Like I said, "The medium is the message"

One bad transmitter in your neighborhood can cut you off from the hobby. Someone who's into linux and computers can follow an online tutorial to rig together an SDR. Look at a bunch of numbers or static, shrug and move on to a different project without disconnecting that anttena breaking an entire band for all of his neighbors. Then it's on those neighbors to go build a directional antenna and buy portable radio gear and then do their own "in the field investigation" to isolate which house is doing that, then go try to explain to the random person they are polluting a band and hope the person is friendly and cooperative.

In a perfect world the FCC would do that, but getting the FCC to act on small infractions like that is a slow and long process and often goes unanswered. Especially if you're not near a marina or a federal building or an airport. So one hackaday reader can take down ham operation in an entire area because they were just interested in a weekend DIY project.

People throw that "against the law" to limit the damage. But actually getting the FCC to prosecute these issues is a challenge in itself.

▲

jhallenworld 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

I listened to a net on a VHF repeater once- some guy's PTT button got stuck, which ties up the repeater, plus you hear the background sounds from his house. It was quite funny- FCC not needed, instead somebody called him (you heard his phone ring and him saying "What?!" over the repeater).

▲

walrus01 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

You have to really egregiously fuck up as an ordinary consumer/non professional to get the FCC to expend the resources to hunt you down and fine you. One example that comes to mind is a guy who continually operated a cellular jammer from his car on his daily commute on a freeway in Florida.

The FCC's enforcement bureau is not very large or well resourced and is primarily concerned with issuing enforcement actions on licensed broadcasters. You can look at their public documents/listings of "Notes of Appparent Liability" for examples. Everyone who gets fined by the FCC is public recod.

https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-d&q=FCC+enfor...

https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-d&q=FCC+NAL+n...

	▲	eddythompson80 an hour ago \| parent [-]
		True. Local ham chapters hold celebration events when they finally get the FCC to take action on something. The FCC used to be a lot more active in the 40s and 50s. Especially when there was a general hysteria and fear of soviet spies. The FCC still has various monitoring station everywhere, but they only use them for huge operations rather than policing hobby bands.