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We're Jammin', Hope You Like Jammin' Too
theodp writes "Slate ponders whether a climate where anything can be photographed or surreptitiously recorded means the once-esoteric world of cell-phone jamming will become mainstream. Sites now offer portable cell-phone jammers that can provide you with the same kind of security bubbles used to thwart industrial spies, hostage-takers and bomb detonators. While actively jamming a cell-phone signal is illegal in the US, a distributor reports most of his sales go to US customers, including universities which use the technology to stop students from diddling away on phones during lectures."
What? Wouldn't blocking the cell phone signal only prevent the person from sending the picture off? The photograph could still be taken and simply sent later, once the cell phone is away from the jamming signal, right?
At first I thought this post had something to do with music!
The impetus has been there for a while, but camera phones seem to have brought the idea of cell phone jamming out in the open.
Of course, if all cell phone / radio signals are jammed to protect privacy, perhaps the gold-chain running-suit set will hold meetings in locker rooms rather than doctors / lawyers offices.
A Human Right
I wouldn't mind being able to jam phones within, say, 10 feet of me. One of my biggest pet peeves is people on their cell phones. Because, you know, the further away they are, the louder you have to yell into the phone for them to hear you...
http://wsulug.org
The grass is only greener, if you don't take care of your own lawn.
Sorry, but we cannot sell this cell phone jammer to UK customers
:)
Apparently, it's not very legal in the UK either
any technology that allows for people to protect their privacy within reason should be allowed and accepted.
Cell phone jamming should be legalized, and it should become more widespread.
I'd specifically like to see cell-phones jammed in movie theaters, and schools. I'm pretty good about shutting my phone off when I go to these places, but sometimes I forget, and sometimes when I forget, I get calls... it'd be a whole lot easier if the building disabled the phone for me, so I don't have to.
The operation of transmitters designed to jam or block wireless communications is a violation of the Communications Act of 1934, as amended ("Act"). See 47 U.S.C. Sections 301, 302a, 333. The Act prohibits any person from willfully or maliciously interfering with the radio communications of any station licensed or authorized under the Act or operated by the U.S. government. 47 U.S.C. Section 333. The manufacture, importation, sale or offer for sale, including advertising, of devices designed to block or jam wireless transmissions is prohibited. 47 U.S.C. Section 302a(b). Parties in violation of these provisions may be subject to the penalties set out in 47 U.S.C. Sections 501-510. Fines for a first offense can range as high as $11,000 for each violation or imprisonment for up to one year, and the device used may also be seized and forfeited to the U.S. government
o ns/blockingjamming.html
From
http://wireless.fcc.gov/services/cellular/operati
30% Troll, 50% Underrated, 10% Interesting
Score:5, Troll
CF and Memory Stick expansion is beginning to be commonplace in these camera phones. Jamming delays transmission from "100% Live", but does little else.
You want to shoot X-Rays strong enough to wipe Flash Mem? Be my guest!
"Flyin' in just a sweet place,
Never been known to fail..."
Maybe this problem would never have gotten started if people had been responsible with their phones to begin with? But no, and here are the consequences.
Good read, but your programming skills need improvement
preventing diddling on phones during lectures, and cheating during exams I think are perfectly fine uses of cell-phone jammers and should be illegal. I also think all variety of theatres should employ this technology so the asshole who doesn't turn his phone off wont distract/annoy the entire audience when his annoying ring tone blares out 10 times. And rather than turn his phone off he pretends it wasn't him.
Of course, this can also be used for evil. Big evil. If I had a portable jammer I could bring it to a bank and prevent everyone from calling 911 as I robbed it. I think that's why these things are illegal.
The GeekNights podcast is going strong. Listen!
While I'm tempted to use this to silence those inconsiderate bastards in the movie theaters, there is a LOT of risk involved. How would you feel if, because of your jamming, someone didn't get an important emergency phone call and got fired / dumped / beaten senseless / etc.? If something were to happen because they didn't get a call, and it was found out that you were jamming the phone, could you be held liable for any proven damages?
Regardless of how rude it is for people to be talking on cell phones anywhere and everywhere, you have no right to decide for yourself, "They shouldn't be talking, so I'll stop them."
1) Build a device which detects the jamming signal.
2) Sell it to "those anti-social types" (quote from article) who would like to use their phone
3) Watch them kick each others butt
I don't have a cell phone. There's too much drama involved.
While it is clearly illegal to jam the signal their is nothing against constructing buildings that jams the signal by just the nature of how the radio signal travels through the building.
HEre an article on home to legal jam cell phones.
30% Troll, 50% Underrated, 10% Interesting
Score:5, Troll
From the article:
This cell phone jammer looks just like a cell phone
You don't see too many cell phones with two antennas sticking out of them like this thing has.
-- -- Warning. Do not stare directly at the sun.
Jamming cell phone spectrum isn't going to stop their cameras from working... are people really that dumb?
-- Even if a god did exist, why the fsck should I worship it?
As much as i can see the reasoning (pres. safety, remotely controlled bombs, etc...), it still leaves a bad taste of "some are more equal than others" in your mouth. Security (even presidential) & military should abide the law just as anybody else. Change that stupid law, if necessary.
IMHO such a law is not logical anyway: since when does some cell-phone operator "own" the airwaves of e.g. my living room, or more to the point, my restaurant / movie theatre. What exact difference does active / passive jamming make w.r.t the law (if it's on my very own property)? How do they justify the (il)legality of one or the other...
what the position here in Germany is, I dunno... Does anybody else, I'm curious.
the dulcet tones of Chief Wiggum in my head all morning...
Years later, a doctor will tell me that I have an I.Q. of 48, and am what some people call "mentally retarded".
I will most definitively be buying one of these things. No more rude bastards in restaurants or theaters. You can ALL thank me.
In Bushworld, they struggle to keep church and state separate in Iraq as they increasingly merge the two in America.
Here's another page on the same "cellphone-like" product.
I don't agree with random people able to jam the phone signal. However, it makes sense for certain places, like movie theaters, banks, etc, although they should clearly have a sign saying "Warning: Cellphone signal jamming inside the building" or something.
Their suggested uses get pretty dodgy pretty quickly, from http://www.globalgadgetuk.com/mj10.htm:
Suggested Uses for a cell phone jammer:
Theatres/Cinemas, Concert halls, Lectures, Libraries, Restaurants, Hospitals, Coffee shops, Police stations, Recording studios, Prisons, Court rooms, Conference rooms, Embassies and Government facilities, Financial institutions, Casinos, Power plants, Schools, Military establishments etc etc
"including universities which use the technology to stop students from diddling away on phones during lectures."
Personally, I find it's a bigger problems when the professors whip out their cell phones and start yammering away during class. If only my employer were so lenient about what I could do on company time...
If a criminal is attacking you right now a cell phone is mostly useful as a second-rate bludgeon. Or maybe, with phones getting so small these days, you could get him to swallow it and use it as a tracking device :-/
But being able to call emergency services can be very important in the phases leading up to an attack. It can also be helpful for witnesses who can't get physically involved to summon the police or ambulance. This changes all that.
I see it as most frightening in cases where the attacker has a lot personally invested in the crime. The abusive ex. The stalker. The dangerously obsessed. In those cases, where the defender needs every available resource, the sudden disappearance of an important tool can be a matter of life and death. We've already seen stalkers use GPS transponders to track their ex girlfriends' cars. So there are at least a few geeks gone bad out there.
I'm afraid I don't have any solutions. These things are already illegal to use. Any thoughts on what a prospective victim or the authorities can do? And yes, I've already factored in "Have a gun." It's not an option for everyone. It is only part of the soluation when it is.
The man who never alters his opinion is like the stagnant water and breeds Reptiles of the Mind -- William Blake
Cell phones are a necessity in today's world, many many people would be bound to desks, landlines, and offices without the *freedom* to take their life on the road.
.. and the complaints you raise are simply the effects of societal change in progress.
.. If the world is to come to Communications ECM/EECM, I'll be there to fight it.
You luddite whiners who bitch about cell phones represent a dying breed. Society depends on mobile technology
If these things become popular, I will highly resent the decision of users of these devices to overrule my own lifestyle and freedoms. Upon that day, I will insure that I keep RDF (radio direction finding) equipment in my vehicle to give myself the capacity to find and confront these passive aggressive jerks who intend on destroying the very communicative structre of today's world. Failing discussion, the next step is simply to HERF their unit and go about your day
Seriously, reception with cell phones is bad enough without adding totally dead zones on purpose, and of course that jamming won't limit itself to the intended zone, but add unpredictably to the sea of electromagnetic noise around.
I would support the FCC creating a courtesy zone signal on some approved EM band, that causes your phone to shut off, or switch to vibrate, depending on what you set it to.
As for jamming cell phones in schools, why not just a rule no cell phones in schools without prior approval, those exceptions being for children with disabilities, or with parents that are disabled, and may require more communication to make connections, or deal with emergencies? Once again blanket jamming will not discriminate between those with legitimate needs to communicate and those that don't.
Letter To Iran
What about people who need cell phones - would you want the attending physician for your wife / brother / etc. to be unreachable when they suddenly have a medical emergency because somebody in the theater doesn't have the guts to stand up and tell someone else to get off the phone, and relies on a pocket jammer instead? (not to mention volunteer firefighters, EMTs, or many other people in the public trust, who also need to be notified during emergencies)
What? Wouldn't blocking the cell phone signal only prevent the person from sending the picture off? The photograph could still be taken and simply sent later, once the cell phone is away from the jamming signal, right?
This is true. But I don't think that's the primary application of cellphone jammers.
Yeah, well, Beethoven's Fifth, being played through a crappy 2" piezoelectric disk speaker as the ringtone on some Nokia in a movie theater. That's the best reason for jamming that I can come up with. (Why custom ring tones? Don't people know those things sound as stupid as coffee can mufflers on Honda Civics?)
I have had cellphones with work, and was glad to get rid of them when I did. I have no interest in being on an electronic leash, forced to be accountable to someone - somewhere. Or standing in the line-up at Wal*Mart, the ring and promptly following, "Hey, it's me. Whatcha doing? Wanna come over?" (Who is "me"? If I slept with this person, it must not have been very memorable.)
In short, I *hate* cellphones.
Quoting from article: including universities which use the technology to stop students from diddling away on phones during lectures.
Hey, if the student diddles quietly, it's his funeral when his GPA drops and he gets kicked out of school.
