Are there places where you can't even make emergency calls

[micky]

Please settle an argument I have with a friend. She wouldn't take my
word for it. I went hiking today, short hike, off road, away from
cities and towns, sometimes no cell service** even on parts of the
highway leadintg to the hike,, and there was no cellular service on the
trail.

My friend insists you can still make emergency phone calls. I keep
telling her, only if there is cellular servie on an cell company you
don't subscribe to, or if you have no sim card at all. She pauses and
thinks, and then doesn't believe me. But if you all vote, she'll
believe you.

Mean time, a week ago or more I asked for an app that would bee[ when
I'd lost cell service. I installedd this one that Andy found:
> *Cellular Connection Monitor* by Pavel Borzenkov (it has a 0 rating though)
> <https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.simple.axanor.simpleconnectivitymonitor>

It didnt' work. So I'll go back and follow the other suggestsions.
What I didn't put 2 and 2 toegher before today was that the car radio
would tell me when the cell service failed, IF SERVICE EVEN ON THE
HIGHWAY WASN'T CONSTANT. aND It wasn't. The car radio uses the phone
to listen to android apps like Tunein. Of course audio is buffered aiui
so I don't know exactly when the signal is gone, but it was gone several
times.

The car radio also shows how much charge is in the phone's battery and
how strong the cell signal is, from the phone's pov.

And it was down to no bars some of the time. But during that time, I
had tried to run the app abovbe and could never get it to save the
start-up values on the first screen. Tried 4 or 5 times.

Turned out, no cell coveragein on any of this 2 mile hike, but this is a
popular one. When I got there at 2:30 there were 25 cars int he lot,
and even when I left at 3;45, there were 12. I need to make further
plans if I go somewhere more quiet, or I need to get started early.

[Andy Burnelli]

micky wrote:

> But if you all vote, she'll
> believe you.

Didn't nospam _already_ answer that same question for you the last time?

HINT: It doesn't matter whether or not you have a SIM card in the phone.

[Andy Burnelli]

micky wrote:

> Turned out, no cell coveragein on any of this 2 mile hike, but this is a
> popular one.

Look at this set of screenshots which can give you a map of imputed towers.
<https://i.postimg.cc/Gtywwn8f/signal01.jpg>
<https://i.postimg.cc/xCbVQ2pj/signal02.jpg>
<https://i.postimg.cc/CKFhMZtS/signal03.jpg?

To get that information, just install this free ad free app on your phone.
*Cellular-Z*, by JerseyHo, rated 4.0 out of 100K+ installs
<https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=make.more.r2d2.cellular_z>

That will show you a _lot_ of important stuff which you can't get otherwise.
"Cellular Z is a telecom signal quality and Wifi network info,
channel info software, the main functions are as follows:
1. Dual SIM mobile phone network information
(SIM card serving cell, serving cell signal quality,neighboring cells).
2. Wifi (connected, nearby Wifi list, Wifi channel 2.5 and 5 GHz).
3. Current location information GPS Satellites
4. Device information (battery, hardware, system).
5.speedtest.
6.Map track,indoor coverage."

The only disadvantage is it does NOT tell you the cellular signal or
neighboring cells of any cellular carrier other than that of the SIM.

[VanguardLH]

micky wrote:

> Please settle an argument I have with a friend. She wouldn't take my
> word for it. I went hiking today, short hike, off road, away from
> cities and towns, sometimes no cell service** even on parts of the
> highway leadintg to the hike,, and there was no cellular service on
> the trail.

You used ** as though to reference a note, but you never explain the **
reference, so "cell service" is undefined. You might mean lack of
signal strenth to reach a cell tower or the tower is too far away, or
the reachable tower doesn't rent service to your choice of cellular
carrier. Does "cell service" mean connecting to the cell tower, or
reaching a cell tower that rents to your choice of carrier?

If you meant you had no signal strength to reach a tower, well, you
aren't making calls of any type, 911 or otherwise. If you meant there
were no cell towers close enough to your phone that rented service to
your choice of cellular carrier, 911 calls don't rely on using just your
carrier to complete. A tower that doesn't rent service to your carrier
will still route your 911 call.

