11th at the Brecht Forum.
See you there.
Strange lights in the sky, visitors from other worlds, dream time visions, psychic phenomena,
UFOs, the internet, and more.
UFO Desk, a feature of Sidney Smith's Carrier Wave.
Alternate Monday mornings between 1 and 2 a.m.
UFO Desk over WBAI, New York.
Produced by Paul Williams.
UFO Desk.
And the time is just about 8 o'clock, which means another exciting edition of Off the
Hook is just around the corner.
The telephone keeps ringing, so I ripped it off the wall.
I cut myself while shaving, now I can't make a cough.
It couldn't get much worse, but if it could, it would.
Bum, dilly, bum, but the best, expect the worst.
I hope that's understood.
Bum, dilly, bum!
Bum, dilly, bum!
Bum, dilly, bum!
We'll be right back.
Off the Hook, where we talk about all kinds of things on the Internet, things that affect you technology-wise.
Bernie S. is with us on the phone from Philadelphia.
Bernie, are you there?
Hello.
How are you doing?
It's cold in Philadelphia.
I wonder why.
We had winter canceled this year, so I don't know why it would be cold anywhere.
But anything new non-weather-wise?
Oh, yes.
The pirate radio community is up in arms.
Okay, that's something to talk about.
We'll be getting into that in just a moment.
And we have updates on decency.
We have updates on the military and some high school madness, which we'll be getting to.
And, of course, we'll be taking phone calls, too, at 212-279-3400.
And I think this week we're actually on the Internet as well as over the radio in New York City.
Last week, of course, we had some problems.
We incorrectly said that MCI was down.
Actually, MCI was down, but it was MCI's connection to our provider that was down.
So there was some kind of a dispute going on with the bill or something like that, and that's why we weren't up.
But I believe everything is cool now.
We'll find out, though, I guess as time goes on.
Anyway, to get into decency, and, Bernie, I think you'll find this kind of interesting.
New Mexico took aim at Internet pornography Monday as Governor Gary Johnson signed a law making it illegal to give minors access to indecent material online.
Now, right away, that sentence is just kind of wrong.
New Mexico taking aim at Internet pornography by making it illegal to see indecent material.
Indecent material is not pornography.
You know, indecent material is, you know, all that stuff we can't say on the air, you know, because it might offend a preacher someplace.
But it's not pornography.
Pornography is, you know, something very graphic and specific.
Anyway, the new law flies in the face of a Supreme Court ruling limiting the power of lawmakers to restrict speech on the Internet.
Yep. And free speech advocates are already promising to challenge the New Mexico law in court.
Opponents of net decency laws point to two 1997 cases that could serve as precedent in their challenge to the new state law.
In June, the Supreme Court, of course, overturned the Communications Decency Act, writing in its ruling that Congress's attempt to ban indecent and patently offensive speech violated First Amendment constitutional protections.
In a case dealing with a similar New York state bill a few months earlier, a federal judge ruled that state lawmakers do not have the power to impose net content restrictions affecting companies outside state borders.
The Internet is one of those areas of commerce must be marked off as a national preserve to protect users from inconsistent legislation that, taken to its most extreme, could paralyze development of the net altogether.
Bernie, why do you think this keeps happening?
I think the enforcer types out there just want to keep people from seeing things that they don't want them to see.
And they just keep trying to get around the Constitution.
And there's no way around the Constitution as far as I'm concerned.
Well, the New Mexico law will allow law enforcement officials to pursue content providers who allow children access to material deemed harmful to minors, but makes exceptions for companies that rate their sites or require credit cards to subscribe.
So you have to use a credit card fraudulently now if you're a minor in order to see this and not get them in trouble.
Has ACLU taken an interest in fighting this law?
I have not seen specific mention of them yet.
This story comes from, what does this come from?
Tech Web News.
Whatever that is.
Tech Web News.
Just grab that off the net and that's the deal with that.
Yeah, you've got to watch out for those indecency bills.
Very interesting.
Especially when they don't define what indecent is.
Yeah, I know.
That's the thing.
It's a blank check.
They can make indecent anything they want it to be.
Unbelievable.
Military news.
And we all know how exciting this is.
On the heels of the recent attack on unclassified Pentagon computer systems, three Army World Wide Web sites were hacked on March 8th.
This comes from Federal Computer Week.
The Army Air Defense Artillery School, the Army 7th Signal Brigade, and the Army Executive Software Systems Directorate, oh boy, all fell victim last Sunday to hackers who replaced official material on these websites with messages about the previous Pentagon attacks which occurred last month.
The hackers mocked those recent attacks which Deputy Secretary of Defense John Hammer described as the most organized and systematic attack the Pentagon has seen to date.
That quote right there, you know, that doesn't say anything about computers.
They're saying it's the most organized and systematic attack the Pentagon has seen to date.
I mean, that, you know, eclipses all military action, I guess, that's taking place.
These kids really have made a name for themselves.
Did you hear what Janet Reno said a couple weeks ago, equating computers with weapons of mass destruction?
Yes.
Yes.
Her logic can also be equated that way, too.
A message from the hackers on one of the hacked DOD pages read,
For those of you in the security community, the so-called Pentagon hackers are using nothing more advanced than the STATD, a scanning technique.
Get a list of 200 sites and sit and try the same exploit to every one of them.
You're going to get one out of 100 sites eventually.
I guess that's a good point.
But it's kind of funny that, you know, you hack a site to say the people that hacked the other site aren't as good as they think they are.
Speaking of those people, though, this is according to Wired News.
One of the two teenagers rousted, I guess it was last week, actually two weeks ago,
by the FBI for hacking government servers, told an Internet activist that he still has high-level access to hundreds of government and military networks.
Further, the youth said colleagues, upset with the way his story has been sensationalized by the media,
are planning online retaliatory actions.
That could be what we saw a couple of days ago.
The hacker, who goes by the name Machiavelli, made the comments in several phone interviews and email exchanges with John Varenas.
This is the guy we had on the air a few weeks ago, and I couldn't pronounce it then.
I'm not going to try it now.
But he's the guy who runs Anti-Online, founder of the computer security group Anti-Online.
He's published several excerpts from the conversations on his website, www.anti-online.com.
In a series of telephone interviews, the youth, a junior in high school in Cloverdale, California, said he wanted to set the record straight about his encounter with the FBI.
They came into my house, took me in the living room, started taking all of the computer equipment from my room.
They didn't even leave the phone line leading from the wall to the modem.
They took all of my CDs, music CDs, data CDs, my printer, speakers, everything.
And, uh, Machiavelli, um, and his partner, who goes by the name Too Short, uh, both lived in the same neighborhood and were both visited by federal agents on the same night.