Cellphones with integrated digital cameras might have their place, though. I know a university student whose math professor puts excellent and comprehensive notes on the blackboard. So he started to bring a digital camera and a small tripod to class, and takes pictures of each blackboard full of material. He sent me a sample a while ago. An integrated camera/phone would never run out of available internal memory. Personally, copying the notes down would help me remember the material, but whatever works for him... there's a certain style of practical problem solving skill at work there: he's a second-year engineering student; I think I'll have to hire him when he's done. :)
Fire and Meat. Yummy.
What if someone carried these things about in order to disable someone's phone before they attacked? It not just disabling that annoying-person-whose-mobile-rings-during-a-movie' s phone, it can disable any mobile phone, anywhere.
I'd like to hardwire one of these into my car. There are too many a-holes on the road who are too busy talking to drive. And no, I don't care about speakerphones or headsets; it's still dangerous and irresponsible.
I really hate it when I'm visiting a friend and their phone rings. However, I've discovered that if I just cut their phone line outside the house before I ring the doorbell I don't have to worry about it.
Since when is talking on the phone any more annoying than talking to the person next to you? It's such a bizarre luddite view that a piece of plastic can make a conversation more annoying.
Yes, it is annoying that people use them in movie theatres and such, but hey, guess what? It's annoying for someone to have a conversation in there anyway. The phone doesn't change that.
My university just installed 54g wireless Internet access available in almost every lecture theature, allowing students to collaborate and do background research during lectures. This seems a much more sane approach than fitting signal jammers if one wants to increase attendance rates. I daresay lectures will never be the same now that I can IRC my way through KRI with the Zaurus and a CF wireless card. More access to communication networks -- not less -- seems to be the way forward.
So he started to bring a digital camera and a small tripod to class, and takes pictures of each blackboard full of material.
Oh, I just found another sample. Ugh... more sequences and series; I hated that stuff.
Fire and Meat. Yummy.
My first thought when reading this was one of glee... I'd LOVE to jam those dolts that insist on yakking on their cell phones during the movie.
Also, where I work (critical care area of the hospital), cell phones are explicitly forbidden, so this might be useful to keep in my lab coat pocket ("What? your cell phone just cut out? Hmmm... must be interference from our cardiac monitors") Yes, I'm sure their conversation is critically important, but accurate telemetry from my unstable cardiac patients interests me far more than somebody telling their friends which bar they'll be patronizing when they get discharged from my ER. You wouldn't even believe how torqued (even violent) some people can get if you ask them to turn off their phone... it's not like you're telling them to STFU; you're just asking them to take their conversation outside. I have no problem with someone communicating with their family to apprise them of a patient's condition... but we have land-lines for that, folks; you just have to walk ten feet...
Now if they had one that only blocked outgoing calls...
Even if a man chops off your hand with a sword, you still have two nice, sharp bones to stick in his eyes.
The ONLY people who need pagers or cell phones are doctors and lawyers. Jamming should be the norm when ignorant people use the phone as a status symbol. All cars need then built in and wideband too. Theaters, should shoot folks who use then inside!!! When will courtesy and decency return?
There's a cute little brewpub in Solon Iowa with prominent sign stating that anyone whose cell phone goes off buys a round for the house.
..
There's more than one way to deal with inappropriate rings
Does that remotely-switch-off-cellphone-camera-thing also decapitate your regular digital camera? I'd be very surprised (and impressed). Seems like more security snake-oil to me.
Glen Dawson 1309 (1:23:01 AM): Hey biznatchhomie69!
Glen Dawson 1309 (1:23:12 AM): Last year, CowboyNeal's boobs grew. A lot. He's so proud of them, he shows them to EVERYBODY
illegal, subterfuge, etc.. all reasons not to.
every movie now has a trailer that tells you to turn off your phones and beepers. fair enough.
beyond that, at restaurants, etc. it's just a matter of taste and manners.
and you can't legislate that.
"Win treats sysadmins better than users. Mac treats users better than sysadmins. Linux treats everyone like sysadmins."
If using a cellphone in a hospital interferes with equipment how does jamming a cellphone not interfere?
Yes, but Guiness is good for you.
(It's even better for you with Bass)
Don't people know those things sound as stupid as coffee can mufflers on Honda Civics?
:)
In my experience, the people "rocking" Beethoven (or, even better, some sort of Dragonball Z-inspired theme) on their cells are the people who then drive off in their coffee-can mufflered, lowered, clear-taillight Civic hatchbacks. So the answer to your question is no
I think there is a world market for maybe five personal web logs.
any sort of interference from a cell phone, with ANY cardiac monitor... and I catch people yakking on their phones in my ER all the time. I've also never heard of a single case where a cell phone affected a monitor such that it caused a problem with a patient.
I personally suspect it's a more-theoretical-than-real concern. On the other hand, I think one of these jammers would probably be a bigger threat to my monitors than a simple cell phone (precisely the reason I would never actually use one of these on-the-job)
Even if a man chops off your hand with a sword, you still have two nice, sharp bones to stick in his eyes.
Nothing is more annoying that going out to eat and some asshole is hollering on a freaking phone, "CAN YOU HEAR ME NOW?" every 10 seconds as he chats with his pals about absolute nonsense while you are trying to have a quiet dinner.
Not too long ago they had phone booths in restaurants and if you had to talk to someone you went to the phone booth and closed the door.
I do not give a shit, nor do I want to hear other people's conversations. I don't want to hear beepers or cellphones going off.
Why do people have to make so damn much noise? Loud motors, loud stereos, loud machinery, loud computers, loud refrigerators, everyone has to be noisy. And as the noise level goes up, people holler louder to go over it.
When I was a little kid I HATED when my mother used to tell me "Silence is golden".. Now I know how very right she was.
Jamm on baby...
Hey -- it'd be great to get rid of that annoying guy getting calls in the theatre, but how would you feel if you walked out of a LOTR marathon and found out that 11 hours ago, someone in your family was in a serious car accident and they couldn't get a call through all that time?
You are forgetting the primary reason these devices existed prior to the emergance of the average teenager belching and shouting into a phone at every street corner. Squelching or jamming electronic signals has been a tool for establishing privacy in situations where the environment cannot be controlled. That is where the potential uses in this least start to look more reasonable. I agree some of them are a little off.
Cellphone jammers are a bad idea on several levels. I'm just waiting to see the news story about someone who has a heart attack or epileptic seizure hit, and that the victim died because someone tried to use their cellphone to call for help, but said phone was within range of a jamming device.
I suspect it would be reported that the few extra seconds (or minutes) taken for the caller to get out of range of said device, and call for help, could have made all the difference in the world.
Take that another way: What if someone's within range of one of these things, and someone tries to call them to let them know that their wife or roomie or whoever has been critically injured, or fallen seriously ill? Seems to me that whoever's operating the jammer under such conditions could be in for some serious litigation.
Another example. Lots of firefighters and paramedics are beginning to depend on cellphones for much of their communications. I can only imagine the consequences if someone in the area is operating a jammer.
I know others have posted that they'd like to jam something "just within ten feet" of themselves, but -- news flash! -- a jamming signal, by its very nature, cannot be limited in this way. In the world of RF, when you radiate a signal, it's going to radiate all over the place. The only way you can control where it goes is to put a Faraday cage (read: shielded enclosure) around the area you want to irradiate (and I think people would look mighty silly walking around in copper-mesh suits, with their 'tail' of a grounding wire).
In other words: Any signal powerful enough to overcome a cellphone's normal exchange with a nearby cell site is going to have to be powerful enough to radiate a lot further than ten feet, period.
A REAL solution to the problem would be (guess what?) education and attitude adjustment. Get people to the point where turning their phones OFF (or at least putting them into 'Silent Ring' mode) is a reflex action for restaurants, movie theaters, etc. Start such teaching early ("Responsible Cellphone Use 101" anyone?), perhaps including it as part of common courtesy and manners, and it'll be something that's useful for life.
Cellphone users really need a strong reminder that their world is not going to collapse if they don't catch every call the millisecond it comes in. At the rate we're going, I won't be surprised to learn that "cellphone addiction" becomes a very real medical or psychological disorder in times to come.
Bruce Lane, KC7GR,
Blue Feather Technologies
In a restaurant, for example, it's perfectly fine for two people physically in the restaurant to be talking loudly at each other (in fact, in many restaurants everyone's talking loudly at each other), and yet no one would think of wandering over there and telling them to shut up. Conversely, people would be perfectly in their rights to expect two people talking in a movie theater to be quiet once the show starts, and it should be the same with cell phones.
This means that this type of problem would be more easily solved by just having areas where people are expected to be quiet (like theaters) do passive shielding, which is already legal. It's legal, costs cell phone users nothing, and isn't subject to vigilante jamming. Improperly used, both cell phones and phone jammers can become an annoyance.
About a year ago I bought one of these ubiquitous devices from the U.K. My friends had cell phones from all the major players....Cingular, Cricket, AT&T, Verizon, Sprint..... Nothing happened with any of them! I would have loved it even if it just made a signal weaker. I did a fair amount of research before I purchased. It seems mine was originally from this company http://www.hubgiant.com/p_wac1000.html (hubgiant) At the time I wanted to buy the Israeli one from NETline....they weren't selling overseas. Bottom line...it never worked. I spoke with many other folks who HAD purchased other models. Their experience was similar to mine. The only positive response I got was from someone who had used the Israeli ones. At the time I didn't have a cell, so hearing other's conversations was annoying, to put it mildly. Eventually, I just gave in and bought a phone myself; therefore, I could talk over the A$$h__le next to me in line at Wal-Mart. As an aside, I teach in a high school. If a student's phone goes off in my class, it stays with me until they write me a paragraph or two on why it's rude to use their phone when someone else is talking. So far I've only had to get reports from 10 students.
I will use my psychic mind reading powers to say that you must be atleast 35.
How come every generation of old people feels the need to criticize every new technology that comes around by mis-characterizing it?
I have no interest in being on an electronic leash, forced to be accountable to someone - somewhere
If you put yourself in a situation where you're "on an electronic leash", then that's your fault. Do you realize that you don't have to answer a cell phone whenever it rings? It's pretty nifty technology, you have to press a button to answer it.
If you say that the advantages of having a cell phone aren't worth it for you, that's fine. But the only real disadvantage is how much it costs and having to carry it in your pocket. The whole leash thing simply tells me something about your relationship with the would-be leash-holder.
I imagine some older folks didn't like the telephone when it came out - I refuse to be on a leash when I'm at home, forced to be accountable to someone - somewhere.
One of my friends in college was an electrical engineer. In the early nineties, as a fun diversion, he built a cell phone blocking device. He'd have another friend go driving with him and the box and whenever they saw a guy using a cell phone while driving, they'd zap him. Their reward was two-fold: they thought they were making the streets safer with this batman and robin vigilante enforcement, and they just loved the looks on these people's faces when they'd get zapped.