> My friend insists you can still make emergency phone calls. I keep
> telling her, only if there is cellular servie on an cell company you
> don't subscribe to, or if you have no sim card at all. She pauses
> and thinks, and then doesn't believe me. But if you all vote, she'll
> believe you.

Federal law mandates that all cell towers handle 911 calls whether or
not they contract with your particular cellular provider for service at
their cell tower, and whether or not you have service with one of their
renting carriers. The FCC has regulations to ensure that 911 calls are
accepted by all carriers.

https://www.fcc.gov/general/9-1-1-and-e9-1-1-services

In other countries, you're may be screwed without a SIM card that is
active; i.e., inactive SIM card or no SIM card means no 911 calls. In
the USA, the FCC mandates all carriers support 911 calls through their
networks even by non-customers, and some towers don't bother with
carrier routing and instead have their own appliance for direct connects
to emergency services.

If you have a activated SIM card, your phone connects to the tower and
the tower attempts to use your carrier to make the 911 call even if you
have no quota or credit with that carrier. If your SIM is deactivated
(or never activated), the tower uses any carrier renting that tower
since all carriers are required to complete 911 calls whether for their
customers, for their customers with no credit, or for non-customers. If
your phone doesn't have a SIM card, the cell phone still uses its
antenna to connect to the cell tower (just as it does with a SIM card),
and the tower has to figure out how to route the 911 call which could be
through any network of any carrier renting their tower, or by on-site
appliances at the tower that directly connect the tower to a PSAP
(Public Safety Answering Point) operated by the local gov't.

Few cellular carriers own their own towers. They contract with the
towers to handle the carrier's network. That is, carriers rent access
from the towers. They share, and why a tower typically handles (rents
to) more than one carrier. Once you connect to the tower to make a 911
call, the tower can use your carrier (if they rent from that tower), any
other carrier (that rents from that tower), or using on-site appliances.

Some folks will keep their old cell phones, or buy them used and cheap
at, say, Goodwill to toss into their car to make 911 calls. They don't
need to have a plans with any carrier. They don't need any quota or
credit with any carrier. They may not have a SIM card. But they can
still make 911 calls if they can reach a tower.

Make a 911 call?
- Phone has an activated SIM (with or without credit): Yes.
- Phone has a deactived or not-yet-activated SIM card: Yes.
- Phone has no SIM card: Yes, through any carrier renting at the tower,
or via on-site direct access appliance to PSAP at the tower.
- Phone cannot reach any tower: No (can't make any calls).

This is a North America (well, USA) mandate by the FCC. I don't know in
which country or region you live. In other countries, an activated SIM
card (without or without quota or credit with a carrier) may be
required. You'd have to check how the towers in a foreign country
operate to route 911 calls if you plan on traveling there.

I toss my old cell phones into my car's glove box or center console as
911-only phones. They still have their SIM card, because a new one for
a new phone costs only $1, and there's always the chance I want to use
an old cell phone with a carrier (i.e., have more than one active cell
phone). Those 911-only cell phones would still work to dial 911 if I
removed their SIM card to use in a new phone. Before I had any old
phones with which I didn't wany any carrier service, I got them super
cheap at Goodwill, and those usually had no SIM card.

[Carlos E.R.]

On 2022-03-03 23:12, micky wrote:
> Please settle an argument I have with a friend. She wouldn't take my
> word for it. I went hiking today, short hike, off road, away from
> cities and towns, sometimes no cell service** even on parts of the
> highway leadintg to the hike,, and there was no cellular service on the
> trail.
>
> My friend insists you can still make emergency phone calls. I keep
> telling her, only if there is cellular servie on an cell company you
> don't subscribe to, or if you have no sim card at all. She pauses and
> thinks, and then doesn't believe me. But if you all vote, she'll
> believe you.

There has to be coverage from at least one company. If no company has
any coverage, you are stuck, isolated.

