can get from mon!!!! If I can't get to one or the other data center things start going to shit fast.
Note to owners: This is a great way to get me to stay way the fsck away from your theater if you install it.
My $0.02 will always be worth more than your â0.02, so
So if I read this right, this paneling also blocks 97% of Wi-Fi (802.11b) signal strength? So if I want to secure my wireless network, I panel the outside walls of my building with this type of paneling, making it so that the warchalkers of the world can't get the signal? And any time I need to go building-to-building, I wire it.
(Yes, I realize this only works if you don't need access outside the building, but many applications wouldn't anyway.)
He looked at me and said, "Kid, we don't like your kind, and we're gonna send your fingerprints off to Washington."
Funny, that I never run into this "cell phone conversation" problem at the symphony.
Everyone who wants to avoid cell phones will create "pockets" of "no-phone-zones" around public places, making the mobile nature of the phones useless. "Not in my theater", "not in my restaurant", "not in my pub", etc. That will also create interference for phones in "legit" areas. (Right outside that theater, restaurant, etc.)
So the phone companies will, of course, modify their system with "new and improved, block-proof service!" Higher power, different frequency, more sensitive equipment, etc. All at a higher price for consumers. So we have buildings that make it difficult to use cell phones, and expensive phones that will work despite the buildings designed to keep them from working. And what have we gained, exactly?
The solution is so much simplier. Tell the jerk next to you in the theater to get a phone with a vibrate mode and to actually use it, and to have some repect for those around him. Turn off your own phone in the theater. In general, use common sense and common courtesy.
You can't solve a the problem of people being rude with technology. They'll find some way to be rude anyway.
--GrouchoMarx
Card-carrying member of the EFF, FSF, and ACLU. Are you?
...until now, there has been no way of enforcing silence.
Ever heard a GSM phone, blasting at full power trying to reach a base station, interfere with a powerful amplifier?
Better cover your ears if you're sitting close to the speakers.
"I have opinions of my own, strong opinions, but I don't always agree with them." -- George H. W. Bush
Panel your interior with this stuff. It'll be crap for getting cell calls in the house, but hell for anyonetrying to get your data short of tapping your net feed. And mount an exterior antenna (something liek a cheapo repeater) to "pipe in" the signals you want. A real RF Firewall. Heh.
Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo! http://goo.gl/J9bkO
Now, I understand that you get reflection and you can normally see more than one antenna, but this could cause whole other problems with people sheilding other areas as a side effect. I mean, what if I live next door to a cinema and they install this? Suddenly I can't receive mobile phone calls in my house because I'm in the shadow of the cinema!
This raises all kinds of interesting issues. Can I force another property to stop blocking my radio waves? Does it devalue my property (probably, in today's modern soceity, yes.) I know whenever I've looked for places to live in the last few years one of the first things I do when I walk in is see if I can get mobile reception.
-- Sorry, I can't think of anything funny to say here.
They have to realise that if the phone cannot find a signal...it simply increases power. So if it finds a signal after increasing its power to the maximum level (1 watt I believe), it will continue transmitting at that power...if you had a roomfull of this...I doubt it would be healthy...heheh
So if they want to block it...they have to _really_ block it.
Nomel
...is a personal cell-phone anesthetizer. So I can reach into my pocket and push a button, and every cell phone within 10 meters stops working for 30 seconds (or at least long enough to drop the current call). It doesn't completely solve the problem but it would be very, very satisfying :P
The first place I saw the idea was AskTog, May, 2000. But he has an update saying the technology has been developed by a company called bluelinx.
"In my values, freedom is more important than 'serving users' in a mere practical sense." -- RMS
I am not looking forward to the first time someone has an emergency in the Movie Theater and no one can call 911, that wont be so good.
Or maybe someone tries something with a gun?
"Sig free in '03!"
I am the parent of two children, and it is extremely valuable that my wife and I have the occasion to escape the kids and go out to have a good time.
This does not mean however, that I am not a parent for that brief time I am out. I always carry my cellphone and it is always on vibrate. I am as disgusted with the people who have the bad manners to not only turn a cell phone to silent ring, but who also answer the phone in a middle of some event, be it a movie or a play.
I would much rather see the device where it forces a cell phone to switch to a silent ring. People such as myself would be much more accepting.
The moment this is installed in my favorite theater, I will stop going as I consider it crucial that my children and their guardians have access to me at all times not matter the circumstance.
For cinemas, concerts et c. I prefer a low-tech solution like this.
Help savingAmigaOS and a free PowerPC market
I don't know about you guys, but I'm already sick of paying $8 for a movie. If these get installed, the price will go even higher! Yeah, they're cheap...but define "cheap" when it comes to installing it in a large building? Plus the cost of installation, which they'll raise ticket prices for - and believe me, once they cover cost, they're not going to lower their prices.
--
http://nemilar.net - Not your grandmother's soup kitchen
Even people who set their cell phones to vibrate would be penalized.
I have an even lower-tech solution:
"Sir: Please turn your cell phone off or leave the cinema" - the usher
or:
"Turn that damn thing OFF!" - me
I remember reading a story of about a man talking on a cell phone on a ski gondola at a resort in Aspen. Another man, sitting next to him, asked him quietly how much the phone (a new, state of the art model) had cost. When the first man replied "Four hundred dollars," the second snatched it, threw it out the window of the gondola, and calmly handed him four Ben Franklins.
I was at this concert series of classical music in Rotterdam, and every concert about 4 different mobile phones rang. So I am all for it. That or flogging. My own mobile phone is always in vibrate/silent mode. And off during concerts/movies etc.