As my friend got closer to graduation, he gave up on the jammer though. He wasn't sure about the legalities of what he was doing and the cell phone population took off geometrically.
Anyway, I think there's a fun aspect to jamming
I can't think of a better place for them to be than in movie theaters or at the opera houses of the world. Since these companies are apparently trying to figure out how to remotely disable cell phone cameras, perhaps they could somehow remotely force peoples phones into vibrate or something.
Shades of Spaceballs....
... hmmm... rasberry... dude, youre getting jammed!
Caller: yadda yadda yadda... huh? *blink* *blink*
Bystander: Whats wrong?
Caller: I just got cut off... and there's this goop comming out of my cell..
Bystander: *rubs finger in goop* *licks finger*
A Human Right
The space inside a private building is private property, and the owner/controller can put anything in it they want that is lawful to possess, including noisy radio waves in a given band at low power. However, my phone is private property, and no one may interfere with it within the physical boundaries of its case. They can jam the waves from my antenna in their air, but they can't send "off" commands inside the phone. So they might claim some kind of "performance" rights, and perhaps copyrights, on the appearance of objects inside, but they can't materially prevent me from snapping a picture and taking it outside, without violating my property rights. The professional photographer and art communities have been fighting that one out; perhaps we can take a lesson from them, or perhaps their commercial rights to the appearance of their property conflicts too much with the traditional reality where beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
--
make install -not war
I agree. This is a universal phone problem not limited to cell phones. However, at least normal people do this in their own homes rather than in public.
- When in a group in a restaurant or car and a person in your group is talking on the phone. This makes me mad because the normal tendency is that everyone else HAS to be quiet in order for the person to hear over the phone.
- Annoying ringers. I don't mind cell phones going off in public places, but why do people have to use the damn ringers that make me cringe?
- People talking on the phone while driving. I have seem more bad driving due to this than your ordinary dumb driver. I also love it when it's snowing, the roads are icy and people are driving around with one hand on the wheel and not paying attention to anything but their damn phone call.
- Who are people calling at 7am? Are they just calling the other folks on the road that have a cell phone?
And to think, I just may have become a hippocrit because I just bought a damn cell phone. Doh!
I'm sure I'm not the only IT person who has to turn on a cell phone in movie theater. In my case, I can check and respond to a situation with WAP or more modern browser. Who says you need to make noise?
I own my business... I'm on call 24x7 but work 50 hours a week (sometimes more, sometimes less).
I love the freedom of being able to go into a movie and only having to read a couple text messages. I keep my phone on my lap, try not to create any light pollution.
For all those who think jamming is cool - why not just force people to use silent text messaging or web browsing?
I mean a silent pager with vibrate worked for me in the 1980's? Is it these stupid new kids who don't think that are causing all of us to suffer?
Why can't a doctor use text msg and vibrating phone?! Modern text msg technology can get a confirmation reply, etc.
Anyone that place their job / relationship / life in the probability of someone answering a cell phone is just asking for it.
Hey, I bought a cell phone jammer from the UK. Not that exact one. It didn't work. You could hold the thing right up to a working cell phone and all it did was dim the signal a little.
Cretinous users of Nextel phones have got to be the worst. For those who haven't experienced this, it's all the fun of hearing one side of a conversation, together with the other side of the conversation, _and_ a piercing BEEP-BEEP when the half-duplex switches directions. Beyond the merely rude, these devices monopolize any environment they're in. So far, my only countermeasures have been to face the user and shout "Breaker 1-9" at random intervals.
Hear hear! Focus on the problem, don't throw baby out with the wawa.
I think a taser might be a more interesting solution.
;)
They have a stand-off distance of 15 feet, so you should have no problem creating a nice quiet area around you.
Happy hunting
GL
the attending physician for your wife / brother / etc
:)
That's what you think! I don't HAVE a wife, OR a brother!
The newest, hottest technology becomes a must-have, until everyone has it and is completely saturated by it. Then new technology comes out to couter the old technology.
I will use my psychic mind reading powers to say that you must be atleast 35.
Heheh... Nope, but I'm old beyond my years.
How come every generation of old people feels the need to criticize every new technology that comes around by mis-characterizing it?Actually, I love technology; my career choices undoubtedly reflect that.
If you put yourself in a situation where you're "on an electronic leash", then that's your fault. Do you realize that you don't have to answer a cell phone whenever it rings? It's pretty nifty technology, you have to press a button to answer it.I know. But the reality is that when the phone rings, you feel obliged to answer it. Then, pretty soon, it's a nuisance and makes you feel guilty.
Of course, you can turn off the ringer. Then, the problem becomes, "Huh-NEEEEEEE... Why didn't you answer the phone when I called? What were you doing?"
People become accustomed to being able to reach you and talk to you about every stupid little thing that happens in their lives.
For the very same reason I eschew land-line telephones or ICQ and other messaging systems, and like e-mail: It's a constant interruption. With e-mail, on the other hand, the sender can send the message when it's convenient for them. I can then read it and reply when it's convenient for me. Telephones, in particular cellphones, require it to be convenient for both parties to talk at the same time.
If you say that the advantages of having a cell phone aren't worth it for you, that's fine. But the only real disadvantage is how much it costs and having to carry it in your pocket. The whole leash thing simply tells me something about your relationship with the would-be leash-holder.Okay. Try this. Turn off your cellphone for a week. Tell me what you get from your friends. "I tried to call you, but you didn't answer." Endlessly. You've built up the expectation that you will be available to discuss all sorts of stupid things, including the weather, any time they're feeling bored in the lineup at the grocery store.
My friends know how I feel about cellphones, and telephones in general. We communicate by e-mail. We arrange to get together to drink beer by e-mail.
I imagine some older folks didn't like the telephone when it came out - I refuse to be on a leash when I'm at home, forced to be accountable to someone - somewhere.For sure. But there's still the escape with a regular telephone. If you don't answer your land line, they assume that you're out. If you don't answer your cellphone - which, by tradition, is always with you - then they assume that you're ignoring them.
Fire and Meat. Yummy.
"I don't agree with random people able to jam the phone signal. However, it makes sense for certain places, like movie theaters, banks, etc, although they should clearly have a sign saying "Warning: Cellphone signal jamming inside the building" or something."
Will that be any more effective than the "Please turn off pagers and cellphones, before entering building." signs?[1]
[1] BIG HINT people. This is a social problem, not a technological one. For those who pay attention to history, technology has a poor record of solving social issues, and in fact makes them worse.
Not terrible arguments, but I still maintain you're putting yourself in that situation. Tell your wife and friends:
"Look... I don't feel like answering my phone all the time, and I don't always have it on me anyway. Leave a message."
I know when I call someone's cell phone and they don't answer, I assume they don't have it on them or they're in an area where they don't get service.
Trains, busses, cinema, cafes, supermarkets and basically just fucking with people's minds when you're bored.
Yabber yabber yabber (repeat ad nauseam)
Reach into pocket, click....
Yabber yabber yabber? Uh? Yabber? Hellooo yabber?
click....
Bleep bleep bleep... Yabber? Yeah yabber phone yabber yabber yabber yabber (repeat ad nauseam).
(snigger) click...
Uh? Yabber? Hellooo yabber? Helloooo? Bloody yabber phone.
click...
Repeat as required.
What? You might be on an important call? There are 6 billion people on the planet less important than I am. Legality? Laws which are unenforcable just make the legal professions look stupid. Detectors? Yah ha, riiight.
Government of the people, by corporate executives, for corporate profits.
exactly why I don't own or use one of these jammers... instead I have my burly security types address those who get angry, or blatantly choose to flout the cell phone prohibition. We are virtually always full, often with sick, sick people, and they I do NOT tolerate disruptive people in my department... it's unacceptable that the other patients have to suffer rudeness on top of their illness.
Note: I always ask nicely first, just to give them a chance to be adult about the matter...
Even if a man chops off your hand with a sword, you still have two nice, sharp bones to stick in his eyes.
First, I fucked your dad in and left a liter of my cum in his ass. Then, I let your mom suck my dick, which was covered in your dad's turds and my cum. Then when I was ready to cum, I rammed my dick inside her and impregnated the bitch. That's how you were born.
Gotta love swingers.
If you're interested, you do have a half-brother. But he's a worthless fuck, I wouldn't bother.
I work for a college, and we use Nextel Direct Connect extensivly to commuicate with our techs. Frequently, a piece of classroom technology will break during a class (projector, pc, ect) or a professor will have trouble using equiptment. If all our classrooms were unreachable, it would make it difficult for us to dispatch techs.
Ironically, one of our satelite campuses has it's own wireless SpectraLink wireless pbx phone system for communicating with techs and facility people.
I have blog like everyone else
Part of the solution is good old community pressure. If everyone would lower the verbal boom on boors, it would serve as a useful corrective in society.
If some biker dude with "Killer" tattooed on his arm applied it to someone's scrawny neck when they "forget" to deactivate their cellphone during a showing of "Love, Actually", I would suspect their memory would dramatically improve the next time they were in a theater. "Direct Connect" technology at its best.
This is all an example of the disconnected culture we have been developing and that wireless devices foster, but do not create. People feel uncomfortable talking to others face-to-face. [irony] What would probably work better than a jammer for these incidents is some way of allowing people with a cellphone to locate a nearby cellphone and page it to bitch out that person for using the cellphone in the theatre or wherever. [/irony]
With new technology from Microsoft, you dont have to jam phones with expensive equipment. Now you can just send them an RPC virus!
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
In other words, people who are desperately starved for attention, and willing to look as ridiculous as possible to get it.
Exactly, its called "managing expectations". Just make it clear how you choose to use your phone. Christ, its not such a big deal.
Although I do agree with him that people tend to let their cell phones rule their lives.
wtf is the point in jamming phone signals for university students in lectures.
If someone isnt paying attention, or causing any kind of disruption, you kick them out, as i saw several lecturers do in my days as a student.
University students dont have to be in every lecture, they are not forced to sit through it, and its not like theyre school kids and theres some legal obligation to teach them.
If the lecture bores you, or you think nattering on your phone is more important, get the feck out and copy someones notes later.
Blocking mobile phones in order to try and force getting peoples attention is just another example of the growing trend in todays society to look for inappropriate technical solutions to social and discipline problems that have always had an effective old-fashioned solution, if only every one wasnt so lazy and/or afraid of frivolous law suits.
