WWV Shortwave Time Broadcasts May Be Slashed In 2019 (qrz.com)

New submitter SteveSgt writes: A forum thread on QRZ.com indicates that the shortwave time broadcasts by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) from stations WWV (Colorado) and WWVH (Hawaii) may be slashed in budget year 2019. [One of the proposed reductions includes "$6.3 million supporting fundamental measurement dissemination, including the shutdown of NIST radio stations in Colorado and Hawaii."] While the WWV broadcasts may seem like an anachronism to some Slashdotters, they remain a crucial component in many unexpected services, from over-the-air broadcasters and traffic signals, to medical devices, wall clocks, and wrist watches. The signals serve as standard beacons for radio propagation, and as a frequency reference for alignment of a broad range of communications equipment. It's easy to imagine that not even the NIST knows every service and device that could be impacted by this decision.

Comments

WTF?

[asackett]

This, coincident with a $717B Defense Authorization?

We need to have a very serious conversation with the god who blessed America. Fucker's high on something.

Re:WTF?

[Anonymous Coward]

Trump doesn't believe in any gods besides his punk ass traitor self. His supporters are worse, they could know better.

Re: WTF?

[Anonymous Coward]

American politics is no longer about big government vs. small government. Both parties like big government and increase spending. The primary disagreement is what type of big government to support. The Democrats favor entitlement spending while Republicans favor defense spending.

We also have an obsession with worshiping the military and pretending they can do wrong. It's a form of excessive political correctness, with particularly strong support from Republicans. I assume it's partly an overreaction to the awful treatment of troops returning from Vietnam. However, we've gone past the need to respect our soldiers to awkward forced displays of patriotism like before sporting events and acting as if the military can do no wrong. Efforts to cut defense spending will be portrayed as dangerous and not supporting our troops. When there aren't real threats to justify the defense spending, we create them by intervening in the affairs of other countries or appealing to the threat of terror. The military-industrial complex Eisenhower warned of has become far bigger and more powerful than even he envisioned.

Re:WTF?

[Anonymous Coward]

There is no doubt in your mind that Twinkies are food.

While you're looking at the pimple of defense spending, you're ignoring the cancer of social security, medicare, Obamacare, corporate and farm welfare, and interest on the debt. Order of magnitude, bitch. One of these (defense) is actually constitutional - the rest are clearly not. And debt has a way of fucking over the very people you think should be helped.

Re: WTF?

[asackett]

Be of good cheer, the military-industrial state will soon collapse.
Meanwhile, we must do all in our power to oppose, resist, and subvert
its desperate aggrandizements. As a matter of course. As a matter of
honor.
        -- Edward Abbey, _Down The River_

Re: WTF?

[youngone]

I assume it's partly an overreaction to the awful treatment of troops returning from Vietnam.

I assume it's because the US military learned a lesson from Vietnam, which was that they needed to control the narrative.
That is why reporters were "embedded" during the Gulf Wars, and also why the US military pays the NFL so much money every year for those very strange "salute to service" games which look an awful lot like Nuremberg rallies to those of us who live outside the US.

It's called propaganda and the US has the most effective propaganda machine the world has ever known.

Re: WTF?

[Anonymous Coward]

They have altered the Constitution. Pray all you want, they're going to alter it further.

Re: WTF?

[Anonymous Coward]

I assume it's partly an overreaction to the awful treatment of troops returning from Vietnam.

I assume it's because the US military learned a lesson from Vietnam, which was that they needed to control the narrative.

That is why reporters were "embedded" during the Gulf Wars, and also why the US military pays the NFL so much money every year for those very strange "salute to service" games which look an awful lot like Nuremberg rallies to those of us who live outside the US.

It's called propaganda and the US has the most effective propaganda machine the world has ever known.

The propaganda works to the extent that it does because it takes credit for an extraordinary rich land mass, a diverse culture made up of immigrants who, by and large, gave up who they were to become "Americans", a strong work ethic we stole from Western Europe, and actual rewards for effort, like wealth, advancement, recognition, and freedom to think widely.

But don't worry, people are beginning to realize the reality. It's just that it's a bitter pill to get down and it takes a while.

Re: WTF?

[msauve]

"In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the militaryindustrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist."

Eisenhower

Re: WTF?

[kelemvor4]

Where does the Constitution authorize the creation of an Air Force, a Space Force, or to maintain standing armies? It doesn't.

Even if we assume the Constitution implicitly allows such defense spending, it doesn't mean that it's good for the country. Why not reduce defense spending and cut taxes?

While entitlement spending is larger than defense, the difference is not even close to an order of magnitude. That's just a lie. And a person can simultaneously support reduce defense spending and reforming entitlements.

This is going to be a shocker, so you might want to sit down. There are laws other than just the ones in the constitution. There, I said it. When you wake up you might want to re-read this lest you get yourself into trouble.

When you finally calm down, I'll sucker punch you again. There are rules in society that are not explicitly written into law. I know. Shocker, right?
[/sarcasm]Some people's kids... sheesh!

Re: WTF?

[that this is not und]

Ike also, in the same address, warned of the risk of the domination of science-based public policy by what he called a "scientific-technological elite"

Re: WTF?

[asackett]

His warning, while true, was as it would be were Trump to declare that pathological narcissism is a threat to democracy. Eisenhower was the chief promoter of the military-industrial complex.

Re:WTF?

[Anonymous Coward]

Truly deranged thinking. The defense budget is a fraction the size of social services mostly which goes to fund deadbeats. Defense is to keep our country from being overrun by invaders who literally would love to steal your home, your job, the food right out of your mouth. Ironically the social services which are really driving up our federal debt is worsened by our unwillingness to secure our border and stop the foreign aliens coming in and abusing our welfare services.

Re: WTF?

[Eravnrekaree]

Air Force is basically an application of the army/navy powers, despite its being its own branch, its the concept of an army and the navy using modern technology, obviously planes didnt exist in 1789. Air Force actually used to be part of the Army, The Navy also has planes.

Re: WTF?

[Anonymous Coward]

Of you mean the deficit that your lord Obama DOUBLED in the time he was in office. 8 YEARS to double the debt that has been building since the country began going into debt. WRAP YOUR LEFT LEANING HEAD AROUND THAT FACTOID.

Re: WTF?

[phantomfive]

Ironically, he missed the biggest problem during his presidency, the dominance of the intelligence/enforcement complex.

Re:WTF?

[CronoCloud]

The defense budget is a fraction the size of social services mostly which goes to fund deadbeats.

The big ticket entitlements are Social Security and Medicare, which supports those deadbeats known as Grandma and Grandpa and the deadbeat that is your cousin with Down Syndrome.

In general, the vast majority of those receiving government assistance are either: Elderly, disabled or children.

Such deadbeat parasites. Maybe we should just kill the lousy parasites and we can build a city where the great would not be constrained by the small...Rapture.

stop the foreign aliens coming in and abusing our welfare services.

The foreign aliens working their asses off in poultry processing factories in Arkansas? Or picking lettuce in California? Running small gardening/handyman/home fix-up services out of pick-up truck at Lowe's? Slaving away in restaurants and hotels and not getting paid fair wages because their employers threaten them?

Re: WTF?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's also sad how badly misunderstand the US constitution.
The constitution is not law.
The constitution is a framework which all laws must conform. This is a significant difference.

Re: WTF?

[dunkelfalke]

So he warned against technocrats. Nothing wrong with that.

Re: WTF?

[Anonymous Coward]

You obviously misunderstood my comment. I was replying to an absurd comment and demonstrating its ridiculousness. It claims a number of programs are unconstitutional. The only such argument I've heard for that is that anything not explicitly enumerated in the Constitution as a responsibility of the federal government is unconstitutional. My point was that under such an interpretation, one could easily question whether some defense spending is constitutional.

As for my comment on standing armies, it's a reference to a debate in the early United States and the belief that maintaining a standing army was contrary to freedom. One of the main reasons for a second amendment was that militia would defend the United States from attacks while an army was organized. Many of the same people who believe the federal government should be restricted to powers specifically enumerated in the Constitution are also originalists. Someone who insists on following the original intent of all parts of the Constitution should oppose the existence a standing army, of which the United States has a very powerful one.

I'm simply pointing out that his position is absurd. I'll add that the comment seems to imply that paying interest on our very large debt is also unconstitutional. However, the 14th amendment requires that the United States pay interest on its debt.

Finally, I believe that I stated two obvious things. One is that although the Constitution certainly allows for high levels of defense spending, it doesn't mean that it's good policy for the country. And then I also said that one can support reform to entitlement spending, recognizing that continued growth is unsustainable, while also supporting reductions in defense spending. These should be obvious statements that don't need to be supported.

No need to get snarky like you did. I'm not arguing for absurd positions. Instead, I'm trying to show that the reasoning used in the comment I replied to can lead to some ridiculous conclusions.

Re: WTF?

[Plus1Entropy]

Factoid 1: You don't understand the difference between deficit and debt.

Factoid 2: You don't understand which branch of government is responsible for budgets.

Re: WTF?

[Anonymous Coward]

The vast majority of the increase during the Obama administration (and the end of the Bush II Administration) occurred while the Dems controlled congress. The first two years of his administration the Democratic party controlled both houses of congress, in 2010 they lost the House and in 2012 even as he won re-election the Senate swung to the right as well. Remember the infamous shutdown? The blame for that really lies on then Senate majority Leader Harry Reid who refused to let the Senate even debate, let alone vote on, multiple Budget bills passed by the house that would have prevented or shortened the shutdown.

Re:WTF?

[Buchenskjoll]

We need to have a very serious conversation with the god who blessed America. Fucker's high on something.

I'm sure he has been smoking weed ever since he created the universe. I call it The Big Bong Theory.

Re: WTF?

[CRC'99]

You mean like the 'nazi salute' that everyone knows was actually an American thing?

It was called the Bellamy salute - which was adopted by the nazi's for being so effective. Of course, after this, the American version became that you put your hand over your heart.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

How quickly we forget...

Re:WTF?

[dcw3]

The foreign aliens working their asses off in poultry processing factories in Arkansas? Or picking lettuce in California? Running small gardening/handyman/home fix-up services out of pick-up truck at Lowe's? Slaving away in restaurants and hotels and not getting paid fair wages because their employers threaten them?

Funny, it worked fine for decades before we had ~30 million of them.

Re: WTF?

[dcw3]

It's called propaganda and the US has the most effective propaganda machine the world has ever known.

That's quite a stretch. It's really nothing more than the DoD marketing campaign. I'll agree with you, in that the pendulum has swung from one extreme to the other, but I'm also just starting to see signs of a turn back toward the middle. Calling every veteran a hero, and all the "thank you for your service" stuff is a bit much for me, and I'm a veteran...one day a year is enough for me, thank you very much.

Re:WTF?

[Mashiki]

The foreign aliens working their asses off in poultry processing factories in Arkansas? Or picking lettuce in California? Running small gardening/handyman/home fix-up services out of pick-up truck at Lowe's? Slaving away in restaurants and hotels and not getting paid fair wages because their employers threaten them?

You mean the people who are paid under-wage, and in turn because of that depresses the actual wage so people won't want to work those jobs? I mean how does the poor and let's be realistic, they are poor americans who'd do those jobs, how do they compete against someone when a company can import the labor for 1/2 the going rate. Or illegally pay under the table 1/4 the wage. They can't.

Even at that, those service jobs in restaurants and hotels were never meant to be a long-term job, but a stepping stone to a better one. Problem of course is when someone can be imported, then the people who are poor get a depressed wage and find it even harder to climb up.

Time to grow up, stop the new version of slavery and that's what it is. TFWs, H2B's, and all the flavors it's all wage depression. Hell I can remember the crash in wages being paid in the 1980's because I was a kid working ON a farm, picking rocks, strawberries, tobacco, blueberries, lettuce and so on. Where it went from hourly, to half-hourly plus weight, then by bushel(weight) only. And guess what happened? People stopped working on those farms when they were only being paid by weight. Them guess what happened? "OH WOE IS US..." we can't find ANY workers, we need to import them says the large corporate farms, this created a race to the bottom for the lowest wages as small farms followed suit, or simply went under because of the undercutting.

Oh and if you don't think those illegals aren't abusing your welfare services? Well dear boy, look north to Canada where those illegals with a mere "36,000" of them broke the welfare systems of Ontario and Quebec in a matter of months. Just a FYI of course, those are the people who were supposed be deported back to their home countries by your government a decade and change ago and the powers that be said "well...it's okay that there here."

But hey, those poor folks up here? They're the ones that have been on a waiting list for 4-8 years for low income housing and now being kicked out and directly onto the street for the illegals that YOU FUCKS didn't deport.

Re:WTF?

[Anonymous Coward]

I love how you think the solution to low wages is to get rid of the people that capitalism is exploiting instead of preventing capitalists exploiting them. It doesn't matter a single shit where the workers come from if you actually legislate against big business racing to the bottom in the first place. Even better, it would actually have the effect you desire and stop "illegals" (people aren't illegal, dumbass) from taking those jobs because it wouldn't be worth anything to businesses to hire them in the first place, because hiring someone who doesn't speak English and has few skills is not better than hiring a native educated English speaker for the same price.

It's the eternal dissonance of the right wing in your shithole country - unchecked capitalism creates all your problems but you'd rather do literally anything else than check capitalism because one day you might benefit from it. Spoilers: you won't, because the people benefiting from it have no interest in sharing with you and you weren't born in the right decade. Sorry, you're fucked, and you're more interested in making sure you stay fucked because god forbid a non-white foreigner might eventually rise to the amount of fucked that you are.

Re:WTF?

[Anonymous Coward]

You mean the people who are paid under-wage, and in turn because of that depresses the actual wage so people won't want to work those jobs? I mean how does the poor and let's be realistic, they are poor americans who'd do those jobs, how do they compete against someone when a company can import the labor for 1/2 the going rate. Or illegally pay under the table 1/4 the wage. They can't.

Even at that, those service jobs in restaurants and hotels were never meant to be a long-term job, but a stepping stone to a better one. Problem of course is when someone can be imported, then the people who are poor get a depressed wage and find it even harder to climb up.

It's nice to see someone arguing for minimum wage instead of pretending it should be abolished, for once.

Those jobs in restaurants? Maybe they were meant for high school kids in 1960s USA but nowadays we're all meant (in Europe and US) to be in a service economy. Yes, adults make a career in restaurants and hotels and always did outside the fast food sector. Yes 60-year-olds on minimum wage are a thing too.

Re:WTF?

[Anonymous Coward]

This, coincident with a $717B Defense Authorization?

We need to have a very serious conversation with the god who blessed America. Fucker's high on something.

One of the proposed reductions includes "$6.3 million supporting fundamental measurement dissemination, including the shutdown of NIST radio stations in Colorado and Hawaii.

Why does an automated system, or a system that should be automated, require USD6.3M to operate?

Re:WTF?

[Anonymous Coward]

(I didn't close my <quote> tag or something ; first two paragraphs are parent's, latter two are mine)

Re: WTF?

[rickb928]

"Why not reduce defense spending and cut taxes?"

Why not reduce Social Security, Medicare/Medicaid, TANF, SNAP, the FBI, the CIA, the DoE, the VA, and a half dozen other Cabinet-level agencies, and reduce taxes?

Shut it all down.

And reduce taxes.

