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Unpopular opinion time: spectrum is a limited resource. We shouldn't waste it on efficient analog technologies like conventional commercial and amateur radio. W

Unpopular opinion time: spectrum is a limited resource. We shouldn't waste it on efficient analog technologies like conventional commercial and amateur radio. We've already ceased conventional broadcasts: that's a step in the right direction, but there's more to do. The entire RF spectrum should be devoted to LTE-like efficient, packetized, and secure communication. I'd make small exceptions for things like radio astronomy, but I don't think we should be squandering prime regions of the EM frequency space just to support transceivers that Marconi would have recognized.

Stratoscope 7y ago
I was talking with a friend the other day, a brilliant young software developer at Google, and the topic of ham radio came up. He said what really got him excited about it was the possibility of building his own transmitter from scratch, using individual components he could see and fully understand. I think that is something to encourage even in this day of LTE.
geggam 7y ago
The solar flare that eliminates all the modern methods appreciates your opinion
- quotemstr 7y ago
  People have been bringing up the solar flare electromagnetic boogeyman for decades. It's never been an actual problem
  - geggam 7y ago
    Maybe not your lifetime but it has happened and we have been damned lucky more than once recently https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/March_1989_geomagnetic_storm https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/March_1989_geomagnetic_storm https://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2014/23jul_superstorm https://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2014/2...
    - quotemstr 7y ago
      I was around for that. Civilization did not end. Services were not disrupted.
howard941 7y ago
I'm saddened that your unpopular opinion targets the very people who pioneered efficient, packetized secure communications, but reminded that there's a reason why we hams lost 220-222 to UPS - we failed to exploit it when we had it. There's nothing between 54Mhz and 222 Mhz for hams other than the 2m allocation. Please pick on someone else.
- quotemstr 7y ago
  One of the most important problems with discussion today is people seeing personal attacks where none exist. I'm stating a policy position, not "target[ing]" people. Conflating policy and personal attacks makes it impossible to discuss policy in a reasonable way.
  - howard941 7y ago
    I don't buy that at all. There are far more important problems than those that arise from voicing an opinion and having to field defenses from those who'd suffer under the unpopular policy regime you espouse.
Sanzig 7y ago
Well, for one thing, conventional analog broadcasts have not ceased. For example, every FM radio station in North America still broadcasts using the old fashioned FM carrier approach with stereo multiplexed on an AM subcarrier. So-called "digital" stations in North America use OFDM sub-carriers stuffed into the band edges (HD Radio), but they are still backwards-compatible with analog radios due to the widespread deployment of the existing technology. Also, amateur radio does not necessarily mean old-fashioned and analog. There is a lot of work by amateurs into Shannon-approaching communications on the HF bands, for example. The ham bands exist primarily for education and experimentation. Backwards compatibility is important. Education is important. Filling the bands with spread-spectrum Shannon-approaching noise may be optimal as far as maximizing data throughput is concerned, but it does not serve some of the other practical constraints on spectrum use.
madengr 7y ago
No it shouldn’t. It’s amateur radio, and an amateur should not have to develop an OFDM modem with LDPC coding, just to experiment. They should be able to cobble together a single tube radio and have fun, while learning something. You don’t want to turn 99.99% of amateur licensees into appliance operators.
AWildC182 7y ago
Have you ever actually used an SDR? Like an RTL-SDR or similar? Go buy one for $20, plug in it and tell me how much spectrum you actually see being used across the board. Below the frequencies used for high speed communications (>800MHz, LTE, WiFi2/5 etc) you'll find a whole lot of dark blue waterfall, even with an appropriate antenna.

Stratoscope 7y ago

I was talking with a friend the other day, a brilliant young software developer at Google, and the topic of ham radio came up. He said what really got him excited about it was the possibility of building his own transmitter from scratch, using individual components he could see and fully understand. I think that is something to encourage even in this day of LTE.

geggam 7y ago

The solar flare that eliminates all the modern methods appreciates your opinion

quotemstr 7y ago
People have been bringing up the solar flare electromagnetic boogeyman for decades. It's never been an actual problem
- geggam 7y ago
  Maybe not your lifetime but it has happened and we have been damned lucky more than once recently https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/March_1989_geomagnetic_storm https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/March_1989_geomagnetic_storm https://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2014/23jul_superstorm https://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2014/2...
  - quotemstr 7y ago
    I was around for that. Civilization did not end. Services were not disrupted.

howard941 7y ago

I'm saddened that your unpopular opinion targets the very people who pioneered efficient, packetized secure communications, but reminded that there's a reason why we hams lost 220-222 to UPS - we failed to exploit it when we had it. There's nothing between 54Mhz and 222 Mhz for hams other than the 2m allocation. Please pick on someone else.

quotemstr 7y ago
One of the most important problems with discussion today is people seeing personal attacks where none exist. I'm stating a policy position, not "target[ing]" people. Conflating policy and personal attacks makes it impossible to discuss policy in a reasonable way.
- howard941 7y ago
  I don't buy that at all. There are far more important problems than those that arise from voicing an opinion and having to field defenses from those who'd suffer under the unpopular policy regime you espouse.

Sanzig 7y ago

Well, for one thing, conventional analog broadcasts have not ceased. For example, every FM radio station in North America still broadcasts using the old fashioned FM carrier approach with stereo multiplexed on an AM subcarrier. So-called "digital" stations in North America use OFDM sub-carriers stuffed into the band edges (HD Radio), but they are still backwards-compatible with analog radios due to the widespread deployment of the existing technology. Also, amateur radio does not necessarily mean old-fashioned and analog. There is a lot of work by amateurs into Shannon-approaching communications on the HF bands, for example. The ham bands exist primarily for education and experimentation. Backwards compatibility is important. Education is important. Filling the bands with spread-spectrum Shannon-approaching noise may be optimal as far as maximizing data throughput is concerned, but it does not serve some of the other practical constraints on spectrum use.

madengr 7y ago

No it shouldn’t. It’s amateur radio, and an amateur should not have to develop an OFDM modem with LDPC coding, just to experiment. They should be able to cobble together a single tube radio and have fun, while learning something. You don’t want to turn 99.99% of amateur licensees into appliance operators.

AWildC182 7y ago

Have you ever actually used an SDR? Like an RTL-SDR or similar? Go buy one for $20, plug in it and tell me how much spectrum you actually see being used across the board. Below the frequencies used for high speed communications (>800MHz, LTE, WiFi2/5 etc) you'll find a whole lot of dark blue waterfall, even with an appropriate antenna.