It seems to me that active jamming would be much easier than having to repanel the entire room in this stuff. I think the real use could be for shielding RF sensitive equipment, acting like a low cost Faraday cage.
Of course having magnetic wall around your sensitive equipment might not be a good idea either.
Give me a break people. Many of you are saying your so good that you don't have to be on call all the time.
:/).
I wasn't on call last night, but I still had to answer the page because the problem fell into my lap by default.
Our security guy made changes to the firewall which altered the routing table without fully understanding what he was doing. (Don't get me started on this, I keep telling my boss that this guy can have as many degrees as a thermomiter in securty but still should be given user access to my firewall, much less root!
One commit on his config changes and my whole datacenter went down. Thanks to a quick check by me I told them to fix their own problem and went back to sleep. If they want to have a n00b in a position to kill the datacenters then it's not my problem.
But this is the real world and I had to PROVE it wasn't my problem or my butt would've been fried.
Wake up people, no data center is perfect and the sysadmin is ALWAYS responsible, reguardless of who's on call.
My $0.02 will always be worth more than your â0.02, so
Japan has one lawyer for every 10,000 people. The US has one lawyer for every 300 people.
"I didn't see the sign saying the theater was blocked and I missed my big interview / wife in labor / server going down / mother dying / stockmarket crashing / etc."
US lawyers would have a field day. "Was the sign displayed properly? What font was it in? Was it also written in Swahili? What about the literacy impared?"
I just can't see it.
=brian
A sign at the door reminding people to turn it off?
I know the theaters I go to don't have them. I'm sure a lot of it is people forgetting to turn them off (happens at school during classes too)
--------
It's OK to be social, just don't tell anyone about it.
I'd love to hack together a portable version of this to affix to my belt.
I'm sorry, but like most of the /. posters I keep my cell phone on vibrate ALL THE TIME. I'm not going to be rude and talk in the theater, but I HAVE TO GET MY TEXT MESSAGES.
/. posters don't keep their cell phones on vibrate "ALL THE TIME"? I don't. I normally leave mine in the car when I go in a public place.
If you can't be without your cell phone long enough to see a movie, then wait until the movie shows up at Blockbuster, rent it, and watch it at home. I do not buy movie tickets so that I can listen to your cell phone doing the vibrate/buzz thing. Neither do I want to see your glaring backlit display while you read your text messages. I don't want you tripping over my feet or my girlfriend's while you stumble out of the theatre because of your oh-so-important message. Your job does not concern me in the slightest. I would sooner see you fired than have you interrupt a movie that I paid to see.
Clue: Important people don't have to carry cell phones into movie theatres. Schmucks that work for important people are the ones on call 24/7.
P.S. Who told you that most
" They need to take extremist action. We're not little kids. "
I mean to say " They don't need to take extremist action..."
Sorry, the submit and preview buttons are too close together. Heh.
"Derp de derp."
I used to have a job where I was on call 24x7, for some reasonably critical stuff. There'd usually be a call a day; some days more, some days none. Late-night calls were less common, partly because the group of people who took the calls was distributed around the planet. However, there were calls at 3 AM now and then.
Why did I accept that? Because there was a quid pro quo. As long as I kept myself available for those calls, and as long as I got a certain amount of total work done on some other things, my employer asked NO QUESTIONS about where I was. I could go anywhere, any time. I didn't even have to be in any specific town.
Well, OK, I did have meetings once or twice a week (on no fixed schedule), but that was about it. If I was in my office, it was because I wanted to be there at that time.
No, I wasn't the only person who could handle the calls. You need backup, always, because there's always a chance that something will keep you from taking a call. If we'd had fixed shifts, we'd have had to have at least two people chained to desks all the time, covering each other. That's six people total, instead of three people with each taking point for her own time zone and the other two backing her up.
By the way, I never, once permitted my phone to ring audibly in a movie theater. That's what vibrate mode is for. Sit near a door, and you can quietly and unobtrusively get outside in plenty of time to take the call.
The arrangement had plenty of problems, many of them caused by my own failure to hire enough people to keep up with expanding load. On the whole, though, it worked. I can see the appeal of having "my time" and "their time", but I also know the appeal of being able to go home and prune my roses if I feel like it.
Actually, except for digitally projected movies (which I simply don't know about) "rewinding" a movie simply isn't possible. To rewind would take approximately an hour. Most theaters these days splice all the reels of a film onto a single, continuous reel that is just replayed constantly. Rewinding isn't an option, most places, because it is very time consuming.
So let's say one of these theatres with RF-shielded walls caught fire. The firefighters rush in, with their VHF two-way radios. But they are now blocked! So if they have to radio warnings, like, "Get out of there, the roof is about to collaps!", they don't hear it, because the wood part of the walls may be on fire, but they are still standing, ferrite intact.
Firefighters died in the World Trade Center *because* the building's construction (the shell had steel vertical beams very close together) blocked the signals from the command on the ground, telling them to evacuate. (This was written up in IEEE Spectrum, I think in April.) Now you want theatres to have this problem, just because some jerks are too tacky to put there phones on "vibrate" or go to the lobby when they get a call?
I'm a parent, and as somebody else noted, we sometimes need to be reached on an emergency basis. I have had to leave a movie because my cell phone *vibrated* and the babysitter told me, while I was standing in the lobby, that there was a problem. I would be hard-pressed to patronize a theater that didn't allow me that luxury.
Back in the sixties, my father was a physician who was often "on call" during his few hours of not actually working. He had an answering service that he checked in with all the time. I think he had occasion to leave them the phone number of the theatre (reserved seat stage, not movie), and his seat, so that an usher could fetch him. We don't do that nowadays; we expect radio waves to do the job. It can be done with minimum annoyance to fellow theatergoers. Blocking is a bad idea.
