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That's a really stupid thing about cell phones. We all carry these amazing radios with us, but they become completely useless once there is no tower around. Why
by thepete2 7y ago
That's a really stupid thing about cell phones. We all carry these amazing radios with us, but they become completely useless once there is no tower around. Why can't phones be used as walkie-talkies?
- Polylactic_acid 7y agoBecause the person you want to contact is unlikely to be within radio distance.
- thepete2 7y agoyes, but how cool would that be?
- state_less 7y agoI think it would be pretty cool too. For those times when you are out of range of a tower and in range of each other, you could chat up your pals out at the campsite or whathaveyou. And if you and your ilk load some kind of meshing or 'router app' on these advanced (non-hobbled) handheld radios, you might have a better chance of getting in touch with that out of range person by routing packets across radios until you're at the internet. Even if you limit the bandwidth to text messages for this feature, it could be a real lifesaver for folks needing to get emergency messages out.
- Something1234 7y agoWhat about the push to talk feature on some work phones?
- lawfulcactus 7y agoYou're effectively talking about APRS[1]. [1] http://www.aprs.org http://www.aprs.org
- state_less 7y agoThanks, it's fun to read through these links!
- BerislavLopac 7y agoI understand they can: http://www.servalproject.org/ http://www.servalproject.org/
- state_less 7y agoThanks for the link!
- SuoDuanDao 7y agoWhat would be really cool would be a protocol to use each other's phones as data relays.
- SkyMarshal 7y agoIt would be cool technologically, but there’s no way in hell I’d let random strangers use my phone as a relay. No telling what some of them would be up to or downloading. If there were a way to whitelist authenticated phones of my friends, that could work.
- SuoDuanDao 7y agoHm, good point. I'm sure there'd be a business model that could get around that, but everything I'm thinking of would require people selling the system to their friends.
- AstralStorm 7y agoNormal walkie talkies have much higher powers and/or different frequencies. Most cell phones already have Wifi, we would need a mesh (or at least special ad-hoc) standard for this and there you have your walkie talkie functionality with a bit of software. There has been little success pushing one of those as apparently nobody cares about this feature.