Or, perhaps, think. Reduce it all and reduce taxes. Where I work we reduced by 10-15% in 2009. And we prospered. Asking our government to manage with even a 5% reduction requires two things:

0 - Near total replacement of the current legislature.

1- Repeat above to make your point.

2 - Real federal budget reform, after step 1 above. It will not be done otherwise.

Re:WTF?

[Sir_Eptishous]

And the next time you hire someone to install a new roof on your house, or put in a new driveway, you're going with the more expensive contractor who doesn't hire illegals, right?
No, I bet you would rather save a few hundred bucks like everybody else.


That right there is why there is ~30 million of them here.
You like the "free market", right?

Hypocrite...

Re: WTF?

[rickb928]

And there you have it. 'True conservatives' quote law. True leftists make up law.

Re: WTF?

[Sir_Eptishous]

Well smarty pants, who won?
The military-industrial complex or the scientific-technological elite?

Re: WTF?

[rickb928]

"those very strange "salute to service" games which look an awful lot like Nuremberg rallies to those of us who live outside the US."

You should be exercising more critical thinking. Your education may be at fault.

Re: WTF?

[rickb928]

"a strong work ethic brought from Western Europe"

FTFY

Re: WTF?

[Sir_Eptishous]

and also why the US military pays the NFL so much money every year for those very strange "salute to service" games which look an awful lot like Nuremberg rallies to those of us who live outside the US.

Right.

Remember when NFL games were just that. A quick SSB at the beginning and then "get ready for some football". Since 9/11 its turned into this masturbation of faux patriotism that the vast majority of fans could give two fucks about. They just want to see the game.

Re:WTF?

[Sir_Eptishous]

I'm sure he has been smoking weed ever since he created the universe. I call it The Big Bong Theory.

That could be a new Netflix show.
Cheech and Chong, along with the Trailer Park Boys, would play a comical version of Greek Gods, meddling with mortals and having a good time.

Re: WTF?

[Rhipf]

You should go back and read the grandparent post:

While you're looking at the pimple of defense spending, you're ignoring the cancer of social security, medicare, Obamacare, corporate and farm welfare, and interest on the debt. Order of magnitude, bitch. One of these (defense) is actually constitutional - the rest are clearly not. And debt has a way of fucking over the very people you think should be helped.

That is why the parent post is talking about the constitution.

Re: WTF?

[Rhipf]

The vast majority of the increase during the Obama administration (and the end of the Bush II Administration) occurred while the Dems controlled congress. The first two years of his administration the Democratic party controlled both houses of congress, in 2010 they lost the House and in 2012 even as he won re-election the Senate swung to the right as well. Remember the infamous shutdown? The blame for that really lies on then Senate majority Leader Harry Reid who refused to let the Senate even debate, let alone vote on, multiple Budget bills passed by the house that would have prevented or shortened the shutdown.

The Democrats only had total control of the Senate for 4 months (from September 24, 2009 until February 4, 2010). There were times that they had control in theory but due to Teddy Kennedy's illness and dying they didn't have the actual sitting votes for the 60 needed for full control (and Al Franken's contested seat didn't help either).

Re:WTF?

[Rhipf]

The defense budget is a fraction the size of social services mostly which goes to fund deadbeats.

The big ticket entitlements are Social Security and Medicare, which supports those deadbeats known as Grandma and Grandpa and the deadbeat that is your cousin with Down Syndrome.

In general, the vast majority of those receiving government assistance are either: Elderly, disabled or children.

Such deadbeat parasites. Maybe we should just kill the lousy parasites and we can build a city where the great would not be constrained by the small...Rapture.

It is also interesting that military retirement and veterans' benefits aren't actually part of the defense spending. These fall outside of defense spending but are only really there because of defense spending. So some of those deadbeats that the GP is talking about are actually vets.

Re:WTF?

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't want unskilled workers working on my house. Am I expected to believe that artisans of the construction trade are pouring across the border illegally? No, they're mostly illiterates even in their own language who can only pick up a hammer and do exactly as told... Until you're out of sight. I've see the work that comes of such atrocious labor, and I've seen the clearly paid off inspector give blatant code violations a pass.

No, I'd much rather contract labor for twice the rate to get a foreman who isn't a corrupt jackass who would hire illegal incompetent labor to save a buck.

Re: WTF?

[wyHunter]

Indeed most laws are unconstitutional.

Re: WTF?

[wyHunter]

No. The USSR and Germany from 1933 to 1944 did.

Re:WTF?

[Anonymous Coward]

Well dear boy, look north to Canada where those illegals with a mere "36,000" of them broke the welfare systems of Ontario and Quebec in a matter of months.

Did you actually read your link? It doesn't what you claim it says.

All the article talks about is how Lisa MacLeod, Ontarioâ(TM)s minister of children, community and social services, is asking for the feds to cover Ontario's expenses stemming from all asylum seekers coming in.

Perhaps this is the National Post's editorial spin and selectively quoting her, but MacLeod appears to just be playing the usual politics game of screaming how terrible things are and asking Big Brother for more money.

Amusingly, if you replaced "crisis at the border" with "sexism at the workplace" or some other SJW lefty issue, she'd sound no different than, say, AmiMojo.

Re:WTF?

[Mashiki]

Oh look. The AC, who doesn't seem to understand that illegals entering a country illegally, are illegal. That being employed as such, is illegal. That using social assistance in any form such as that is illegal. That the only way to get that social assistance is through fraud, which is illegal. Oh, there's plenty of ways to be illegal in a country, you can try and white wash it in any form you want, but you're just showing your fundamental ignorance.

Re:WTF?

[MightyYar]

One of these (defense) is actually constitutional

You opened this can of worms, not me. :)

The constitution definitely clearly lays out a place for spending by the federal government for common defense, that certainly is not in dispute.

However, there was a big fear at the time about standing armies - so much so that we got the 2nd Amendment as part of the Bill of Rights. The idea was that we would try to provide for the common defense with militias of citizens, who would even provide their own weapons. In hindsight, this was a terrible idea. There were several high-profile failures, and within a few decades this system was completely abandoned... and here we are, with the most powerful standing army the world has ever known despite the existence of the 2nd Amendment.

So I mean, yeah, the Constitution does explicitly authorize this spending. But, well, it also specifically calls out militias as the way to accomplish this... and yeah, we just sort of ignore that part because it was a neat idea that didn't work.

Re:WTF?

[Mashiki]

Apparently, understanding why the provincial government is charging the federal government $200m is what you're missing. So let me explain. $220m is the general and total allotted budget increase amount for ALL people on social assistance in the province of Ontario, out of $8.7B yearly for social assistance. The number of illegals entering the country *broke* the piggy bank. There is no more money, the debt is too high, the lenders are looking to downgrade the province again if the ship isn't righted. That means no COLA, no increases, no extra helping hands. No extra $15/mo. Notta. 36k people roughly was enough to fuck it up for every person getting social assistance, not disability. And this was directly caused by Trudeau Jr., opening his mouth and saying "we're open to take those illegals..."

Re:WTF?

[Mashiki]

It's nice to see someone arguing for minimum wage instead of pretending it should be abolished, for once.

Those jobs in restaurants? Maybe they were meant for high school kids in 1960s USA but nowadays we're all meant (in Europe and US) to be in a service economy. Yes, adults make a career in restaurants and hotels and always did outside the fast food sector. Yes 60-year-olds on minimum wage are a thing too.

Problem is, here in Ontario the "jump" in the minimum wage cause nearly 70k people to lose their jobs at the start of the year as employers were unable to afford it. It was all based around the idea that Toronto is the centre of the universe. And while you're right that those jobs do exist, in most cases being 60 and working at a restaurant was usually the "old folks" looking to make a bit of cash and helping the new kids out. Some people also did it because they were disabled, but didn't want to be on the public dole and so on. The stigma of being on social assistance(welfare) has been pretty much lost over the last 20-30 years or so. The problem with a service economy is that you're not going to be selling high end products, or even middle-of-the-road products to people making minimum wage, especially when a significant percentage of your employable population is making minimum wage or just over it.

This is why the loss of the middle class hurts both the general economy and lower income the most, because as that middle class disappears one of two things happen. Either the government takes the option to increase the non-taxable bracket, or they start taxing the poorest while giving tax breaks to those service jobs to keep them in the province. Which is what's happened in Ontario. The province has lost nearly 300k middle class jobs in the last 7 years. The average wage of those jobs was over $68k/year, the median income of the province $52k/year, the average wage of a person working those service jobs is just above the poverty line at $35k/year. A person working a service job eeking out that little is not going to afford even a basic shithole in Toronto, or even London, or hell even Woodstock these days. They're going to be working 2-4 jobs to make ends meet, they likely won't get married, they won't have kids either. There are a lot of people in the 25-39 bracket like that in the province, and it accelerated over the last 10 years because those were the policies pushed.

Re:WTF?

[Anonymous Coward]

Ah yes, quibble over the semantics of "people aren't illegal, the things they do are" instead of addressing the takedown of your stupid ass thoughts about how wage depression works and why it's not the fault of the people who are being exploited. Classic

Re:WTF?

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh, didn't realize I'm on reddit.

Re:WTF?

[DaveSewhuk]

Except that we all pay into social security & medicare and they are self funding. The CONservatives want to empty out what people payed in and give it to the rich. A whole other thing. Other than poor people, the ACA is just a wet dream for insurance companies as the law says you must BUY health insurance from a private company or get taxed. Defense is just graft for the military industrial complex. Heed Eisenhower.

Re:WTF?

[Anonymous Coward]

You claim I'm a "Hypocrite" and yet know nothing about me, which makes you a moron.

I'm all for "legal" but limited immigration, which is the way my ancestors, and my wife entered the country. So, don't preach to me about immigrants...I've been through the legal process with her. We had to prove that she wouldn't be on the government dole.

You're likely too young to remember when fast food joints were full of teenage kids working at minimum wage. Try placing an order now w/o having to deal with someone who's speaking English as a second language, and getting it wrong half the time. I'm not anti-immigrant, but I am for assimilation...speak the language if you're in customer service. I lived overseas for a dozen years in a couple other countries, and did so myself.

Yes, I"m for the the free market, but I witnessed up close what happened when the auto industry exported jobs from Detroit in the late 70s and early 80s, so I'm in favor of some regulation as well. Thankfully, the huge Ford plant that was a stone's throw from the house I grew up in has been replaced with an Amazon center. I do try to buy American whenever possible.

Re:WTF?

[EETech1]

They broadcast multiple signals used to calibrate other devices.

They are standards.

They require maintenance, traceability, and calibration.

Re:WTF?

[Anonymous Coward]

2017 military: $569B, welfare and income support: $226B.

569 / 226 is a fraction, just not a proper one.

No doubt there are some illegal immigrants that are abusing our social safety net. Oddly though, almost every Latino I ever see is busting their ass: landscapers, hotel housekeepers, line cooks.

Re:WTF?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's working fine now. The "problem" is a made-up right-wing conspiracy. Like the one that says Nancy Pelosi is an extremist who must not become speaker of the House again or all hell will break loose.

Re:WTF?

[CronoCloud]

30 million? I don't think that's an accurate number.

And suppose we stop all immigration and kick all the illegals out. So who's going to replace all those jobs the illegals did? Who's going to replace all those payments into the Social Security system because the US population will start dropping.

Why don't you focus on the BUSINESSES that caused the problem by not paying living fair wages. Who do you think the maids, busboys, vegetable pickers and whatnot were before Latinos? What we have now is basically Plutocrats exploiting ANOTHER minority.

Re:WTF?

[CronoCloud]

I'm all for "legal" but limited immigration, which is the way my ancestors

The USA didn't HAVE immigration laws till the 1920's (except for Asians)

But... did your ancestors apply for asylum and get green cards from the Sioux, Cherokee, Miami, Mohawks, etc etc. Or did they just move in and shoot any of them who objected or got in the way or who even were living on land granted to them...that somebody found gold on.

I'm quite certain it was the latter.

Re:WTF?

[CronoCloud]

how do they compete against someone when a company can import the labor for 1/2 the going rate. Or illegally pay under the table 1/4 the wage. They can't.

So the problem is the businesses and wall street, but nowhere do I see in your reply that business owners should be punished....only the immigrants themselves. You know, the people trying to make a better life for themselves who are being exploited by plutocrats.

Even at that, those service jobs in restaurants and hotels were never meant to be a long-term job, but a stepping stone to a better one.

Really? And which jobs are those? Businesses need more "Indians" than "Chiefs" how many managers does a hotel or restaurant need compared to how many people they need doing the HARDEST work. If your logic was true, the military would be all officers, but it isn't, is it? Somebody has to do the actual work. We live in a finite society and world, we can't all be middle managers. The problem is that we as a society, even if we need things like produce-pickers, busboys, and maids, don't value that work. Why shouldn't someone who is a maid make enough money to buy a small house? Why shouldn't a produce-picker be able to live a comfortable life and be able to have nice things. They work HARD, it might not be as intellectual as code work, but they work their asses off.

TFWs, H2B's, and all the flavors it's all wage depression.

so was the outsourcing of the US's manufacturing jobs in the 70's, but I don't recall ever seeing you complain about that other than perhaps calling rust belt factory workers stupid for not seeing the way things were going and becoming coders or something.

Well dear boy, look north to Canada where those illegals with a mere "36,000" of them broke the welfare systems of Ontario and Quebec in a matter of months.

National post? isn't that like the Canadian equivalent of the uber-capitalist-uber-right National Review here in the states? Don't you think that site might not be un-biased on such things?

Re:WTF?

[CronoCloud]

You are implying that the illegals are getting benefits... such a supposition does not jibe with them actually doing the work that we both know they do. I have seen newspaper articles here in the states about illegals who paid into the various tax systems AS illegals using fake id's and whatnot.

And I have seen articles saying that the illegals paying in (and not receiving) are helping prop up systems such as Social Security, since our population growth is coming from immigration.

So again, why focus on the immigrants and not the employers?

Re:WTF?

[CronoCloud]

Problem is, here in Ontario the "jump" in the minimum wage cause nearly 70k people to lose their jobs at the start of the year as employers were unable to afford it.

The employers lie, business people lie, plutocrats lie about how the minimum wage is so horrible and make all sorts of untrue claims about it.

We know that in the states when the minimum wage goes up, the economy improves... EVERY TIME. It's one of the easiest ways to boost the economy. Now sure, the business people you identify with will lie and claim it will hurt them...but their employees having money helps them becuase it's a Trickle UP economy.

Helping the people on the lowest end of the socioeconomic scale helps the ones at the top. Even more than if money was just thrown at just the top.

The province has lost nearly 300k middle class jobs in the last 7 years.

Whose fault is that? CEO's, CFO's, investors and whatnot telling companies to shift jobs overseas! It's white guys in suits and ties, not illegals.

And why do they do that, because guys to guys like you the #1 consideration on buying things is how low the price can go. You and society want's the cheapest stuff possible... so they shift jobs overseas to take advantage of the labor differential.

They're screwing YOU and screwing the foreign labor too. The only people who win are investment bankers, CEO's and CFO's and other plutocrats.

Re: WTF?

[youngone]

That's quite a stretch. It's really nothing more than the DoD marketing campaign.

The propaganda machine I'm thinking of is the advertising industry that the DoD makes use of for their marketing.
The difference between marketing, PR, and propaganda revolves around what you're trying to sell to me, in my view.

Re: WTF?

[youngone]

Care to explain?

Re: WTF?

[youngone]

Compared to the modern advertising industry combined with Hollywood?
That's laughable.