This will really help my dating life. I always notice my date's cellphone rings in the middle of the date and then she "suddenly" has to go.
:-)
But now their phones won't be able to ring...
My wife and I always go to the movies (and dinner dates, and theaters, and concerts) with our cellphone set to vibrate simply so that if things go horribly wrong at home with the baby sitter and our children, we can be reached. Just because my wife and I are having a date out doesn't mean that everyone back at home (children and/or babysitter) need to have a miserable evening.
Only once did the babysitter call during the theater. I got up, walked out, and took the call and told the babysitter that my daughter's teddy bear was probably under the couch (it was) and waited until they found it. Without a cell phone our daughter who was two and half would have been miserable. And there's no reason when we are a mere cellphone call away to help.
Honestly, if they blocked our cellphone we wouldn't go there. We'd find something else to do on our rare dates and wait until it came out on video. I'm sensitive to the noise issue during public performances, and I would no more take a call during a movie than I would talk loudly to my wife during the same movie. But we need the phone if only to have the peace of mind that everything is ok at home.
Theaters should just implement a spotlight system a-la the Movementarians' indoctrination video in The Simpsons. As soon as you pick up your phone, the movie stops, and you are nailed by a high-power spotlight until you hang up. This should serve as a nice deterrent. For added fun, intercept their signal and play their call over the sound system for everyone to hear. Hell, I'd pay extra for a seat if theaters around here did that!
Similarly, sheets or mesh screens of conductive material are routinely used to block unwanted RF interference generated by devices like computers and televisions which would otherwise create a great deal of "leakage".
So I ask again: What's new here? Why is this guy getting attention? I think any electrical engineer could figure out how to wrap a Faraday cage around a theater; the question is whether theater owners want to do it.
When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a skull.
The active part here is the metal, not the wood, which is just for decoration. Maybe you young folks don't remember "panelling" from the 70s, but if this technology takes off here, it won't be some clean natural-looking Japanese aesthetics, it'll be cheap-plastic-looking fake wood. Might as well stick to straight metal.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
Very good idea, IMHO.
Vibrating phones are no better if you're still going to answer the bloody thing and start talking into it.
If you're on-call, part of that deal is that you've not just got the phone with you, but are capable of answering in. In a cinema, you are not capable of answering it - if you're sitting next to me, you'll be LARTed and unable to speak at all!
Author, Shell Scripting : Expert Re
Cellphones already work badly inside many buildings, so people who need pagers and cellphones for life-threatening emergencies don't just have problems in electrically-shielded theaters, they have problems in lots of buildings with too much metal. Pagers put up with this kind of restriction better than cell phones; people who have cellphones work around the problem by stepping outside and YELLING A LOT SO THE OTHER PEOPLE CAN HEAR THEM, AND SHIELDING THAT MAKES MORE PEOPLE YELL MORE OFTEN IS JUST A BAD IDEA....
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
I can't believe all these comments from people who say that they absolutely must be able to get text messages and urgent calls on their mobiles. In my experience mobile phones just aren't that reliable even when noone is trying to block the signal
In the centre of London there are lots of places that have no signal and I've lost count of the number of times a crucial voicemail message only came through the next day because the provider had problems.
If you are on call in case of emergencies then you don't go places where the signal is weak, it's as simple as that!
If the signal was so reliable why would they put the little strength indicator on the display.
finally a real solution. I want this stuff in the walls of every conference room in my office building. I might actually be able to have a meeting without being disturbed them.
Faraday, Michael (1791-1867)
Invented the concept of a metal box sheilding radio waves (Faraday Cage). All these guys did was add paneling (a 1960's technology, found in many basement family rooms). So what exactly in new 1867+1960=???
How about the health nuts who don't like all these radio waves in the air causing them cancer? they could line their houses with it. maybe make a domed city or something. isn't there a city in the desert in california with the same goal?
1. We didn't need flame supression zones (water jets?) to stop people from smoking in theaters. It just kind of happened as people started getting a clue.
2. It's not just movie theaters - meetings, sports games, etc. also get interrupted by cellphones. Not everything takes place in an enclosed room.
Rude people in movie theaters are a red herring - most cell phone violations are probably not specifically rude people, just people who don't "opt in" to courtesy (or forget to) because the barriers are too high. Today it's too hard to get your phone into quiet mode. So let's ask for a physical ringer switch on the phone (besides the power button, which causes you to completely lose missed calls.) That, plus funnier "turn your cell phone off" reminders, should mostly solve the problem.
The next best thing to do is to focus on taking courtesy from opt-in to opt-out. Just brainstorming, it'd be something like this: How about a "courtesy" feature so phones can receive a short-distance signal asking them to go quiet? People who want to ignore it can set that as a default, or you can always put it back in noisy mode. (Yeah, there's potential for mistakes and abuse. I'm not thinking this one out very deeply because I don't see any $$ incentive for people to deploy it anyway)
Passive signal attenuation does not.
I do not deploy Linux. Ever.
One of my EE friends made a little device that ran on a couple of AA's and fit in his pocket. IT consisted of a broken off piece of breadboard an IC and some loops of wire. He said he could cause all cell phones around him to hang up when he "pressed the button". I think he said it was illegal to own one and it could mess up pace makers too. The guy was kind of out there, most EE's are, anyone else heard of this kind of thing before?
I came to the datacenter drunk with a fake ID, don't you want to be just like me?