If one or more companies give coverage, then you "should" be able to
call emergencies on it. The trick to do it may vary. Change network on
your phone, try removing the sim... In some cases, no way, nothing works
except a sim of said company, according to some reports.

--
Cheers, Carlos.

[Andy Burnelli]

VanguardLH wrote:

> Does "cell service" mean connecting to the cell tower, or
> reaching a cell tower that rents to your choice of carrier?

Decibels are everything.

Micky's question was answered quite a few times, so, while you answered it
thoroughly yet one more time, what really matters, IMHO, are decibels.

Hence, a better question might be at about what signal strength is a
reliable-enough connection to the tower at the break-off point?
<https://i.postimg.cc/Gtywwn8f/signal01.jpg>

[sms]

On 3/3/2022 2:12 PM, micky wrote:

<snip>

> My friend insists you can still make emergency phone calls. I keep
> telling her, only if there is cellular servie on an cell company you
> don't subscribe to, or if you have no sim card at all. She pauses and
> thinks, and then doesn't believe me. But if you all vote, she'll
> believe you.

Of course you can't make a 911 call if there is no cell service by any
carrier.

> Mean time, a week ago or more I asked for an app that would bee[ when
> I'd lost cell service. I installedd this one that Andy found:
>> *Cellular Connection Monitor* by Pavel Borzenkov (it has a 0 rating though)
>> <https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.simple.axanor.simpleconnectivitymonitor>

<https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.simple.axanor.simpleconnectivitymonitor>
works great on my Note 9. It has a 4 star rating. Don't know where you
saw a zero rating.

But whether or not it indicates when you have no service on your
carrier, or no service period (so no 911 calls either) is not clear.

[Andy Burnelli]

Carlos E.R. wrote:

> There has to be coverage from at least one company.
> If no company has any coverage, you are stuck, isolated.

To bring this thread up to an actual _adult_ level of detail...

While "coverage" is a broad term, and as such is correct, what really
matters most is the signal strength (although there are quality factors)
where the minimum signal strength also depends on the frequencies used
and a host of other typical conditions (such as weather & noise levels).
<https://i.postimg.cc/Gtywwn8f/signal01.jpg>

> If one or more companies give coverage, then you "should" be able to
> call emergencies on it. The trick to do it may vary.

An _adult_ question might be what the signal/quality inflection point is.

*What is a Good Cell Phone Signal Strength?*
<https://www.accu-tech.com/accu-insider/what-is-a-good-cell-phone-signal-strength>
"Signal strengths can range from approximately -30 dBm to -110 dBm.
In general, anything better than -85 decibels is considered a
usable signal."

*What is Good Signal Strength for a Cell Phone?*
<https://www.wilsonpro.com/blog/what-is-a-good-cell-phone-signal-strength>
"Signals better than -85 decibels are considered usable and strong,
and you'll rarely see a signal stronger than -50 dBm.
At the other end of the spectrum, a signal that's weaker than -100 dBm
is likely too problematic to be useful - resulting in dropped calls
and incomplete data transmissions."

*What's considered "good" cell signal?*
<https://powerfulsignal.com/cell-signal-strength/>
"Excellent signal strength on the RSRP scale is anything stronger than
about −85 dBm; poor signal strength is anything less than −115 dBm.
If you're receiving less than −120 dBm RSRP, you'll probably have
difficulty making phone calls, sending or receiving text messages,
or using internet data.

Another factor to keep in mind is the quality of your cellular connection.
How much usable signal you are receiving vs. the amount of noise
(unwanted disturbances of the signal). There are ways to measure cellular
signal quality (RSRQ and SINR), but that's beyond the scope of this article.

Just be aware that you can have strong cellular signal but still have
slow data and dropped calls because your signal quality is poor."

