Before I start on this week's diatribe, I'd like to acknowledge the tragedy in Las Vegas. I learned about it in the early hours of Monday morning as most did. I've listened to countless hours of NPR as they interviewed survivors and families of the murdered concert goers. I am deeply saddened about the event and fear that this will set a precedent for my own concert-going, habits. I've written about how I believe that politicians who call for prayers while not changing legislation are cowards and that there's a special place in hell for them. More words on how we need to reform our gun laws can be found here, here and here.
Now, let me sum up the crisis in Puerto Rico in a few words: people are suffering without electricity, regular influx of food and clean drinking water, and communications are down...on an entire island. Roads are blocked, and even if they weren't, nobody knows where to go to help themselves, or who is coming (and when they're coming) to provide aid. This is especially true when you consider the communities not adjacent to ports or major cities.
Puerto Rican internet message boards are filled with tips of where people can go to get cellular service...however, getting that information has been all word-of-mouth on the island as, well, they have insufficient power for computers and internet...so they can't really read those message boards. And, it's clear that direction to help from the U.S. Government has been slow. I've got some questions:
Why can't we have major LTE providers establish portable cell signal boats around the island to temporarily provide some cellular service? According to the Washington Post, tower range is highly variable and based not just on the strength of the signal, but also the geography it covers where signals get blocked and bounced based on buildings and topography. But, the general consensus is that it is possible to project a cell signal 20 miles. Puerto Rico is 40 miles at its thickest point, granted, it's not flat, but I would believe that, in this modern age, we could easily establish floating cell points to be used in instances such as this.
It appears that San Juan has limited power. However, even just after the Maria hit, NPR was able to communicate with FM radio stations on the island to get updates as to the conditions. Why? Some of those stations had generators to keep them up and running. That's good. Anyone with a battery- operated FM radio could, potentially, get life-saving information from the radio. The problem is that nobody buys new FM radios. I mean, we have them in our cars, and from the looks of it, most cars on Puerto Rico after the storm were...compromised. Still, an FM broadcast signal has the potential (at 100,000 watts) to reach a maximum distance of 100 miles...in all directions. Wouldn't it be great if there was a modern technology we already owned that had an FM receiver in it?
Well, as it turns out, most iPhones and some Android phones have disabled FM receivers in them! Wait, what? Why are they disabled? Here's a complete hypothetical, but I believe it's in line with Apple's responsibilities to the carriers that support their devices, namely wireless providers: AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile, etc. You see, if you give away something for free, like the ability to listen to the radio on your phone without using data, that's a potential revenue source gone. Mobile carriers would much rather you front-load your wireless contracts so that you're constantly streaming data (hello TuneIn Radio and I Heart Radio apps). So which phones have it? Well, there are too many Android phones to name, but Apple's iPhone, at least since the 4s have had this technology...including the recently introduced iPhone 8.
So, as you seethe while watching the President Jack-Ass throw paper towels to desperate American citizens that live on an island that was slammed by one of the worst hurricanes on record...save some of your anger for wireless carriers who insist that your cell phones be dumbed down for their profit, and to the detriment of desperate and dying Americans who could have used that technology that they already own, to improve their lives after a severe catastrophic tragedy.
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