"While actively jamming a cell-phone signal is illegal in the US, a distributor reports most of his sales go to US customers, including universities which use the technology to stop students from diddling away on phones during lectures."
Or you could, you know, *ask people to turn off their phones* at the start of the lecture/term.
They had grasped this concept when I was at university five years ago, I would be surprised if there were still pockets of the academic world who hadn't figured this out yet.
Most likely these supposed 'sales to universities' are just some marketing crap that the people selling these illegal and antisocial devices have cooked up to try and give themselves an air of legitimacy or acceptability.
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...you must be at least 35. older folks didn't like the telephone when it came out well, (wheeeze) I'm 48 and (cractchet cawf) what's this dagnab (whisle) phone thing you are talking about (wheeze)? you youngin's ought to be more polite and what were we talking about now?
All sigs should be as funny as possible, but no funnier.
I bought a cell phone. And I gave the number to one person. Why? Because it's for emergency use only.
From the article: By connecting a cell phone to hidden explosives, and then calling that phone, one can detonate a bomb (the electrical charge that activates the ringer on the cell phone serves as the triggering signal)
:)
Triggering bombs with cell phones? Funny, I had thought *exactly* about this some time ago. And yeah, I thought using the ringer's electrical input was the easiest way to go. With only one big question mark though: what happens if someone (wrong number) calls while I'm setting up the bomb?
To be more specific, I had thought about hiding a cell phone + a year's worth of battery (or maybe using a dynamo) + some grams of explosive in the frame of my bicycle: in case somebody stole it, I just had to call that number and the whole bike went BooM. I never did it and actually regretted it when some motherfucker stole my bike!!
Next step, figure out how to build a GPS/cell phone that passively stays in the bike's frame, and that gives me the coordinates by SMS when I call it. Can I script a Java phone to do that?
Hello! I'm a disaster waiting to happen!
Jamming is a solution, but simply being able to locate and reprimand people with cell phones would probably be better in the long run.
:P . With a little more work, you could probably tune them to the 2Ghz cell phone frequencies to increase their range and do some triangulation to cover a larger room, and put it on a public display so everyone could see who was violating the no cell phone rule, or forgot to turn them off, etc.
First of all, it's a sociological solution. If people know they can be detected, they would simply concentrate on following the "no cellphone" rule, rather than trying to be discreet or circumventing jamming mechanism (which would lead to a jamming/anti-jamming escalation).
The detector wouldn't have to be so complex (though it would certainly be tres cool to have a tricorder-like 3D spectrum analyzer). It could be as simple as a wand hooked up to an amplified speaker
Heh. I've actually gotten trained to decline or let voicemail get calls...since I'm allowed to have my personal cell at work, but not to answer it. (I work customer service phone for a large, bankrupt LEC phone company, you see, so I can be on their phone but not mine.) So I can hear the vibrator go off against the desk, look at the screen, see who it's from...and then press the "decline" button so it goes right to my voicemail. The only annoying thing are people with no caller ID who don't leave voicemail...but then, if it's not important enough for them to leave a message, it probably wasn't important enough for me to need to talk to them anyway. And thus, I can treat my voicemail like you treat email: I can listen and reply when it's convenient for me.
The funny thing is, it's actually easier for me this way than it was with a landline. For the couple of years I had a landline (with no caller ID) and an answering machine, I never could remind myself, "Hey, you dope, let the machine get it and only pick up if it's someone you want to talk to." Briiing, and I'd grab the receiver...and sometimes end up wishing I hadn't.
And actually, yes, I do get "why don't you ever answer your phone?" usually from my parents. (Though I imagine I'll get that less now that I have a spiffy new cellphone that supports putting a timer on the profile, so even if I forget to turn the ringer back on, as I often did with the old one, it turns itself back on after I get off work.) But I've got them pretty well trained to communicate the really important stuff via email and let me call them if it's necessary that we talk.
Since when is your cellphone "always with you" anyway? You could have left it in your car or your other coat. And even if it is with you, you're under no obligation to get it, no matter what your "friends" think. There are places like my job where you can't answer it, movie theaters or restaurants where it would be impolite to answer it (or even let it ring in the first place, not that this stops some people), driving on the freeway where it might be dangerous to answer it (not that this stops those same people), or quiet time when you just plain don't feel like answering it. And guess what? That's your choice to make. If your friends can't understand that, then they probably aren't worth your friendship. And hey, a nice thing about today's cellphones is that you can actually send text messages to them that, like email, you can review and answer when you feel like it.
For me, the decision to upgrade to a cellphone came when I got cablemodem and stopped relying on dialup. I then realized that I could either spend $30 a month on a landline whose only purpose was now to take and make calls, or $35 a month on a cell with 200 minutes a month...which is more than I ever use most of the time anyway. So not only could I still take those calls, I could make them from anywhere. With subsequent spiffs like unlimited nights and weekends, free long distance, and limited web functions (such as a phone directory and AIM messaging) on the cell, the choice has become easier than ever.
Now I can get off work in the evening, go out to my car, pick up the take-out menu I keep in the passenger seat, place an order for sate beef or curry chicken at the excellent Chinese restaurant around the corner from my apartment, and have it ready for me by the time I get there. I can go to the movie theater early and reserve seats for The Fellowship of the Ring Extended Edition for my parents, who have to attend my niece's birthday party right before and want to leave that as late as possible...and when they get there, they can phone me from the payphone in the lobby to come out and give them their tickets. (And of course I'll turn it off during the movie itself.) If I have an emergency on the road, or otherwise think of an urgent call I need to make while I'm out of the apartment, I can make the call right then and there, without having to hunt for a payphone or fish in my
Editor Emeritus and Senior Writer, TeleRead.org
Just build a building with metal walls, or staple metal window screen to the wall side of the sheetrock when building the theater or classroom and no more damned cell phone noise! All perfectly legal.
Of course it would be more fun to come up with a device to make all cell phones within a certain radius blow up, but this is unlikely to be legal. Justifiable, but not legal.
They still use blackboards? Here in NL, Canada they are considers a health hazord and have been replaced by white boards in all the schools and collages.
I don't think the fumes from some of the cleaners and markers are much better for you than chauk dust.
Hopefully they will all be replaced by LCD projectors and the instructors will make all the notes aviable on the lan.
God, root, what is the difference?
Setting realistic expectations for reachability is only part of the problem. People place calls for conversation at inappropriate times (e.g. driving or *in* restuarants or stores to use up that "wasted" time) and, even if they recieve or place a call during an "appropriate time", there is a general unwillingness to hang up with the disembodied voice gabbing in their ear when the physical situation changes. The net effect is that quite a few folks end up ignoring completely or only giving partial attention to real world situations that need their undevided attention.
I can't count the number of folks I've seen drive extremely poorly, bollux up the works going through check-out lines or ignore friends at dinner all while carrying on a conversations with the box at their ear. Apart from when you're isolated in a box (driving your car or at home) the conversations are loud and disruptive in any but the noisiest of environments, making for an unenjoyable time for the friends in the flesh and everybody within earshot.
-Brad
Check yourself. You seem to be saying that all of your cell conversations concern these important aspects of your life, certainly this doesn't reflect your reality! You further assume that cellphone jamming would be used only in arbitrary situations or for frivolous reasons. While that may be true in some instances, I would feel perfectly justified using one of these in a restaurant, movie, or other environment where one person can ruin things for a larger group. This includes talking on the phone while operating the most common of deadly weapons: the car.
Revenge is one of the most self-righteous of desires, will your instinct to destroy anything that annoys you (even if it is aggravated by your own behavior) stop you from engaging in frivolous conversations in a public setting? Is other peoples' annoyance secondary to your own? It seems so, given that you are blind to the basic idea that two wrongs don't make a right.
When I was a kid, we only had one Darth.
Yeah, well, Beethoven's Fifth, being played through a crappy 2" piezoelectric disk speaker as the ringtone on some Nokia in a movie theater.
I absolutely hate those damn ring tones.
Who wants their incoming call to sound like they are playing a gameboy?
With the latest cell phones having better speakers in them, why don't they just have the damn thing beep once and announce in a human voice "You have a call"?
Would that be too much to ask? Aaagh!
The next time I hear "Great Balls of Fire" on a cell phone, I think I could quite possibly kill the person.
There's no place like
Then just pop the jammer enough to remove the signal the moment that someone decides to get obnoxious. Case closed.
If someone gets a cell phone call in a theatre and runs out, that is respectable, although the vast majority of cells should be ON VIBRATE ALL THE TIME, and not playing some damn song that makes you think "is that Limp Bizkit? I think that's Limp Bizkit. What was I thinking about again?"
Zap them when they are offensive, not on the possibility of offending. That is extreme.
Also, the last time I checked, people on some of these new phones can message send. They should have an option that says message only, if you want to leave a phone number or message, which I bet many do.
Look, don't ruin someone's life by running the thing all the time, just jam their stupid conversation when they ruin your movie or dinner.
There are hotels in Scotland (and probably elsewhere) that jam cellphones so that guests think their in a dead spot and use the hotel phones. It sounds like the sort of thing Basil Fawlty would do
Sorry, I'm not 35 and I'm another cell phone hater.
Are the devices inherently evil? Of course not. However, in the vast majority of people who have them, they encourage behavior that ranges from irritating to extremely annoying to downright dangerous.
I know any number of otherwise nice people who will answer these things (or at least reflexively check the screen) in the middle of face-to-face conversations, which is the height of rudeness. Some of these people do it enough that I really don't enjoy hanging around them anymore. For one of them it's even caused problems with her marriage - her husband can't stand it either and she doesn't seem to be able to kick the habit.
On trains, the racket of cellphones ringing and getting yacked into has destroyed what was once a restful way to travel. Other public spaces have suffered as well. People who are able to maintain normal volume levels when talking with the person next to them are for some reason unable to resist screaming their stupid inane shit into the little plastic box. In fact, I think one of the upsetting things about cell phones is that by raising the volume level of conversations I'm exposed to, it's correspondingly raised my awareness of what morons most people are. I'd like to think it's just that the same people who choose to have cellphones are also subintelligent twits, but depressingly I've seen no particular basis for that.
And, of course, almost every time I look into the window of a car after it's executed some brain-dead maneuver on the city streets (last-minute unsignalled turns, cutting other drivers off, almost mowing down pedestrians in crosswalks, etc.), the driver has a phone stuck to his/her ear.
If the price came down to about $100 I'd happily buy a jammer and carry it always.
"Patriotism is your conviction that this country is superior to all other countries because you were born in it." -- GBS
Curry chicken from a chinese place? :)
Odd
They still use blackboards? Here in NL, Canada they are considers a health hazord and have been replaced by white boards in all the schools and collages.