*What Is Strong And Weak Signal In DBm For 3G Vs. 4G?* (older)
<https://www.signalbooster.com/blogs/news/differences-between-3g-1x-vs-4g-lte-signal-strength-in-dbm>
Excellent: -70 dBm on 3G is considered excellent signal strength versus
-90 dBm on 4G or LTE network which is also considered excellent.
Good: -71to-85 dBm on 3G is considered good.
So is -91 to -105 dBm on 4G/LTE.
Fair: -86 to -100 dBm on 3G is fair and
-106 to -110 dBm on 4G/ LTE is also fair.
Poor: -101 to -109 dBm on 3G is poor and
-111 to -119 dBm on 4G is poor.
Dead Zone: -110 dBm on 3G network is practically a dead zone,
So is -120 dBm on 4G LTE network.
--
The job of a Usenet post is to add value each time we communicate.

[Andy Burnelli]

sms wrote:

>>> *Cellular Connection Monitor* by Pavel Borzenkov (it has a 0 rating though)
>>> <https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.simple.axanor.simpleconnectivitymonitor>
>
> <https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.simple.axanor.simpleconnectivitymonitor>
> works great on my Note 9. It has a 4 star rating. Don't know where you
> saw a zero rating.

While Steve kindly tested the suggested apps we each found for micky's
earlier question, we did discuss that discrepancy in ratings already.
*An app to tell me when I'm entering the no-signal-zone*
<https://groups.google.com/g/comp.mobile.android/c/mi80JxUj1x0>

Steve just missed that discussion for some reason.

*Anyone have an explanation for the discrepancy in GP client app ratings?*
<https://groups.google.com/g/comp.mobile.android/c/yGVrK5nwzZc>
--
Usenet is purposefully helpful intelligent people helping each other.

[VanguardLH]

I can go into Android's Settings -> General -> About phone -> Network
and look at signal strength instead of using the coarse measure using
bars in the notification area showing signal strength. There is no
standard for what change in signal strength is represented by each bar,
and signal strength can change sufficiently regarding connectivity
without even changing a bar. Anything under -85 dBm is going to be
flaky to unusable.


In my basement in my house that is in a geographical dip next to a river
with towers up on cliffs (they don't work well in downward direction), I
get -112 dBm, and why cell calls are pretty unreliable -- and why I
connect wifi on my phone to my wifi hotspot (cable modem) to
make/receive calls. I could buy a signal booster for several hundred
dollars, but the wifi hotspot is already there to use inside and around
my house. However, 911 service is typically unusable over VOIP unless
you pay extra. Same for the Google Voice VOIP service via Obitalk 200
converter that I have at home on the cable modem: no 911 service.
That's why many wireless phones have settings for you to enter your
location (which is really of value at a fixed spot, like at home).

Rather than drill through the settings to find the phone's signal
strength reading, there are several apps to tell you that info. I also
have the Network Cell Info app which has a panel showing both cellular
and wifi signal strength, and even a map showing where is the tower to
which I'm currently connected.

I've seen some users of femtocell towers at home. Those are cellular
transceivers that let you connect a cell phone to the femtocell
appliance which then goes to your cable modem to connect to your
cellular carrier's service (cell phone -> cell tower -> Internet ->
carrier). I remember looking at those long ago until I realized wifi
from smartphone to cable modem and VOIP to Internet (which connects to
landline/POTS and cell phones) worked just fine.

For micky out on his trails, he won't have a nearby wifi hotspot to use,
but which probably won't have 911 service unless he pays extra. He
won't have a cellular booster to up signal strength (please don't go
off-target with those foil sheets put inside a phone claiming to up
signal strength). He'll just have his phone, a tower, and whatever he
gets with the trees, hills, and other obstructions for what signal
strength he can get between his phone and the tower. If his phone can
reach the tower (and connect to it), he can make 911 calls. If his
phone cannot reach the cell tower, he won't be able to make calls of any
type.

Wifi hotspots have far less range (100 ft for 5GHz, 300 ft for 2.4GHz)
than cell towers (22 to 45 miles). No app is going to magically give
him a wifi hotspot out of nowhere nor boost the signal strength,
especially the one micky mentioned which is just to notify when signal
strength gets too low (i.e., when you "device looses signal or
unregisters from cellular network"). Just what are you going to do when
out on the trail when the monitor app tells you that your phone cannot
connect to a cell tower? You'll know you're out of range, but that
won't change you're out of range. Seems just another noisemaker app.