Uh, they were very upset by the way they were treated by the FBI.
They were roughhoused, according to them.
Um, and, uh, he was, however, Machiavelli was, uh, neither handcuffed nor placed under arrest.
And, uh, though agents, uh, removed all of his equipment, the youth still has internet access through his school and, uh, is able to send email and all that kind of thing.
One of the things the agents came back to over and over was the LLNL, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.
They wanted to know if he had read any files, if he remembered the names of any files and folders, if he knew if anything was classified.
I guess they don't really know themselves, so they're depending on him to, uh, to tell them.
Sounds like they're fishing.
Yeah, they, I think they are, they are fishing.
But, um, it's, it's, it's interesting how this, these stories just keep coming back, you know, they never really get settled.
All right, a couple of, uh, miscellaneous bits.
Uh, we mentioned, um, actually somebody called up a few weeks ago with an offer for free PPP, and they started to give out a, a password, and, uh, you know, we had to stop them right there.
But I'm told now that there is more information if you go to www.freeppp.com, uh, that will give you all the information that you want.
And, uh, we don't have to read passwords out over the air that way.
So, just go over to www.freeppp.com and see what you can do about getting free internet access.
Uh, here's a letter from Sweden, one of our listeners over there.
Uh, we have, uh, just giving some comparisons in rates and things like that.
We have one national phone provider owned by the government.
Uh, Telia offers a few different plans for domestic use.
Um, Telia Private has a monthly fee of $13.12.
I assume this is American dollars.
Installation costs of $121.
Uh, and, uh, Telia Private Youth.
I guess young people get lower rates.
Yeah, 18 to 25 years old.
It's half the price.
Uh, the call rates that apply to everybody.
Local calls are, uh, 0.025 cents a minute.
Long distance, which is the rest of Sweden, is 0.0625 cents a minute.
That really breaks it down.
Every call is charged what they call an opening fee of five cents.
Uh, there's no flat rate alternative.
A monthly phone bill of about $60 to $120 is not uncommon.
If you enjoy internet dial-up, you could easily be billed $200 to $300 per month.
If you want to move your phone, you'll have to pay $150.
Uh, because Telia was the builder of the pots, they now enjoy a great monopoly situation where
they own the whole national telephone network.
A few other companies have started to offer long-distance calls a bit cheaper.
The only problem is that the call always has to be switched through the local Telia phone
switch, for which they debit the other company five cents a minute.
Uh, the sad part is that Telia still has rather low rates compared to other European countries.
And that's certainly true.
Some European countries are extremely high.
Uh, one thing we wanted to do this week, we started last week, and maybe one of our
listeners can help with this.
Um, we, we had this, this toll-free number we were calling about the 646 area code.
You know, I had the thing all ready to go today.
I, I, I clipped it out and I was going to bring it in, but I left it, uh, I left it where
I put it, I think.
I don't have it with me.
So if somebody has that phone number, we can call it later and listen to the entire little,
uh, little play that they have as far as introducing the 646, uh, area code.
Bernie, I think you'll find it very interesting.
We heard a little bit last week and it was pretty amusing.
You don't have the number on you, do you?
Um, no, I wish I did.
Yeah.
In fact, I meant to call it later, but I forgot to write it down.
Well, in case, in case one of our listeners wants to help us, it's in that little, uh,
you know, whatever you call that newsletter, that Bell Atlantic newsletter that comes with
your, your phone bill.
I don't suppose anybody brought the phone bill with them today, so, uh, we don't have access
to that information.
Uh, 212-279-3400 is our phone number, country code one if you're outside the, uh, the country
and follow whatever international dialing regulations you must do in the particular nation
that you're in.
Uh, a couple of stories from high schools.
You know how high school students are always being persecuted for various things?
It's, uh, it's interesting.
You can do a whole magazine on, on just this.
Uh, we were talking about, um, uh, about a website last week that, uh, that prints things
that are censored from high school newspapers.
Well, here's some stories.
Uh, after listening to February 3rd's show and hearing about a kid being expelled for hacker
publications, I just wanted to show another side of moronic school administration.
I was in the library and messing on the computer and accidentally figured out something about
the Fortress 101 software they were using.
They have a Novell network set up and after you log in, you can move your mouse and click
the start button right after the start bar thingy appears and the start menu will pop
up.
The uneducated teacher saw me do this and then I got a Saturday for it.
I guess, uh, that means he had to go there on Saturday or something.
That's how they say it, got a Saturday for it.
And I did absolutely nothing to the system, but they are paranoid and thought I'd change
something and still acted stubbornly after I showed them what I did.
What I had access to by clicking the start button was nothing different from what I could
get through Microsoft Works.
Oh my goodness.
Through the open dialogue box.
Uh, the worst thing about this is a week earlier I showed them they could increase how
many computers had a certain newspaper archive, um, because they were all connected to the
same network and they took my advice.
And I guess he wants us to give out the name of the school because he says it, you know,
he says for the record, the school is Cardinal High School in Middlefield, Ohio.
Yes, stand up and take a bow.
Cardinal High School, Middlefield, Ohio.
So, and, uh, okay, well that's, that's a story added there.
And here's another story.
Uh, last week a few callers and email messages and snail mail messages happened to be based
on the subject of students being punished, even expelled from school for doing nothing
more than printing something or displaying information on the school or hacker related
information by web page or underground newspapers.
Almost one year ago, you could say I'm celebrating the anniversary, I was expelled from a high
school in Illinois.
I won't bother being specific, as opposed to the last, uh, last listener, uh, but the
main point was that I was the head of a local group of hackers and freakers.
We printed an underground magazine with information on making boxes and basics about hacking.
It was quite famous around a few of the circles of school and gained popularity quickly.
Unfortunately, this caused the creation of another underground newspaper, which was centered
more closely on explosives, stealing, etc., and this caused some heads to start turning.
That same week, one of the members in the group crashed the network at the school and
then foolishly decided to lock each computer out with a startup password after having formatted,
then corrupting the drives.
Another member of the group began that week to dial out the telanet using the school's modem
and trying to hack into NASA.
It's like the thing to do these days.
Why they did this, I don't know.
Yes, it's stupid, but let me continue.
While all this was going on, the NASA web page was hacked by, you know, Hages, the Scottish
thing.
Uh, the name of the HP group at the school was Fire, spelled with a P-H.
Apparently, the school board supposedly put two and two together.
They called in the FBI.
Yes, that's right, the FBI.
And the longest investigation the school had ever had before began.
As with most hacker cases, the first hacker that was pulled in squealed like a rat.
He knocked on all of his buddies.
This didn't speed things up very much.
However, everyone's story was different.
Some of the members were even being questioned for local robberies at the mall and spread
in more police and deeper investigation.