This is in Ottawa, Canada, at Carleton University. Yup, still using blackboards, installed last year in the brand-new Azrieli Theater.
I don't think the fumes from some of the cleaners and markers are much better for you than chauk dust.I would think so. It's probably some idiot with an arts degree who read in The National Enquirer that chalk dust might cause coughing, so without considering the whole system implications (ie. whiteboard chemicals), petitioned the school for the health effects. Universities are more apt to be "politically correct" and "environmentally correct" than rational, so they probably caved.
Personally, I would have sat the complainant down in my office, where there would be a chalk board, a white board, and a video projector.
I would invite the complainant to sniff the chalk dust, then the whiteboard markers and cleaners, then lick the lead solder on one of the video projector's PC boards. Before the Pb2+ ions could reach the complainant's intercranial fluids, I would then ask the complainant which one he or she now felt was more environmentally friendly and less apt to cause health problems.
If the complainant continued to prefer that blackboards were removed, then I would have the complainant removed from the campus for "lacking the basic common sense and reasoning abilities which we must expect of university students". At the very least, I would provide the complainant with a DeVilbiss respirator with dust cartridges, and one of those old Radio Shack toy firefighters helmets with the revolving light, both of which said complainant was going to wear as a condition of his or her presence on campus. (After all, we have to simultaneously protect this student from accidentally banging his or her cranium on things, and alert faculty and fellow students that this individual is delicate.)
Hopefully they will all be replaced by LCD projectors and the instructors will make all the notes aviable on the lan.No. For many parts of the lecture, yes, this would be a good thing. But there are lots of cases where the chalkboard is useful - in particular, answering a student's question by working out the problem on the board. The actual act of writing notes on the blackboard also forces the instructor to interact with the material. In my university experience, many PhDs really shouldn't have been teaching at all (a gifted researcher, for example, isn't necessarily an even reasonable teacher), and the best instructors were those who didn't have the "Doctor" title. Actually interacting with the material at a blackboard might be helping a PhD who hasn't solved a differential equation in 20 years remember how to do it so he can properly answer a question. I think the potential for embarrassment would also make them spend time reviewing the material before presenting it to the class.
Fire and Meat. Yummy.
Oy ve. So now they have simply sunk to teaching high school math in the universities in the States.
It's their own fault for having a medical emergency within my 'Sphere of Silence'.
Besides, who am I to interfere with the will of God?
It is rated for usage at a maximum of 80% humidity. Most people don't live in such dry areas that the humidity never gets above 80%.
Sure, some cellphone users are inconsiderate, but you don't blame every driver on the road, just the ones who drive recklessly. Also, I find it interesting that you talk about revenge, isn't dropping people conversations a form of revenge for their offending you with their conversations? When you get your jammer, I doubt if you'll politely ask anyone "Do you mind me making the service you pay for and posibly need unavailable", or will you just decide for them.
Just because you were wondering about my reality, my bill tells me that I use about 150/minutes a month, I'd say 20% are work related, and 60% my wife, and the other 20% my family. I am not a "heavy cellphone user", but I need to be sure that the phone is on. When my phone vibrates (I always keep it on vibrate and in my pocket), and I am in a public place, I answer it with a short low "hello", then either "I'm sorry I can't talk right now" or "hold on", but then again I am generally very civil. Maybe that is how you act, but I seem to think of you as less civil.
A definition of self-rightous is someone who would do an illegal act just because they think they are right. Not paying attention to the road (cellphone, radio, sex) is often called reckless driving, and as others have pointed out jamming transmitions of radio is also illegal. Both of those are wrong.
The grass is only greener, if you don't take care of your own lawn.
Don't go to the movies.
I understand that there are times when you absolutely need to be reachable.
What I don't understand is why you think that during these periods you feel you don't have to put yourself out but you have absolutely no qualms about putting everyone else at a movie out.
Your need to be reachable is your problem. Do not make it other people's problem.
Simply put, there are places were cell phones aren't appropriate. Perhaps you will just have to stay away from those places. It's not as if you are being denied emergency hospital care because of your celllphone.
It's run by a Hong Kong expatriate who's run Chinese restaurants in England, Scotland, and Australia, among other places. According to a newspaper article on display in the place, the curry dishes were his most popular dishes in England, "perhaps because it's so cold there."
Editor Emeritus and Senior Writer, TeleRead.org
I can understand these arguments, and even agree with some of them. The majority of people in the world (or atleast here in the United States) are complete idiots who have no regard for anyone else's feelings, privacy, or comfort. And while cell phones aren't a bad thing in-and-of themselves, they make it possible for all the idiots out there to more easily annoy others.
But the fact is that cell phones aren't going to go away, whether you like it or not. Carrying around a jammer isn't going to address the larger problem at all, it will simply stop one rude person from using his/her cell phone at that particular time. And while you're blocking that one rude person, you might be simultaneously blocking another person's conversation, who might be using that cell phone responsibly (in the lobby of a theater, say) or even in some kind of emergency. That doesn't sound very responsible to me, and just as selfish as the assholes who don't know how to use their cellphones responsibly.
Another point regarding being annoyed in a restaurant/theater/train is one I made in another post in this thread: if you are in a restaurant/theater/train that doesn't effectively prevent people from using their cell phones inappropriately, that's your fault. It's the businesses choice to allow/disallow such behavior, and it's your choice whether or not to patronize that business.
10 years ago, I thought it was pretty cool to have a cell phone. Now I rarely carry mine around, and think it's cool to NOT have one!
I so wish this technology would become mainstream in cinemas. Either that, or it be legal (and mandatory) to kick the living crap out of anyone whose phone goes off mid-film.
"'I pass the test,' she said. 'I will diminish, and go into the West, and remain Galadriel.'"
- JRR Tolkien.
People will surely only assume you always carry your phone if this is, in fact, true. Leave it at home sometimes, let the batteries die for a day or two. Ignore a few calls. Sure, there might be some griping at first, but once people realise that you regard your phone as a convenience for you to be able to call other people rather than as a guaranteed method of reaching you, they will accept it. Remember, you bought the phone. You control it.
"'I pass the test,' she said. 'I will diminish, and go into the West, and remain Galadriel.'"
- JRR Tolkien.
Then someone can holler "is there a doctor in the house"? The theatre can call 911, you can summon one of the off-duty cops doubling as theatre security, you can go outside of the theatre to dial 911 on your cell phone (reception inside sucks).
Someone expecting news about a lifethreatening situation is a moron for going to the one place that forbids cell phone use. The theatres I patron insist that all cell phones be turned off - no, they don't frisk you, they expect you to be courteous.
And for your hypothetical movie-going doctor expecting emergency news - hospitals have contigencies for this. It's called standby. It's not like the heart patient is all alone up there in the hospital - there's a staff of doctors and nurses to take care of them until their primary physician shows up.
Sheesh.
If you go somewhere that tells you up front "hey, you can't use cell phones in here" then you don't have any standing to sue for blocking communication. You agreed to abide by those terms by patronizing that place. If you don't agree? Go somewhere else or wait for your movie on DVD.
http://www.globalgadgetuk.com/detector.htm
I'm against picketing, but I don't know how to show it.
To suggest that "I'll operate a jammer to disrupt the signal of phones around me because of what they could do" is to say that the person/phones are guilty, without any proof that they are guilty: in using a jammer you're stopping/interferring with the rights of the other person to use their equipment. I don't like invasion of privacy as much as the other guy, but in a public place, I there is no privacy (by definition). On the other hand: preventing/jamming phones in situations such as manufacturing areas, confidential meetings, and so on seems entirely appropriate. In this case, it's not a public area, and you have some rights to control access of people / material. If I were on a bus and couldn't use my phone because the guy next to me was using a jammer, I'd expect any nearby police to confiscate the equipment.
I will use my powers of logical deduction to say that you must be a fuckwit.
The quality of your arguments is at the level of the common racist.
You dismiss the opinions of millions of individuals based on you prejudiced notions of the members of an extremely large group of people.
How come every nigger and jew feels the need to criticize every new technology that comes around by mis-characterizing it?
Indeed, I would argue that this statement is not logically different than yours and no more inflammatory.
This being said, I know many young and old people (myself included (I'm 19)) who generally hate phones and cell phones and prefer other communication methods. I own a cell phone. There is such a thing as disliking something greatly, and still being able to live with it. I choose many times to not even keep the goddamn thing on. Regardless, I still hate it, and would rather I did not have to own one in the first place.
Now, if one own's a cell phone, there must be somebody that will call them. If you suggest owning a cell phone, and keeping it off all the time, then you are even stupider than I originally thought. (Unless you suggest using it for outgoing emergency calls only, but your rantings did not lead me to believe you were implying that)
So this means that the cell phone is another means for interruption no matter who it is that is doing the interrupting, and how nice they are. For me, this is a real disadvantage, and fuck you to tell me otherwise.
Go back to sticking your face in your mom's cunt. You can get off in hearing the echo of your nonarguments.
If the cops find you in someone's yard with "burgular's tools" they can charge you with just that. For the most part, wire cutter serve a useful and legal purpose, I doubt if you can say the same for radio jammers, which are illegal by current definition.
The grass is only greener, if you don't take care of your own lawn.
Am I the only one who never notices these supposed self centered jerks who destroy everyone's lifes by rude cell phone usage?? I do see people use them all the time, of course, but it doesn't annoy me any more than people talking to someone present.
Maybe some people are just looking for something to be annoyed by?
I agree that people talking in a movie theatre would be a big problem. But that hasn't happened anytime I can remember. People talking to each other are a much bigger issue in my expereience.
Doctors at the movie do not need to leave for emergencys. It sounds like an important reason, but in truth, in an emergency seconds count. Between the time the doctor gets the call in the movie and the time he gets to the emergency room the emergency is past becasause either some just died or the doctors at the hospital have taken care of it and don't have time to bring the new doctor up to date on the problem.
To be a Level 1 tramma center a hosptial must have 1 heart specialist and 1 brain specialists= (and a bunch of other highly trained doctors) avaiable 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. That means in the hospital and able to get to the emergency room in moments. If there is brain surgery going on that means at least 2 brain surgens are in the hospital, one to do the surgery, and one standing by in case of need in the emergency room. Time is far too critical in an emergency room to wait for doctors to come in.
Don't forget too that the movie theator doesn't even have to be in the same town as the hospital. It is extreemly common for people to live half an hour from work, and shop half an hour from either place.
That isn't to say that doctors don't get called in all the time. However when they do there isn't a critical need yet. There is also a order, doctors on call need to be free, but that means they can't go to movies. They also can't go to bars and get drunk, like some peoplelike to do once in a while.