[Andy Burnelli]

VanguardLH wrote:

> I can go into Android's Settings -> General -> About phone -> Network
> and look at signal strength instead of using the coarse measure using
> bars in the notification area showing signal strength. There is no
> standard for what change in signal strength is represented by each bar,
> and signal strength can change sufficiently regarding connectivity
> without even changing a bar. Anything under -85 dBm is going to be
> flaky to unusable.

See my other posts in this thread which answer _both_ your issues above.
1. There are free apps that show the signal strength & quality perfectly.
2. The drop off point depends on the frequency but it's around -115 dBm.

[NY]

"micky" <NONONO...@fmguy.com> wrote in message
news:4ke22hl5l28oh27fk...@4ax.com...

> Please settle an argument I have with a friend. She wouldn't take my
> word for it. I went hiking today, short hike, off road, away from
> cities and towns, sometimes no cell service** even on parts of the
> highway leadintg to the hike,, and there was no cellular service on the
> trail.
>
> My friend insists you can still make emergency phone calls. I keep
> telling her, only if there is cellular servie on an cell company you
> don't subscribe to, or if you have no sim card at all. She pauses and
> thinks, and then doesn't believe me. But if you all vote, she'll
> believe you.

You need coverage from a mobile phone mast to make any sort of call. I think
the rules about making emergency calls differ from one country to another. I
*think* here in the UK you can make an emergency call even if the only
coverage is from a provider that is not your own. But away from a populated
area, you may find that there is no coverage from *any* mobile phone
network.

And being in a populated area is no guarantee of coverage. The local
supermarket was a completely dead zone for Vodafone coverage, which was a
bummer if my wife had given me a shopping list and I needed to phone her to
ask "they haven't got Brand X, will Brand Y do instead?". I had a most
frustrating set of phone calls when I tried to retrieve an item from an
Amazon locker that was just inside the supermarket. I had to go outside and
up the road to call them and report "this is what I've done, but the door
won't open"; they would suggest something else to try; the call would drop
as soon as I went back inside; I'd try what they suggested; I'd go outside
to phone them again to report what happened and ask for further help. Rinse
and repeat! Sadly, bringing faster and faster comms to the large towns and
cities is seen as more important than bringing at least voice comms and
slower internet to all the not-spots.

[R.Wieser]

NY,

> I *think* here in the UK you can make an emergency call even if the only
> coverage is from a provider that is not your own.

AFAIK the OP is right : even when you do /not/ have a SIM card in the phone
you can still dial your countries emergency number. Its why you should not
let todlers/children play with phones.

> the call would drop as soon as I went back inside;

That sounds as the effect of a "Faraday cage" - which can happen when you
step inside any kind of building that is pretty-much a glorified metal box.

@OP:
> Are there places where you can't even make emergency calls

Ofcourse.

As mentioned here, simply being out-of-reach of any GSM tower will do it.
Being shielded from such towers will cause the same. A faraday cage is one
possibility. Standing in a vally with hills around a possible second (a
so-called "black hole"). Replace "hills" with "buildings" and you have a
possible third. And do not forget that some people/companies use so-called
GSM jammers.

I've seen a story of a restaurant which used such a jammer so their
coming-in-together guests would actually talk to each other and enjoy their
meals. They where found out as the jamming spilled over (far) outside the
establishment.

Regards,
Rudy Wieser

[R.Wieser]

Mickey

> My friend insists you can still make emergency phone calls.

...

> She pauses and thinks, and then doesn't believe me.

One of /those/ users, eh ? Having heard something, not understanding how
that would-or-could work and than just religiously repeat it.

Emergency voice calls are exactly the same as any other voice call, with the
exception that the GSM tower has marked the target phone number as a "never
reject" one.