Usually, you'd say, oh, ha, ha, ha, nobody had the same story, they're all screwed.
Well, no, none of the members were stupid, nobody told the whole truth, and even each
truth was overshadowed with a lie.
The school did everything from outright threats to throwing us against each other by saying
another had said that they admitted to blah, blah, blah.
Some 20 students were pulled out of classes repeatedly for a week.
Some were even in small interrogation rooms for over 10 hours.
I have these interrogation rooms in the schools now.
Threatened with expellation?
Expellation?
Is that even a word?
Threatened with expellation.
Wow.
Maybe that's even worse than being expelled.
It's like, you know, a permanent, eternal expelling.
Expellation.
Most signed notes confessing to some crimes they'd ever even committed.
By not allowing some students on the first day to call home, which is a breach of civil
rights, I believe, they got what they wanted.
In the end, I got a lawyer, I got rid of all the evidence, and would not sign anything.
For that, the dean of students at the school decided to cause my grades to actually go down
by talking to my teachers.
You've heard the old story about how the teacher hates you, I guess.
Well, you're listening to the only person that ever meant it.
I'm not sure what that means.
I know this because another of the deans at the school happened to be a good friend of
the family and almost risked his or her job by leaking information about the investigation.
And I myself, who had never actually done anything in any way, was fighting back.
It's so hard to believe that after reading all this, but let's assume it's true.
In the end, this caused an eventual expelation for God knows what.
Even the printing of the other underground newspaper was blamed on me, as well as anything
else the school could pin down on me that they weren't able to pin down on anyone else.
All the members received suspensions.
Two had to get truant officers and some non-members, those who merely knew what was going on and
possibly withheld information.
Anyone at the school caught with one of the underground issues was also given a suspension.
Locker searches were done, as well as pocket and backpack searches for anyone known to
associate with any of the 20 students.
Not only were rights violated, but it all started because of the school system's fear of hacking.
I'm not giving the whole story here.
That doesn't surprise me, but trust me, if it had not been a hacker group, nothing at
all would have happened.
Sure, some members did some pretty stupid things, but to get the rest of us in trouble, or even
our friends who know nothing about computers in the first place, come on.
Well, you know, there's an element of truth to this, but there's also a lot of stupidity
going on in these kind of situations.
That's where these other people come in or are associated with real crime, and you just
get all these rings and rings of bad behavior.
And you mix that up with honor and honesty and things like that.
It just doesn't work.
You know, you read a story like this, and you say, boy, these people, they just don't
get it.
You know, they don't understand what the difference is between something that's wrong and something
that's right.
And that's the last thing you need.
If you want to put out a newsletter about hacking, you have to have some sense of values.
And by having people mixed up in it that are into, you know, explosives, stealing, you
know, friends that rob malls and things like that, it just, it makes an already cloudy
issue all the more murky and hard for the average person to figure out.
So, yeah, of course.
Why be surprised when you categorize as criminals when you hang out with and act as them?
Bernie, does that make sense to you?
Oh, yes.
It gets all very confusing when you just have to keep on the straight and narrow and don't
lose sight of the hacking ideal is all about.
Yeah.
Well, I mean, you know that better than anybody as far as, you know, what they can get you
for in associations and things like that.
But, uh, when you're involved in something controversial, you don't want to be involved
in something that's downright illegal and wrong and stupid on top of that, because that
just makes it all the easier for the controversial thing to be condemned.
So, hopefully that will, uh, that'll, uh, get through to a few people.
But we are interested in hearing your stories, uh, you know, as far as your adventures through
schools and things like that.
Our email address, othat2600.com, and, uh, we'll look forward to any kind of mail.
If you want to mail us regular mail, which we always welcome, of course, it's somehow
a lot nicer.
Our address is, uh, WBAI, off the hook, 505 8th Avenue, New York, New York, 10018.
That's right.
Now, uh, Bernie, what's this about Steal This Radio Downtown, the, uh, the community radio
station that's on the air without permission of the FCC, they got, did they get raided
it or something?
What happened to them?
Well, it was a, uh, a near raid by the FCC.
In fact, I could, uh, I could bring someone in on, uh, on the call in, uh, in about one
minute that has some more direct knowledge of that.
If you want to, uh, uh, put me on hold for a minute and come back, I'll have him on with
me and he can, uh, speak more knowledgeably about this.
Okay, as long as he remembers that this is not the free radio type of thing.
Oh, yeah.
We have all these FCC restrictions and regulations about speech and content and things like that.
So as long as that's clear.
Do not worry.
All right.
I, I, I won't.
Well, continue, continue talking about another subject.
Well, that was, that was, those were all my subjects.
I, I exhausted everything.
Oh, come on.
You must have one more subject up your sleeve.
Uh, you know what I'll do?
I'll take a phone call.
How about that?
There you go.
Take a call.
Then when you come back, uh, we'll, you know, we'll, we'll just resume seamlessly.
And if you lose me, call me back.
Okay.
Well, we'll, we'll, we'll try not to do that.
Okay.
All right.
Be right back.
So, uh, Bernie S. going to get somebody from, uh, Steal This Radio to tell us what happened
with the, uh, with the alleged pseudo raid or whatever.
Let's take a phone call while we're waiting.
Good evening.
You're on, off the hook.
Hey, uh, sorry I don't know what you guys are talking about, but I have a really quick
question for you.
Okay.
Why don't you know what we're talking about?
Because I'm driving right now and I live in Boston.
I don't happen to have real audio connected to my dashboard yet.
You don't have real audio connected to your car.
Boy.
Well, at least tell us what kind of phone you're using because you're obviously using
something weird.
Yeah.
And that's pretty much what I'm using.
I'm using a digital PCS phone by, uh, cellular one.
It's, uh, PDMA technology.
Uh-huh.
But, uh, I bought a GSM phone today.
Okay.
From Omnipoint.
Uh-huh.
And, um...
They have service up there now, right?
Yeah, they do.
It's been going on for about two weeks.
He said they have about 511, uh, sites around the city.
Cell sites, whatever you call them.
Right.
Anyway, he sold me the phone and, um, he didn't know what the, uh, PIN number was for the, uh,
SIM card.
And we called.
He actually gave me his phone and I called a bunch of his coworkers and no one knew.
Uh-huh.
And we tried to call customer service and we were on hold for about 20 minutes.
So, um, do you happen to know?
Is there a default PIN number or anything?
Or...
Yes, uh, I don't think so.
I don't think it's that easy.
Yeah.
Um, I would, I mean, if you have an evening to, to, to spend, I suggest calling Omnipoint
customer service and staying on hold.
Yeah.
And getting them to maybe figure it out.
I mean, they really should give you this information.
Yeah, that's what I thought, too.