Re: WTF?

[reiterate]

You didn't quote any laws. Everyone in this thread is supplanting opinion for fact and citation. The person you're doing this with isn't your opposition, they're your enabler, and you are theirs . That you consider yourself so diametrically opposed to them is a testament to your intellect.

Re: WTF?

[rickb928]

Must I?

The NFL in particular may actually sponsor multiple professional sports in the US via advertising and event production. But the Nuremberg rallies were purposeful celebrations of the Nazi Party in Germany, between 1923? and 1932 or so. Your confusion is itself nonsensical to me, for our military is not a ruling party despite the popularity of conspiracy theories among some, and they don't even do so at every game in every sport. Many teams do bring on a color guard, but this is coincident with the Pledge of Allegiance and performance of our National Anthem, common to many leagues and games.

Jingoism is the refuge of the stateless, nation-denying Leftist, who sees nations as impediment to global dominance. And rightly so. I value my nation as a distinct entity, distinct from all others, and I think I'm blessed to have been born here. Changing it into something else meets with my disapproval and opposition. Equating it with, for instance, Nazi Germany, is to my ears tinny and a shrill attempt to deny its true nature, and of course is intended to do harm. It's mistaken at best, intentionally hurtful most likely.

Re: WTF?

[youngone]

Fair enough.
You've bought into the propaganda you have been subjected to your entire life. I understand. It must be very hard to see past it.
The fact you have characterised me as a Leftist, because I point out how your your military/industrial complex uses it's massive economic power to continue that power is a dead giveaway.
I am not American, so I don't really fit your liberal/conservative narrative. Politics where I come from has a fair bit more nuance to it.

The NFL in particular may actually sponsor multiple professional sports in the US via advertising and event production.

I don't know what that means. My point was about the military spending millions at NFL games to influence public thinking. I have no knowledge of the NFL sponsoring other sports.

Re: WTF?

[ChatHuant]

'True conservatives' quote law.

In my experience what "true conservatives" actually quote is what they imagine is law, as opposed to real law. Most of them are in reality pretty ignorant or selective in regards of said law. The phenomenon is widespread enough that it was even satirized by The Onion.

It's also one of the raisons d'être(*) of organizations like the ACLU, who often have to force conservative government officials or organizations to actually respect the law as it is written - not as they'd like it to be.

(*) Slashdot's handling of even basic accented characters is beyond pitiful

Re: WTF?

[wyHunter]

I was referring to political propaganda.

Re: WTF?

[youngone]

When the US military uses the NFL for their own propaganda purposes, it is political.

Re: WTF?

[rickb928]

Don't think I characterised you as a Leftist, just not entirely informed. Our military advertises. It's currently a volunteer service.

But I'm well aware of the propaganda I've consumed and still am assaulted by daily. I just still believe what I believe...

Re:WTF?

[ImprovOmega]

At last count there were roughly ~11 million undocumented people living in the United States. If you're counting all of the legal permanent residents then your argument fails because the legal residents have all the same minimum wage and employment protections as any other citizen.

Re:WTF?

[Anonymous Coward]

If you're counting all of the legal permanent residents then your argument fails because the legal residents have all the same minimum wage and employment protections as any other citizen.

Um, no it doesn't fail, it stands. It worked fine for decades before them.

Re:WTF?

[Mashiki]

So the problem is the businesses and wall street, but nowhere do I see in your reply that business owners should be punished....only the immigrants themselves. You know, the people trying to make a better life for themselves who are being exploited by plutocrats.

Apparently you didn't read too well then, because I've made that statement in the past. Then again, this isn't about immigrants now is it. It's about illegals and wage depression caused by companies depressing the wage, by importing 3rd world labor.

... Why shouldn't a produce-picker be able to live a comfortable life and be able to have nice things. They work HARD, it might not be as intellectual as code work, but they work their asses off.

If you haven't figured out that the valuation of a job is based on the skills a person has, you're not going to get very far in life. Besides, that very little in terms of crops are even hand picked anymore. Hell we don't even pick blueberries or grapes by hand in most of Canada.

so was the outsourcing of the US's manufacturing jobs in the 70's, but I don't recall ever seeing you complain about that other than perhaps calling rust belt factory workers stupid for not seeing the way things were going and becoming coders or something.

Sure was. But you apparently haven't been paying attention to what I've said over the last decade or anything either, but calling "rust belt factory workers stupid" seems to be the way of it for progressives. Hey, by the way. Did you ever notice that when this was happening, that there was no help from government in most cases to find these people new lines of work? Bet you didn't.

National post? isn't that like the Canadian equivalent of the uber-capitalist-uber-right National Review here in the states? Don't you think that site might not be un-biased on such things?

It's one of the largest centrist papers in Canada, your bias and ignorance is showing. Glad to help educate you though.

Re:WTF?

[Mashiki]

You are implying that the illegals are getting benefits... such a supposition does not jibe with them actually doing the work that we both know they do. I have seen newspaper articles here in the states about illegals who paid into the various tax systems AS illegals using fake id's and whatnot.
They are. What do you think SNAP and welfare fraud is mainly caused by in the US? You can look up your own government numbers on that one.

And I have seen articles saying that the illegals paying in (and not receiving) are helping prop up systems such as Social Security, since our population growth is coming from immigration.

And if your illegally in a country, you have no right to it. You seem to not be able to understand that difference between a person who enters a country legally, gains the right to work legally, and a person who enters illegally.

So again, why focus on the immigrants and not the employers?

Focus on illegals you mean.

Re:WTF?

[Mashiki]

We know that in the states when the minimum wage goes up, the economy improves... EVERY TIME. It's one of the easiest ways to boost the economy. Now sure, the business people you identify with will lie and claim it will hurt them...but their employees having money helps them becuase it's a Trickle UP economy.

So when people lose their jobs, the economy improves every time huh? Better tell that to the 70k people who lost their minimum wage jobs here in Ontario that it really helped them. You fail to understand when there are significant bumps UP in the minimum wage, you put more people at the poverty line.

Whose fault is that? CEO's, CFO's, investors and whatnot telling companies to shift jobs overseas! It's white guys in suits and ties, not illegals.

And why do they do that, because guys to guys like you the #1 consideration on buying things is how low the price can go. You and society want's the cheapest stuff possible... so they shift jobs overseas to take advantage of the labor differential.

They're screwing YOU and screwing the foreign labor too. The only people who win are investment bankers, CEO's and CFO's and other plutocrats.

You mean the Liberal Party of Ontario? That pushed more regulations, more environmental regulations, more taxes on manufacturing, higher mill rates on manufacturing, higher prices on electricity? I mean I can really keep going, you seem to be pretty ignorant on the topic. Maybe that's not your fault, maybe it's because you've made a comment on a topic you're simply ignorant on.

Hate to break this to you, but the Liberal Party of Ontario did more damage to businesses in the 15 years they were in power then any action by CEO's, or CFO's could. Their entire policy was to drive high paying manufacturing out of the province.

Re:WTF?

[Anonymous Coward]

$220m is the general and total allotted budget increase amount for ALL people on social assistance in the province of Ontario, out of $8.7B yearly for social assistance. The number of illegals entering the country *broke* the piggy bank.

Dude, you originally said they broke the "system", now you're saying they broke the "piggy bank".

They're not the same thing. Going over budget is not the same as the system breaking. Maybe you're some ivory tower elite who has the privilege of never having to borrow money or carry debt his whole life, but real people have to struggle with budgets all the time, sometimes going over.

There is no more money, the debt is too high, the lenders are looking to downgrade the province again if the ship isn't righted.

Sexism is oppressing us!
Climate change is gonna kill us!
Those 50 guys with tiki torches is gonna turn America into a fascist hellhole!

Again, you're making mountains out of molehills just like the SJWs.

Re: WTF?

[that this is not und]

I'd hardly say they were competing against each other.

Re:WTF?

[Mashiki]

Dude, you originally said they broke the "system", now you're saying they broke the "piggy bank".

They're not the same thing. Going over budget is not the same as the system breaking. Maybe you're some ivory tower elite who has the privilege of never having to borrow money or carry debt his whole life, but real people have to struggle with budgets all the time, sometimes going over.

It did break the system, it also broke the piggy bank. Maybe you could try reading the AG's report on this? I've linked it a few times. Then you can read the current budget issues, and news articles on it.

Again, you're making mountains out of molehills just like the SJWs.

So, Ontario which has $320B in debt with a population of ~12m people is making a mountain out of a mole hill? I'll remind you that when Greece defaulted they had roughly the same amount of population, with a government that also drove manufacturing and industry out.

Beacons

[Anonymous Coward]

"The signals serve as standard beacons for radio propagation"

As a ham operator, I have used the signal from time to time to determine radio propagation. However, using it depends on where you live. Some ham throughout the world run radio propagation beacons themselves that are better used to determine how signals are propagating. Concerning the other uses, it will probably be missed.

Economy?

[msauve]

While WWV is a useful service, I have to question a cost of $6.3 MM/year. A rough calc says it costs less than $250K/yr in electrical power for both sites. I'll grant another $1MM for equipment maintenance and personnel. They already have to maintain time and frequency standards, by law.

As far as time and frequency dissemination goes, GPS does a vastly better job, with better coverage in almost all cases.

Re: Economy?

[jetole]

GPS tend to be more expensive but I'd really like to see a $50 wall clock that's always accurate to milliseconds and, on the other hand, I can place that clock in areas that can't receive a GPS signal. Sure fewer people are wearing watches but it seems to be the norm on all emergency services and military personnel as well as some of us who just enjoy to easily tell the time from a durable device that doesn't need to charge every night. Sure GPS may be better in many situations but there are a lot of valid use cases where WWV still is the best solution, in my opinion.

Re:Economy?

[Anonymous Coward]

RTFA, but I'm pretty sure WWV doesn't cost $6.3M/annum. That number is the total deduction for a number of items, one of which is WWV.

Re: Economy?

[msauve]

Not sure where you live, buy my WWV clock in the midwest is very "iffy" for reception. A $25 GPS receiver is much more reliable (and accurate). But I'd like to see a $50 wall clock which uses WiFi and NTP - really only needs to connect once a day like the WWV ones, so power requirements would be minimal. If it needs C cells instead of AA, so be it. (Looks.like those might exist now!, via alibaba)

Re: Economy?

[Peter Allan]

It's only accurate to a millisecond within a 300km radius of the transmitter. NTP over WiFi is capable of much higher accuracy. GPS much more than that.

Re: Economy?

[Anonymous Coward]

Not sure where you live, buy my WWV clock in the midwest is very "iffy" for reception. A $25 GPS receiver is much more reliable (and accurate). But I'd like to see a $50 wall clock which uses WiFi and NTP - really only needs to connect once a day like the WWV ones, so power requirements would be minimal. If it needs C cells instead of AA, so be it. (Looks.like those might exist now!, via alibaba)

Well, I certainly wouldn't want to depend on something that needs the internet... that would be foolish. I receive the time signal fine here in Southern Ontario.

Re: Economy?

[Solandri]

I'd really like to see a $50 wall clock that's always accurate to milliseconds

They used to be, back when clocks were powered from an AC wall socket. Their gears were synchronized with the AC motor, and the power company worked really really hard to make sure the long-term average AC cycle was exactly 60 Hz. If equipment problems caused the frequency to drop slightly below 60 Hz, they'd run at slightly above 60 Hz for long enough to get the clocks back on the correct time.

Then we switched to clocks running off batteries with built-in quartz timing mechanisms. In theory they're better, but in practice they're never calibrated well enough or their calibration drifts with age and temperature, making them less accurate than the old AC powered clocks. The best quartz watch I had lost a little less than a second a month. Then I got too greedy and killed the golden goose - tried adjusting the quartz timing mechanism myself. After that I could never get it below 2 seconds of drift per month. What I didn't realize until it was too late was that as the error gets smaller, you have to wait longer between each adjustment (weeks) to determine if you had improved it or overshot. With the 60 Hz power line method, only a single clock has to be calibrated to be super-accurate; and all the other clocks powered by AC synchronize off it.

Re:Economy?

[JBMcB]

As far as time and frequency dissemination goes, GPS does a vastly better job, with better coverage in almost all cases.

GPS can do a better job but it costs more. You can't use off the shelf GPS receivers for lab-grade time standards, as there is too much variable latency in the decoding phase. The receivers used for time standards output the time along with latency statistics so it can be corrected.

You can get nearly the same accuracy, with manual compensation for atmospheric conditions, with under $100 in parts off of WWV. Probably much less than when I saw the schematic in Radio Electronics 20 years ago.

Besides that, using WWV as a simple time standard is trivial, which is why it's used in self-setting clocks and watches. While the signal quality is variable throughout the continental US, you can pick it up enough to decode with the lousiest of hardware. When I run a longwire antenna for my shortwave, it's the first station I check as, even if something got screwed up, if I'm getting *any* signal it will pull in WWV.

Re:Economy?

[slyborg]

This may surprise you, but GPS in-building penetration is zero. Whereas the longwave signals from WWV keep a clock I have in my basement synchronized. So yeah, GPS does a vastly better job at providing location, because that's what it's for, and pretty much is shit for providing cheap time sync.
Oh, and as of the 2012 budget, GPS operating costs were $2M ... *a day*.

The real issue here is that this is something that primarily provides a useful service for the little guy and doesn't have armies of lobbyists shilling it, so even if it cost $1.50/yr, let's cut it, because it's SOCIALISM.

Re:Economy?

[Anonymous Coward]

While WWV is a useful service, I have to question a cost of $6.3 MM/year

Huh? 6.3 million is a pittance for what this provides, which is a time standard for the entire US, Canada and Mexico. My school district spent 34 million this year just to maintain buildings! And you think 6 million is a lot of money for a service that serves a huge portion of the developed world? Methinks you don't understand how little a million dollars really is.

Re: Economy?

[Anonymous Coward]

And yet I, also a southern Ontario resident, have found it takes 30 to 60 minutes to get equipment to synchronize to it.

Anecdotes are fun.

Re: Economy?

[Anonymous Coward]

Jetole: Just search for Radio Controlled or Atomic Clock. They are for sale all over the place from Walmart to Amazon.

I own 3 wristwatches and have 5 wall clocks in my home which are radio controlled by the WWV broadcast. They contain good quartz oscillators and set themselves automatically every night so I'll bet they are never off more than a few milliseconds a day. Two of the wristwatches even keep the battery charged with solar power. I suspect that I am not that unusual. Discontinuing the WWV broadcast will make those wristwatches and clocks just fancy battery powered garbage. I can't believe anyone would want to do that to the general public.

Re: Economy?

[aaarrrgggh]

I have wanted a POE NTP wall clock for a while, but that doesn't abrogate the utility of WWV. It is useful to have a terrestrial time reference in case things go to shit in orbit. It is good to have a variety of independent time references.

But, my clocks are wwvb, which someone else pointed out is apparently not impacted.

Re: Economy?

[ls671]

This sounds very counter-intuitive. Not to say that you are wrong although. Who knows with the fancy ntpd algorithm? But then again, it should help WWV just as well as a WiFi connected device. Are you talking about a dedicated WiFi connection just for time syncing?

Anyway, please provide some links if you have time. That might help me educate myself a bit.

Thanks in advance,

Re: Economy?

[msauve]

" I certainly wouldn't want to depend on something that needs the internet... that would be foolish."