But for a GSM tower to "never reject" such a number it ofcourse has to be
able to receive the phones signal. When it can't ...

Regards,
Rudy Wieser

[Mayayana]

"Carlos E.R." <robin_...@es.invalid> wrote

micky wrote:
| > Please settle an argument I have with a friend. She wouldn't take my
| > word for it. I went hiking today, short hike, off road, away from
| > cities and towns, sometimes no cell service** even on parts of the
| > highway leadintg to the hike,, and there was no cellular service on the
| > trail.
| >
| > My friend insists you can still make emergency phone calls. I keep
| > telling her, only if there is cellular servie on an cell company you
| > don't subscribe to, or if you have no sim card at all. She pauses and
| > thinks, and then doesn't believe me. But if you all vote, she'll
| > believe you.
|
| There has to be coverage from at least one company. If no company has
| any coverage, you are stuck, isolated.
|

That's what he's talking about. No coverage is common
in the US. I have a brother in New Hampshire who has no
cell service from home. Urban geeks believe the world lives
by cellphone, but the carriers have no interest in putting up
towers in areas of low population density.

I'm guessing Micky's friend is just one of those ninnies
who wears a helmet to go hiking and feels confident that
safety services are always at hand. Surely, wilderness is
illegal? This is the 21st century!

[Andy Burnelli]

Mayayana wrote:

> No coverage is common in the US. I have a brother in
> New Hampshire who has no cell service from home.

Please do not listen to ignorant people like Mayayana proves to be.

I don't mind that ignorant racists like Mayayana exist; but what irks me is
that they're _always_ wrong as a result and yet, they're so confident in it.

As usual with Mayayana, he's absolutely unequivocally dead wrong. Again.

*Nobody in the US who has Internet is devoid of cellular signal at home*
Nobody.

All the major carriers give users, & in my experience for free, either a
cellular repeater and, more so lately, a femtocell (aka a microcell).

I personally have _both_ a cellular repeater & a femtocell in my house,
which my carrier gave me for free, and I've helped many others get them too.

For Mayana to always be this wrong is, I must say, bothersome to intelligent
well educated people because Mayana is always so very _confident_ in always
being so very wrong.

We've proven Mayayana is an opinionated racist in the past, but this
response has nothing to do with Mayayana's ignorant racism but his ignorance
alone.

Please understand that at home, _everyone_ in the US with Internet, has
cellular coverage since the carriers provide what is, in essence, a home
cell tower (I have two of them in my home alone, admittedly it's large).

> I'm guessing Micky's friend is just one of those ninnies
> who wears a helmet to go hiking and feels confident that
> safety services are always at hand. Surely, wilderness is
> illegal? This is the 21st century!

Again, Mayayana is, as always, being an ignorant opinionated uneducated
person who doesn't even realize _everything_ he claims is dead wrong.

What irks me isn't that such ignorant opinionated people exist, but that
they don't even realize that everything they claim is always dead wrong.

What micky wants, IMHO, based on me _understanding_ what his needs are, is
what _anyone_ would want (even me!) who hikes in the backcountry
(particularly if we have children and grandchildren who hike in the wild).

1. Anyone would want access to 911 emergency services when needed!
2. Anyone might want an audible signal when cell coverage is lost/restored.
2. Anyone might want to _queue_ up messages when cell coverage is spotty.

They just would.
For Mayayana to desperate what is perfectly reasonable exemplifies all that
is wrong with opinionated racists like we've proven Mayayana to be.

But what's worse isn't Mayayana's racism or ignorance - but that he's always
dead wrong in almost everything that he claims (as he was in his response).
--
I don't mind that ignorant racists like Mayayana exist; but what irks me is
that they're _always_ wrong as a result and yet, they're so confident in it.

Mayayana is not an iKook but he exhibits some of the first quartile traits
1. He's uneducated
2. He's of a rather low IQ
3. He holds a very strong (ignorant & racits) set of opinions
4. But he _never_ checks his facts

The fact Mayayana is _often_ dead wrong isn't a big deal as lots of people
are as ignorant as Mayayana; but he's always so _confident_ in being wrong.