At my local AMC they put up a fat advert on the screen asking people to switch off their cellphones. (Obviously it doesn't work) If you miss that warning then you are obviously too blind to be watching the movie or you are too stupid to be receiving important phone calls during a movie.
This sounds great, but I want it to protect me from the orbital mind-control lasers. It's such a hassle wrapping the tinfoil around my head, especially when I forget to leave my eyes uncovered.
This might also help when the Goldeneye satellite blasts EMP everywhere. At least my computer will still work so I can play Quake, Unreal Tournament, and Barbie's Fashion Designer after all the banks collapse.
Will it also work against telepathy and remote viewing? Got to call Art Bell and ask.
lf(1): it's like ls(1) but sorts filenames by extension, tersely
We have kids and I give my cell phone number to my babysitter. If something is wrong or emergent I want to know ASAP while my wife and I are out to the movies. If the cinemas did this I would go to some other theater where my children would not be put in danger because other rude people have to make trivial noises and conversations on their cell phones during a movie.
If we put this sheilding into cars, we wouldn't have to deal with people in front of us, weaving sise to side, driving 35mph on the freeway, talking on the cell phone, until then, WOULD YOU DRIVE ANY BETTER WITH THAT PHONE SHOVED UP YOUR ASS!
How ya like dat?
Secondly, I believe there are FCC regs or _something_ that prohibit jammers. I just remember reading/hearing somebody from the U.S. govt. say that in an interview. It also kind of makes sense ... jammers are being deployed all over the world, but not in the states.
Jack Valenti and the MPAA are to technology as the Boston strangler is to the woman home alone
/joeyo
2^5
While I have no first-hand experience, I would imagine a lot of parents will not go to see movies if they can not get calls from a babysitter. Same for people with relatives in the hospital etc. Wouldn't be easier install cell phone detectors at the entrance. Then most people will be asked to turn off the phone and those who really need it will be allowed to bring it in.
If they want to have a n00b in a position to kill the datacenters then it's not my problem.
Hrrm? It was your problem. They woke you up.
This is not a dream, not a dream...we are transmitting from the year 1-9-9-9.
a cell fone blocking system could be potentially life threatening, some doctors are allways on call, but does that mean they shouldn't enjoy a night out, if their cell fone is blocked and its an emergency a patient of theirs could die, this is why at a theatre if someones fone or pager goes off i ask them if their a doctor, if not i chuck ice at them for the rest of the show
"Sic Semper Tyrannosaurus Rex."
Oh, I guess not.....
"Prejudice is wrong; you should hate everyone the same."
I'm shocked that with all of these posts no /. readers have pointed out that use of such communication jamming devices isn't kosher with the old FCC. Any US theater trying to use this will find the feds knocking at their door... and that is a shame.
Remember... ZG9uJ3QgZm9yZ2V0IHRvIGRyaW5rIHlvdXIgb3ZhbHRpbmU=
The article quotes 97% attenuation, which is 15dB, which is little enough that there's no point in doing it.
-- ;-)
Kuro5hin.org: where the good times never end.
This story would have you believe that you need this ferrite material to make a microwave shield. But that is nonsense. Any sort of screen will greatly attenuate the signal also. In fact, stucco houses (populare in SW US) use "chicken wire" as the base for the material to cling to.
So... why would they be pushing this ferromagnetic material for shielding? Doesn't make sense.
Most likely, this is a typical example of journalism misreporting a technical story. OR, it is a con man trying to make people buy an expensive solution for a simple problem.
The only good weather is bad weather.
What i'd like to see, and haven't seen mentioned yet, is a standard for cell phones to switch to vibrate/standby/whatever upon recieving a 'silence beacon' signal. The phone would just have a 3rd setting: ring, silent, or auto. If it comes in range of a silence beacon, it switches to silent. When it goes out of range, it can switch back to ring. It's voluntary, so if you're expecting life or death communications you can leave it on ring, but people are still free to take you phone and throw it. This, along with a ringer schedule to switch to vibrate during meetings and classes, should help a lot if people are willing to use them.
Come to think of it, these panels should be installed in restaurants, too. Not to mention classrooms, bathrooms, and lots of other places.
D'oh...
A solution to the problem with music today
I'm surprised that no one mentioned this yet. You can't have a device like this in the states, because ftc regulations state that the airwaves are public, and devices that jam airwaves are illegal. Jamming equipment has been prevalent in europe and japan for years, but no one uses them in the u.s. because they would be slapped with massive fines.
The point of napster is to trade legal files for which you have gotten permission of the copyright holder... But the point of cell phones in movie theatres is to disturb the person next to you by not using vibrate mode?
The idiocy of slashdotters amazes me.
Clue: I'd like you to see what happens when all the 'peons' go on strike. Then how important do your jack-crap managers become?
Your measure of importance is highly skewed.
P.S. Nice troll.
A solution to the problem with music today
If you enter a cinema in Germany chances are that about 100% of the people have a cellphone.
There you are now - in a Faraday-cage together with n >>100 microwave transmitters sending with full 2 watts of power because they lost their basestation.
Get used to it, relax - as soon as cellphones are no status-symbol anymore, people will suddenly figure out how to turn them off / silent.
k2r
"Can you hear me now?"
(silence)
"Damn!"
Tired of FB/Google censorship? Visit UNCENSORED!
I read on the news that they installed jamming equipment in the Indian parliament because, they can't have a peaceful session with 100s of phones ringing all the time! Must have been difficult teaching etiquette to politicians :-)
Not that I ever actually have a signal in the movies anymore,...
But if they intentionally jammed the signal I would be pissed!