I have my own local stratum 1 NTP server, you ignorant, foolish clod. No need for the Internet.

Re:Economy?

[msauve]

"You can't use off the shelf GPS receivers for lab-grade time standards"

Not sure what you consider "lab-grade time standards", but 10 nanosecond accuracy is readily obtained by a $25 GPS receiver with PPS output. What WWV receiver do you use which is cheaper and better?

Re:Economy?

[msauve]

"This may surprise you, but GPS in-building penetration is zero."

Only the claim is suprising, because the it's not true in fact as anyone with a cell phone can tell you.

But, your mom's basement may be an edge case.

Re: Economy?

[Anonymous Coward]

Not sure where you live, buy my WWV clock in the midwest is very "iffy" for reception. A $25 GPS receiver is much more reliable (and accurate). But I'd like to see a $50 wall clock which uses WiFi and NTP - really only needs to connect once a day like the WWV ones, so power requirements would be minimal. If it needs C cells instead of AA, so be it. (Looks.like those might exist now!, via alibaba)

How about a cellular serviced clock? (Probably needs an app.)

Re: Economy?

[Anonymous Coward]

So is the fact that most short wave radio antennas are directional, so the problem is probably that you need to rotate the clock a few degrees. I always try to do my initial sync outside first, to minimize most kinds of interference, so that I can figure out directions of the antenna and what might be interfering with it.

Re:Economy?

[Anonymous Coward]

That seems downright cheap considering it gives everyone in the US (and a vast majority of the world) a free highly accurate time base to use. Divided by the number of people in the US that comes down to a penny or less per person to support such a service.

Re: Economy?

[Anonymous Coward]

Anyone can have their own Stratum 1 NTP server for about $25 dollars in parts, a GPS receiver, an ESP8266 and some code. I have one setup here for my home network as well.

Re:Economy?

[Anonymous Coward]

"$6.3 million supporting fundamental measurement dissemination, including the shutdown of NIST radio stations in Colorado and Hawaii."

The actual cost of of the NIST radio stations appears to be an amount up to $6.3 million. The bullet points on the NIST site have an amount, a general area, and then an example of something that will be cut that might be of interest.

Re: Economy?

[adolf]

That'd be as easy as hanging a cheap pre-paid Android phone on the wall...if Android supported NTP.

(Sadly, it does not.)

Re: Economy?

[adolf]

Just about all plug-in clocks that do not have a wall-wart, like the cheap LED bedside alarm clocks or the clock on your stove, still are timed from the utility. The chips that do this are wickedly inexpensive and *just work*.

My grandfather worked in rural electrification back in the day. He told me that they tracked variations in frequency during the day and intentionally caught up on any errors at night when load was (relatively) low, just to keep the clocks accurate.

Re: Economy?

[Sarten-X]

I don't have any good links, but it's not too complicated...

The radio beacon travels at (roughly) the speed of light. That's about 300 million meters per second, so there's a 1ms delay after the signal gets to be 300 km away.

From a technical perspective, all communications (including Internet-based systems) are bound by that same speed, and trying to break that cosmic limit has proven to be extremely difficult, so engineers have done what engineers do best: they cheat.

The "fancy" algorithm is really pretty simple, conceptually: Instead of just accepting a time beacon, the NTP client measures how long it takes to ask for a time, and assumes that the time it receives was accurate halfway through the round-trip time. For example, if it takes 14ms to get a message saying it's exactly noon, that message was probably received very close to 7 ms after noon, so NTPd will set the local clock accordingly. It's not perfect, because the round-trip time might not be symmetrical, but it's close enough for most practical purposes. Using WiFi might add a bit of delay, but as long as the delay is symmetric, it won't be a problem.

The key for NTP is that it's a client-server protocol, so the client knows approximately how long the message was in transit. A one-way radio beacon like WWV doesn't have that, but that also means WWV doesn't need to receive transmissions from clients to function.

GPS is even fancier. A GPS satellite transmits not just a time beacon, but also a message with the satellite's location when the beacon was sent. Once a receiver has learned the locations and delays for at least four satellites, it can start to determine its own location. First, it will compare the satellites' locations and delays relative to other satellites to figure out where the receiver could possibly be on Earth. Then it can use that location to determine the exact delay for each satellite's signal, which is then used (just like in NTP) to compute the actual time.

GPS is superior to both NTP and WWV, because it is still a one-way communication system, but also isn't subject to any network traffic or assumptions about symmetry. With no prior knowledge, a GPS receiver can accurately compute both its location and time.

Re:Economy?

[adolf]

The first GPS receiver I ever had was a Garmin Nuvi. It took a long time for it to cold start in my living room when I first got it, but it *did* work.

My current cell phone, an S7, gets GPS coverage inside most buildings with windows, with large positional errors -- but good enough for (most) time stuff. It does this far better than the OG Motorola Droid did, but even that would find a fix on at least one bird indoors.

The $6 clone GPS receiver I have on my RPi works a treat indoors, too: All kinds of channels light up on it with an indoor antenna, though it obvious does do better in a window.

Re: Economy?

[Miamicanes]

Newer cell phones sniff wi-fi beacons & use crowdsourced services that correlate wifi ssids & relative signal strength to locations.

Actual GPS works poorly, or not at all, indoors (besides LITERALLY next to a window), and accuracy is poor because what little signal you get has so much multipath interference.

Re: Economy?

[ls671]

I still don't see how a ntpd server syncing over WiFi could be more precise than a stratum 0 server syncing with WWV. All you need to do is tell the stratum 0 server how far it is from the tower. Pretty damn accurate IMHO.

From OP:

It's only accurate to a millisecond within a 300km radius of the transmitter. NTP over WiFi is capable of much higher accuracy. GPS much more than that.

I really do not see how your ntpd server is going to keep "better than a millisecond" precision over WiFi and I ran a few use cases ;-)

Re:Economy?

[DNS-and-BIND]

That's not socialism. Socialism is government control of the means of production. Anyone tells you anything else is socialism, he's lying.

Re:Economy?

[Anonymous Coward]

Only when the military is prohibited under penalty of execution of disabling or interfering with GPS signals will GPS be a valid replacement for WWV.

Re: Economy?

[bickerdyke]

GPS time is currently off UTC by (iirc) about 15 seconds. Granted, it's a fixed offset that could be easily fixed (simply do a -15 seconds) but that's not part of GPS yet. Until GPS time can't be a replacement for any other UTC time signal.

Re:Economy?

[Anonymous Coward]

When in the hallway outside my office, four different cell phones I've used or borrowed over the last year show a position that jumps around by about a block. When I go into one of the lab spaces, some app silently fail and just maintain the last position, while a diagnostic shows there is no usable signal.

Bad GPS signal in any decent sized building is quite common (someone's basement would actually be much better...), especially older ones or ones with large utility runs like a lot of labs and R&D departments at larger companies. To get GPS signal for timing, usually more expensive receivers are needed using an antenna mounted on the roof or outside a window (if the lab is luckily on the right side of the building) and a decent length of cable. This adds some additional failure modes, complexity, and costs compared to shortwave timing.

If it was as simple as just using your cell phone, these antenna setups wouldn't exist, so maybe you shouldn't so smuggly tell people it is trivial to deal with.

Re: Economy?

[thegarbz]

making them less accurate than the old AC powered clocks.

Define your accuracy requirements. Quartz clocks have orders of magnitude better short term accuracy than anything grid synchronized. The grid has far greater accuracy over the long term.

The GP said millisecond accuracy, the fact is that wall synchronized clocks never achieved this. On a given day they could be all over the place. In fact their accuracy can often be out by many seconds before producers take action to get the frequency back in sync with the clock, and that is hardly surprising when you think about it. a 1mHz clock error on the mains frequency will throw you out by more than a second by the end of the day.

Even cheap quartz clocks can out perform grid synchronization over the course of a year. However the longer you wait eventually the grid clock will be better ... as long as you're happy with anything up to a 20 second error.

Re:Economy?

[Anonymous Coward]

You make it sound as if it were simple as just running a wire. Our lab had to go through three different brands, not counting the loaners we tested, because some are just out of spec or have weird timing glitches. The stuff isn't as plug and play as it should be, but depends on what timing precision and synchronization you're going for though. At the extreme, like another lab down the hall, you have to be aware of space weather to get necessary timing precision. Or alternatively, with another source to compare against, you can measure space weather effects from GPS timing deviations.

Re: Economy?

[Anonymous Coward]

That synchronisation only works if they're plugged in at all times and you never have a power failure.

Re:Economy?

[Plus1Entropy]

I have to question a cost of $6.3 MM/year.

Gimme your PayPal and I'll transfer you $2. That will cover your personal contribution to this endeavor for the next century, plus change.

Re: Economy?

[Anonymous Coward]

That's wrong, the leap second offset is signaled as part of the GPS signal. That has always been there. So all GPS receivers automatically correct that before showing the time to the user.

So the "GPS time" that differs from UTC is an internal implementation detail of GPS. The GPS receiver will show you the right time.

Re: Economy?

[thegarbz]

When your justification is that all you need to do is something extra that isn't currently done then you often can achieve the results you want. That requires a few things though, such as knowledge of your location and the location of the source.

I also don't understand why you're holding up wifi as some weird randomness. WiFi is incredibly short range and the delay unless your cheap chinese router is feeding packets through a random number generator is quite consistent in two directions. It will be far less significant than external network effects.

Re:Economy?

[thegarbz]

, because the it's not true

How not true is it? I'm willing to bet your GPS signal isn't actually entering through the building but rather those potrusions in its side.

Re: Economy?

[Anonymous Coward]

My sister had radio/clock when we were growing up that was driven by the AC frequency. We moved to a country where the mains ran at 50hz and the clock was useless, as it would fall behind by 10 minutes every hour.

Re: Economy?

[Anonymous Coward]

But GPS requires a ton of computation and is therefore more expensive to implement. So maybe there are aspects of GPS that are superior to other solutions, but other considerations still do exist.

Don’t believe me that anyone cares about power requirements? Just look at the decision for the AES implementation. The decision was based largely on the simplicity of Rijndael and not necessarily upon its superior security.

Re: Economy?

[Anonymous Coward]

I purchased an alarm clock from of all places Radio Shack back in the late 1990's. It can be powered by either a wall wart or a 9 volt battery. It uses WWV as when you turn it on within a minute it will have the correct time on it.

I still use it today to get up in the morning. If I remember correctly(IIRC) I only paid $39.95 for the alarm clock 20 years ago. The place on the night stand where the alarm clock sits does not have GPS reception. I don't know who is the real manufacturer of the clock as it has the "Radio Shack" logo on the top of it.

if this really takes place, I'll assume that the alarm clock will stop working. It is well past is warranty date too.

Re: Economy?

[Anonymous Coward]

Are you two bozos really arguing about the accuracy and stability of packet jitter and local oscillator variance vs. distance uncertainty and propagation variability?

Quite frankly either method should result in sub-millisecond synchronization with WWV / stratum 0 if implemented correctly.

Re: Economy?

[msauve]

There's no such thing as an ntp stratum 0 server. Stratum 0 is the time source itself (Cs, GPS, etc.), the server stratum starts at 1.

WWF broadcasts on HF. Propagation delays are variable, and can easily result in multiple ms of variability within the continental US. It's not just "telling the server how far it is from the tower."

It's not difficult to stay sync'd to a local server within a ms using ntp over WiFi, as long as the device has a good local clock. Problem is, most devices use crystals which are pretty temperature sensitive, so temperature changes tend to move the clock out of sync pretty quickly.

Re: Economy?

[Anonymous Coward]

https://www.theverge.com/2018/3/8/17095440/europe-clocks-running-slow-electricity-frequency-kosovo-serbia

Re:Economy?

[msauve]

OK, I'll bet you $1000.

(pause)

I just ran an Android "GPS Status" app on my phone. I went into a half bath in the middle of my house (no exterior wall), closed the door, and saw I had a fix on 15 GPS satellites. Then I went out on the deck, and saw the exact same. The signal levels were a bit higher, but same number of satellite fixes.

Re: Economy?

[drinkypoo]

Just about all plug-in clocks that do not have a wall-wart, like the cheap LED bedside alarm clocks or the clock on your stove, still are timed from the utility. The chips that do this are wickedly inexpensive and *just work*.

Unless you live somewhere with frequent power outages... clock on my last stove would lose time in that scenario. That house burned up in a recent fire in lake county, though, so that stove is now gone :p

Re: Economy?

[drinkypoo]

That'd be as easy as hanging a cheap pre-paid Android phone on the wall...if Android supported NTP.
(Sadly, it does not.)

Are you sure about that?

Re:Economy?

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, workers' control of the means of production. Government or the State is a way but not the only one e.g. a country may maintain the equivalent of Social Security and Medicare (for all) but in a structure technically separate from the government (albeit the government will enforce paying the dues and make up laws)
Credit unions may be a somewhat socialistic construct.
At the other extreme end of the scale, a mom and pop shop employing family members is kind of socialist?

Socialism is government control of the means of production. Anyone tells you anything else is socialism, he's lying.

You're not wrong probably. But there are several or many sectors of the economy. E.g. trains being run by the government won't impact your business of doing haircuts or building and selling stuff. In other cases socialist and capitalist companies may compete (capitalism itself has different kinds of companies, e.g. Tesla exiting the stock exchange)
If everything needs to be capitalist.. I won't even talk about roads, military or fire fighters. Before these, you should crack down on churches and soup kitchen that contradict the "there ain't such thing as a free lunch" motto. Because believe me, there are free lunches.

Re:Economy?

[Dragonslicer]

"This may surprise you, but GPS in-building penetration is zero." Only the claim is suprising, because the it's not true in fact as anyone with a cell phone can tell you. But, your mom's basement may be an edge case.

Not exactly an edge case. I live in an apartment building, as do many people who live in large cities, and I can't get a GPS lock from inside my apartment. It might work fine in a house of wood, drywall, and shingles, but it isn't getting through the concrete in my building.

Re: Economy?

[Anonymous Coward]

The power companies have been trying to slough off the responsibility of keeping an accurate frequency pulsing through the lines for over a decade now. WWV was the other go-to, and now that is endangered as well. https://phys.org/news/2011-06-power-grid-disrupt-clocks.html

Re: Economy?

[Anonymous Coward]

Consumer wall clocks don't use WWV, they use WWVB. Different service.

Re: Economy?

[Anonymous Coward]

Any off the shelf GPS timing receiver with 1PPS is good to 1 microsecond, better ones are good to 100 nanoseconds. This is far better than the variable propagation delays a wwvb/wwv/wwvh receiver will have. We're talking $100 for those GPS receivers. A complete solution with a disciplined quartz oscillator like a Trimble Thunderbolt can be had for a few hundred dollars. I discipline rubidium standards with one.

Re: Economy?

[Anonymous Coward]

GPS works fine in one or two story wood framed structures with modern receivers. My GPS based NTP servers have indoor antennas and work fine. They won't work well in multi-story concrete/steel structures or those with metal roofs. You can't compare this to "GPS" on cell phones (some of which don't have any GPS receivers at all) because they all use AGPS which also depends on the cellular network and wifi.

Re:Economy?

[msauve]

The claim was unqualified, and false as stated. GPS penetrates some buildings just fine.

Re: Economy?

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow. I get WWV from Colorado here in the central valley of CA without issue.

Re: Economy?