What happens when providers blame lack of signal availability on "someone must be using a jammer". I mean, there are times I would love to shut my neighbor or roommate's phone off, but is it right? Enforcement the law is next to impossible, especially if its only localized jamming.
Error: Id10t detected
My friends know how I feel about cellphones, and telephones in general. We communicate by e-mail. We arrange to get together to drink beer by e-mail.
And I bet you've found yourself alone in many a bar, when your mates have had to change the plan at the last minute but can't get hold of you !!!
It's silly, dumb, or just plain intellectually dishonest to pretend that the "guy waiting to hear about his pregnant wife" type of extreme case is in any way representative of the "assholes who bother others with cellphones" population. And it's easy to tell that these calls are not the norm, too, since the assholes in question will invariably share the contents of their conversation with all those around them.
Now before I get modded down, I be to remind whoever might read this that what I am saying is FACT. - bogaboga
I've found that the best way to eliminate cell-phone use in my general location is to make more noise than what can be tolerated by the cell-owner, or better yet, by the person on the other end of the conversation. Carrying a leaf-blower around is still legal, as far as I know.
Do you realize that you don't have to answer a cell phone whenever it rings?
Then what's the point of carrying it around? Do you also clip a pager to your belt, only to ignore it all day? Maybe you buy a T1, only to not send any data over it?
moron.
The only thing worse than someone who feels they need to make their argument by strewing childish insults is an Anonymous Coward who does so :)
Your insults don't carry much weight, so maybe you'd be kind enough to explain (this time using a legitimate login, coward) why my arguments are so worthless and inflammatory?
Now, if one own's a cell phone, there must be somebody that will call them. If you suggest owning a cell phone, and keeping it off all the time, then you are even stupider than I originally thought
When did I come close to implying that? Talk about putting up a straw-man.
So this means that the cell phone is another means for interruption no matter who it is that is doing the interrupting, and how nice they are. For me, this is a real disadvantage, and fuck you to tell me otherwise.
If you don't want to be interrupted by a cell phone, then simply don't carry one. There are very few people who are forced to carry a cell phone, and even less 19 year olds who are. So tell us, are you a very young doctor or something?
You've completely missed my entire argument. I'm not arguing that you, or anyone else, should have a cell phone. What the hell do I care if anyone else has a cell phone? I was arguing that the parent's reason for criticizing a cell phone (the fact that they're on an electronic leash if they do) is flawed. You're only on a leash if you put yourself on a leash.
I don't know why I bothered to reply to an anonymous coward who makes his arguments using insults, but I won't again. So if you reply to this, have some balls and do it with a login so everyone can see who it is that can't control himself on an internet forum.
you regard your phone as a convenience for you to be able to call other people
Then turn off the ringer.
Problem Solved.
I was in Wal-Mart with my buddy and I noticed that my T-Mobile phone had 0 reception within the building where his AT&T phone had full reception. As soon as I walked out the door my reception returned to 100% This happens every time I go to Wal Mart even to my other friends that have T-Mobile
Who wants their incoming call to sound like they are playing a gameboy?
Amusingly enough, my current ringtone is the background music for Level 1-1 of Super Mario Bros.
And yeah, I like custom ringtones -- when a phone rings in a noisy place, I can immediately tell if it's my phone or someone else's by the ringtone alone.
--R.J.
Electric-Escape.net
Here.
Any person who has a job or assignment that requires them to be contacted in an emergency should not have to see a "No Service" blurb flashing on the display because some facility does not like cellphones. I could see this happening...a doctor who is seeing a movie, who is not on call but has to be available 24/7, doesn't get the call to assist a life-or-death situation and the patient dies but could have survived if the doctor was able to handle the call. Lawyer: "Did you have your cellphone on?", Doctor: "Yes, I did but it was showing 'No Service' and the signal indicator was at full."...Lawyer: "Do you have a record of the doctor being called?", Cell Company: "Yes, he was called at 8:25 pm. We saw his PIN number as being logged into the system but the phone did not respond."...Lawyer:"Do you have a cellphone signal jammer installed in your facility?", Theatre Owner:"We have a unit to protect the quiet of our clients while watching a movie." IANAL but I smell wrongful death lawsuit. Let alone the grief from the FCC. --- This boils down to courtesy of the phone user, not the phone. If the user was being courteous to the people around them, then put the unit on vibrate. There is no need to hurt the rest because of a few rotten apples.
Same here. Three people have my number, and I've never received a phone call on it. I always make outgoing.
if the story was about a way to jam mp3 players or your dsl line, everybody here would be going into convultions. why are cell phones different? and how is it any more rude of me to be on a bus or in a shopping mall or whatever talking to somebody who isn't there as opposed to someone who is? is it that you can only eavesdrop on one side of the conversation?
there are real problems in our world people, and cell phones don't rank real high on my list.
Schematics and resources are available here
That's a little glib. Only one company runs a train from New York to DC. They put quiet cars on sometimes, but not always, and only a few conductors are vigilant about shutting down the jerks who sit in the quiet car and then use their phones. I have very little control over Amtrak; I can write letters, but that's about it. I do find myself flying more and more when it's a leisure trip, precisely because of the phone issue, but when I need to get a lot done on the trip there's no substitute for the train.
Likewise there may or may not be another cinema showing the movie I want to see, or another restaurant that serves food as good as what I want to eat.
If it's an emergency they can use a payphone. Payphones are readily available in cinemas, on trains, and in or nearby restaurants.
As for the "responsible" phone user, in the hypothetical situation where I have a jammer, they're an unfortumate victim just like I was before. Buying the jammer would be a way to improve my personal odds of a favorable outcome in a zero-sum game. When the "selfish assholes" go away, so will the jammer. Until then it's just a matter of spreading the misery around. No reason I have to be the victim all the time.
"Patriotism is your conviction that this country is superior to all other countries because you were born in it." -- GBS
Not in the northeast USA. They all have it (all the takeout places, anyway). I get it at least once a week.
"Patriotism is your conviction that this country is superior to all other countries because you were born in it." -- GBS
I'm not stopping going to that restraunt. That would be plain stupid. There's never been another cell phone problem there ever. I've got a lot more reasons to stop visiting restraunts. So your post isn't much help, is it?
Only one company runs a train from New York to DC.
Likewise there may or may not be another cinema showing the movie I want to see, or another restaurant that serves food as good as what I want to eat.
So what? If that's your only choice, and you don't like how that company runs stuff, then you're SOL. There right to a quiet train is not inalienable, and the fact that you can't find a train/theater/whatever that meets your critera doesn't give you the right to illegally force that train/theater/whatever to meet your criteria.
You're making the assumption that businesses out there are obligated to give you a comfortable experience, and if that business doesn't then you're perfectly happy illegally treading on other people's rights.
Guess what? People have the right to have annoying ringers and speak annoyingly on their cell phones if the owner of the property they're on at the time doesn't have rules against it or doesn't enforce them. You do not have the right to take away other peoples' rights just because the only train in town doesn't meet your expectations.
One important key to functioning successfully in a social environment is respecting other people, and you have the right to be annoyed. But another important key is respecting other people's rights, recognizing that your desires are not rights, and learning to live with the fact that not everyone in the world has the same desires you do and not every business in the world is obligated to tailor their services to you.
Like I said a few times before, if you don't like it then leave!! Only train in town? Sorry about your luck.
If you put yourself in a situation where you're "on an electronic leash", then that's your fault. Do you realize that you don't have to answer a cell phone whenever it rings? It's pretty nifty technology, you have to press a button to answer it.
Dude. It's called a *JOB*.
Try getting one that doesn't involve stocking shelves, or flipping meat. They give you a cell phone, and you *DO* have to answer it when it rings. Or you're up shits creek.
I'll use my psychic mind reading powers, and say that you're in college, on your parents dime.
So if you reply to this, have some balls and do it with a login so everyone can see who it is that can't control himself on an internet forum.
No, he's right - you're a fuckwit. I imagine kgbkgb is your real name? It's funny, I can't find you in the phone book. Talk about balls!
I don't see that their right to yack supersedes my right to relax. If you can convince me that it does, excellent.
By that same principle I should have the right to annoy them back by jamming their phone. You haven't made it clear to me why one person's "right" is more important than the other's.
You're the one who came in saying that the free market had all the answers, and I should just go use a competing train if I didn't like the way this one worked.
Oh, I get it. Your desires are rights and mine are silly whims.
In point of fact I do have the right to reasonable tranquility; that's why we have laws about disturbing the peace and disorderly conduct and so on.
"Patriotism is your conviction that this country is superior to all other countries because you were born in it." -- GBS
Okay let's examine what you're attempting to argue (in an Anonymous Cowardly sort of way).
The parent poster said:
I have had cellphones with work, and was glad to get rid of them when I did. I have no interest in being on an electronic leash, forced to be accountable to someone - somewhere.
Presumably he lost his job, got another job, or his job changed its policies and no longer required him to carry his cell phone.. so he got rid of it.
I argue that his logic (getting rid of the cell phone so he wouldn't be on an "electronic leash") is flawed, because he's only on an electronic leash if he makes it that way.
Then you jump in with your witty post and tell us: Dude. It's called a *JOB*.
Please try to follow along next time before jumping in and posting. I really need to stop displaying Score:0 posts.
Please see this post while you jabber on all high handed about me being an anonymous coward. Wow, you've got all of 12 posts invested in your account, half of them in this discussion. It's amazing your balls don't drag on the floor when you walk.
You are in college, aren't you? And your parents just write a nice big check. Don't you feel just like hot shit? I'm almost embarassed that I'm right.
A cellphone is still an electronic leash for millions of people, in exactly the situation I'm pointing out. You're disproving that by pointing out that that's not the case for one whole guy?
Better keep those grades up, sonny.
Blackboards have been known to cause poor grammar and spelling in students and faculty staff ;->
e.g. Here in NL, Canada they are considers a health hazord and have been replaced by white boards in all the schools and collages.
All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain.
You don't seem to be paying attention. A person has the right to do anything (within the law) that THE OWNERS OF THE PROPERTY DEEM THAT PERSON MAY DO.
If you're in a theater that allows people to yell at the top of their lungs, then those people have the right to yell at the top of their lungs.
In point of fact I do have the right to reasonable tranquility; that's why we have laws about disturbing the peace and disorderly conduct and so on.
Of course you have the right to reasonable tranquility... when you're on YOUR PROPERTY or on public property. Do you have the right to keep people from screaming on a rollercoaster because it hurts your ears? Do you have the right to tell the people at a concert to STFU so you can be more tranquil? NO.