What if it was an emergency or something... or just a damn text message... I can't help it if some ass is a rude SOB, don't punish me...
It's not so much the cell phone, as much as it's the bastards that just can't keep their mouth shut...
=1000101
- I need to get my pages
- I can no longer get pages at the movies; therefore
- I may no longer go to the movies (or, by extension, anywhere else I can't get pages)
Notice the use of the word "may". That's right, you can still go to the movies, but your job doesn't permit you to any more.What's usually added to the 'argument', and what pisses me off, is:
- I'm a whiny bitch who thinks I have a God-given right to play with my toys, any time, anywhere
You made a life decision to be in that career, you signed the contract, now SUCK IT UP. It's your fault for getting yourself involved in something that you can't deal with. Lawsuits based on the "whiny bitch" premise will get thrown out. Entertainment is NOT a right you possess. It's a priviledge that you now may no longer enjoy. If the movie theatres want to throw away doctor and tech business, that's their choice. They're private businesses, they are not required to cater to you.I personally think that the theatres are well within their rights to do this. They're trying to provide a service, they make money based on people's experience of that service. I don't like that they're considering it, I would much rather have all the 'whiny bitches' exhibit a little self-restraint, but I've already resigned myself to the fact that hoping for this to spontaneously occur is a lost cause. Look for movie theatres to plaster this stuff up at the earliest possible moment.
This post expresses my opinion, not that of my employer. And yes, IAAL.
I will probably be modded down for "redundant", but I'd just like to say, I wish there were a (Score: 6) for posts like this. Kudos to you.
To the OP: dude, like fmaxwell said, it's not our problem that your servers are down. Feel important on your own time.
"Never bullshit a bullshitter" All That Jazz
Everyone seems to be so bent on stopping cellphones during movies. Hmm, 7$ for 2 hours. How about the classroom, where you're paying somewhere around 40$ hour to sit in a lecture? The people on the movie screen can't hear your phone ring, but it annoys the hell out of profs when they have to stop lecturing because some fool sorority girl just HAS to answer her boyfriend's phone call.
The people who are letting their phones ring loudly aren't the doctors, or others who are "on call" - they're the same kind of people I see driving down the road yapping on the phone while giving their dog a bath or some such nonsense - the kind of people who think that because they can afford the toy, everyone should know that they have it.
There is very little future in being right when your boss is wrong.
This technology has far more use than merely making phones not work in theatres, especially if the panels are cheap, reasonably light and can be cut to size with standard power tools.
If it was adapted for computer cases, then you would cut most of the electromagnetic interference originating from your case. It won't stop the interference from the cables, but there are other ways of shielding cables. Cable conduits could be made out of this stuff.
Aircraft could cover the interior of the cabins with this stuff, to keep the avionics from playing up because of someone's Gameboy.
The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing. - Edmund Burke
"The magnetic ferrite absorbs much of the energy of the radio signal, cutting the phone dead in most cases."
This is a passive jamming scheme that the FCC has no juristiction on. It's not the FCC's job to regulate how RF permeable your offices wall is any more it is to regulate the theaters. If it were broadcasting an active jamming signal, then I could see the FCC getting their shorts in a bind, but this? Nah. It does what any wall does- absorbs RF energy, only more so. No worries for an idea who's time has come. A notice to the effect of "This is a cell/pager dampening zone. Your devices will not work past this point" should do the trick nicely.
Now if they could only have guaranteed child free theaters...
You need a FREE iPod Nano
this is unlikely to be used for concerts, theatres etc as it's likely to interfere with the use of wireless headsets etc for backstage crew/ directing etc...esp if the techs are in different rooms (does happen), although i may be utterly misunderstanding how it works.
...simply the wrong forum, perhaps.
You may not be able to get around the "emergency" issue of the general public, but you can certainly justify installing these things in university lecture halls. College students have few real-life emergencies, unless you call trying to decide between going out with friends and studying for that final in number theory.
"Ok, class, *ring* today we're going to go over the finer points of differential equatio*ring*ns."
At 8 in the damn morning. C'mon! Didn't you people get enough to drink or something? Monday mornings are for hangovers.
If you get mad paying $8.50 to see a movie only to have it interrupted by a cell phone, try paying 5,000+ for 17 class hours only to have every single class interrupted every single day by at least 3 or 4 cells.
Maddening.
TiFox
-- I'd say your post was about 3 monkeys, 18 minutes.
Ya think you search adequately for colleg-y terms so you don't post redundantly, and you miss one that's a few messages before yours.
Snake. Bite me. That whole deal.
Move along mods....no karma whoring here...
-- I'd say your post was about 3 monkeys, 18 minutes.
If you're that worried something is about to go wrong, what are you doing watching a movie? Like another poster said, millions of people survive without a cellphone implanted into the side of their face.
As far as going to another theater for your coverage, I'm don't think you'll hear too many complaints. The same with people who like to tote their kids to the movies, only to have them yell and cry at certain scenes. Sorry, but people don't pay $8.50 a ticket to hear your cell phone ring "Do-Mi-So" while you fumble around to answer it or listen to little Tommy bawl his head off because the parent didn't have the discretion NOT to bring him.
You have the right to be connected at the hip to your child just like you have the right to choose a non-interference theater. Excercise it. Please. We're begging you.
You need a FREE iPod Nano
Yeah. You take that mobile jammer and irradiate yourself. Have fun.
You need a FREE iPod Nano
I don't know about the rest of you, but I enter a theater maybe twice a month. However, I drive next to inattentive morons at least twice a day.