[Anonymous Coward]

Your clock uses WWVB, not WWV, and WWVB is only designed to cover the country in the wee hours of the morning. And the antenna in your clock is directional, so it needs to be pointed generally towards Colorado.

Re:Economy?

[sjames]

It's not just within buildings, but it cane get awfully funny between tall buildings as well. Suddenly your accurate to a couple meters GPS can't decide which city block you're on.

It is likely your cellphone routinely loses GPS inside buildings too. It just assumes you haven't moved much as long as it sees the same cell towers and possibly WiFi SSIDs.

Re:Economy?

[sjames]

Try the basement or a high rise office building.

Re: Economy?

[ls671]

Sure, I could have used "stratum 0 device".

Also, I must have been thinking WWVB which can maintain an accuracy of 100 microsecond if you program in the delay (distance from the tower). If you couple it with an enterprise grade ntp server, you can get a better accuracy than 100 microsecond as stated below.

https://cdn.selinc.com/assets/...

The frequency uncertainty of the WWVB transmitted signal is less than one part in 1xE12. If the path delay is removed, WWVB can provide UTC with an uncertainty of less than 100 microsecond. The variations in path delay are minor compared to those of WWV and WWVH. When proper receiving and averaging techniques are used, the uncertainty of the received signal should be nearly as small as the uncertainty of the transmitted signal.

Thanks for your reply!

Re: Economy?

[Anonymous Coward]

You know GPS doesn't work indoors, right? And I don't know what bunker you live in, but WWV works fine for my watch indoors in Los Angeles. My watch. If you have a clock that can't receive WWV in the midwest, you need a clock that doesn't suck.

Re: Economy?

[Anonymous Coward]

Just about all plug-in clocks that do not have a wall-wart, like the cheap LED bedside alarm clocks or the clock on your stove, still are timed from the utility. The chips that do this are wickedly inexpensive and *just work*.

That doesn't mean the Chinese manufacturer didn't figure it was cheaper to throw in a surplus switching power supply and a quartz movement in that clock radio. I have one that drifts a few seconds a day.

You want to get really upset trying to maintain a clock, check out the clock in a 2010 Honda Accord. You can adjust the hours and minutes, but the seconds start ticking as soon as the clock sees power and there's no way for the user to adjust the seconds. Unlike every other clock on the planet, changing the time does not reset the seconds to zero.

Re: Economy?

[Thelasko]

I always thought the reference time for GPS was WWV anyway. You should only really have one standard reference. Or does GPS reference the same clock, and NIST is just shutting down the radio transmitter?

Re: Economy?

[illtud]

If you didn't know about it already, this is an interesting article about mains frequency and how it can be used to timestamp electrical recordings:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/sci...

Re: Economy?

[adolf]

Well, I mean: Lots of them have battery/capacitor backup to keep a local oscillator going, but revert to mains timing whenever possible. (Appliances are the worst at this: You'd think that a tiny supercap or a lithium coin cell wouldn't break the bank on expensive stuff, but you'd be wrong.)

(Sorry about your house, dude. I lost one over a decade ago in a flood. It sucks. )

Re: Economy?

[adolf]

That's fairly awesome, and is something I never thought of.

It makes perfect fucking sense, too.

Thanks!

Re: Economy?

[adolf]

Every time I look, and it is a thing I look at with some regularity, it's a thing that doesn't work yet... so yes. If it dates back to ICS, then I should have seen it somewhere along I, J, K, L, M, N or O.

Besides, folks are re-implementing NTP in Android userspace on a per-application basis because the clock sucks on Android smartphones -- a thing that wouldn't ever happen if it didn't have to happen.

There are other hacks that work system-wide, but they require root since Android doesn't let usermode apps play with the system clock despite its extensive permissions system. (Because FUCK YOU, I think.)

I don't have root. (Wouldn't need it anyway if NTP was actually supported in the wild...)

But if I install the package at that last link, I can see that the offset is 1.4 seconds off from whatever instance of pool.ntp.org it found -- which is way, way outside the normal margins for modern networks and common NTP servers.

So no, Android doesn't use NTP.

Re: Economy?

[Miamicanes]

Not quite (re "they all use AGPS").

There are several things that need to happen in order to get a GPS fix:

1. You need the satellite ephemera data. Android and IOS phones normally download this over the internet, because it's just a chunk of metadata. It's technically available directly from the satellites, but it takes about 10 minutes to receive a complete copy (the satellites only send a few bits at a time, interleaved between their timestamped beacon data). That's why old GPS devices took so long to get their first fix after powerup, and why they didn't take nearly as long if you kept them continuously powered on and someplace where they could get a clear signal.

2. You need a radio that can receive the satellite broadcasts. The silicon needed to do this first appeared around 15 years ago. The satellite broadcasts themselves are little more than timestamped beacons.

3. You need a way to correlate the timestamped beacon data with the ephemera data. This is where AGPS originally came in. To cut costs, the first phones with "GPS" worked by putting the radio receiver on the phone, but offloading the number-crunching to a remote server. Along the way, "AGPS" did other things that expedited the location lookup... if you know your APPROXIMATE location, it's a lot quicker to calculate your GPS-derived location than it is if you literally have no idea where you are. The more precisely you can approximate your location, the faster and easier it will be to calculate the real location. Since towers were at fixed, known locations, AGPS could say, "Hey, here's the radio data, and we know the user is somewhere within a few miles of (lat,lon) by virtue of using {some specific tower}".

Nowadays, what happens is more like this:

1. You reboot your phone, and it uses the internet to grab a fresh copy of the ephemera data.

2. Your phone knows which tower it's using. It does another query over the internet, and finds out the latitude and longitude of the tower. If it sees two or more towers, it can narrow down your location to approximately 1km.

3. Using the data from steps 1 and 2 to expedite the process, it does its own number-crunching on the GPS data.

In theory, a typical Android phone is capable of getting a GPS fix 100% offline... but it doesn't always work due to poorly-implemented software. Some devices don't even TRY to operate completely offline... if they can't access the internet, their software doesn't even TRY to obtain a GPS fix "the old fashioned way". Other devices have buggy firmware... say, they might fetch a copy of the ephemera data at bootup, but might never try to update it any other time... so if you go for a few weeks without rebooting your phone, the ephemera data will eventually become "stale", and your phone's ability to get a GPS fix will get worse and worse until you finally reboot.

Google changed the rules again a couple of years ago when they added location services to Google Play Services for Android. As I understand it, Play Services attempts to use all sources of location data available to it... if the phone is offline, it should (in theory) be able to fall back to raw, offline GPS... but that will ONLY work if the vendor who sold the device and built its firmware actually IMPLEMENTED offline GPS properly. Because it's so hard to test rigorously outside of lab conditions, a lot of custom kernels (and quite a few STOCK kernels) fuck it up and don't quite get it right (or even try at all).

In any case, on a modern Android phone, the "GPS" radio (which, on newer phones, can almost always handle Glonass as well... and probably BeiDou and Galileo, though the latter two constellations aren't quite 100% functional yet, and I have yet to see a stock ROM that even TRIES to make use of either one) is just one of several sources of location data. A lot of people call the way modern Android phones do GPS "AGPS" because of how it fetches the ephemera data and tower locations over the internet, but strictly speaking, it's NOT the same thing that "AG

Re: Economy?

[Anonymous Coward]

You have to account for propagation delay on all these services to get anywhere near 1 ms. That includes WWV/H/B. NTP is often worse than 1ms. Tens of ms are not uncommon across wan links for NTP and the latency is highly variable. WWVB is fairly stable due to it being a groundwave service and this is what your wall clock uses. WWV/H is more variable due to skywave propagation. GPS is so variable that it is unusable unless the device automatically adjusts for the variation in the delay (which they all do).

Re:Economy?

[thegarbz]

Cool story. Just ran the same experiment. No satellites, step closer to the window, more satellites, step even closer, look at that even more.
The frequencies used by GPS have fucking absymal material penetration and are easily defeated by even trivial amounts of construction around you. How cyclone proof is your house made of paper? Or maybe move into the civilised world where among buildings but none the less outside of them you're often lucky to a fix at all.

By the way given you need a theoretically perfect horizon view to get a fix on 15 GPS satellites, congradulations you've outed your bullshit.

Re: Economy?

[Areyoukiddingme]

Anyone can have their own Stratum 1 NTP server for about $25 dollars in parts, a GPS receiver, an ESP8266 and some code. I have one setup here for my home network as well.

I've been looking into this periodically for years now, in hopes of getting a packaged solution that eliminates the $25 in parts part. Last I looked into it, it was starting to sound reasonable. Seems there are now GPS receivers with built-in serial ports.

Re: Economy?

[Anonymous Coward]

WWVB is impacted.

Re: Economy?

[Agripa]

I still don't see how a ntpd server syncing over WiFi could be more precise than a stratum 0 server syncing with WWV. All you need to do is tell the stratum 0 server how far it is from the tower. Pretty damn accurate IMHO.

From OP:

For most of the WWV reception area, the signal bounce off of the ionosphere causes an uncorrectable doppler shift. It requires days to average this out meaning a local precision oscillator. The phase error is fun to watch on an oscilloscope.

I really do not see how your ntpd server is going to keep "better than a millisecond" precision over WiFi and I ran a few use cases ;-)

Network latency has high jitter but less change in path length than WWV. A high precision local oscillator is still required though.

Re:Economy?

[msauve]

So sorry your mud hut isn't conducive to modern technology. Probably wouldn't help you much though,since you don't even have a modern cellphone which receives both GPS and GLONASS satellite signals. It obviously makes you upset to be wrong.

Re:Economy?

[thegarbz]

Actually I do. There you go making silly assumptions again. You really need a clue. You can start with a basic physics textbook.

If it has to go...

[jetole]

As long as I find plans to create a short-range broadcaster / emulator out of a raspberry pi for my watch and clocks as well as one for all of my relatives and friends that I bought wall clocks for. ...but I'd rather it just stay.

Re:If it has to go...

[msauve]

Problem is, you can't legally broadcast on any of the WWV frequencies. And rightly so - it's not like WiFi, where you lock to a particular AP, it would be useless with multiple signals in an area.

Re: If it has to go...

[Anonymous Coward]

Other problems, your RPi isn't connected to an atomic clock, and it's not connected to THE national standard atomic clock.

Asshole.

Re: If it has to go...

[adolf]

My RPi is connected to an atomic clock. It's a Stratum-1 NTP server. It keeps excellent time.

Parts: RPi Zero + cheap-shit direct-from-China Ebay 3.3v GPS receiver board + decent active GPS antenna + gpsd + ntpd + some wire.

The hardest part is that Raspbian ships with a neutered ntpd and an ancient gpsd, both of which need upgraded. Other than that it's really a very simple project.

Re:If it has to go...

[grep -v '.*' *]

Problem is, you can't legally broadcast on any of the WWV frequencies. And rightly so

Agree. Broadcasting on frequencies 2.5Mh, 5Mh, 10Mh, etc would bring the wrath of the FCC down on you. They're not for general public use.

HOWEVER: if those frequencies are suddenly unused by the government, I wouldn't mind having a small transmitter in the house on those freqs that would feed time to all of the radio clocks I currently have. A raspberry Pi, a GPS receiver module, and a pirate radio broadcasting signal sounds just about right. I'm not trying to reach the other side of the world or the country, I'm trying to reach the other side of the house -- no linear amplifiers needed. (Well, maybe if I got a much larger house.)

Re: If it has to go...

[jetole]

This is why I said short-range. I was already aware of the legalities. If the signal is unused and my transmission doesn't extend past the perimeter of my home then, while I may be violating certain restrictions, I would be doing so in a manner that will not be observable outside my home and will not be overlapping with other signal on that frequency. Ultimately my goal is to allow me to continue to sync my watch and wall clocks. Furthermore, if need be, I can limit this to a precise window since most atomic sync'd devices tend to this only on the hour and only within a specific window (topically midnight to 5am local time).

Re: If it has to go...

[Anonymous Coward]

I had a modem/router/VoIP/NAS/fiber combo (the latter two unused) that happily displayed atomic time. Only hours and minutes but fuck for human purpose we need a minute of accuracy as evidenced that most clocks only display hours and minutes.

Charge for the service ?

[Crashmarik]

If it's so useful, it should be able to be self funding. Get it out of the government hands all together, who knows maybe there are other uses for the tech, or maybe because it's free now, people aren't bothering to upgrade to things like internet time distribution or GPS.

Re:Charge for the service ?

[Anonymous Coward]

The idea that "useful" things automatically -- or even can -- make money doesn't strike me as inherently true. And if it is we should start with grade schools and family households.

Re: Charge for the service ?

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh, good idea. Let me just hook up my wall clock to the internet or a GPS antenna and plug it in to the wall just to get time sync. Sure, i used to be able to do this with a AA battery for a year, but your idea is better. Shit, NTP time servers are actually less accurate than DCF-77 and WWV. /S

Maybe we should commercialize radio time broadcasts? How about we commercialize police departments too? That is some absurdist libertarian wet-dream shit

Re:Charge for the service ?

[omnichad]

Yeah, sure. And let's replace the National Weather Service with The Weather Channel because hey, it's self-funding. And we could replace libraries with book stores too. And eventually you'll miss the point of why taxpayer-funded projects exist at all.

Re:Charge for the service ?

[careysub]

If it's so useful, it should be able to be self funding.

Like police and the military. They are useful, so maybe they should be self-funding too.

You really do not want to go there.

Re: Charge for the service ?

[Anonymous Coward]

Internet time depends on infrastructure that can fail in a variety of ways that radio isn't vulnerable to. It's very useful, but has its limitations. GPS isn't vulnerable in the way internet-based infrastructure is. However, it's difficult to receive a GPS signal in many places that shortwave radio can still be received. It isn't redundant infrastructure.

Re: Charge for the service ?

[phantomfive]

Traditionally in a lot of places "police" actually were self funding. All you had to do was pay them protection money.

Re:Charge for the service ?

[Crashmarik]

The idea that "useful" things automatically -- or even can -- make money doesn't strike me as inherently true. And if it is we should start with grade schools and family households.

Grade Schools often are run for profit and much more efficiently than public schools. Family households used to be strictly for profit operations prior to the modern era. Children were your retirement policy.

Re:Charge for the service ?

[Crashmarik]

If it's so useful, it should be able to be self funding.

Like police and the military. They are useful, so maybe they should be self-funding too.

You really do not want to go there.

Why wouldn't you want them to be self funding ? Police/military/Fire/emergency services could all be funded by insurance policies.

Re: Charge for the service ?

[Crashmarik]

Internet time depends on infrastructure that can fail in a variety of ways that radio isn't vulnerable to. It's very useful, but has its limitations. GPS isn't vulnerable in the way internet-based infrastructure is. However, it's difficult to receive a GPS signal in many places that shortwave radio can still be received. It isn't redundant infrastructure.

Redundant infrastructure is exactly what you have described. It's a pain in the rear to get WWV devices to work in general and you will need an antenna where either can't be received.

Re: Charge for the service ?

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey deadbeat maybe you should learn the world doesn't owe you the time of day.

Re:Charge for the service ?

[Crashmarik]

Yeah, sure. And let's replace the National Weather Service with The Weather Channel because hey, it's self-funding. And we could replace libraries with book stores too. And eventually you'll miss the point of why taxpayer-funded projects exist at all.

Why do they exist at all ? Looking at California they exist so politicians can rob the public blind and do everything they can to encourage people to leave the state.

