Far, far more people are injured and killed by balls used in sports than R/C models.

Well that sure seems like a bold statement to make with no links. Can't help but notice you have links for everything else...

Although it agrees with what I said about baseballs and common sense, so thanks for that.

That's the difference - common sense. People playing in a park are not using the velocities those balls reach during sports.

Drones though are just one mechanical failure away from lethal force given the height and mass they generally have during operation, all without any effort. To move a ball with enough force to hurt someone requires conscious action.

Your comparison of drones to balls is absolutely absurd.

I imagine that significantly more people have been injured and killed by kites than R/C models.

Common sense... *sigh*

Presumably, you also think that kites should be treated the same way?

I'm not sure why anyone would think that given how much less mass they have, and the fact they are almost entirely physically controlled. If a string breaks they flutter to the ground, not plummet.

And baseballs, footballs, soccer balls?

These objects basically hug the ground and don't have the ability to rapidly change course, nor are they generally operating at speeds that can cause much harm. Note however that baseballs ARE dangerous enough that people batting generally confine themselves to specific areas for that purpose, because they could in fact hurt someone.

When's the last time you saw someone playing baseball (with a bat, not throwing) in the middle of a festival or crowded park? You are basically saying you would do that if given a choice?

If drone operators had 1/10 the common sense the average baseball players had you wouldn't see regulations like this.

Oh, wait, you didn't need to pass a test for that.

I'm just trying to think how that would have been possible. I think back then there was a medical exception you could plead for. I didn't. I passed the 20 WPM test fair and square and got K6BP as a vanity call, long before there was any way to get that call without passing a 20 WPM test.

Unfortunately, ARRL did fight to keep those code speeds in place, and to keep code requirements, for the last several decades that I know of and probably continuously since 1936. Of course there was all of the regulation around incentive licensing, where code speeds were given a primary role. Just a few years ago, they sent Rod Stafford to the final IARU meeting on the code issue with one mission: preventing an international vote for removal of S25.5 . They lost.

I am not blaming this on ARRL staff and officers. Many of them have privately told me of their support, including some directors and their First VP, now SK. It's the membership that has been the problem.

I am having a lot of trouble believing the government agency and NGO thing, as well. I talked with some corporate emergency managers as part of my opposition to the encryption proceeding (we won that too, by the way, and I dragged an unwilling ARRL, who had said they would not comment, into the fight). Big hospitals, etc.

What I got from the corporate folks was that their management was resistant to using Radio Amateurs regardless of what the law was. Not that they were chomping at the bit waiting to be able to carry HIPAA-protected emergency information via encrypted Amateur radio. Indeed, if you read the encryption proceeding, public agencies and corporations hardly commented at all. That point was made very clearly in FCC's statement - the agencies that were theorized by Amateurs to want encryption didn't show any interest in the proceeding.

So, I am having trouble believing that the federal agency and NGO thing is real because of that.

How is it not sane to think that the people who could be potentially hit by your craft would have something to say about it flying over them?

I find this a perfectly reasonable law. Don't forget it means that could could fly on private property NEXT to the public property and film from there, as long as you are not directly over the public area...

LAX T-Mobile service was pretty good for me just a few weeks ago, way better than the LAX WiFi!

I've pretty much given up on airports and hotels to provide usable WiFi, I just tether now pretty much anywhere if possible.

Organic honeybee producers never had much of a real problem, it was really only large scale agricultural bees that had issues - it never really was at the point of crisis, like everything else these days it was just being used to scare you for someone else's gain.

Lots of government money happily funneled to useless bee research...

As an aside honey is really good for you, you should have some when you can - it's great to replace sweeteners in things like tea or cereal. It has lots of health benefits and never goes bad. Believe it or not it also relieves pain from bee stings when a bit is applied topically to the stung area (I know that that sounds absurd but all I can say is that it works and works quickly).

Watching porn is not dangerous

You, sir, are not watching the right kind of porn.

They were probably just making a reference sample.

Who is to say if a call was really pocket-dialed, or the call was triggered by a third party on a hacked phone....

The real question is why ANYONE would think you have to like all the people you work with.

You don't have to of course. You are just an idiot if you don't seek that out when you have the ability - which all developers do because of the ease of finding work currently. I feel sorry for people who have more trouble finding work, who do not have that flexibility...

If you think about it, if you are working with a lot of people you don't like as a developer you are spitting on the less privileged. Or you are a masochist, which is fine - I also don't have to work with you.

The Technican Element 3 test wasn't more difficult than the Novice Element 1 and 2 together, so Technican became the lowest license class when they stopped having to take Element 1.

The change to 13 WPM was in 1936, and was specifically to reduce the number of Amateur applicants. It was 10 WPM before that. ARRL asked for 12.5 WPM in their filing, FCC rounded the number because they felt it would be difficult to set 12.5 on the Instructograph and other equipment available for code practice at the time.

It was meant to keep otherwise-worthy hams out of the hobby. And then we let that requirement keep going for 60 years.

The Indianapolis cop episode was back in 2009. It wasn't the first time we've had intruders, and won't be the last, and if you have to reach back that long for an example, the situation can't be that bad. It had nothing to do with code rules or NGOs getting their operators licenses.

A satphone is less expensive than a trained HF operator. Iridium costs $30 per month and $0.89 per minute to call another Iridium phone. That's the over-the-counter rate. Government agencies get a better rate than that. And the phone costs $1100, again that's retail not the government rate, less than an HF rig with antenna and tower will cost any public agency to install.

You think it's a big deal to lobby against paid operators because there will be objections? How difficult do you think it was to reform the code regulations? Don't you think there were lots of opposing comments?

And you don't care about young people getting into Amateur Radio. That's non-survival thinking.

Fortunately, when the real hams go to get something done, folks like you aren't hard to fight, because you don't really do much other than whine and send in the occassional FCC comment. Do you know I even spoke in Iceland when I was lobbying against the code rules? Their IARU vote had the same power as that of the U.S., and half of the hams in the country came to see me. That's how you make real change.

Warhol's Entitlement isn't just for people anymore.

Sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn't (at least for me).

The problem is that needing that to come on eliminates any advantage it had in having a screen that was always on vs. the Apple Watch - in the end if I move my wrist to see the time I am successful way more often with the Apple Watch than with the Pebble Time.

Yep, there are a lot of flashing lights and beeps sending code in the computer world. I still hear phones using "... -- ..." to indicate an incoming SMS.