I hate people who think they can drive and perform their inane yakking at the same time. If I run up your ass in the fast lane because you can only hear the person on the other end of the line if you go 40mph or less, you should get the f*ck out of my way and follow me to my destination to grovel at my feet. This means don't flip me the bird because you are an imbecile. Behind every bird is a pile of shit. I've been hit by someone while they were on the phone, and almost hit several more times.
Anyway, these things need to be installed in the median of every federal highway, with a range that just exceeds the distance to the outside edge of the shoulder. If this happens, I might not be so pissed about the exhorbitant taxes I pay.
A study concluded last year that cell phone owners are four times more likely to be in an auto accident than normal people. The solution? Quadruple their insurance premiums. That'll get people to STFU and drive.
Firefighters died in the World Trade Center *because* the building's construction (the shell had steel vertical beams very close together) blocked the signals from the command on the ground, telling them to evacuate.
What do you suppose those steel vertical beams were used for? Take a guess. Go on. You're right! Just to block fire fighters RF transmissions! Bad, bad, bad analogy, Tex. They couldn't have been used to hold the building up or anything, right? Sorry, but not every structure hundreds of feet high with the ability to withstand minor quakes can be conveniently cell accessable. I would expect firefighters to realize that there is ALWAYS the potential for such risks because of the buildings structual makeup. Using your logic, we shouldn't build buildings hundreds of feet high because they have the potential to collapse and really give somebody an ouchy.
As for being a parent, millions of people actually- get this -survive on a regular basis without a cell permanently imbedded in their face. Some of them are even parents! Go figure. As for you father, something tells me an usher wasn't half as intrusive as your cell playing the Hawaii 5-0 theme. I'd like to think everybody had the forsight to set their phones to vibrate and answer the phone outside the theater, but they don't. You expecting a life or death call? Maybe you shouldn't be watching a movie in the first place. Flame all you want, could care less.
You need a FREE iPod Nano
What you need to realize is that most people don't really care. They are trying to watch the movie, play, or listen to the concert. Not listen to you talk on the phone, or be crawled over 5-6 times during a show, while you go to the lobby to yak.
My Weblog
I wonder if these things could also be used to block radiation emitted from computers which can leak data? This sounds somewhat like building a faraday cage around the theater.
Require cell phone companies to turn up the broadcasting power on cell phones so that everyone who uses them will get brain cancer and fucking die.
No one needs to be in constant contact with everyone. And don't say doctors cause (as was mentioned before) there was a gap between the bubonic plague and the invention of the cell phone.
"The toughest time...in anyone's life...is when you have to kill a loved one just because they're the devil." --Emo Philips
If all the cell phones would support the same profiles standard, that is, when ever a signal is recieved, the phones automatically switch to silent mode, in the case of hospitals, they are placed 'offline'. As soon as the client leaves the reach of the 'licensed' sender, it switches back to the profile. Of course it may take a while to support this standard, however, if it is implemented then I am pretty sure all the problems and annoyances would be nullified, and at the same time 911 would still be available.
The original story can be found here:i d=ns999 92461
http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?
-If this can help me to stop hitting the guy next to me, HE will be very happy his signal is blocked too....
If you can't be without your cell phone long enough to see a movie, then wait until the movie shows up at Blockbuster, rent it, and watch it at home.
So everyone on call should just give up their social lives, eh? (ok, so you don't *have* to go to the movies, but I can imagine the reactions of my friends if I refused every time they wanted to go)
I do not buy movie tickets so that I can listen to your cell phone doing the vibrate/buzz thing.
What makes you think you'll hear my phone doing the vibrate/buzz-thing?
Neither do I want to see your glaring backlit display while you read your text messages.
Please stop staring at my crotch and watch the screen instead.
I don't want you tripping over my feet or my girlfriend's while you stumble out of the theatre because of your oh-so-important message.
You'd be right if it weren't for the fact that anyone voluntarily leaving a movie they've paid for probably has such a damn good reason it would override your momentary discomfort. Or perhaps you'd also object to sysadmins running through crowds because a vital datacenter's gone down? Or a mother doing the same because her child's gone missing? Both of these things could be announced by text message, and I'd gladly help these people get out of the theater as fast as possible.
Your job does not concern me in the slightest. I would sooner see you fired than have you interrupt a movie that I paid to see.
Wanker.
Clue: Important people don't have to carry cell phones into movie theatres. Schmucks that work for important people are the ones on call 24/7.
You're posting on Slashdot and basically saying that sysadmins are unimportant schmucks. Yet you get modded up as +5 insightful. Wtf??
Oh, and good managers tend to want to be reachable even when they're on vacation, in case something happens. Note how reachable doesn't equal constant communication. It's knowing that people can contact you instantly if something goes wrong that's important, not actually being in contact all the time.
P.S. Who told you that most /. posters don't keep their cell phones on vibrate "ALL THE TIME"? I don't. I normally leave mine in the car when I go in a public place.
Your self-imposed limitations are not other people's concern. If you choose to treat your mobile phone as if it weren't mobile, why did you get one?
My Sig: SEGV
Anyone who has worked in the microwave industry and has bought ferrite components, like isolators and circulators, will be able to guess that this isn't a low cost solution.
D.
consider how much of the time he needs to be in contact. If I wanted to be 100% sure of getting an "important" call, I wouldn't rely on my mobile phone anyway, I would probably have to stay at home.
they're building orgonne accumulators!
...the magnetic stripe card in my wallet?
sarchasm: The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn't get it.
This technology might have been useful a few years ago, but in the last couple years I haven't heard any phones go off in the cinema (which I do frequent).
/SMSes/etc).
