4 ms·

I monitored the Facebook amateur radio club’s repeater during the outage to see if they utilized it in any capacity like that. I didn’t hear it used that way.

the-dude 5y ago
Isn't commercial use of amateur radio prohibited?
- throwanem 5y ago
  Yes, and so is encryption. Either would rule it out for this kind of crisis. That said, I don't know what's so wrong with telephones.
  - fknorangesite 5y ago
    > That said, I don't know what's so wrong with telephones. Do you have all your coworkers' personal phone numbers?
    - zrail 5y ago
      Sure they are ...on.... Facebook oh I see the problem now.
    - bityard 5y ago
      I don't... but why would I? My manager has my phone number, as does HR, and I imagine this is a standard situation at nearly every company.
    - mulmen 5y ago
      I have carried a company provided on-call cell phone.
    - htrp 5y ago
      Don't forget that all of those numbers are only available via the internal directory which just went down....
    - throwanem 5y ago
      Yes. Every time I've ever participated in an oncall rotation with 24/7 coverage, we absolutely did have one another's phone numbers, whether for work-issue phones or - as in my own case, since I never have wanted to bother with a second phone - personal ones. Sure, not everyone had everyone else's number, but among all of us we had enough coverage to reach anyone who might be needed to help respond to a sufficiently severe incident. The point was to make sure that, even if all of our infra including third-party IP comms and chat providers was hard down, we'd still be able to talk to one another and figure out what to do about it. For an organization on Facebook's scale to overlook something so fundamental implies lots of things about the collective blind spots of its engineering and operational culture. None of those things make me less glad I so assiduously avoid even using any of its products, to say nothing of relying on them - at least to the extent that I'm able to avoid it, given their apparent ability to break half the anglophone Internet more or less at whim.
    - callalex 5y ago
      Facebook issues a company iPhone with AT&T service to every employee. If they couldn’t communicate with each other it’s because the phone book is not set up well to handle this kind of event.
- thakoppno 5y ago
  That’s a good point; however, I do wonder if an outage like this could trigger an emergency use exemption. There was a point when this was unfolding where it seemed at least plausible it was an attack on a robust communication platform. Mostly I was hoping to hear some amateur enthusiasm gloating about invisible light resilience.
- bityard 5y ago
  It is, and it would have been illegal for any Facebook employee with a ham radio license to use ham radio to contact another employee for any business reason during the outage. We don't have any evidence that that happened. Where I live there is a General Motors amateur radio club. The club is not owned or run by GM, but GM sponsors it by allowing repeater equipment on top of their building, and presumably monetary and other donations over the decade. Many of the members are current and former GM employees but you don't have to be affiliated with GM in any way (or even have an amateur radio license) in order to join. There are lots of amateur radio clubs associated with a company for sponsorship/community outreach reasons, I assume the Facebook one is the same. (And I have to assume because they don't seem to have a website that I could find.) To reply to another comment in this thread, you can break nearly all FCC rules if you need help in a life-threatening situation. Facebook being down was NOT a life-threatening event as defined by the FCC, even if their services being unavailable indirectly lead to loss of life.
  - aerojoe23 5y ago
    "...was NOT a life-threatening event as defined by the FCC." That's interesting. How do they define it?
    - daveevad 5y ago
      > ... communications directly related to the immediate safety of human life or the protection of property may be provided by amateur stations to broadcasters for dissemination to the public where no other means of communication is reasonably available before or at the time of the event. https://www.ecfr.gov/cgi-bin/text-idx?SID=1a361a6eb3d1594e6a347ce0e363b533&mc=true&node=pt47.5.97&rgn=div5 https://www.ecfr.gov/cgi-bin/text-idx?SID=1a361a6eb3d1594e6a...

the-dude 5y ago

Isn't commercial use of amateur radio prohibited?

throwanem 5y ago
Yes, and so is encryption. Either would rule it out for this kind of crisis. That said, I don't know what's so wrong with telephones.
- fknorangesite 5y ago
  > That said, I don't know what's so wrong with telephones. Do you have all your coworkers' personal phone numbers?
  - zrail 5y ago
    Sure they are ...on.... Facebook oh I see the problem now.
  - bityard 5y ago
    I don't... but why would I? My manager has my phone number, as does HR, and I imagine this is a standard situation at nearly every company.
  - mulmen 5y ago
    I have carried a company provided on-call cell phone.
  - htrp 5y ago
    Don't forget that all of those numbers are only available via the internal directory which just went down....
  - throwanem 5y ago
    Yes. Every time I've ever participated in an oncall rotation with 24/7 coverage, we absolutely did have one another's phone numbers, whether for work-issue phones or - as in my own case, since I never have wanted to bother with a second phone - personal ones. Sure, not everyone had everyone else's number, but among all of us we had enough coverage to reach anyone who might be needed to help respond to a sufficiently severe incident. The point was to make sure that, even if all of our infra including third-party IP comms and chat providers was hard down, we'd still be able to talk to one another and figure out what to do about it. For an organization on Facebook's scale to overlook something so fundamental implies lots of things about the collective blind spots of its engineering and operational culture. None of those things make me less glad I so assiduously avoid even using any of its products, to say nothing of relying on them - at least to the extent that I'm able to avoid it, given their apparent ability to break half the anglophone Internet more or less at whim.
  - callalex 5y ago
    Facebook issues a company iPhone with AT&T service to every employee. If they couldn’t communicate with each other it’s because the phone book is not set up well to handle this kind of event.
thakoppno 5y ago
That’s a good point; however, I do wonder if an outage like this could trigger an emergency use exemption. There was a point when this was unfolding where it seemed at least plausible it was an attack on a robust communication platform. Mostly I was hoping to hear some amateur enthusiasm gloating about invisible light resilience.
bityard 5y ago
It is, and it would have been illegal for any Facebook employee with a ham radio license to use ham radio to contact another employee for any business reason during the outage. We don't have any evidence that that happened. Where I live there is a General Motors amateur radio club. The club is not owned or run by GM, but GM sponsors it by allowing repeater equipment on top of their building, and presumably monetary and other donations over the decade. Many of the members are current and former GM employees but you don't have to be affiliated with GM in any way (or even have an amateur radio license) in order to join. There are lots of amateur radio clubs associated with a company for sponsorship/community outreach reasons, I assume the Facebook one is the same. (And I have to assume because they don't seem to have a website that I could find.) To reply to another comment in this thread, you can break nearly all FCC rules if you need help in a life-threatening situation. Facebook being down was NOT a life-threatening event as defined by the FCC, even if their services being unavailable indirectly lead to loss of life.
- aerojoe23 5y ago
  "...was NOT a life-threatening event as defined by the FCC." That's interesting. How do they define it?
  - daveevad 5y ago
    > ... communications directly related to the immediate safety of human life or the protection of property may be provided by amateur stations to broadcasters for dissemination to the public where no other means of communication is reasonably available before or at the time of the event. https://www.ecfr.gov/cgi-bin/text-idx?SID=1a361a6eb3d1594e6a347ce0e363b533&mc=true&node=pt47.5.97&rgn=div5 https://www.ecfr.gov/cgi-bin/text-idx?SID=1a361a6eb3d1594e6a...