Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2020/12/03/fcc-cancels-proposal-to-allow-cell-phone-calls-during-flight.html
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The reason @frauenfelder is against in-flight calls is that that they are annoying? I haven’t really found their use on trains and buses to be that disabling to my peace of mind.
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They annoy me there as well: the only mitigating factor for either is the higher level of ambient noise on those methods of transport.
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Just because you can doesn’t mean you should. On a plane it’s much harder to get up and move away from the source of annoyance, like the child kicking your seat.
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You also tend to be on a plane for longer than other forms of public transport
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Heh, I used to have a longer commute on BART than most of my plane rides in the last 5 years…
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Typically when an aircraft is in flight several large jet engines are operating just outside the window making an incredibly loud noise. Trains, in contrast, are nearly silent. So idiots making sales calls on trains can at least talk in their usual annoying voice; on the plane, however, they would need to shout to be heard over the din. No thank you.
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Is the actual decibels on a bus higher than on a plane? That surprises me. Maybe I shouldn’t comment as I’m hearing impaired.
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Can BB make a post about Ajit Pai bailing the FCC now that Trump is going out the door?
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Depends, I suppose, but in my experience usually yes, as I have been more often on older, noisy busses than older, noisy planes, and also on buses in loud urban environments.
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If I live to be 100, I will never understand the Hate-Boner so many people had for this guy.
Now, disclosure, he is a friend and was a classmate of his in law school and last time I was in DC, stayed in his guest room. I hardly know a more decent guy and while I get the policy dispute about NN (although I firmly am in his camp), the piling on of personal insults against him was not only one of the most circle-jerky things I’ve seen on the internet, it lead proximately to death threats aimed at now only at him, but his wife getting rape threats on her work phone, and death threats being aimed at their children, with pictures, naming the kids’ school.
I suppose said friendship colors your perception of acceptable behavior and impartiality, especially when it comes to naked corruption, conflict of interest and self-interested dealing. Pick one:
Also where do you stand on killing Net Neutrality? Is this something you’re ok with as a citizen?
Edit: To add, i am not saying it’s ok to personally hate on Ajit Pai and threaten him or his family. However considering that ending Net Neutrality directly affects citizens and opens them up for abuse from telecoms one can’t exactly be surprised there are strong feelings about his failure to protect Americans from corporations. Fuck people who send him death threats, but also good riddance to Ajit Pai now that he’s leaving. He will not be missed.
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BART, not so much. The squeeling tracks are really loud.
Well done on acknowledging your bias, that’s step one. . The next step is to try to understand what almost everyone else is talking about. It’s pretty well documented; he’s visibly, publicly corrupt, bought and paid for. If you are looking for it, you’ll be able to find it without trouble.
There was a guy in my college who regularly used to get drunk and start fights, harass women and smash things up. ‘He’s a nice guy really’ said all his friends, as they swept up the mess.
Spoiler: he wasn’t, he was an arsehole.
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Look, I get the strong feelings about telecom policy. I’m merely lamenting the endless “Fuck Ajit Pai and his Punchable Face” crap you’d see Reddit and whatnot. Like that’s at all clever.
I am not going to get into scrum on this. I am just merely lamenting this kind of abuse directed at anyone just because they dared made themselves a public figure.
I myself possess about zero subject matter expertise, although all the doom and gloom predictions of $1 tweets and all that have come to naught and the internet has held up very well indeed during the 'Vid. If he was going to destroy the internet, he wasn’t very good at that.
Also, one aside: the “Senior Verizon Executive” canard is so ridiculous. First, he was one of about 80 people who were “Associate General Counsel” – and he had that job for two years, 10+ years before he became a commissioner. Second, lawyers (IAAL) have about zero personal loyalty to their previous employers and doing Verizon’s bidding or not doing its bidding has zero to do with his future employment prospects. If you are an FCC Commissioner, let alone Chairman - and whether you are a heavy handed regulator or had a light hand on the till - you are employable for life at any telecom company in the world, immediately and (it has to be the case) that that’s going to be in the highest six figures at a minimum. The “bought and paid for” thing because he once had a line attorney job at Verizon is just so much nonsense.
Oh bosh. He has a profit sharing plan with his old law firm who represents clients in telecom, and that’s corruption? You’d have to try hard to something more attenuated.
Setting aside the Internet has thousands of videos of actual circle jerks…
This particular one didn’t rate that high compared to the far-right news cycle this past 4 years. Dude on twitter says something > super fringe source writes article about it > less fringe source cites that > repeat a few times > ends up on fox news > back to the guy on twitter retweeting Fox News article.
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Yeah but this is more about long distance transport not commuter trains and buses.
Well, he could have quit and saved himself the trouble.
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Yeah, no. The aprobrium for Ajit Pai isn’t becuse he “dared to make himself a public figure” it’s because he’s a prime example of not just regulatory capture but of actual corruption.
Your defense of him is not on the merits.
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I think Slashdot said it all with the first comment on any story involving Ajit Pai always being the same-
“Fuck Ajit Pai”
The man is a joke and deserves to never hold a job with anything involving an EM signal anymore.
Like, we need to make him one of those people who cartoonishly does nothing but break rocks with a sledgehammer. And I bet he’d fuck that up too. Because he’s Ajit Pai. That’s what he does. Fucks shit up.
Fuck Ajit Pai.
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