It seems everyone (including myself) knows the drill of switching their phone into a silent profile - or if they can't figure that out they turn it off.
And the problem has been solved - without losing any contact with the GSM network (so phones can still register missed calls
I don't know what the situation is like in the US - obviously it's still a problem I gather based on the posts I have seen - but educating people - friendly reminders etc, does seem to work
This seems to be a bigger issue in the US than it is in the UK. Personally I can't actually recall the last time I was in the cinema and someone's phone went off during a film. I remember when it was bad a few years back though. I think the Ad series that Ericsson ran in the Cinema had a large impact..
While the screen was black, they made the sound of someone's phone ringing - to the point that it was VERY realistic, and had people in the cinema groaning in annoyance.
Then the screen said "Dont be a plonker!" then their slogan "Make Yourself Heard" with the addition of (but not for next two hours)
Made all the people who did talk on the phone in the cinema feel like dicks, and was very effective in stopping people doing it.
Put a person at the entrance who will ask people entering the room to take out their cell phone and make sure that it is switched off, or at least the bell is off, and remind them to leave the room if they want to use the phone (or warn them that they might not be able to use it in the future if they don't).
He saw some dirty arabs and fired. Too bad it was just some friendly kurds, BBC reporters and his fellow cowboys.
Its really disappointing to see the readers of Slashdot (and indeed most of society,) so easily moved by the "popular discontent" of the moment. Its "popular" to bash cell phone users, but the majority of those bashing phones have and use them, and often use them in situations they complain about (driving being the primary offence.)
So while you're so concerned about "glaring LCD backlighting" or "buzzing" or indeed even the rudeness of having a conversation in a public cinema, your ignoring the real problems. Your apathy towards your neighbors and community, your lack of involvement in government affairs and your complete support for the corporatism that is going to ultimately bind you to more of this sort of muck in the future.
You (general) need to get up and start caring about something more important than whether or not some guys phone is beeping, because there are a hell of a lot things worse to concern yourself in life than some trivial noisemaker.
I applaud the inventor of this particular solution for his ingenuity in providing a solution that people can use to control their own homes or businesses as they see fit, but I do not think it is acceptable for you people to get so up in arms about something so meaningless as a cellular telephone ringer.
And if you run into someone so absolutely offensive in their loudness or inability to operate a mobile phone (such as engaging the vibrate feature,) than either A> Politely comment that their phone is bothersome and suggest the vibrate feature, escalate to screaming fits if they respond rudely; or B> speak to the manager of the business you're in, since they can evict; or C> go away and avoid being that way yourself. And if you're in a movie theater, maybe you should consider whether or not the real problem is your support of the movie industry who does far more to damage your "freedom to enjoy" media than a guy who can't part with his phone.
Dammit.
-b-
He made it clear that it is on VIBRATE, not RING.
Therefor you don't have to listen to it and in fact CANNOT HEAR IT!
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
There are other ways to block signals.
:)
Metal works pretty well.
Or if you need to see through it, there are some forms of glass that have trace amounts of a conductive substance that will give it a mild tint to visible light but make it impassable for RF. Also fine-mesh screen works too.
I'm not sure exactly what they use in the windows, but because the company I work at makes RF power amplifiers, mainly ones for cell phone use, the building is heavily shielded to keep signals INSIDE. (Not for security, but to prevent us from interfering with nearby cellular systems, but security would be an additional benefit if we ran 802.11b) - We do make sure to use dummy loads, but even dummy loads aren't perfect. I've been working with some FM broadcast-band equipment - I'm sure it radiates somewhat, but I can walk out to my car (50 feet away from the lab), turn on my radio, and hear pure static with no sign of a carrier anywhere nearby.
This just happens to be a form of RF shielding for places where they can't afford to shield the room totally with metal/can't design such shielding in as an afterthought.
Conductive paint (perhaps containing graphite, or maybe powdered ferrite) would work well too.
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
Multiple layers of ferrite will block ANYTHING... Not just gigahertz signals.
Most materials (wood, etc.) have RF blocking power that is dependent on the frequency.
Sandwiched ferrite and pure conductors, on the other hand, are a different story.
You might be able to get around the problem with a passive reradiator coupled with a low-pass filter. (Will leak certain signals very well - Something similar to the Radiax used to give cell coverage in subways.)
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
OK, this technology stops the cell phone transmissions, or reflects them around inside a metal cage?
Sig free since 2/6/2002
Since when each piece of private property needs to gurrantee you can make your living by hindering the costumers that make possible that the landlord makes a living?
If anything, cinemas, theatres and any other public fora like those should be suing the hell out of those unconsiderate enough to take those instruments of hell in public places. Such anoyance surely must be puting off possible cinemagoers.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
Nah, is this all hypothetical? You are a slashdot reader, how could you possibly have a gf... ;-)
This is getting old, and has not been funny for a long time. Why do people keep modding this crap up?
I'm a 50 karma, 4-year slashdot contributor, married for 6 years (to a girl I met on the net, no less) with a kid on the way. How do I fit in the "everybody is a pimply-faced, socially-inept geek who is 16-21 years old" viewpoint that these posters take?
Just because you are unlucky in love doesn't mean everyone is. It's just not funny anymore... so save you keystrokes and your mod points. Please.
SlashSigTheorem: Humorous, Political, Critical, Constructive- If you have a
So everyone on call should just give up their social lives, eh?
No, just movies in theaters.
(ok, so you don't *have* to go to the movies, but I can imagine the reactions of my friends if I refused every time they wanted to go)
If your friends can't understand a desire to not annoy others, you need new friends.
Please stop staring at my crotch and watch the screen instead.