The weather service is something that could easily self fund, there's actually a large number of private services that sell their product on the basis of doing a better job.

Between Franklin and Carnegie libraries were privately funded, and just out of curiosity when was the last time you used one ?

Re:Charge for the service ?

[iCEBaLM]

Why do they exist at all

Because it turns out having privately funded road, health, education, and defense systems are bad for various reasons. This extends out to other areas, like some branches of science.

Re:Charge for the service ?

[Crashmarik]

Why do they exist at all

Because it turns out having privately funded road, health, education, and defense systems are bad for various reasons. This extends out to other areas, like some branches of science.

Seems public funding isn't that great either. Matter of fact private schools are so much better that parents are willing to pay absurd amounts of money to send their kids to them. Toll roads work pretty well, and most of the problems with the medical system stem from the government limiting the supply of doctors.

Re:Charge for the service ?

[omnichad]

private schools are so much better that parents are willing to pay absurd amounts of money to send their kids to them

If public schools had access to the same absurd amount of money, they would be better too.

Re:Charge for the service ?

[iCEBaLM]

Seems public funding isn't that great either.

Only if it's mismanaged. Most western countries don't have the same problems as the US with their public health and education systems. You'd really be in favor of having all roads be toll roads? Including the one your house is on?

Re: Charge for the service ?

[Anonymous Coward]

When we didn't need time of the day we were either born as hunter-seekers or born on a farm.

Re:Charge for the service ?

[Anonymous Coward]

From what I can read about US police they seem to fund themselves in many cases...

Re:Charge for the service ?

[SuiteSisterMary]

Mandatory insurance? Or when people call in to 911 for police or fire insurance, do they need to have their credit card ready?

If the former, well, we already have that, it's called 'taxes.' If the latter, well, it already works that way in quite a few places in America, and it's terrible.

Re:Charge for the service ?

[Anonymous Coward]

The main reason private schools are better is because they can kick out the kids who do not want to learn, and aren't forced to accept every kid who appears at the schoolhouse steps regardless of the cost per year to accommodate. When the $20k private school tuition is spent educating the kid that paid it, vs a district that spends $14k per student on average and spreads it around accommodating special ed and English-as-a-second-language kids with only $5k left for the kid in the chair, a lot more can get done.

Re:Charge for the service ?

[Anonymous Coward]

Unless "often" is some vanishingly small percentage, that's completely false.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/answer-sheet/wp/2013/10/04/the-failures-of-for-profit-k-12-schools/

Re:Charge for the service ?

[Crashmarik]

Unless "often" is some vanishingly small percentage, that's completely false.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/answer-sheet/wp/2013/10/04/the-failures-of-for-profit-k-12-schools/

I guess while democracy dies in darkness facts die at the post

https://www.moneycrashers.com/...

Re:Charge for the service ?

[Crashmarik]

private schools are so much better that parents are willing to pay absurd amounts of money to send their kids to them

If public schools had access to the same absurd amount of money, they would be better too.

Ignorant and stupid is no way to go through life son

https://www.moneycrashers.com/...

Public schools spend more and have worse results.

Re:Charge for the service ?

[Crashmarik]

The road my house is on is owned by my home owners association and is maintained by dues and assessments.

So yes it does work well.

Re:Charge for the service ?

[Crashmarik]

Mandatory insurance? Or when people call in to 911 for police or fire insurance, do they need to have their credit card ready?

If the former, well, we already have that, it's called 'taxes.' If the latter, well, it already works that way in quite a few places in America, and it's terrible.

It's terrible, the fact free diatribe of the brainwashed. Anyway if you want other people to make a profession out of being ready to help you why shouldn't you pay them for it ?

Re:Charge for the service ?

[SuiteSisterMary]

They do get paid, via taxes, in a group insurance setup.

Because things like fire, police, and health care are something that are commonly needed, but nobody quite knows when or where, it makes FAR more sense to charge everybody a little bit, then to charge rich people a lot, and deny service to people who can't afford it, or worse, to require them to provide the service anyway, forcing them to recoup their costs in other ways.

Re:Charge for the service ?

[Crashmarik]

They do get paid, via taxes, in a group insurance setup.

Because things like fire, police, and health care are something that are commonly needed, but nobody quite knows when or where, it makes FAR more sense to charge everybody a little bit, then to charge rich people a lot, and deny service to people who can't afford it, or worse, to require them to provide the service anyway, forcing them to recoup their costs in other ways.

Taxes don't charge rich people proportionately more. Matter of fact taxes shift most of the burden to the middle class. Insurance would tax people according to their need and their desire to protect what they have.

Re:Charge for the service ?

[Anonymous Coward]

Ah, so that's what those bronze/silver/gold cards "friend and supporter of the police force" were all about.

Re:Charge for the service ?

[SuiteSisterMary]

Optional insurance would either a) leave people unprotected, either because they're too stupid to buy insurance, or because they can't afford it, b) increase prices because you have a smaller pool of people to spread it out across, and c) probably result in higher prices because in practice, it would be treated like emergency care is now; they HAVE to treat you, but somebody's still gotta pay, and if it's not you, it's everybody else who IS paying for it.

The postulate here is that BECAUSE EVERYBODY will need emergency services at some point in their life, be it directly (your house is on fire) or indirectly (your neighbour's house is on fire, it would be awfully nice if it got dealt with before it spread to the whole neighbourhood) it's both cheaper, more efficient, and more humane, to just have everybody pay a bit into the fund to pay for those services, and for everybody to have access to them.

Re:Charge for the service ?

[iCEBaLM]

That's not a toll road, that's actually socialist tax.

A toll road would require anyone driving on it, including people coming to visit you, to pay per use.

Re:Charge for the service ?

[Crashmarik]

Words have meanings

Tax a compulsory contribution to state revenue, levied by the government on workers' income and business profits or added to the cost of some goods, services, and transactions.

maybe you can come back when you know what a tax is

Re:Charge for the service ?

[Crashmarik]

a) leave people unprotected, either because they're too stupid to buy insurance, or because they can't afford it,

My how do people get through the day without you telling them what to do ?

Re:Charge for the service ?

[iCEBaLM]

Compulsory dues are akin to a tax, the only difference is who is collecting it.

You focus on a word instead of the argument made... Congratulations: https://yourlogicalfallacyis.c...

Re:Charge for the service ?

[SuiteSisterMary]

Ah, now we're into the ad hominems. Excellent.

All you need to do is look at outcomes in insurance-optional regimes; say, American healthcare, versus outcomes in non-optional regimes, say, every other first-world country's healthcare.

Answer: in the non-optional countries, costs are lower, effectiveness is higher, lives are longer.

Re:Charge for the service ?

[Crashmarik]

a) leave people unprotected, either because they're too stupid to buy insurance, or because they can't afford it,

Yes ad hominem indeed. I mean there has to be a specific logical fallacy of deciding that entire groups of people don't know what's best for them.

All you need to do is look at outcomes in insurance-optional regimes;

Pre or post WWII ? Pre or Post Obamacare ?

It seems everytime we take decision making power away from people prices skyrocket.

Re:Charge for the service ?

[Crashmarik]

Compulsory dues are akin to a tax,

Yes and paying my gardener is a tax by that reasoning, and paying my electric bill is a tax.

You focus on a word instead of the argument made.

Don't blame me because you can't say what you mean, and get upset when people respond to what you actually said.

Re:Charge for the service ?

[SuiteSisterMary]

I mean there has to be a specific logical fallacy of deciding that entire groups of people don't know what's best for them.

It's established fact that people, by and large, are irrational, tend to make poor decisions, or make the best decisions they can based on the information they have available, but that information is incorrect, incomplete, or inaccurately interpreted.

It seems everytime we take decision making power away from people prices skyrocket.

Again, American healthcare is ridiculously fucked up, and if Obamacare had been straight-up single payer, things would have been different. Like every other country that does it. There's a reason Americans want cheap Canadian drugs. And I'll admit, there's a reason Canadians sometimes go to America to pay for non-critical surgery rather than wait their turn.

Nevertheless, in Canada, needing surgery never involves sitting down and deciding if you can afford the procedure, or if you need to just suffer whatever the surgery would correct.

Re:Charge for the service ?

[Crashmarik]

It's established fact that people, by and large, are irrational, tend to make poor decisions,

It is ? wow somehow civilization got built before you came along and will go on after you are out of the picture.

Again, American healthcare is ridiculously fucked up, and if Obamacare had been straight-up single payer, things would have been different

Yes it would have been much much worse. For someone who thinks the mass of people is stupid, you seem to suffer from magical thinking. Obamacare didn't add one doctor or one hospital bed to the system, there was no way prices would come down. Single payer would have had doctors retiring or going pay for service for the people that could afford it.

Re:Charge for the service ?

[SuiteSisterMary]

So why does socialized healthcare work in so many other countries?

Re:Charge for the service ?

[Crashmarik]

Well for one thing they have us footing the bill for pharmaceutical research.

Ranking by Total Biotechnology R&D Expenditures

The number of firms is one way to rank biotech by country, while expenditures in research and development are another. The United States outspends its nearest competitor, France, by eight to one, at almost $27 billion to a little over $3 billion in 2012. The other big spenders are Switzerland, Korea, Japan, Germany, and Denmark at all over one billion dollars.

https://www.thebalance.com/ran...

Make no mistake

[PopeRatzo]

"$6.3 million supporting fundamental measurement dissemination, including the shutdown of NIST radio stations in Colorado and Hawaii."]

The NIST is under the Secretary of Commerce, Wilbur Ross, who is a cryptkeeper who only stays alive through daily applications of graft and corruption. Here's an article about just how corrupt this ancient swamp thing really is.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/d...

The $6,3 million saved will pay for a lot of KFC Gravy Bowls on Air Force One. Plus, Colorado and Hawaii voted for Hillary, so fuck them libs, amirite? Trump is just that kind of petty degenerate..

Re:Make no mistake

[careysub]

I think that is offensive to cryptkeepers everywhere.

Re:Make no mistake

[Solandri]

As much as I dislike Trump, the specific line items in the budget are decided by Congress. The President only gets to sign or veto the whole thing as a single package.

Re:Make no mistake

[markdavis]

>"The $6,3 million saved will pay for a lot of KFC Gravy Bowls on Air Force One. Plus, Colorado and Hawaii voted for Hillary, so fuck them libs, amirite? Trump is just that kind of petty degenerate.."

I don't want to see the WWV dismantled. I have lots of equipment that use it both at home and work. But I really would like someone to explain to me how it can possibly cost 6.3 million dollars a year for such an incredibly simple function/technology. THAT should be the uptake here- not that we don't need or shouldn't have the service, but why does it need cost so much?

Re:Make no mistake

[Anonymous Coward]

You saw the spin. Report to your re-education center for better blinders.

It is all spin. All of it.

Re:Make no mistake

[PopeRatzo]

As much as I dislike Trump, the specific line items in the budget are decided by Congress.

Wrong. Not with a department within a department. Do you believe Congress approved the spending for Trump's Space Force?

You really think every time Wilbur Ross decides to take a private plane instead of a commercial airliner that Congress has to approve that?

Plus, if you go to the NIST's own website, this is what they say on the matter:

" The FY 2019 request is a net decrease of $49.0 million from FY 2018 levels. The proposed reductions will allow NIST to consolidate and focus on narrower core SI measurement programs while meeting budget levels.

In other words, they took a program that had been budgeted and decided to cut it. It wasn't Congress' decision, it was the executive branch.

Re:Make no mistake

[PopeRatzo]

But I really would like someone to explain to me how it can possibly cost 6.3 million dollars a year for such an incredibly simple function/technology.

Simple. It's about $300,000 to keep the program running, and the other $6 million is so that Wilbur Ross never has to fly commercial.

Re:Make no mistake

[DerekLyons]

But I really would like someone to explain to me how it can possibly cost 6.3 million dollars a year for such an incredibly simple function/technology.

The explanation is as simple as reading TFS:

"$6.3 million supporting fundamental measurement dissemination, including the shutdown of NIST radio stations in Colorado and Hawaii."

WWV is only one small part of the $6.3 million. The rest is probably metrology standards of various kinds, which is an even more frightening loss than WWV. In theory, WWV could eventually be replaced with 'net connectivity and local clocks... But primary reference standards? Those, by definition, have to come from a central source.

Re:Make no mistake

[AmiMoJo]

It's not that simple.

First it needs an accurate source of time. These days that could be GPS, but it needs to keep working when GPS is not available so you need an atomic clock at each site.

Then you need some equipment to generate the signal. Yeah, a Raspberry Pi could do it, but have you certified that Python script to be correct and to produce a signal that is synchronized within nanoseconds of the atomic clock?

Finally you need a high power transmitter to broadcast it. Actually you need five because it broadcasts on five different frequencies.

Oh, and you need to keep monitoring it, not just at the transmitter but around the country to ensure propagation and accuracy. Conditions change, if you are relying on it for anything important you have to keep checking.

$6.3m actually sounds quite reasonable for such a system.

Re:Make no mistake

[sjames]

Based on that, it's no wonder Trump wanted him.

Re:Are there any ham radio dudes that are norma

[asackett]

I don't recall ever meeting a ham named Norma, but there are enough amateur radio operators that there probably is one. Or several.

WWV[H][B[

[Anonymous Coward]

NIST is taking a gigantic budget hit. WWV/etc is just one victim. We are headed back to the scientific dark ages...

From what I've read, there was no mention of WWV-B, the VLF broadcast that such gadgets as people's clocks depend on. Is that on the chopping block too? (probably. grr)

Re:WWV[H][B[

[merlock]

We are headed back to the scientific dark ages...

But we can bomb the shit out of your country, alright!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

US taxpayer supports the new oligarchy

[Anonymous Coward]

Any government service that isn't privatized or going to contractors will be cut in the near future.

If you're well connected to the political organs of our neo-consevative (and neo-liberal) empire, you can expect a fat paycheck from John Q. Taxpayer.

Anyone against globalization. Against austerity. Or against the currently administration has been clearly identified as an enemy of the state. Your execution papers are in the mail.

Re:US taxpayer supports the new oligarchy

[careysub]

Any government service that isn't privatized or going to contractors will be cut in the near future.

If you're well connected to the political organs of our neo-consevative (and neo-liberal) empire, you can expect a fat paycheck from John Q. Taxpayer.

Anyone against globalization. Against austerity. Or against the currently administration has been clearly identified as an enemy of the state. Your execution papers are in the mail.

Right - if the NIST offered to privatize this, and have a company transmit the signal, with the same budget (or maybe higher, for that private sector profit incentive) then the Republicans would be fine with it. And the CEO of the company would of course kick back part of his salary from the venture to the party, just to show his appreciation. That's how it works with prisons.

Re:US taxpayer supports the new oligarchy

[Anonymous Coward]

Except the prison establishment, including the all powerful state prison guard unions, kick back their graft to the... Democrats. Corruption is not a partisan issue. Look up Bill Clinton and Diane Feinstein... they make Republicans jealous and appear innocent (even naive).

Re:US taxpayer supports the new oligarchy

[DaveSewhuk]

They would add ads every minute and self-promotions. "WWV all the time all the time", "This minute brought to you by Coca-Cola",.......

Re:Another Trump Victory

[Darinbob]

He's not slashing useless fat, just trimming a few toenails here and there.

Re:Are there any ham radio dudes that are norma

[Anonymous Coward]

ham here. no. no there isn't.