They shouldn't stump them.
Well, he...
This is what they do, isn't it?
That's what I was, I asked him.
I mean, he had me try 000 and a 1234.
And after that, it said you have one attempt left before your SIM card is locked up, so...
Oh, that's just great.
That's just lovely.
Yeah, so, I don't know.
I thought I'd ask you guys, but apparently, um, do they maybe assign a number once they
set up your service, or...?
Well, no, this is something they gave you, right?
This is something you bought from them.
So why are you the one, uh, doing this?
Exactly.
It's ridiculous.
Well, I suggest you march right back into that store and, uh, and, and demand some satisfaction
because that's not the way, that's not the way to win customers over.
Yeah, unfortunately, we're closing in 15 minutes, and I was late for an appointment, but, uh...
Oh, well, march back tomorrow, then.
Yeah, all we could do was talk about how high their stock price is now.
Uh-huh.
Anyway, all right, uh, what are you guys talking about anyway?
Uh, we're talking about, uh, well, pirate radio, amongst other things, and, uh, you know...
And we're, uh, we're back on.
We're back on.
Bernie S. is on the phone with us, and we have somebody from, from Steal This Radio who's
going to tell us what happened.
Yes, he did.
How you doing?
Excellent.
All right, so, uh, you hurry on home and turn us on Real Audio.
If you missed the show, listen to it on the web.
Certainly will.
Great, thanks a lot.
All right, take care.
Bye-bye.
There's a caller in a car in Boston, uh, speeding away in, on, uh, a PCS phone.
So, okay, who do we have with us from, uh, Steal This Radio?
Hi.
Oh, hi, this is Pete Treatish from Radio Mutiny in Philadelphia.
Oh, okay, so you're not from Steal This Radio, you're from the one in Philadelphia.
Yeah, yeah.
All right, but do you know what happened to Steal This Radio?
Yeah, I actually came by to visit yesterday.
Uh-huh.
Uh, to, to, you know, confer with them about, about, uh, about their FCC visit.
And?
Well, uh, sounds like, sounds like they got their visit the same as we did, um, you know,
a couple, uh, you know, a couple months ago.
And, uh, you know, I, I'd actually, you know, prefer, you know, for them to, you know, sort
of speak for themselves about, you know, the, like the exact, uh, you know, context of the
whole thing.
Okay, but, but you're telling us what, what occurred, what actually happened to them?
Was it, was it a raid?
Was it a visit?
What was it?
Um, you know what, I, you know, I actually probably, uh, I probably should just put you
in contact with them, because I didn't know that that was actually what we were going
to be talking about.
Uh, you know, you know, like I don't, I can't really speak for Steal This Radio or anything
like that.
Okay.
Can you, can you speak about what you were told had happened, not what they're planning to
do, or what, what did you heard had happened?
Um, uh, you know, like, I don't know what they're, what they're planning to do.
I'm sorry about that.
Um, you know, uh, you know, it's really for them to, you know, to talk about as opposed
to me.
Okay.
Sorry about that.
Well, we'll, we'll, we'll reach somebody then.
Yeah.
You know, sorry about that.
Why don't I, why don't we go offline and I'll give you a phone number to call and, and,
uh, you can, you can talk to them directly.
Okay.
Bernie, can you manage that?
Uh, yeah, I can do that.
Okay.
Would they be available, would they be available right now?
Uh, very possibly.
I'll take another phone call, Bernie, while you handle this off air.
Okay.
Okay.
Okay.
And I'll call them and bring them in.
Okay.
Sounds good.
Um, okay.
212-279-3400, uh, while, uh, Bernie's booking guests on, while we're, while the show is in
progress.
Oh, great.
Um, speaking of, uh, PCS phones, um, I'm really mad at Sprint PCS now because I don't
know what it is.
I think they've just gotten too popular.
Uh, they, they basically, you run out of space.
You know, you make a phone call and it doesn't go through anymore.
You have to wait.
You have to wait about four or five attempts now for the call to go through.
And lots of times it just gets cut off for no reason.
You have a strong signal and it just, I guess somebody barges in and overrides you and,
and, and you suddenly, uh, suddenly are, are, are knocked off again.
You have to, uh, make the call a second time.
Um, I don't know.
It's, it's, it's getting annoying.
I mean, it's, I guess it's good that the service is popular, but if you don't expand,
uh, the architecture to, uh, to handle it, it's kind of pointless.
Um, Omnipoint also did something annoying today.
They, they, you subscribe to these services where you get text messages and that's something
that Sprint PCS is supposed to be offering.
They've been, they've been claiming this now for months, but, uh, so far nothing.
Um, with Omnipoint, I get weather, I get, uh, I get news, I get business, all that, that
kind of fun stuff.
Uh, today I got an advertisement.
Yes.
Isn't that nice?
Today I got advertisement from, uh, I'll see if I can find it here.
Okay.
Yeah.
This, uh, this came from, from a special number that they send out.
Omnipoint perk.
Purchase tickets to April 27th Rainforest Concert in New York City before the public.
Dial star RFI from your Omnipoint phone.
Limited availability.
Call now.
I mean, come on.
This is, this isn't a commercial TV station here.
This is my phone.
I don't need to see ads showing up, you know, beeping and waking me up and, and things like
that.
This is not what you want from a phone company.
And it's, that's just silly.
Uh, so hopefully, uh, that won't be happening anymore, any more times.
They, uh, they've introduced a new, uh, weekend rate, five cents a minute, uh, which I believe
goes from 12.01 a.m. Saturday morning to 11.59 p.m. Sunday night.
And that beats Sprint PCS as far as, uh, per minute rates.
However, Sprint PCS still beats them on, um, on per minute rates all other times.
And, um, a feature that I've been playing with, showing people that I, I, I thought
was really cool that Omnipoint offered was, uh, the weather, where you can get weather
from any part of, uh, the nation just by, um, typing in the city and sending it to box
four, four, four, and it comes right back to you and gives you the weather.
Well, I just saw in their newsletter that they're now charging 30 cents every time you
do that, so it's no longer a cool feature in my definition.
Bernie S., are you back?
Oh, that silence indicates that Bernie S., oh, you know what?
Bernie S. is gone altogether.
How about that?
I have to, I have to call him back now, um, let's get ourselves a dial tone.
So far, nobody has come up with the, um, with the phone number for the Bell Atlantic hotline,
and I, I should caution you, if, um, if we get it in the last few minutes of the show,
the same thing's going to happen as last week, where we don't have time to play the whole
thing, because it's a rather long, extended Shakespearean drama thing that they do for this
whole, uh, uh, introduction to the 646 area code.
Uh, Bernie, you there?
No, you had the wrong number.
Uh, okay, sure.
