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> Test and measurement supersedes intentional emission. On what authority are you claiming this? The language LeifCarrotson quoted refers only to digital devic

> Test and measurement supersedes intentional emission. On what authority are you claiming this? The language LeifCarrotson quoted refers only to digital devices, and the language I quoted above says plainly that a digital device must be an unintentional radiator. To be clear, I believe selling their dev board is fine, but it's fine in the same way that driving 60 mph in a 55 zone is fine. Anyone selling an intentional radiator dev board that could reasonably be considered to be a complete device in itself is taking a small risk of FCC action, especially if (as here) they're pushing the limits of "dev board". Note that the Raspberry Pi developers do seem to get certs. https://www.raspberrypi.org/documentation/hardware/raspberrypi/conformity.md https://www.raspberrypi.org/documentation/hardware/raspberry...

R0b0t1 6y ago
On what authority are you claiming otherwise? My opinion comes from experience and getting things certified but also common sense and observing enforcement patterns (the latter of which is most important until they overstep and get challenged). Go back to my example: Does a one-off product need to be certified to be transferred to the people that paid for it? Keep in mind, best case, this will add a roughly >$10k fixed cost to the sticker price. It's a general principle in common law that the law makes sense. The popular, sophomoric, and extremely conservative interpretation of the FCC rules makes no sense by way of being extremely costly for no discernible benefit, either to the seller, the buyer, or the economy at large.
- tripletao 6y ago
  I am claiming this on the authority of the text of the regulations. The USA is a nation of laws, and those regulations have the power of law. If it came to that, a judge isn't going to disregard them just because you think they're too expensive. If you think otherwise, can you provide case law to support your view? By law, that one-off intentional radiator absolutely does need to be certified. The FCC's enforcement priorities will be different depending whether that product is a little 2.4 GHz radio or a television transmitter, but their enforcement discretion doesn't change the law. Anyone who wants to be compliant needs to pay for the testing (or use a certified module, which is often easy and cheap; I've done that several times myself). Lots of people disregard lots of laws because they're too expensive to comply with. Most of them get away with it, and a few of them get nasty surprises. I believe that I've given both the correct legal advice and a correct description of typical (not fully legal) practice. It's not helpful to conflate the two.
  - R0b0t1 6y ago
    The text of the law matters not as much as what the law was intended to do. In any case, by saying the one off needs certified you've gone off into la-la land; any reasonable person classifies it as a test/measurement device and gets on with their life.
    - tripletao 6y ago
      You are failing to distinguish between the law as it's written and the law as it's currently enforced, and inventing a quasi-legal framework with no relationship to actual American law to justify your conflation. It's true that judges will sometimes consider legislative intent when the text is unclear; but in this case, the text is perfectly clear, so that's not relevant. Large companies, small companies that want to get bought by large companies, and other conservative entities generally aim to comply with the law as written, even though there's lots beyond that you can probably get away with. Everyone should judge for themselves how far they want to push from clearly legal actions to grey to clearly illegal but unenforced; but they should know which one they're doing, and your advice isn't helping. If we submitted a KDB inquiry asking the FCC whether the board in question required certification, what do you think they'd say? (It's free, and you typically get a quite competent response within a few days. If anyone wants to try, please use a generic description, and not a link to the particular product. I doubt the FCC would waste their time enforcing, but the chance isn't zero and the developers don't need that attention.) Or why do you think the Pi developers got certs?
      - R0b0t1 6y ago
        The words on paper are only a lens which you view what was originally intended. I'm not doing anything abnormal, and judges always consider legislative intent. We are not ruled by the particulars of language. I generally aim to comply with the law as much as possible as well, but the people in this post (including yourself) seem to have no idea of the true cost of complying with the interpretation of the FCC rules you are putting forth. Yes, if you ask the FCC whether it requires certification they would probably say yes, mainly because they do not want to undermine their authority. This is something I've dealt with quite a bit with pretty much any regulatory body; they pick the most restrictive and burdensome interpretation regardless of what common sense or existing or future court cases eventually say.

R0b0t1 6y ago

On what authority are you claiming otherwise? My opinion comes from experience and getting things certified but also common sense and observing enforcement patterns (the latter of which is most important until they overstep and get challenged). Go back to my example: Does a one-off product need to be certified to be transferred to the people that paid for it? Keep in mind, best case, this will add a roughly >$10k fixed cost to the sticker price. It's a general principle in common law that the law makes sense. The popular, sophomoric, and extremely conservative interpretation of the FCC rules makes no sense by way of being extremely costly for no discernible benefit, either to the seller, the buyer, or the economy at large.

tripletao 6y ago
I am claiming this on the authority of the text of the regulations. The USA is a nation of laws, and those regulations have the power of law. If it came to that, a judge isn't going to disregard them just because you think they're too expensive. If you think otherwise, can you provide case law to support your view? By law, that one-off intentional radiator absolutely does need to be certified. The FCC's enforcement priorities will be different depending whether that product is a little 2.4 GHz radio or a television transmitter, but their enforcement discretion doesn't change the law. Anyone who wants to be compliant needs to pay for the testing (or use a certified module, which is often easy and cheap; I've done that several times myself). Lots of people disregard lots of laws because they're too expensive to comply with. Most of them get away with it, and a few of them get nasty surprises. I believe that I've given both the correct legal advice and a correct description of typical (not fully legal) practice. It's not helpful to conflate the two.
- R0b0t1 6y ago
  The text of the law matters not as much as what the law was intended to do. In any case, by saying the one off needs certified you've gone off into la-la land; any reasonable person classifies it as a test/measurement device and gets on with their life.
  - tripletao 6y ago
    You are failing to distinguish between the law as it's written and the law as it's currently enforced, and inventing a quasi-legal framework with no relationship to actual American law to justify your conflation. It's true that judges will sometimes consider legislative intent when the text is unclear; but in this case, the text is perfectly clear, so that's not relevant. Large companies, small companies that want to get bought by large companies, and other conservative entities generally aim to comply with the law as written, even though there's lots beyond that you can probably get away with. Everyone should judge for themselves how far they want to push from clearly legal actions to grey to clearly illegal but unenforced; but they should know which one they're doing, and your advice isn't helping. If we submitted a KDB inquiry asking the FCC whether the board in question required certification, what do you think they'd say? (It's free, and you typically get a quite competent response within a few days. If anyone wants to try, please use a generic description, and not a link to the particular product. I doubt the FCC would waste their time enforcing, but the chance isn't zero and the developers don't need that attention.) Or why do you think the Pi developers got certs?
    - R0b0t1 6y ago
      The words on paper are only a lens which you view what was originally intended. I'm not doing anything abnormal, and judges always consider legislative intent. We are not ruled by the particulars of language. I generally aim to comply with the law as much as possible as well, but the people in this post (including yourself) seem to have no idea of the true cost of complying with the interpretation of the FCC rules you are putting forth. Yes, if you ask the FCC whether it requires certification they would probably say yes, mainly because they do not want to undermine their authority. This is something I've dealt with quite a bit with pretty much any regulatory body; they pick the most restrictive and burdensome interpretation regardless of what common sense or existing or future court cases eventually say.