My Casio Wave Ceptor 4756

[dlfretz]

My Casio Wave Ceptor 4756 still uses the WWV for keeping accurate time. Wrist watches on the hand have been on the downward trend in favor of cell phones for a while. So my alternatives are to use my cell phone or get some kind of smart watch like the Google Watch or the Apple Watch 3?

Re:My Casio Wave Ceptor 4756

[dlfretz]

I think, I should resurrect my old wind up pocket watch. There are not that many people that can fix them. Besides who uses that watch pocket on jeans anyways?

Re:My Casio Wave Ceptor 4756

[omnichad]

Wrist watches on the hand have been on the downward trend in favor of cell phones for a while.

If history is any indicator, we'll be moving back to wristwatches from pocket watches soon enough. A GPS activation once a day wouldn't be a horrible compromise, but requires a lot more complicated reception.

Re:My Casio Wave Ceptor 4756

[Anonymous Coward]

I think Casio's (non-GPS) are actually using the 60 KHz signal from WWVB, that doesn't appear to be part of the cut backs.

Re: My Casio Wave Ceptor 4756

[phantomfive]

You could say a cell phone is just a fancy pocket watch. People use it as such, among other things.

Re:My Casio Wave Ceptor 4756

[Anonymous Coward]

If you have a smaller smartphone, they fit in the watch pocket on your jeans... The trend of Plus-size phones is stupid and smaller phones are hard to find.

Re: My Casio Wave Ceptor 4756

[omnichad]

I just did.

No Way This is happening

[Anonymous Coward]

I could see maybe the regular WWV broadcast where the dude says, "At the tone: 12 hours, 33 minutes Coordinated Universal Time.... BEEP."

But the disappearance of WWVB, whose transmitter pulses are a low baud-rate time code for gajillions of devices, would have a substantial impact. I'd be very, very surprised if it went away.

if that happens

[FudRucker]

i have two radio controlled clocks i will have to throw out, both set their time by WWVB at 60_KHz, i can understand the need to cut back but dont eliminate WWV completely, get rid of 15 & 20 MHz, and just keep WWVB on 60_KHz, and WWV 2.5, 5 & 10 MHZ because 15 & 20 is rarely heard since propagation rarely favors those higher frequencies, and possibly switch to SSB because AM requires more power output so it could save a little on the electric bill, canada uses SSB on their time frequencies on HF 3.33, 7.85, 14.67 all on USB

Re:if that happens

[Megane]

i have two radio controlled clocks i will have to throw out, both set their time by WWVB at 60_KHz

Or you could RTFS and see no mention of WWVB.

Re:if that happens

[SteveSgt]

Or, Megane, you could read not only the source article, but follow the other links and discover that WWVB is also one of the, "NIST radio stations in Colorado and Hawaii."
[ https://www.nist.gov/pml/time-... ]

GPS *AND* Internet fail (could happen)- important?

[charliemerritt03]

Some nation attacks US in the crypto battlefield: sats and .ip driven life stop.
With my battery driven sw I could at least know the time, important? Importand during that kind of crisis?
I remember a time when wwv had a strong signal, world wide - is it just me or have they really reduced powered? Last I checked while in Costa Rica 2.5 wasn't there 5 was weak 10 was weak and 15 didn't exist.

Most of those "self setting clocks" use WWVB...

[Ellis D. Tripp]

on 60 kHz. The WWV/WWVH services being cut are on HF (2.5-25 MHz).

The loss of those frequencies will obsolete the older HF clocks, like the Heathkit GC-1000 "Most Accurate Clock" I have in my ham shack. As well as removing the other functions they provided besides time, such as precision frequency reference (zero beat a signal generator or receiver VFO against WWV's carrier, and you know it is exactly on frequency), and the various frequencies throughout the HF band provide useful propagation checks, as well.

Oh well, the $6M they save can pay off a lot of porn stars, or cover the security detail for a couple rounds of golf in Bedminster...

Re:Most of those "self setting clocks" use WWVB...

[adolf]

But why does it cost $6M?

It's just a few transmitters and some awesome clocks, very carefully intertwined.

I know that engineers aren't cheap and power isn't free, but $6M buys a lot of transmitter/clock/tower maintenance and electricity every year.

Re:Most of those "self setting clocks" use WWVB...

[Anonymous Coward]

It is a very powerful transmitter (10kW on 10mhz, licensed civilians can only operate to 1.5kW in the US) on each frequency, transmitting 24x7, with a UPS sized to give them three hours to start the generators.

They also mail back a postcard to anyone that mails them one reporting they heard a broadcast, a ham enthusiast keepsake/tradition. That gets expensive.

Each government employee is going to cost $200-250k per year after salary and benefits, especially for RF engineers.

Here's a paper on the station from 2005: https://tf.nist.gov/general/pdf/1969.pdf

Re:Most of those "self setting clocks" use WWVB...

[Anonymous Coward]

Our television antenna is 1MW. You'd be surprised how much one million Watts 24x7 costs. It's over $1.8 million per year for electricity alone, and that's one frequency.

Re:Most of those "self setting clocks" use WWVB...

[Ellis D. Tripp]

That would be a megawatt ERP, no? Actual RF power likely a lot less, but still not cheap to run.

Re:Most of those "self setting clocks" use WWVB...

[Anonymous Coward]

The original article from SWLing.com via ARRL was incorrect in stating this affects only WWV and WWVH. These plus WWVB are described in the actual NIST funding request albeit rather loosely.

Re:Most of those "self setting clocks" use WWVB...

[Ellis D. Tripp]

Source?

I can't see them shutting down WWVB. That would have a negative financial impact on companies that sell those clocks, and making money selling crappy imported consumer goods is a vital part of our economy.

WWV/WWVH, on the other hand, are only used by radio geeks and scientists, and who gives a damn about them?

Re:GPS *AND* Internet fail (could happen)- importa

[Anonymous Coward]

...is it just me or have they really reduced powered?

Well, there is the twelve year sunspot cycle to think about, which has major effects on propagation of radio signals. We're at a minimum right now.

There's one foolproof way to find out

[Jeremi]

It's easy to imagine that not even the NIST knows every service and device that could be impacted by this decision.

It's easy to imagine that we'll find out in very short order what was impacted, when they turn off the service; and that the resulting lawsuits will end up costing them well over the amount they hoped to save.

Ready, fire, aim!

Re:There's one foolproof way to find out

[Anonymous Coward]

Is there a law that says that this service must be provided? If not, I'm not sure how any lawsuit over this will stand.

Re:Are there any ham radio dudes that are norma

[Anonymous Coward]

So like a trans ham? Seems unlikely from a statistical perspective, but I guess you never know.

Speak plainly

[drew_kime]

It's easy to imagine that not even the NIST knows every service and device that could be impacted by this decision.

There's no fucking way the NIST knows half the shit that could be impacted by this decision. [FIFY]

Cost savings? Not likely.

[Anonymous Coward]

Once the NIST transmitters go down, that will be the end of time.

NTP (millisecond), PTP (microsecond)

[raymorris]

NTP will give you accurate time sync across your network of about 1 millisecond. Ntpd on your ntp server ( will keep your local network time to within a few milliseconds of worldwide network time. Frequently your DNS server or router will also serve as your DNS server.

You can of course connect a single GPS receiver to your NTP server and thereby keep your whole network within a millisecond or so of perfect time using just one GPS server.

Precision Time Protocol (PTP) provides much greater precision.

NTP is far more common.

Irrelevant. Slashdot turned into Facebook? Nerds?

[raymorris]

Are there no nerds on Slashdot anymore?
Has this turned into Facebook, where trolling utterly irelevant crap somehow gets this many replies?

There is an actual conversation about the topic below.

You should be ashamed of yourself.

Re:Irrelevant. Slashdot turned into Facebook? Nerd

[asackett]

The fact that we're bankrupting and sacrificing ourselves with illegal, immoral wars to prop up Nixon's petrodollar while allowing our social institutions and infrastructure to decay is very relevant to the discussion. The fact that this grotesque irresponsibility is the driver of capitalism's collapse and American social decay is very, very relevant. Personally, I consider these to be the most relevant aspects of the discussion.

I would be ashamed of myself were I one given more to reaction than reflection.

Penny wise and pound foolish

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, this may save $6M / year from the federal budget. But the costs to all the systems and tech out there will be much higher.

I can only guess that running out of time is a Trump thing.

Clocks do not set to WWV

[Eravnrekaree]

WWV and WWVH are different from WWVB. WWV and WWVH are voice, WWVB is what the clocks are automatically set to. Still cancelling the voice service seems a little ridiculous to save 0000.1% of the federal budget, maybe what they should do is overlay the time signal on news and more informational broadcasts, i know there is already some informational broadcasting but it certainly could be expanded to justify the expense, however.

Re:Clocks do not set to WWV

[SteveSgt]

The budget proposal says:

...including the shutdown of NIST radio stations in Colorado and Hawaii

So perhaps all broadcast operations in Colorado will be shut down.
According to this page, WWVB is also in Colorado:
[ https://www.nist.gov/pml/time-... ]

NIST radio station WWVB is located on the same site as NIST HF radio station WWV near Fort Collins, Colorado.

So it looks to me like WWVB could also be on the chopping block.

Re:Another Trump Victory

[Anonymous Coward]

Whatever he does is fine by me. I'll suck his dick 2020. MAGA

Re:Are there any ham radio dudes that are norma

[Anonymous Coward]

As an amateur radio guy myself, it didn't take me long to learn that the Internet is pretty much just amateur radio for fags.

Zombie State

[Anonymous Coward]

What?! Big Government doesn't know what's going on? And didn't do useful due diligence? Surprise surprise.
I'll bet they spent money planning to plan somewhere though.

Not irrelevant at all

[Anonymous Coward]

I couldn't disagree more. From the NIST budget request summary:

This budget request is consistent with the administration’s priorities to redirect domestic discretionary resources to rebuild the military and make critical investments in the nation’s security, and keep the nation on a responsible fiscal path.

Funding for discretionary programs is being reduced to allocate more funding for the military and "national security", which I suspect refers largely to the President's idea of border security. That makes it fair game to discuss defense and border security when commenting on the proposed shutdown of the WWV stations.

While we can debate a reasonable level of defense spending, let's use NATO's 2% of GDP standard. US defense spending is around 3.6% of GDP, and President Trump's requested FY 2019 budget increases DOD spending by 13% over 2017 levels. Proposed military spending is outpacing GDP growth. At the same time, President Trump is requesting a long list of reforms and spending cuts.

In fairness, it's necessary to understand the context of proposed cuts. For example, NOAA is proposing to cut VORTEX-SE, which is a project that studies tornadoes in the Southeast US. Taken out of context, one might think NOAA isn't prioritizing the improvement of tornado warnings. In reality, VORTEX-SE was supposed to collect high quality in-situ data for a few events each spring over the span of 2-3 years and fund a number of related research projects, many of which use the data collected during the field campaign. Most field campaigns such as the original VORTEX (1994-5) and VORTEX2 (2009-10) have been just as short in duration. VORTEX-SE has run longer and wasn't cut in FY 2018 because Congress never passed the relevant appropriations bill and kept funding basically at FY 2017 levels in the continuing resolutions. Context is important to understand proposed cuts, such as if a program has already achieved its goals.

I looked for justification for the proposed cutting of WWV stations and I couldn't find anything that explains why these stations are being targeted for shutdown. Absent any good context for why funding cuts for these stations is requested, it's fair to assume it would be a casualty of the President's overall budget goals. For that reason, it's certainly fair game to criticize our excessive defense spending.

Re:Are there any ham radio dudes that are norma

[CronoCloud]

I understand that ham radio buffs tend to be older-bearded-ex-military-janes-reading-model-railroading-tabletop-wargaming-cessna owning sort of guys...but did you have to engage in casual homophobia?

After all, hams complain about their declining numbers, do you think that contributing to the stereotype of hams being right-wing bigoted jerks is going to encourage new blood....well except amongst the younger versions of guys like you of course.

Not even taking into account that the earliest users of the internet were bearded unix geeks, basically just like you, only doing computers more than radio and perhaps slighty less into Janes and wargaming.

Re:Are there any ham radio dudes that are norma

[CronoCloud]

Ham radio is a fairly common interest amongst older transfolk. And Cessna's amongst those with more money. And of course model railroading and trains in general. Linux and anime amongst younger ones. The ones who are transitioning young will probably have more tradtionally-gendered interests.

I used to call a bunch of upper-class crossdressers in a support group I was in "The Cessna's and Sailboats crowd"

Gotta Love This

[Crashmarik]

The idea that people should pay for what they use is so triggering it's considered flamebait. Wow some people need to emigrate to one of the remaining socialist paradises, No Korea, Cuba and Venezuela are still there.

Re:Gotta Love This

[Anonymous Coward]

The idea that people should pay for what they use is so triggering it's considered flamebait.

The idea that people should get the government they're paying for, instead of the robber barons and other members of the leisure class, is apparently triggering you.

“We all too often have socialism for the rich, and rugged free market capitalism for the poor.” Martin Luther King Jr.

Re:Gotta Love This

[Crashmarik]

The idea that people should pay for what they use is so triggering it's considered flamebait.

The idea that people should get the government they're paying for, instead of the robber barons and other members of the leisure class, is apparently triggering you.

“We all too often have socialism for the rich, and rugged free market capitalism for the poor.” Martin Luther King Jr.

I'd be very happy to not get the government I pay for. Having elected officials being able to profit off of selling parts of the country to foreign powers, leaves me cold. The funding of "public education" to teach kids if they can shut up people they don't like it somehow makes their reasoning correct, just makes me happy I own guns.

Or just reading this thread, and the hypocrisy of people who would gladly burn books arguing how great public libraries are.

Re:Are there any ham radio dudes that are norma

[Anonymous Coward]

>declining numbers

Looking at the FCC database the numbers are going up.

20 percent of last years graduating class had Amateur tickets.

I wonder if the rest of your post was ass-backwards also???

WWVB will still work

[thmitch]

Most of the devices mentioned use WWVB which I understand will continue to operate. It is the shortwave signal, WWV and WWVH that will be terminated.

Re:WWVB will still work

[SteveSgt]

Most of the devices mentioned use WWVB which I understand will continue to operate.

WWVB is one of the, "NIST radio stations in Colorado and Hawaii." [ https://www.nist.gov/pml/time-... ]

What references can you cite that say it won't be shut down?

Re:GPS *AND* Internet fail (could happen)- importa

[Anonymous Coward]

Even in your hypothetical, post-apocalyptic scenario, the accuracy of your 30-second-per-year mechanical Timex is sufficient for anything you might need to do.

The reason you have a harder time hearing WWV is because the global noise floor has risen about 30dB in the last couple of decades. In the 1980s, it was common to see an ambient noise floor around -120 to -130dBm. Today, you would be hard pressed to see anything less than -90dBm, or even more like -60dBm in urban areas.

There is just so much crap out there throwing off broadband noise, and it adds up.

Nuclear Pulse Burst or conventional EMF Bomb

[Anonymous Coward]

See how you nice comptuers, GPS, Quartz watch and gizmo work if the unthinkable happened, I presume the valve operated dinosaur will tick on nicely.
Those few minutes saved - will ensure better defence retribution. Its called cheap insurance.

Easy solution

[Anonymous Coward]

Since it seems to be the ham radio community that is most up in arms about this (sorry, your hanging wall clocks aren't important, and nobody cares about them, including me), why doesn't the FCC just hand the frequencies over to the ARRL and let them pay for running them? Maybe then the ARRL can actually be useful for something other than negotiating away property rights and supporting restrictive covenants against ham radio operators.

