SHUT THE CELL UP
By ANGELA MONTEFINISE
Can you hear me now? Unsuspecting cellphone users may find themselves saying that more often now that cellphone jammers — illegal gizmos that interfere with signals and cut off reception — are selling like hotcakes on the streets of New York. "I bought one online, and I love it," said one jammer owner fed up with the din of dumb conversations and rock-and-roll ringtones. "I use it on the bus all the time. I always zap the idiots who discuss what they want from the Chinese restaurant so that everyone can hear them. Why is that necessary?" Swe....r ch....pers and st...ce. Hello Hello did you g....
Hello He...
| It could be necessary because they want to pick it up when they get there, not wait around for it. Who're you to be telling them what to use their phones for? |
Wise move. I don't think injuries received inciting a riot is covered by health insurance. But I am with you in spirit!
| I'm not. Just because I disapprove of what somebody's doing, that doesn't mean I have the right to tell them not to. Teenagers use their cell phones constantly, I forget mine half the time. But when I do have it with me, I don't want some bystander censoring my calls. |
Bless you my son, did you foget to put it on vibrate? Tsk, Tsk...
Jammers come in a variety of shapes and sizes, from portable handhelds that look like cellphones to larger, fixed models as big as suitcases. Their sole goal is to zip inconsiderate lips. The smaller gadgets emit radio frequencies that block signals anywhere from a 50- to 200-foot radius. They range in price from $250 to $2,000.
And to make idiot drivers pay attention to traffic lights instead of conducting arguements, I imagine...
But don't expect to find jammers at the local Radio Shack — they're against Federal Communications Commission regulations because they interfere with emergency calls and the public airwaves. They are illegal to buy, sell, use, import or advertise.
Why are we reading about this. O-oh we are being watched. Shhhhhhhh
| Why would you want to allow Mr. Dummschitz to jam your call to 9-11 after you've been mugged? |
Just wait 'till a jammer ends up minus a couple of teeth for interfering with emergency traffic. Popcorn time.
"Right now, there's a growing curiosity about jammers in the United States and New York," Bernstein said. "There's no better way to shut up a loudmouth on the phone, so people definitely want them and are finding ways to get them."
Like booze during prohibition.
One way is at a spy shop on Third Avenue, which sells medium-sized jammers out of a back room for $1,500. The sales clerk there said he had sold jammers to a 50-year-old man who bought one to use on the Long Island Rail Road, and to restaurateurs.
Yes! I am a Left Coaster. LI Railway doesn't mean much, but the restaurant situation is universal.
Folks who run auto auctions also buy them to stop people from chit-chatting about prices and rigging their bids, the clerk said.
OK Cheating at auctions? Fancy that!
An employee at a West Village spy store said the shop also sells jammers, but only to people from other countries.
You mean like using one in the Frontier country of Pakistan and waiting to hear someone curse in Arabic to locate Binny?
| Jammers aren't for locating people. All they do is put out a junk signal to disrupt communication. |
Tut tut tut -- Picking on the retarded is quite mean!
| But was the guy actually retarded? I mean the guy with the cell phone? My customers sometimes call me if there's a problem with a website. Why does Mr. Dummschitz have the right to jam my conversation? A physician friend of mine occasionally gets calls from the hospital. Why should Dummschitz be allowed to jam his calls? |
I will exclude sanctions of assault against any hotel manager caught doing this. Most of them are oily bastards anyway...
| Anybody remember CB radios, from the 70s? They became very common because of the national 55 mph speed limit, and they spread as a way for people to chat in a pre-computer age. Then the goofs started up and CB radio receded before a flood of 16-year-old potty mouths with RF amplifiers. Anybody remember email? It used to be a way for people to communicate with each other. I watched "You've got mail" with the Little Woman the other night, and it occurred to me how quaint it was. Today, the anonymous lovers would be waiting for mail from each other, certainly, but would occupy themselves deleting a constant flow of ads for Viagra, hot women to use it on, doinker enlargement, business proposals from Nigerians, notifications that they'd won lotteries they never entered, and of course lots of emails with strange titles and attached viruses. I bought my first cell phone about ten years ago. It lived in a bag and weighed about 12 pounds. I bought it after waiting for a customer to show up for an hour or so, without a working pay phone in sight to call the office. It cost me about $400. I had it for about six weeks before somebody broke into my car and stole it, which was a good business move for me because the air time cost more than the profit the thing generated. But they've gotten cheaper now, and lots of people have them, and the same nitwits that destroyed CB radio and email will do their best to destroy mobile communications, out of the sheer love of destruction. Pfui. |