I don't see that their right to yack supersedes my right to relax. If you can convince me that it does, excellent.
Their right to yack does not supercede your right to relax. But in attempting to exercise your right to relax, you are ILLEGALLY infringing upon their rights. If you sat next to the yacker and talked loudly to your neighbor, infringing on their right to yack, there would be nothing wrong with that. Because, although you're "infringing on their rights", you would be WITHIN THE RULES OF THE OWNERS OF THE PROPERTY.
Sorry about the caps, but I feel like I'm saying the same thing over and over again without anyone listening. Think about it. They're following the rules. You're not (in using the jammer). It's as simple as that.
I work for a major wireless carrier, and my opinion on jammers is: "God I wish I had one sometimes!" 99% of the time, it would remain unused.. I would reserve it for extreme cases. However! if I'm in the movies and some idiot is carrying on a conversation... BAM! I would jam his/her signal with zero remorse. A considerate person would answer an emergency call in a theater in a low voice and immediately exit. Another instance would be while in school... doesn't matter if the teacher isn't doing anything at the moment, carrying on a conversation in the classroom would be an immediate jam. Once again, a respectful person would answer in a low tone and immediately exit if they had to take the call. I think everyone would agree with me here. But Jammers should remain illegal because not everyone would have the good judgement to use the device only in the extreme cases like the ones I mentioned.
That's one reason why I never asked for a company phone at my last company, and thankfully was not issued one regardless. They still put my personal phone number on my business cards without asking me, but at least I could ignore it after work since they weren't paying the bills.
All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain.
All the mobile phones over here in the UK transmit your number to the calling phone when you place a call...so they know your number, and can store it for later to call you back. Just FYI.
All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain.
I'm paying plenty of attention. It so happens that I disagree with your conclusions.
Okay, you find me a cinema that has posted a "no cellphone jammers" sign. If you can't, then your argument is no more than a reiteration of the present illegality of cellphone jammers in the US, which everyone already takes as a given, and is therefore entirely uninteresting. You might as well argue that trying to find a cure for AIDS was stupid because it was a fatal disease.
These examples don't address the point. Rock concerts and roller coasters are not places where it is reasonable to expect quiet.
Sorry, if I went and sat next to someone and started yelling in their ear - or even trying to disrupt a conversation between two other people by talking loudly through them - I could certainly be cited for it.
This is because we are dealing in the grey area of conflicting preferences, and not everyone sees things the same way you do. Saying the same thing over and over again is not a very effective approach to these situations.
One day, when you grow up, you will become sufficiently humble to realize that people can disagree with you without necessarily being retarded or hard of hearing.
"Patriotism is your conviction that this country is superior to all other countries because you were born in it." -- GBS
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Sorry, if I went and sat next to someone and started yelling in their ear - or even trying to disrupt a conversation between two other people by talking loudly through them - I could certainly be cited for it.
You're absolutely wrong. We're talking about private property here, which is what I think you're missing. Legally, you don't have the right to a quiet environment or an undisturbed conversation if the owners of the property don't grant you that right. That's the reason I brought up the rollercoaster and the concert. In my opinion you're right that they are not "places where it is reasonable to expect quiet" and theaters are... but that's up to the discression of the theater. What do you have to say about the hypothetical theater where everyone's allowed to scream at the top of their lungs? Do you think you have the right to forcibly cover their mouths with duct tape? In my opinion, the jammer amounts to the same thing.
our argument is no more than a reiteration of the present illegality of cellphone jammers in the US, which everyone already takes as a given, and is therefore entirely uninteresting
You're right that there's a difference between the legality of it and whether someone has the right to it. I'm using the legality because talking about what one has the right to do ignoring the law is a completely philosophical question, and we all know how arguments about questions like those go. You're basing your argument that you have the right to jam this person's cell phone on the fact that in your opinion, a theater is a place where it should be completely quiet. How do you expect anyone to argue with this opinion? Someone else might argue that it's completely reasonable to talk on a cell phone if it's not too loud. You'd disagree, but it would be a completely subjective opinion! That kind of reasoning leads to people (presumably less peaceful to you) saying things like "Well if he jams my cellphone, I have a right to take his jammer and beat him with it." How do you argue something like this with no basis?
Are you arguing on the basis of morality? I have been in too many arguments where morality is in question, they're never resolved.
So what's your basis?
P.S. Sorry if I was insulting or inflammatory in earlier posts.
No, they're the folks who load the screaming kids into the biggest SUV from Mack Trucks and back into that civic hatchback in the parking lot.
Oh and btw, it's usually the coupes that have clear tails, not hatchbacks.
I have wondered for a while about the need for a localized cellphone status protocol. LCSP?
I propose that Cellphones have a designed in default profile (allow user to disable?) setting which allows them to pick up a localized "Set Silent Command". Emit say one beep to let the user know its been tripped and then stay silent for a few hours (user configurable duration?). Localized means say within a specfic room or corridor.
There should be an inverse "Return to Prior State" protocol command that resets the cellphone back to its earlier alert state (which may have already been silent of course).
At the entrance to a movie, or live theatre, or sound studio, etc..., a small transmitter uses the protocol to "Set Silent" at the end of the movie, on the way out of the theatre, transmit "Reset State". Post a decal or two to let folks know that they are in a cellphone local protocol area or something.
Maybe we could use this to default cellphones to silent, while we are driving, might prevent a few accidents.
This seems likely to have been proposed somewhere before and clearly has not happened, but why not I wonder? I am sure there's some gotchas in here, but this would be a social boon in many circumstances. Is it a reasonable idea?, technical feasibility? any chance of it happening?
What say you Slashdot!
There is no god; get over it already! Never exchange a walk on part in the war, for a lead role in a cage.
With the latest cell phones having better speakers in them, why don't they just have the damn thing beep once and announce in a human voice "You have a call"?
Are you being facetious or are you serious? I bought a motorola t720 (which is a piece of crap) last christmas that does that by default.
I really miss my startac.
Best mac commercial ever(mirror)
Despite being a space cadet, I do turn my phone to silent when I go into the theatre. I just forget to set it back to ring when I leave!
A cellphone could, as a feature, have a setting for "go to silent/vibrate for N hours. After the requested delay, it would revert to normal and Spacey Jamie won't miss her phone calls.
-- Jamie
vigilante style cellphone jamming is illegal for a reason. Think you're cool because you're jamming the theatre or concert you're in? Think you've outsmarted your students by placing on in your classroom?
Well then buddy, I hope the pager-carrying EMTs, nurses and doctors you're surrepticiously blocking signal for are missing calls to save one of your loved ones. Fools.
Oh and btw, it's usually the coupes that have clear tails, not hatchbacks.
Oh and btw yourself ricer, honda didn't make a civic coupe. It's a two-door sedan.
Fuggin clear taillights... *mutter mutter*
Send lawyers, guns, and money!
If you don't like answering every little phone call, don't. Get a phone that has caller ID and a button that lets you turn off the ringer if you don't want to answer. Let the voice mail pick up if you're busy, oror in a place where it would be rude or dangerous to talk on the phone. Or if you just don't feel like answering the phone. (In this era of telemarketers and other meme spammers, you cannot treat answering the phone as a fundamental obligation.) If you let a device like a cell phone enslave you, it's not the device that needs retooling.
And distinctive ring tones aren't meant to be cute or pretty. They're a way to distinguish your phone so you don't reach for your pocket every time somebody else's phone ring.
Speaking of which, does anybody know WTF "Kyung Bokung" is? It's one of the ring tones hard-wired into my Samsung 3500. Since the alternatives are various electronic chirps, and a couple of Western Classical pieces I like too much to listen to them every time my phone rings, it's what I use. I'm guessing Korean folk or patriotic tune. Google, for once, is not helpful.
Funny, I was just telling someone this story today. I was watching Jurassic Park III (I was high, all right?), and there is a rather lengthy scene in the movie where the protagonists are being chased around by some manner of dinosaur who has apparently swallowed their satellite phone, which someone is calling. So, they run around for a while, and then they hear the ringing from inside the dinosaur, and then they run until he's gone again. But the baffling thing was that sometimes, the phone would ring, but they wouldn't act scared, or even act like they noticed it was ringing while they hid quietly. Only after about a minute did I, and my friend, realize simultaneously that someone's phone in the theatre was ringing in a similar tone to the one in the movie, and that we were hearing that sometimes, and not the one in the dinosaur (Don't smoke weed, kids.) Just as we realized this, an enormous, giant of a man stood up, looked at the kid with the phone a few rows away, and yelled "If you don't shut that fscking phone off, I'll shut you off!" I have never applauded more genuinely in my life.
There's no such thing as a 2 door sedan, sedan = 4 doors. The 99-01 Civic Si was a COUPE.
I can't believe I earned the title 'ricer' by correcting obvious mistakes. FYI I drive a 2003 Accord V6 COUPE. Stock.
CDMA was originally researched and refined by the military for precisely this reason. Because it uses a spread spectrum, a single carrier (or several) can't jam it. You'd need to jam the entire BAND, at a high enough power level, and that is physically impossible. Well, it might be possible with military grade gear, but we're talking huge amounts of power here. You'd need an entire destroyer to carry and power it.
One simple rule for its versus it's
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No wait....
It is never
My Linux Command of the Day site : LCOD
Two doors do not a coupe make. A coupe has no B-pillar, a civic does, hence it's a two-door sedan.
Send lawyers, guns, and money!
"Huh-NEEEEEEE... Why didn't you answer the phone when I called? What were you doing?"
I tell her I forgot to turn it back on and remind her how the drunk kept calling the wrong number last night.
The truth shall set you free!
The problem many people are having isn't that cell phones are fundamentally, the problem is that there are idiots using cell phones. But those same idiots drive recklesses, double-park, run cars without mufflers at 4 in morning, and engage in a host of other socially unacceptable activities. Would you ban cars because some people are idiots?
Specific silly objections:
But people use it in restaurants, and that's rude.. How is it rude? Many people specifically go to restaurants to talk with other people. Is taking to someone remotely fundamentally worse? If they're being too loud you do what you would do if someone was being loud talking to the companion: ask them to quiet down. Now, if you're dining with someone and that someone proceeds to take a call while you sit there, that's rude. But it's only rude to you. The answer isn't to disable the cell phone, the answer is to dine with non-rude people.
People use it movie theatres, and that's rude. Indeed it is. And the occasional gaggles of high school kids behind me laughing at the serious drama are also being rude. The answer? Tell them to shut up. Point out that if they want to continue their conversation they can do so from the lobby.
