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I'll say this for the ARRL: it's more flexible than the NRA for cases where one's hobby is causing problems with the wider community. Indeed it's over regulate

I'll say this for the ARRL: it's more flexible than the NRA for cases where one's hobby is causing problems with the wider community. Indeed it's over regulated- that you can't carry the internet over ham radio is one of the main reasons for its lack of popularity. Can you imagine if hams and the ARRL held the first amendment in the same regard that the NRA holds the second amendment?

curiousfab 6y ago
No commercial activities, no encryption, no politics and no religion are fundamental pillars of ham radio's culture and the adherence to these principles (on the air) has led to a world wide community of radio amateurs, who are living the "ham spirit" across political and cultural borders. It is a very good thing in my opinion. Ham radio would be a completely different hobby, and I dare say not an enjoyble one, without it.
2ndisnohobby 6y ago
The 2nd Amendment is a lot more than someone's hobby. Gun rights are minority and womens' rights.
crims0n 6y ago
I would argue the lack of internet over ham radio is more about technical limitations and less about regulation. The only practical transport frequencies are in the VHF/UHF range and those rely on line of sight. Even if you did put some kind of access point on top of a tall tower you are limited to 1200 baud on 2m, 9600 baud on 70cm (which is what most radios support). That is barely enough bandwidth to load simple static HTTP pages, add the overhead of encryption and it is completely impractical. Hams have access to bands higher than 70cm, and some look technically promising for an implementation of internet over radio - but the lack of equipment manufactured for those bands make it a challenge to get off the ground.
kawfey 6y ago
> that you can't carry the internet over ham radio is one of the main reasons for its lack of popularity This isn't exactly true; misleading at best. Internet via ham radio isn't really that much "fun" whilst the scope of amateur radio is incredibly broad. You can buy COTS 802.11 networking gear, update their firmware to operate on ham radio channels, and transport TCP/IP at 1500 watts of power all day long (sans encryption), but part 15 devices perform this service admirably. In fact, it's a part of the amateur service to not use amateur spectrum if the communication can be reasonably furnished with another service. A majority of ham radio happens at VHF and below, where data transmission speeds are very slow for TCP/IP communication, but fine for voice, other forms of data like ASCII text or digital voice via FSK/BPSK/MFSK/GMSK/QAM etc modulations. At HF, spectrum is very limited and shared, so wide-band modulations are frowned upon or disallowed, but the phenomena of worldwide propagation via ionospheric refraction is the main allure. There are numerous forms of ham radio internet, like HamWAN, HamNET, BBHN, AREDN, and adhoc mesh systems out there, that transport all kinds of (unencrypted) data useful to the radio amateur, but there are far more Part 15 systems that deliver the Internet and other encrypted information to its users. Allowing encryption on ham radio opens doors to illicit and commercial use of amateur spectrum. The fact you can't use encryption isn't killing ham radio's popularity, it's that it's practitioners and organizations are having trouble keeping ham radio relevant for the 21st century, and advertising/marketing the hobby to a new generation of prospective hams.
- jhallenworld 6y ago
  Well you can do TCP/IP yes, but not the public internet- it would violate the third-party traffic rule, non-commercial traffic rule and the no-encryption rule.. I guess you could do it if you monitored all traffic.

curiousfab 6y ago

No commercial activities, no encryption, no politics and no religion are fundamental pillars of ham radio's culture and the adherence to these principles (on the air) has led to a world wide community of radio amateurs, who are living the "ham spirit" across political and cultural borders. It is a very good thing in my opinion. Ham radio would be a completely different hobby, and I dare say not an enjoyble one, without it.

2ndisnohobby 6y ago

The 2nd Amendment is a lot more than someone's hobby. Gun rights are minority and womens' rights.

crims0n 6y ago

I would argue the lack of internet over ham radio is more about technical limitations and less about regulation. The only practical transport frequencies are in the VHF/UHF range and those rely on line of sight. Even if you did put some kind of access point on top of a tall tower you are limited to 1200 baud on 2m, 9600 baud on 70cm (which is what most radios support). That is barely enough bandwidth to load simple static HTTP pages, add the overhead of encryption and it is completely impractical. Hams have access to bands higher than 70cm, and some look technically promising for an implementation of internet over radio - but the lack of equipment manufactured for those bands make it a challenge to get off the ground.

kawfey 6y ago

> that you can't carry the internet over ham radio is one of the main reasons for its lack of popularity This isn't exactly true; misleading at best. Internet via ham radio isn't really that much "fun" whilst the scope of amateur radio is incredibly broad. You can buy COTS 802.11 networking gear, update their firmware to operate on ham radio channels, and transport TCP/IP at 1500 watts of power all day long (sans encryption), but part 15 devices perform this service admirably. In fact, it's a part of the amateur service to not use amateur spectrum if the communication can be reasonably furnished with another service. A majority of ham radio happens at VHF and below, where data transmission speeds are very slow for TCP/IP communication, but fine for voice, other forms of data like ASCII text or digital voice via FSK/BPSK/MFSK/GMSK/QAM etc modulations. At HF, spectrum is very limited and shared, so wide-band modulations are frowned upon or disallowed, but the phenomena of worldwide propagation via ionospheric refraction is the main allure. There are numerous forms of ham radio internet, like HamWAN, HamNET, BBHN, AREDN, and adhoc mesh systems out there, that transport all kinds of (unencrypted) data useful to the radio amateur, but there are far more Part 15 systems that deliver the Internet and other encrypted information to its users. Allowing encryption on ham radio opens doors to illicit and commercial use of amateur spectrum. The fact you can't use encryption isn't killing ham radio's popularity, it's that it's practitioners and organizations are having trouble keeping ham radio relevant for the 21st century, and advertising/marketing the hobby to a new generation of prospective hams.

jhallenworld 6y ago
Well you can do TCP/IP yes, but not the public internet- it would violate the third-party traffic rule, non-commercial traffic rule and the no-encryption rule.. I guess you could do it if you monitored all traffic.