If you weren't running a glaring backlit mobile phone to draw attention to your crotch, it would be a lot easier for those around you to watch the film.
What makes you think you'll hear my phone doing the vibrate/buzz-thing?
Because it makes noise and I have heard them in meetings, theaters, offices, and restaurants.
You'd be right if it weren't for the fact that anyone voluntarily leaving a movie they've paid for probably has such a damn good reason it would override your momentary discomfort.
It's not up to you to decide whether you should inconvenience and discomfort me. Your hypothetical data center? Couldn't care less. Your company can hire multiple people to rotate the "on-call" responsibilities. Then you can go to movies when you're not on call.
Or perhaps you'd also object to sysadmins running through crowds because a vital datacenter's gone down?
And I suppose you think it's fine if some idiot sysadmin running through a crowd runs into a pregnant woman, small child, handicapped, or elderly person while rushing to get www.petfoodmart.com back online?
If you choose to treat your mobile phone as if it weren't mobile, why did you get one?
Obviously, your car is on cinder blocks in your front yard, but rest assured that my car is perfectly mobile.
Get an usher to kick the person out for talking.
This is no different than what is already available in Anechoic and SemiAnechoic rooms for RF Immunity and Emissions all over the country. They've made tiles that do this already. TDK makes some. I have a chamber that does this right now. http://www.nceelabs.com
The phones do not work ad-hoc (phone to phone). You must go through a cell site for call setup, handling, billing, etc etc etc.... If you still want to be annoying, buy a set of those cheap family radios to talk back and forth...
Personally, I'm concentrating on the movie, and just tune little things like that out. If your concentration ability is that bad, you might want to consider medication.
I did not say that I can't follow a movie when that happens. But when you are immersed in a movie, something like that can quickly snap you back from the illusion of being there. Obviously, that's not a big issue if you are watching something like Men In Black II, but when you are watching a cinematic masterpiece, it's a different matter.
And it's the sum total of annoyances. One watch? Minor annoyance. 4 watches, 8 cell phones, 9 backlit pagers, 2 PDAs, a Blackberry, some infant wailing away, and a guy two seats down that sounds like he has tuberculosis and the movie is ruined.
First of all, I'd like to emphasize that I in no way condone actually talking while watching a movie, having the sound on, or having the sound on in a restaurant etc. I just believe more considerate people shouldn't be blocked simply to stop the inconsiderate ones.
I would very much like to see a solution like a Bluetooth-network inside the theater that would flag the area as silenced. If this setting couldn't be overridden, phones would still work, but all sounds would be forcibly turned off. It could also prevent the making of calls.
Now for some more ranting!
No, just movies in theaters.
Ah, but the problem is that people disturbed by phones would also get disturbed at places like restaurants etc. Where would you draw the line?
If your friends can't understand a desire to not annoy others, you need new friends.
They would understand that desire. However, saying that I can't go to movies with them (all the time) cause I need to have an operating cell phone with me would instead sound like a very lame excuse not to see them. And even if they understood totally, they'd inevitably start classifying me as boring company ("never goes anywhere").
If you weren't running a glaring backlit mobile phone to draw attention to your crotch, it would be a lot easier for those around you to watch the film.
I could cover the screen with my free hand, allowing only myself to see it.
Because it makes noise and I have heard them in meetings, theaters, offices, and restaurants.
OK. This portion of the argument is subjective, even though I've never noticed the noise. There is a third option, though: wearing a hands-free device throughout the movie. Any alert could be played directly into the user's ear. And yes, I am willing to do this in order to be available.
It's not up to you to decide whether you should inconvenience and discomfort me.
Yes and no, actually. If everyone could decide for themselves, anything could be defined as discomforting. You should also notice that being without a phone would inconvenience *me*, so the same argument could be applied in the other direction.
Your company can hire multiple people to rotate the "on-call" responsibilities.
Yes, but I'm also planning on having kids some day. No one can rotate that responsibility with me.
And I suppose you think it's fine if some idiot sysadmin running through a crowd runs into a pregnant woman, small child, handicapped, or elderly person while rushing to get www.petfoodmart.com back online?
Bad analogy, sorry... I can't come up with a better one right now, but my point was that I'm willing to endure a little discomfort to help other people. Letting people receive text messages in movie theaters couldn't hurt pregnant women :-)
Obviously, your car is on cinder blocks in your front yard, but rest assured that my car is perfectly mobile.
So whenever you're out of your house you always stay in your car? A mobile phone will reach its peak potential only when carried around like a body part.
Sorry if I sound a bit fanatic comparing phones to body parts, but I love the sense of freedom that always being available gives me ;-) Granted, some people feel it's a ball and chain, but I view it as something that lets me be in contact with anyone, anytime. It's great.
My Sig: SEGV
I've already been operating a 12VDC powered cellular jamming system in my truck for over a year. It is simple to make (just a PA driver and some circuitry to generate a null signal). With a 10W amp, it saturates the entire 800 MHz and 1.9 GHz cellular bands with an active carrier, making it impossible for other phones to reach the cell towers. It's about the size of a phone handset. My coworker and I found the range to vary from 80 yards to 110 yards. I am presently dumping the signal out of my own cellular phone antenna, though I have considered using a rotatable omnidirectional antenna to target particular vehicles, but this would be quite conspicuous;Yes, it's illegal, but how many cops are searching cars for cell phone jammers?
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
What the hell did all these essential people do for entertainment ten years ago?
They got real expensive cellphones/pages.
30 years ago they had to stay home by the phone.
100 years ago they had a guy on a horse come or they stayed at the hosipital.