Okay, we have the wrong number somehow.
I don't know how we'd manage that, um, and I can't seem to hang up on this one.
Okay, there we go.
Let's try that one more time.
Dial tone?
I dialed the right number.
I did.
I definitely did.
Okay, we're going to try this one more time.
Okay.
Hopefully, I won't get that strange person again.
Hello?
Ah, that sounds better.
Okay, this, uh, this is Bernie, right?
I apologize for that, uh, miscommunication.
No, you don't know about...
The person who we had on the phone knew all about it, but he was just reluctant to talk
about it.
Okay.
And, uh...
You don't know what happened to us.
We just got a strange woman on your phone line, too.
We don't know what that was all about.
Oh, really?
Yeah.
Hmm.
She claimed we had the wrong number, but, uh, I dialed the exact same thing twice, so
I don't know how I managed to do that.
Oh, you can thank Sprint PCS for that one.
No, actually...
Well, you know what?
Maybe, maybe that was Sprint PCS.
Although, she didn't sound like she was on a cellular phone.
She sounded like she was on a cellular phone.
Have you noticed with your Sprint PCS voicemail that, that at the tail end of your voicemail messages,
sometimes you, you're hearing someone else's voicemail?
I noticed at the tail beginning of lots of phone calls, I hear somebody else's voice.
Uh, I also noticed that a lot of calls are getting dropped.
A lot of calls are, are busy, you know, where you can't get a line out.
A lot of times when you call somebody, you can't get to them because all the trunks are busy.
Like a reorder?
Yeah.
You get a reorder signal?
Yeah, one ring and a reorder.
Yep, I've been getting that, too.
Yeah, it's a real pain.
And, you know, sometimes I'm, like, walking along in a city street, and my signal suddenly
plummets to zero, just like, like somebody unplugged it or something, and then it comes
right back with five bars.
Has that ever happened to you?
It's happened to me.
I think they're having problems with their network.
I think they're going to have even more problems if they don't fix these ones.
That's, uh, it's pretty, it's pretty annoying, you know?
You, you come to depend on these things, and, uh, and they let you down.
Well, I feel like I let you down, but not giving you the, uh, the proper steel list radio
info.
Oh, no, that's okay.
That's okay.
But I can, uh, I can shed a little bit of light on it, but this is, you have to realize
this is fourth-hand information.
Okay, well, we'll take it for what it's worth, then.
Go ahead.
Last week, uh, the station was visited by, uh, an agent of the Federal Communications
Commission, and, um, again, I was not there, but what I was told happened was that the FCC
said that, you know, you're operating, uh, the FCC was claiming that the station was causing
interference to a licensed station.
Whether that's the case or not, um, remains to be seen.
Frequently, the FCC will, will say that, and that may not be the case, but, uh, there was
no affidavit saying that that really was true or not, but that's, what's one of the
justifications the FCC can use to try to shut a station down.
Um, they were not, from what I understand, they were not permitted onto the, into the
station to see the equipment, because they didn't have a search warrant.
Now, why is it that when they come, they don't bring a search warrant?
That happened to Radio Mutiny, too, and I believe it happened to Free Radio Berkley.
Uh, yes, it did happen to Radio Mutiny, and it, it may have happened to Free Radio Berkley,
but, uh, it's a, it's a complicated process to get a federal search
warrant.
Uh, they have to go to get it from a federal judge, show probable cause.
It's much easier for the feds just to stop by and try to intimidate their way in, and
they're often successful in doing that.
Um, they weren't successful in doing that with Radio Mutiny or with Steelvis Radio or
Free Radio Berkley, as far as I know.
But, uh, what they do say when they stop by is that, uh, they can, uh, they can give you
a cease and desist order, basically a letter saying that you have to stop transmitting
or they will have a search warrant, and, uh, they will execute it with federal marshals
who will take away equipment, arrest people, smash things, that sort of thing.
Mm-hmm.
That didn't happen last week at, uh, Steelvis Radio.
They were, uh, just visited and, uh, told to cease and desist, and, uh, that if they did
not, that they'd be bringing the federal marshals with them.
So I think Steelvis Radio was trying to figure out what they're going to do now, whether they're
going to stay on the air, whether they're going to move to another location, um, what
they're going to do.
So that's, uh, the gentleman I had on the phone, Pete Treatish, who started, uh, Radio Mutiny,
was meeting with the folks at Steelvis Radio yesterday, discussing their options, and I
don't think he felt comfortable talking about specifics, and like I said, the specifics
I had were fourth-hand information.
Okay, well, we'll be keeping, keeping abreast of the situation.
I'm sure this is going to come up at the, uh, at the conference next month.
That's true.
In fact, I just got, uh, the premier issue of, uh, Hobby Broadcasting Magazine.
Have you heard of this?
I've heard of this, yes.
This is Volume 1, Number 1, correct?
Volume 1, Number 1, published by, uh, a gentleman named Andy Yoder, who's a long-time, uh, Pirate
Radio, um, book writer.
Uh, quite a nice guy.
Um, you can find this magazine at, uh, probably Bookstans, I imagine it's being sold.
Um, there's a two-page article in there about the upcoming, um, micro-radio, a micro-broadcasting
conference coming up in, uh, in April, April 3rd through 5th here in Philadelphia.
And, uh, we will have the Chief of Enforcement at the FCC, or Chief of Compliance, rather, and,
uh, one of the lead attorneys with the American Civil Liberties Union here in Pennsylvania, who
was greatly involved with the successful, uh, constitutional challenge to the Communications
Decency Act, um, last year.
Actually, it was more than last year.
It was about a year and a half ago.
Uh, and, uh, Mr. Yoder with Hobby Broadcasting will also be at the conference.
And, uh, we'll be discussing topics of interest to people who are disgusted with what's on
the air these days.
And, uh, really the whole free radio movement is about better radio.
As, uh, as you're well aware, the radio, FM radio spectrum is pretty, uh, pretty much
like a wasteland now.
There's just a few bright spots.
And you could live in a city where there are no bright spots.
Mm-hmm.
So, um...
Fortunately, we're on one of the bright spots right now.
You are on one of the few bright spots on the East Coast.
Mm-hmm.
And I'm glad, uh, I'm glad you are.
I can give a telephone number for more information about the radio conference.
Why don't you do that?
Yeah.
Because we're going to get some more phone calls.
212-279-3400.
Go ahead.
Okay.
Um, let me find it here.
It is, uh, area code 215.
Uh, 215.
215.
You're really ready today, aren't you, Bernie?
Well, you caught me at a bad time.
Um, let's see.
Also, number four, here we go.
Okay.
Area code 215-472-4903.
If you call that number, you will get a, uh, you'll get a tape with more information about
the conference.