People use it in public, and that's rude. That's just surreal. Would you be complaining if their friend was instead standing right next to them talking? It's a public space, people talk, learn to live with it.
If you have a cell phone you're on a leash and always have to answer it. That's just a silly habit; break it. Get a phone with silent alertand leave it in vibrate mode all of the time. If you don't want to take a call now, just ignore it (on many phones you can hit hang-up and immediately shunt them to voice mail). If it might be important check the caller idea. Not important? Ignore it. Most cell phone plans come with free voice mail. Use it. If you have someone who gets pissy when you don't answer, politely explain that would rather not be on a leash to them. If they still insist you should answer they're rude, get more polite friends. (If it's your boss, get a new cell phone number and don't admit to your boss that you have it. I see no reason for my boss to have my cell phone number. If your boss is paying for the phone... well... high availability is probably what he's paying you for.)
There are plenty of good uses for cell phones, even in movie theatres. A friend of mine is a sysadmin and is on call every few weekends. He could simply sit at home all weekend, or he could take the chance that he might get a call while he's at a movie. If no call arrives, he enjoys the movie. If a call arrives it's unfortunate, but he knew the risk. He's very polite, when his work phone rings he immediately leaves the theatre to answer it.
Ultimately cell phone jammers are a crude solution that harms good users of cell phones as much as rude users. The answer is to educate and mock stupid users until they get the picture.
Search 2010 Gen Con events
(Sorry for the delay; I was out at a movie, and I'm happy to report that no cellphones rang)
It's not someone's home. It's a place made accessible to the public, and as such, the property owner's say is constrained to some degree. See, for instance, Marsh v. Alabama, particularly noting Justice Black's conclusion that "Ownership does not always mean absolute dominion. The more an owner, for his advantage, opens up his property for use by the public in general, the more do his rights become circumscribed by the statutory and constitutional rights of those who use it."
But anyway, the issue in my example about intentionally interfering with two people having a pre-existing conversation is largely irrelevant to the property owner or his wishes. It's a matter of whether the conversants could reasonably expect freedom from this sort of thing; if so, a police officer could cite the interferer for disorderly conduct.
That's how all the most interesting arguments work. Arguing over who won the World Series in 1957 is boring; someone looks it up and we're done.
The laws are made based on the outcomes of discussion like these. They did not fall down to earth from heaven. Someone has to sit down and decide which is more important: my right to reasonable quiet or your right to use a phone.
I think the right to quiet trumps, because your single phone disturbs multiple people, and because you're the one who wants to do something creating the need for conflict resolution, so it's more reasonable that you step outside to do it. You may think differently, but if you can't make a convincing case then it doesn't matter much.
Or another approach: At the end of the day, there is some outcome which leaves society the best off in the net. You can assume a logarithmic increase in social cost per person as the outcome diverges farther and farther from their preferred outcome, then sample the population to figure out what they'd prefer and then figure out how your numbers add up. I don't have any scientific data, but I brought this topic up with my friends this evening, and 7 out of 8 (including me) felt that jammers in cinemas would be a great idea.
Nobody has a right to physical violence except in self-defense. Anyone who thinks seriously about beating someone either for making noise with a phone, or for jamming one, has some problems to work out, and these problems have nothing to do with the phone/jammer issue.
"Patriotism is your conviction that this country is superior to all other countries because you were born in it." -- GBS
Maybe you should tell Honda that their website is wrong.
If there's one thing I hate, it's having a battle of wits with an unarmed person. FYI, there are 'pillared coupes' that DO have B pillars, and have been around since AT LEAST 1956, starting with the 1956 Studebaker PowerHawk Pillared Coupe.
a sp?Num=3232
Look here: http://www.answerbag.com/t_view.php/76, here: http://www.hyperdictionary.com/dictionary/coupe. here: http://www.wordwizard.com/clubhouse/founddiscuss.
If that's not enough links for you, google should come in handy. Coupes have 2 doors, sedans have 4, and I don't give a rat's ass about B pillars. Also, just to add insult to injury since you're probably some beer-swilling, uneducated musclecar fan, this one is just for you: http://www.71superbee.com/VINBreakdown/. Scroll down until you see pillared coupe. There are more than one.
I know that's pretty much what my voice-mail message says. My phone tends to stay in either my backpack (at school) or my tool bag (at work) and there are times (like being half upside down over a bank of capacitors) when I can't drop what I'm doing to answer a phone.
Some people do find it humorous that my message begins "You've reached my bag..."
--- As to make my comment seem, by comparison, more intelegent... doodie doodie doodie poop poop poop!
Dude, just carry an airhorn with you. Every time the guy next to you with the cell phone gets loud, hit the horn. You just change the place you are jamming the cell call from the EM spectrum between the phone and the tower to the audio spectrum between the annoying person and his/her phone.
--- As to make my comment seem, by comparison, more intelegent... doodie doodie doodie poop poop poop!
It's a place made accessible to the public, and as such, the property owner's say is constrained to some degree. See, for instance, Marsh v. Alabama, particularly noting Justice Black's conclusion that "Ownership does not always mean absolute dominion. The more an owner, for his advantage, opens up his property for use by the public in general, the more do his rights become circumscribed by the statutory and constitutional rights of those who use it."
:)
:)
I'll let the fact that you and I are both not lawyers excuse the fact that you're citing a court case from 1946. In addition to it being extremely old, it was effectively limited to applying only to private property that assumed all characteristics of a municipality by HUDGENS v. NLRB (1976). That case denied that picketers have the right to enter a shopping center against the owners' wishes. If the First Amendment doesn't restrict the owner of a shopping center (a very public place) from kicking people out, then nothing forces the owner of a theater to protect your right to relax (or whatever).
The laws are made based on the outcomes of discussion like these. They did not fall down to earth from heaven. Someone has to sit down and decide which is more important: my right to reasonable quiet or your right to use a phone.
Actually, they might as well fall down to earth from heaven. They are based on the philosophies of judges and politicians. There's nothing special about laws that makes them any more objective or true than any other opinions or philosophies. Sure, laws are made based on outcomes of discussions like this one, but at the end it all comes down to whether some law is consistent with the Constitution, an old piece of paper written based on the completely subjective philosophies of long-dead people.
So unless we can appy this to some framework (i.e. assuming your rights are defined by the law), I'm not interested in the argument. Besides, you'd never get past my egoism
I think the right to quiet trumps, because your single phone disturbs multiple people, and because you're the one who wants to do something creating the need for conflict resolution, so it's more reasonable that you step outside to do it. You may think differently, but if you can't make a convincing case then it doesn't matter much.
Who's to say that the "rightness" of an action is determined by how many people are annoyed by it? You're arguing that whenever an action causes creates "the need for conflict resolution", the actor should stop? I don't call that a convincing case at all, and anyone could come up with plenty of examples in which an action created "the need for conflict resolution" and yet isn't wrong.
Or another approach: At the end of the day, there is some outcome which leaves society the best off in the net. You can assume a logarithmic increase in social cost per person as the outcome diverges farther and farther from their preferred outcome, then sample the population to figure out what they'd prefer and then figure out how your numbers add up. I don't have any scientific data, but I brought this topic up with my friends this evening, and 7 out of 8 (including me) felt that jammers in cinemas would be a great idea.
I'm not sure I follow you. Are you arguing that if most people think something is a good idea, then it should be instated? Lots of Southerners thought slavery was a good idea.. maybe even most... (don't bother arguing against that fact, I offer it simply as an example of a case in which many people might think something is a good idea but it still isn't). Sounds like Utilitarianism to me, which I think is completely evil... so by spouting it, you've already earned by contempt
But his is how arguments based purely on opinions go. They're useless.
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2 a : a 2- or 4-door automobile seating 4 or more persons and usually having a permanent top
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As for your battle of wits.. Do you battle yourself often?
In Hong Kong it's a standard dish. Along with Russian borscht, French toast, iced milk tea. None of these are exactly the same as the native versions though, as American pizzas aren't the same as Italian ones. However I've never seen chop suey or fortune cookies in Hong Kong.
That could be explained by the fact that fortune cookies are a purely American food, invented in California. Not sure about chop suey but I'd suspect it's the same thing.
Of course, you can turn off the ringer. Then, the problem becomes, "Huh-NEEEEEEE... Why didn't you answer the phone when I called? What were you doing?"
:)
This is actually quite simple to deal with. I resisted a cell phone for a long, long time, because of all your points. But now that I have one, I set it up so if I'm out of range/turned off/battery's dead/or (crucially) I hit ignore, it rings through to my house. I know who's likely to call me about stupid shit, and who isn't. If an abuser is calling me and I'm not in the mood, I hit ignore, and they leave a message at my house. Or preferably, realize it's not important enough to leave a message, and e-mail me later.
I've also conditioned people to realize that a text message on my phone is the best way to get a response to a simple question. It's like e-mail, I don't have to answer right away, and I don't look like a jack-ass answering my phone in public. I can go duck behind something to write my response, and hide my shame.
The key to avoid the expectation of an answer you're talking about is to never build it in the first place. Last month I used 8 minutes of airtime, but sent 50 text messages. It was great.
The problem with jamming cellphones is that a jamming device is non-selective and renders the entire phone useless, even when it is not necessary. For example, in a movie theatre all you want is to disable the voice services and alert tones, but there is no reason to disable text/SMS reception and sending, if individuals want to do that. In fact jamming the cellphone signal can be counterproductive. GSM phones will up their transmit power if they can't get decent reception, in effect reducing battery time and *increasing* the possibility of interference with nearby electronic equipment. In an environment with sensitive electronic equipment, jamming is the last thing you want.
What I would like to see is some way of providing context information to a cellphone, so that the cellphone can decide for itself what would be appropriate behaviour. A movie theatre, for example, might have a small [bluetooth] transmitter that tells all nearby phones that they are in a theatre, and the phones automatically switch off voice services and ring tones. In a hospital context the phone might switch its transmitter off automatically, but still allow the owner to look at the onboard phonebook. A library context might switch off the ring tone and switch on the vibrating alert.
This is obviously something that would have to be supported by the manufacturer. I hope they are reading.
No--I was being serious.
My current cell is about a year old and it's all beat up. The 'voice alert' is going to be pretty high up on my list of needs for a new phone...
There's no place like
Au contraire. You don't "rock" Beethoven. You "rock" Amadeus.
1) One Cell Phone Jammer. Must be portable and battery powered with 150-200 ft range.
2) One placard suitable for use in a car that says in large letters: "You would drive better with that cell phone shoved up your ass. Sideways!".