Accuracy and precision

[Anonymous Coward]

Accuracy is important for synchronizing time, such as with cell phone equipment or satellite receivers.

Lab grade time standards are concerned with precision, meaning you get a time pulse at *exactly* 10ns intervals. To do that you need an ultra-stable frequency source. To get that through GPS you need to compensate for the latency of decoding the GPS signals, which consumer grade GPSes don't do (as they are geared toward accuracy, not precision)

This ultra-cheap microcontroller-only implementation will get you 10e-6 stability for around $20.
http://users.ece.utexas.edu/~bevans/courses/ee382c/projects/spring98/deosthali-gummadi/finalreport.pdf

Here's a fancy version of a cheaper circuit, that uses a temperature stabilized crystal clocked synced to the WWVB standard that provides indistinguishable performance to a GPS locked rubidium time standard (the cheapest of which start at $1500)
http://www.arrl.org/files/file/QEX_Next_Issue/2015/Nov-Dec_2015/Magliacane.pdf

Re: Accuracy and precision

[Anonymous Coward]

A lab quality reference uses a quartz oscillator which has extremely good short term stability (even better than rubidium and cesium), and you discipline it to phase lock with GPS over long timeframes. Timing GPS receivers with PPS outputs all compensate for delay. They don't have to be hyper accurate to discipline an oscillator. This gives you the best of both worlds and is a lab quality standard on your bench for about $300.

Not as relied on as you think

[CharlieG]

There are 2 services
WWV + WWVH - which the NIST cut from their own budget. This is mostly the classic "At the tone, the time will be XXX", but includes some electromagnetic propagation reports etc. There are some tones with phase shift data

WWVB - The BINARY format version, which is NOT on the chopping block, and IS widely used!!

WWVB affected?

[The New Guy 2.0]

WWV/WWVH are outdated and were replaced by WWVB... so nothing of value seems lost.

Re:WWVB affected?

[SteveSgt]

Someone didn't RTFOA. And I neglected to include WWVB in the summary. But the source document [ https://www.nist.gov/director/... ] indicates that all radio broadcast operations in Colorado and Hawaii are on the chopping block.

According to this page, WWVB is also in Colorado:
[ https://www.nist.gov/pml/time-... ]

NIST radio station WWVB is located on the same site as NIST HF radio station WWV near Fort Collins, Colorado.

#MAGA

[mark_reh]

It's all part of the process...

Never mind

[Anonymous Coward]

How much can it cost to have an automated WWV? What? It's owned by the government? Never mind...

WWV/WWVH don't typically control consumer clocks

[Anonymous Coward]

Nearly all consumer wall clocks and wristwatches receive signals from WWVB which operates at 60kHz, not WWV/WWVH which operate in the shortwave bands. Nobody has mentioned shutting off WWVB.

Re: Are there any ham radio dudes that are norma

[Anonymous Coward]

There are more hams now than ever in the history of amateur radio.

But it's NOT a free market.

[Ungrounded Lightning]

You like the "free market", right?
Hypocrite...

Unfortunately, it's NOT a free market. The low wages are subsidized by a host of benefit programs for housing, food, medical care, and what passes for education for the families of the underpaid "undocumented" workers; by effective waivers of minimum wage laws, workplace safety rules, working hour enforcement, auto insurance requirements, and so on.

Citizens and legal residents who WOULD be willing to do those jobs, even at the low pay, need not apply: The employers can't employ them on those terms, since they could later demand the remainder of the legal minimum pay and enforcement of working conditions. Better for the employer to pay cash and, if the worker were crazy enough to gripe, report him to la migra.

It's a government welfare program for large employers and corporations, not for the common man. We pay for it in taxes for direct programs. We pay for it in lowered wages and higher unemployment. We pay for it in astronomically higher health care costs. We pay for it in higher auto insurance rates. We pay for it in low quality education of our children in public schools or by paying private school tutition in addition to our school taxes. We pay for it in shoddy work that has to be redone.

And the next time you hire someone to install a new roof on your house, or put in a new driveway, you're going with the more expensive contractor who doesn't hire illegals, right?

Tried that. In our area we weren't able to find any. When the laws aren't enforced, in a highly competitive market like contracting the businesses are divided into two groups: Those who hire "undocumented" workers, and those who are out of business. So even the licensed, bonded, high-rep, high quality contractors use illegal immigrants. (We know of one exception - in Oregon. He hires only citizens and other legals. And he makes his living fixing up the botch jobs done by the shadier subset of contractors and the "out of a truck - can't find them when it falls apart" "contractors" from the hardware store parking lots.)

Re:But it's NOT a free market.

[ImprovOmega]

Undocumented people do not get most public benefits in the United States. They absolutely do NOT get any housing assistance AT ALL. They would qualify for food stamps (but not welfare, cash aid, or really any other similar program) and for medical care their only option is the emergency room or paying out of pocket.

Emergency rooms are required to treat and stabilize people regardless of ability to pay. You don't want to change this. If you get brought in after a car accident and they can't find your purse to figure out your insurance information, you don't want to die waiting for financial authorization to clear. Stupidly, this is WAY MORE EXPENSIVE than just letting them be on medicaid or similar, but that would look "weak" on immigration so it's politically untenable.

And finally, the right to a free K-12 public education was established by a Supreme Court precedent, so take that up with them. But realistically, since most school funding comes from property taxes, and they are living SOMEwhere, those taxes are getting paid directly or indirectly by the families going to the schools.

So, yeah, immigrants consume way less resources than the talking heads on TV would like you to believe. Oh, and did you know that between 50-75% of undocumented workers actually pay federal, state, and local income tax? Fun fact.

Another WWV reference

[Ungrounded Lightning]

The best quartz watch I had lost a little less than a second a month. Then I got too greedy and killed the golden goose - tried adjusting the quartz timing mechanism myself. After that I could never get it below 2 seconds of drift per month. What I didn't realize until it was too late was that as the error gets smaller, you have to wait longer between each adjustment (weeks) to determine if you had improved it or overshot.

Which is why, if you want to trim a watch crystal, you use a frequency counter against the 32,768 oscillator output. One second per month is one cycle per three seconds of error, so you can get a measurement better than that in a few seconds.

And you trim the frequency counter's reference by similarly using a radio to hear the "beat" of its reference oscillator output or spurious emissions against a WWV carrier. At 10 MHz a second-per-month accuracy would be about 90 beats per second.

(I seem to recall that there is, or was, at least one time reference transmitter at a power-of-two Hz that you could beat directly against harmonics from a watch. But I didn't find a reference to such a signal in a few minutes of net searching.)

THANKS, TRUMP!

[Rick Schumann]

Trump likely has no fucking idea what the NIST does but he's willing to kill their budget. Fucking brilliant.

Perhaps NIST should learn from LORAN ...

[cebu2018]

Everyone seems to think that GPS is the be-all/end-all solution for navigation and timing, but it just isn't - and redundancy is a critical infrastructure need. Perhaps NIST should pay more attention at what's transpiring with LORAN, which may be resurrected (heck, NIST even volunteered to help with the chips for eLORAN, look in your own backyard guys!) Or go hit up the Department of Transportation for a few bucks, in case the "National Timing Resilience and Security Act of 2017" ever passes - WWV/WWVH would seem to count as an alternate source of timing.

I remember finding WWV by chance when I got my first shortwave receiver as a kid, I probably still have my postcard from them up in the attic somewhere.

Explain why all appliances don't have self-setting

[tdailey]

Explain to me why all appliances don't have self-setting clocks.

Radio time signals have been around for decades. Yet, almost every appliance with a clock needs to be manually set and adjusted. Would "self-setting clock" not be a prized marketing feature? Is it expensive or difficult to add time signal compatibility? Why is the year 2018 and I still need to manually adjust the clock on my microwave oven?

big mistake

[bill.pev]

As a matter of national defense: the radio time sync is invaluable in the event that technology fails the nation or is compromised over a large area. Its kind of like the ham radio requirement (now gone) that anybody with a ham radio license be able to magyver a radio from a lot of wire and old bits of junk.

The more basic failsafe options we abandon, the more fragile our emergency response options become.

Schools

[Anonymous Coward]

"A just educational system is not one where a few of the poor are privileged enough to enter elite private schools, but one where the public schools are good enough that even the rich will attend them."--Marianne Huusko, Finnish minister of education

Re:Are there any ham radio dudes that are norma

[CronoCloud]

20 percent of last years graduating class had Amateur tickets.

Graduating class? "What" graduating class. Ham radio doesn't have a "Graduating class" Do you mean new or upgrade licenses?

And why focus on the Amateur tickets, that's the highest level isn't it? Isn't the Technician license the one new hams would get?

And the ARRL itself says numbers are a problem, sure there's been some increase in new hams but the number of licenses going away via expiration or "Silent keys" is also going up.

Despite the optimistic influx of 32,196 newcomers last year, the net growth of 5,349 â" about 0.72% over December 2016 â" reflects some 27,000 expired or cancelled licenses in the FCC database over the past year. In making the case for changes to the entry-level license, the ARRL Boardâ(TM)s Entry-Level License Committee referred to âoethe large number of Baby Boomers (roughly born 1945 â" 65) [who] will soon be aging off the licensee rolls.â The committee predicted the likelihood of âoea significant decline in the number of hams, unless we take steps to reverse it.â

http://www.arrl.org/news/more-...

And I guess the hams on slashdot/websites/forums saying the hobby is graying and declining are wrong? I know someone who goes to Hamvention and has said themselves that the hobby is aging and in decline.

Re: Are there any ham radio dudes that are norma

[CronoCloud]

Why yes, but the US population is much higher than it was in 1914 when the ARRL was founded. 92 million or so versus over 308 million, So it's going to be higher, but what matters is the percentage. there's what, 752000 or so? That's not even 1 percent of the US population. How many of those are truly active and not people who've given up on the hobby due to age/money/time.

Sure the influx of cheap chinese equipment has helped...heck I've thought about picking up one of those 2 meter handhelds just to see what the Slashdot hams talk about. But there are ZERO license classes within 50 miles.

I can google and see a ton of blog posts and articles from hams saying how there's less activity and talking about how their friends are going "silent key" more and more.

The Hobby of Ham Radio is not a healthy one, maybe the ARRL needs to get more class sites and test sites out there. And it doesn't help the disdain some hams have for new people or for people who aren't one of those more affluent hams who can blow thousands of dollars on gear. Would you be one of those showing disdain for a new ham with one of those Baofeng BF-F8HP's

Re:Are there any ham radio dudes that are norma

[Anonymous Coward]

Regarding your subject (Are there any ham radio dudes that are norma) I never met any ham dudes named Norma, but the ham community includes a significant number of women, some of whom are likely named Norma.

every one I have met in person is an artistic freak, but maybe those are the only types that will admit to doing ham radio

I've had my ham radio license for a bit over five years and I have been very active in the ham community. I have 280 hams in my contact list. There are two people in this list who have their head about three feet up their ass, otherwise this is a great bunch of folks. I'd say two losers in 280 people is a pretty damned impressive set of people. I've never been in any other group that had so few losers.

Re:WWV[H][B]

[SteveSgt]

Although I omitted WWVB in the summary I submitted, there's no information that it wouldn't be included in the general statement:

...including the shutdown of NIST radio stations in Colorado and Hawaii.

Because WWVB is in Colorado [ https://www.nist.gov/pml/time-... ].

Ya need a donkey kickin

[Anonymous Coward]

OMG. Why don't we go back to leeches for medical treatment and horses for transportation. Got an injury? Hey, get a bluejay to peck out the blood. Or maybe ya need an ear nail. That's right, a fucking nail in your fucking ear.

Go be old somewhere else.

You lost. Get over it.

[Anonymous Coward]

Moving goalposts. The claim was "GPS in-building penetration is zero" Is he not inside a building since he claims he's in the bathroom of his house? He also claims he can get 15 satellites. I am inside a brick building made in 1958. Not brick facade, but real cemented brick built by the US military when nukes were cool and Nazis weren't. I have lock on 4 sats.

You lost your argument. Come to terms with it, stop arguing over stupid shit, and go be annoying elsewhere.

Re:You lost. Get over it.

[sjames]

Since the original claim was a general statement about GPS not being a complete replacement of WWV, one specific counterexample doesn't really counter it. Any more than a claim that an astronaut who 'drops' a 50 pound weight on his foot doesn't get hurt doesn't really counter the statement "if you drop a weight 50 pound on your foot, it'll hurt." since for the other 99.99999% of us living on Earth, it will.

It would be more of a counter if the claim was "GPS can never be recieved inside any structure".

Re: Are there any ham radio dudes that are norma

[Anonymous Coward]

But there are ZERO license classes within 50 miles.

What's your zip code?

Re: Are there any ham radio dudes that are norma

[CronoCloud]

Do you really think I didn't check the ARRL before writing that? I could take the test closer though. It does surprise me that there aren't any classes/tests in the nearest college town. And bog knows what the local repeater situation is, I've only done a quick check but have seen only one listed and it appears to be offline.

So I'm rather disinclined to join the hobby for those and other reasons.

BAD: Shut down WWV* soon; BRILLIANT: Recommend it

[dakra137]

Shutting down WWV* in the near term is bad.
Recommending shutting down WWV* in the near term is brilliant.
Shutting down WWV* in the long term is a reasonable possibility to consider.

Shutting down WWV* in the near term is bad.
Many things depend on them, without having time, plan, or anything leading to reducing dependency on them, by switching to the available alternatives.

Recommending shutting down WWV* in the near term is brilliant.
NIST and WWV* have very little in the way of name recognition let alone appreciation. Does the packaging on products that rely on WWV* mention WWV or NIST? Usually they call themselves "Atomic clocks" or say that they rely on radio signals, without saying from who or where.
The controversy raised by the recommendation will serve to raise awareness of the value provided by NIST to the USA and the world.

Shutting down WWV* in the long term is a reasonable possibility to consider.
There is an alternative radio time signal. Using signals from several satellites, GPS receivers figure out the time to within 100 ns. I believe this is more accurate than WWV* receivers can accomplish, due to propagation variations and not knowing where they are. Less expensive and lower power receivers could get just time at accuracy a little better WWV* receivers.

Who pays for replacing devices? In the consumer space, countries handle this for analog TV, and in some countries, AM and FM radio.
In both consumer and commercial space, vendors often drop support for older technologies: New applications that don't run on older hardware. Phones that don't get OS upgrades. Software that doesn't get security updates, etc.

What about technology that many users do not pay for, or at least not directly? This starts with non-toll roads funded by taxes & registration fees and extends through DNS to search engines funded by advertisements.

What obliges the provider of that technology to continue to do so at its own expense or when its funding runs out?

Is it reasonable for the transmitter of a streaming broadcast to encrypt it and charge a fee for the decryption key? Satellite and cable TV operators operate that way. Non-military GPS could become a fee service.

Re: Are there any ham radio dudes that are norma

[Anonymous Coward]

Do you really think I didn't check the ARRL before writing that?

There's a lot of things going on that the ARRL doesn't know about. I had a heck of a time finding a testing location. I found one, no thanks to the ARRL.

Regarding repeaters, they are useful but self-limiting (i.e., limited range on VHF/UHF). Using HF frequencies you can talk to the entire planet.