The location has not been hammered down yet.
We're struggling between two large, uh, places and trying to get the best price for
it, that sort of thing.
So, uh, that space will be determined in about a week.
But you can call that information and get to exact times and where the conference is
going to be held, that sort of thing, if you call that number.
Okay, uh, just, excuse me one moment.
Do you need to do this right now?
This has to be done during the show?
I mean, is this, are you going to announce the results or something?
Oh, okay.
That's the point.
That's the point.
So, you want me to give you my voicemail password to do this?
I don't think you have any other messages other than the one I left you, so.
Um, can I have my phone and I'll change it to something else?
And then, because, because it's a certain algorithm that I don't like to have made public.
And if you, if you know that, you could figure out other things, you know, other secret things
that I'd rather not reveal.
It's, you know, a question of, uh, of privacy here.
So, uh, they're doing something with my Omnipoint phone in the other room.
Kind of, kind of scary.
I don't know exactly where this is going to go.
All right, um, 212-279-3400.
Good evening.
You're on the air.
Speak up, please.
Yeah, um, this is, uh, Ed in Detroit.
All right, I wondered if you got some information faxed to you, uh, about a month ago from a
Detroit cellular phone company.
Um, I can't remember, um, describe it a little better, because we get all kinds of things
faxed to us all the time.
It would have been from your touch cellular.
Uh-huh.
Oh, are you the guy that faxed us, like, about 500 pages of phone numbers or something like
that?
I would never do that.
I wondered if you got it.
Well, I think my comment there should pretty much indicate the answer to that one.
Okay.
Yeah, uh, interesting, interesting, interesting stuff there.
Hey, I just wanted to say, Emmanuel, you got a great show.
Well, thanks.
I wish you had been up last week.
I thought the feds pulled you guys off the air.
You thought the feds pulled up?
No, no, it was MCI.
It was an MCI billing dispute.
Gotcha.
Hey, I'll let someone else get on the line.
You're fantastic.
Take it easy.
Okay, thanks for calling.
You're not going to leave us all hanging about what this information was, are you?
Well, uh, I'm afraid I can't discuss it right now.
Oh, come on.
I'm trying to change my password in one ear while taking calls in the other.
Change your passwords with your ear?
Uh, no, I've got, I've got, I've got, just never mind.
Let's take another phone call.
Good evening.
You're on the air.
Yeah, let someone else get on the line.
You're being there.
Yeah, speak up, please.
Oh, hey.
Uh, it's, uh, hi there.
It's, uh, Walter called Charlottesville.
How are you?
From where?
From Charlottesville.
Charlottesville.
I was, I was up there over the summer.
Okay.
I don't remember me.
Uh, I'm, I'm calling, uh, actually for, for a couple of purposes.
The first, I'm curious what you know about NAMs for, with PCS.
I'm calling from a CDMA compatible PCS.
Are you familiar with the concept of a NAM?
Uh, I'm not.
The number assignment module.
Oh, is that what it is?
Okay.
I'm, I'm new to this.
All I know is from listening to Off the Hook.
Uh, with, with my, my PCS, it gives you the option to switch NAMs.
Yeah.
Now, what I'm interested in here is, uh, I'm using a local company because it's dirt cheap.
And, uh.
What is your local company?
Pardon me?
What is your local company?
I'm, I'm using, uh, uh, CFW Communications, uh, Intel Oasis, NAM, but it's a division of CFW.
Okay.
Uh, and it's, it's cheap.
It's like, it's 50 bucks a month for unlimited usage, free calls across Virginia, et cetera.
Problem is, I can't leave Virginia.
They don't have roaming service.
So, I was hoping that I could work with Sprint to be able to use their NAM, if I don't know
if this is even applicable, to be able to identify myself as a different person or a
different subscriber entirely when I'm in other parts of the country.
What kind of handset do you have?
I'm using the Qualcomm generic soap bar kind of handset.
The soap bar one?
Yeah, the big, big, ugly thing.
Well, is it the one that, the one that says Sony on it also?
No, no, no, all it says is Qualcomm.
Okay.
There's no model number, or else I'd give it to you.
Is the, is the, is the front of it sort of curved, curved around?
No, it's perfectly, uh, rectangular.
Okay.
I know the one.
There's no model number, unfortunately.
Got you.
Okay.
Uh, unfortunately.
Is it just a feasible concept, at least?
Well, it's a, technically it's feasible, but unfortunately, Sprint PCS has a policy.
They refuse access to their network from any handset that is not branded as a Sprint PCS handset.
Even though Qualcomm makes the handsets, uh, for Sprint, and Sony makes handsets for Sprint,
unless they say Sprint on it, uh, they refuse to allow them to work.
Now, the, the way they get that to work is they have a database of all the electronic serial numbers of Sprint-branded handsets.
Mm-hmm.
Unless your handset is one of those serial numbers, they will, you can't even go into a Sprint,
you could, you couldn't even cancel your service, you canceled your service, and walked in to a Sprint PCS store,
and even though that handset may be a 1900 megahertz CDMA handset, perfectly capable of operating on their network,
they will not give you an account using that handset.
Gotcha.
It makes no sense, it makes no sense technically.
No.
They just want to have control over the handsets that are accessing their network.
I know I didn't like Sprint.
So, uh, I don't like that policy either, but, um, that's their policy.
Uh, a couple minor things, anybody that's living in 804 down here in Charlottesville,
you can get the A&I, Loopback, all that, at, uh, 297-0001,
and, uh, Beowulf, who's on channel, uh, off the hook right now,
is begging somebody in New York to dial 1-800-322-3511, go on off the hook, and tell them what it does.
So, if anybody's in New York, just do it, and he'll be quiet.
Okay.
Well, I don't know if I want to do it.
Uh, what do you think, Bernie?
Nah, I'm not going to do it.
Yeah.
Already got myself into trouble tonight.
Plus, we're running out of time, so we've got to get moving, but, uh, thanks for the caller.
Let's go on to another call.
Good evening, you're on off the hook.
All right, that's enough of that.
Good evening, you're on the air.
Uh, I just wanted to say that, uh, well, it's Indigo again.
Um.
How you doing?
All right.
Um, I was experiencing, like, the same problems with AT&T-PCS.
It sucks, too.
Uh-huh.
Do you use AT&T-PCS?
Yeah, the coverage is, like, really horrible in my area, and not only that, like, whenever
I try to, like, make a call, especially, like, at night when, like, it's peak usage, uh-huh,
um, like, it never goes through.
It takes, like, 30 times to even, like, get the call through, and then I'm always getting, like, disconnected, and it's really cracking.
Oh, that's, uh, that's, that's disheartening to hear, because I, I don't really know anything about AT&T-PCS.
Bernie, have you had any experience with them?
I was just talking with a salesman, uh, this evening, who's called AT&T-PCS.
He didn't have a lot of technical information.
He did say that the coverage was, uh, was better than Sprint and available in more markets, but I don't know that to be a fact.
What about prices, though?
Their pricing is pretty cheap.
Yeah, it was cheap.
It was $24.99, and you get, the first 60 minutes is free, and then you get free nights and weekends for the year, and you only have a one-year contract, and you get the free numeric messaging.
When you say free nights and weekends, what, you mean really free and not a penny?
You could spend it all weekend long?
Yeah, there's, there's, there's not even, like, um, like, with Bell Atlantic, they charge you, like, what, oh, I forget what the hell it's called, but, like, the, the, um, like, few cents per minute landline charges, but AT&T doesn't do that either, and I got my statement from last month.
Bernie, does that, does that beat Sprint, Bernie?
Uh, no.
I don't think beats the, uh, the introductory rate I got with Sprint, which I'm guaranteed to 2001, is 1,500 minutes a month for $75, which works out, which works out to five cents a minute.
How about, how about the free weekends, though?
They don't know if it's something like that.
No, no, no free weekends for me.
Yeah, because it's.
I don't think anybody gets that on Sprint.
Nope.
It's free, man.
That's a great thing.
I would use my phone all weekend if it was free.
Yeah, and it's free in all of New York, parts of New Jersey, parts of Connecticut.
I think, too, and.
Sounds like you'd want to stock up on batteries for the weekend.
It's pretty nice.
And it's, like, free all, like, all weekday from 9 p.m. to 7 a.m., I think, too, so it's not bad if you use it at night, too.
You know, even though all these wireless services really seem to suck now, um, as far as quality of service, you got to put it in perspective.
Um, I don't know if you remember back in the earlier days of cellular.
I had a cellular phone back in 1986, and that service really sucked, too.
Yeah, it was expensive, too.
You had to pay for those.
It was very expensive.
The phones themselves were, like, a couple thousand dollars.
And you had two hands to lift them, too.
And it had to bolt in your trunk.
Right.
And you could hear other people's conversations, which was, which was okay.
That happened to me.
It was okay, but you didn't want them to hear your conversations at the same time.
You know, it was just, it was just horrible.
It's worse than the PCS services are now.
So I predict within a few years, you know, the bugs will be worked out.
I would hope it happens sooner than that.
You know, I had a dream, though, as I was driving in, you know, to the city today, you know, of the future, of what the future is going to hold for us.
You were driving through the city of the future?
Well, no, I was just thinking.
You know, I do that sometimes when I drive, and I had just called information.
This is how Sprint PCS works.
You call information there, and they give you the number, and for no additional charge, they connect you to the number, which is kind of cool.
But what's bad is when you're driving and you lose the person that you're talking to, you don't know what the number was.
I mean, it's not on your screen, so if you redial, you're going to get the information operator again.
However, you can use the star back feature.
Are you familiar with that?
Star back?
Yes, the star back feature.
Sounds like something a football team has.
Sprint promotes this.
You can hit star.
Are you there?
Yes.
I heard a click.
I thought I lost you.
No.
I thought it was Sprint knocking me off the phone again.
You can hit, what is it, star pound or star talk.
I forget which it is.
Okay.
And it will connect you, if you call Sprint, they'll tell you what it is, and it will connect you back again to their directory assistance operator.
And you can do that up to four times and not pay for additional call lookup.
So you could do that.
Oh, really?
Star back feature.
Get the number again of the person you were just talking to, and they will reconnect you at no charge.
That's interesting.
That's interesting.
It just was a bit of a pain.
But anyway, as I was driving along, cursing out my phone for disconnecting me at that point, I was thinking, you know how you have these little phone books inside your phone where you can store like 100 names,
and you see, you know, the name of the person calling you when they call you because you've, you know, you've entered it as that person.
And then everybody gets to hear the touch tones as you're pressing buttons.
Yeah.
But how about this?
How about in the future when, you know, memory is really, really, you know, cheap and everything is stored on a chip, you have the entire phone book of the entire nation on your phone or accessible,
and you simply scroll down your phone to find, you know, say, the Howard Johnson's nearest you or something like that.
You hit enter and you call that.
No information, nothing like that.
It's just all available all the time, online information integrated into your phone.
I'm sure they charge a monthly fee for that, for the updating and all that.
But, yeah.
It would be reflected in your rates.
No charge.
I think that would be a good idea.
Well, it wouldn't have to be memory in the phone handset.
There's no reason the spring PCS phones and Omnipoint phones are, you know, digital terminals on a network.
There's no reason they couldn't be connected to a database where you could just access that database of phone numbers directly on their switch.
That's true.
That's true.
Well, that's something to think about, and we'll see how long it takes for that to happen.
Okay.
Thanks for the call.
We're going to move on to another phone call.
Take care.
See you later.
All right.
212-279-3400.
Good evening.
You're on Off the Hook.
Yeah.
Hi.
I wanted to let you guys know a few things about Sprint.
Okay.
Sprint seems to be the topic tonight.
Yeah.
One thing is, is that about the bad phone service.
Right.
I'm also in the New York area, and last month I gave them a call.
Apparently, if you call to complain about the service, they give you money back, $20, $30.
The way they do it is they look at your phone bill, look at two consecutive calls, and if
they see two consecutive calls, they give you money for that.
Yeah, I'm going to try that.
Also, if you complain that you've been losing calls coming in, you can't even get those
calls in, they give you credit for that.
Apparently, I called today to get it again this month, and what happened was Sprint said
that their network was down today, and they could not access my account.
So, I don't know what that means, but, you know, something's wrong with Sprint there.
Wow.
Okay.
So, it sounds like they're having their share of trouble.
Right.
Also, they said that they were going to put up new cell lines in the New York area.
Uh-huh.
Well, they better hurry, because, I mean, everyone's subscribing to the service now,
and it's getting really crowded.
Right.
So, they said they were going to put up all new cell lines in the New York area, in the
city area.
Uh-huh.
And so, it should get much better, so.
Okay.
Well, we'll look forward to it.
All right.
Thanks for calling.
Sure.
A lot of people are using these services now.
Money back from Sprint.
That's something.
Good evening.
You're on Off the Hook.
Thanks for calling.
Sure.
Hey, how you doing?
Okay.
Where are you calling from?
New Jersey.
New Jersey.
Okay.
Yeah.
How you guys doing?
What's going on over there?
No, I just heard something, and maybe you can clarify this about the AT&T network, and
there's different, what is it, CDM or TCDM?
What's the difference?
CDMA and TDMA.
Right.
Now, CDMA is supposedly...
That's the old-fashioned cellular, right, Bernie?
No, CDMA is the new-fashioned.
CDMA, I'm sorry.
I got it backwards.
TDMA is the old-fashioned.
Yeah.
CDMA is the, you know, PCS type.
CDMA is superior, right?
There's time, there's a carrier division, multiple access, and time division, multiple
access, I think are the acronyms.
Time division, right.
But my understanding was that the phone that AT&T is running, trying to get rid of, or,
you know, giving great deals on is that they're TDMA.
And eventually, because they got hooked up, when they got into this whole digital cellular
system, they hooked up with the TDMA, and it wound up being CDMA was better.
Oh, it's much better.
And it's my understanding that these phones that they're giving people almost for nothing,
is that they're all TDMA, and when they switch over, then eventually, after they get rid of
a lot of phones, that they're going to be switching to TDMA.
Well, it's not going to be an overnight thing, but yes, that is probably what's going to
happen.
The reason they want to shut down TDMA is because they can only squeeze in about, well, with
TDMA, it gave them about three prescribers in the same bandwidth that an analog subscriber
would have.
So you get three for one, and three times as many customers is three times as much revenue.
CDMA gives approximately, gives them about ten times the number of subscribers per unit
of bandwidth compared to analog cellular.
So it's more than three times more profitable for them to offer CDMA versus TDMA.
So naturally, they want to squeeze the most customers in and make more money.
I see.
I guess it depends on, you know, your usage.
If you're going to be in a small area, Omnipoint works or Sprint works or a few of the other
guys, but if you're going to be going from coast to coast, I think somebody that'll switch
you over and that also runs the biggest network.
Actually, well, I think the way Omnipoint works, though, it's a GSM carrier, so they
would naturally have contracts with other GSM carriers in other cities, so you could still
use it in other places.
I think as the technology improves, it won't make a difference so much where you travel
from, you know, all around the world.
It should be able to work.
Eventually, we'll come to that, I would imagine.
Yeah, I'd say within five years, it'll be pretty seamless, no matter which system you're
using.
But I look to your show to enlighten me on these things and also your callers.
Okay.
It's great having you guys out there.
Well, thanks for calling.
Thanks.
Have a good night.
Take care.
See if we can squeeze in one more.
Good evening.
You're on the air.
Hello.
How you doing?
All right.
Give you some clues to your PCS problems.
Okay.
They've been working with line-of-sight problems, LOS problems, and they're redoing
their reinforcement cells, like little sub-cells in between, and the buildings are fronting
a lot of dead zones in Manhattan.
Unfortunately, an interesting sideline on that is, as Bernie would be familiar with, is that
if you've ever been to a music concert and two notes are coming in at the same area, you
can sometimes get cancellation.
They're having a little trouble with FM capture effect.
Yes.
And nulls being produced by their actual cell sites.
I've noticed that the signal seems to sometimes move in like a wave and then sort of move
out again.
You know, you're sitting in a room and the signal comes in and then it just like evaporates.
Well, that's because they're doing some tuning tests on some of these reinforcement sites,
and I'm willing to bet you they're knocking their customers off while they're doing it.
Uh-huh.
I wouldn't be surprised.
And...
The old wave interference problem.
If you throw two stones in a pond, watch how the ripples interfere with each other.
You'll see there's certain areas where they cancel each other out.
That's what's happening with Sprint.
Yeah, that's where I am.
Yeah, well, they're sitting there trying to map out because, you know, Manhattan's a pretty
rough area, and the signals tend to also bounce and reflect at 1.9 gig.
You know, I did something this weekend that I never did before, ever in my life.
I went to the Statue of Liberty.
And, you know, I think they have a transmitter on top of the Statue of Liberty.
I think they have it in their hand because I was there and I had a five-bar signal.
Oh, I wouldn't be surprised since the torches shut off to cover all the people running cell
phones and whatnot on the ferries.
I'm sure they'd want to cover that area.
The bay's not that small.
They'd need to...
That is also a cell site on Governor's Island.
Uh-huh.
But, I mean, to actually put it on the statue, that's unbelievable.
Oh, you can hide it easily.
The antennas are not that big.
That's true.
You can hide them in the vents and the torch in the windows facing outwards.
Uh-huh.
By the way, I don't know if you're interested, they now make a car kit for your Ericsson.
Oh, really?
So you can put a duck on it.
I don't think it amplifies, but I think it allows you to put the adapter in, answer the
phone calls, but what's nice is it puts an outside antenna so you don't sit there and
change lanes unexpectedly on the LIE.
Yeah.
Okay.
Well, that's good, then.
But, yeah, they've been playing with the subsites.
I ran into somebody who was doing some work on the roof and I noticed the frequency of
the antenna.
I asked him where he was from.
He said some company down in New Jersey that's been contracted to redo all the sprint sites
up on some of the taller buildings in Manhattan, he told me that they're making these little
subsites and that they have to attune them because the cells have to be reached to a
certain size or a certain footprint.
They're still working out adding these little footprints in between where another site should
have covered it, but it's being eclipsed by a building or some other obstruction they
hadn't taken into account when they took their last survey.
Okay, listen, we're out of time, but thanks very much for the information.
Hopefully we'll get some more on this in future shows.
Okay-doke.
Take care.
And hopefully we'll be able to find out where all the cell sites are because I think that's
public information that should be known.
Bernie, I want to thank you very much for being on the show tonight.
Thank you.
And I guess nothing happened with my Omnipoint phone because it hasn't returned and I'm
kind of worried about that.
We'll find out about that next week.
Another edition of Off the Hook from 8 to 9 p.m.
Until then, this is Emmanuel Goldstein.
Have a good night.
The telephone keeps ringing, so I ripped it off the wall.
I cut myself while shaving, now I can't make a cough.
It couldn't get much worse, but if they could, they would.
Bum-diddly-bump are the best, expect the worst.
I hope that's understood.
Bum-diddly-bump!
Bum-diddly-bump!
Bum-diddly-bump!
Thank you.
Thank you.
In response to this policy, the Columbia Media Project is coordinating a solidarity delegation to Columbia in June, where humanitarian aid will be offered to indigenous and Afro-Colombian communities in that country.
To kick off the delegation, CMP will be holding a benefit dance party for peace on Saturday, March 21st at the Brecht Forum, 122 West 27th Street in New York City.
The party will begin at 9 p.m. and will feature the best in Colombian, Afro-Cuban, and Caribbean music mixed by DJ Power Surge.
All proceeds benefit the Columbia Media Project and its summer delegation to Columbia.
That's the Columbia Party for Peace, Saturday, March 21st at 9 p.m. at the Brecht Forum.
For more information, call 212-802-7000.