That's first quartile DK.

[VanguardLH]

Personally I have to wonder why micky is going off onto trails to go
hiking, but has his cell phone on. Isn't the point of venturing into
wilderness to get away from the din of civilization, not to have a phone
making noise and interrupting the experience?

Oh yes, there's the emergency feature of a phone to call when you need
help. Um, handholding you in the wilderness takes away from the risk of
you going there. What would be the point of bungie jumping if there
were a quater-mile square 100-ft high air pad below? If he really is
enjoying wilderness, and he is turning off his phone to use only for
emergencies (especially since the phone's battery is crucial for that
intended emergency-only use, not to blather to friends or family), why
would he need an app to tell him when he's out of tower range while his
phone is off?

When we go camping, and if any kids are attending, we say before leaving
that they either agree to keep their phones off their during the entire
trip, leave them at home, or they stay home. The only noise I want to
hear when camping or hiking are the birds screaming to wake me before
the sun rises. I don't even want the people on the trip talking since
the point is to be in nature, not yakking away which can be done back
home.

Just imagine how stupid it would be to go a scuba trip to suffer the
boobs that managed to use their phones underwater. Gee, how was the
trip? Oh, so-and-so texted me about their cat having kittens. Um, what
did that have to do with the scuba trip? Oh, I saw videos of the
Ukraine invasion. Um, did you see anything of the ocean when diving?

[Andy Burnelli]

Andy Burnelli wrote:

> For Mayayana to desperate what is perfectly reasonable exemplifies all that
> is wrong with opinionated racists like we've proven Mayayana to be.

Spell checker typo.
Here is the sentence corrected.

For Mayayana to _disparage_ what is perfectly reasonable is what exemplifies
what is wrong with strongly opinionated people who can't understand others.

[Ken Blake]

On Thu, 3 Mar 2022 17:50:32 -0800, sms <scharf...@geemail.com>
wrote:

>On 3/3/2022 2:12 PM, micky wrote:
>
><snip>
>
>> My friend insists you can still make emergency phone calls. I keep
>> telling her, only if there is cellular servie on an cell company you
>> don't subscribe to, or if you have no sim card at all. She pauses and
>> thinks, and then doesn't believe me. But if you all vote, she'll
>> believe you.
>
>Of course you can't make a 911 call if there is no cell service by any
>carrier.

Right, of course not. More generally, you can't make *any kind* of
cell phone call if there is no cell service by any carrier.

To make any kind of cell phone call, you need

A cell phone
Nothing broken that prevents the phone from working
A battery that's not run down in the phone
Cell phone service where you are. no 911 calls either) is not clear.
--
The real, original Ken Blake, not some other newcomer

[VanguardLH]

Nice you decided to pay an actual carrier for cellular service, and that
carrier gave you a repeater (booster) and femtocell for free. That's
not true in many cases. To get a booster means the carrier has to
qualify you are in a low-coverage area. To get a femtocell means you
have to get the one your carrier provides, and not all do. Those using
MVNOs (e.g., Tracfone) are *not* customers of the actual carrier to
which the MVNO user is assigned, so they don't qualify for free, or even
paid, boosters or femtocells. Your experience does not dictate what is
available or usable to all cellular users.

When did this mutate into a discussion about cellular coverage at home?
Micky "lives" on the trails he treks? How is micky going to use a
booster or femtocell on the trails? What you have available, and what
you got for free, depends on to whom you are a customer, and what you
have at home is irrelevant to the discussion of cellular coverage for
micky on the wilderness trails.

Either you intended to diverge the discussion to what may be available
and usable at home (free or not), or you forgot the focus of the
discussion of micky's predicament. Seems you were more interested in
your stalking of Mayayana.

[nospam]

In article <5re42hli914ium2hj...@4ax.com>, Ken Blake

<K...@invalid.news.com> wrote:

> >Of course you can't make a 911 call if there is no cell service by any
> >carrier.
>
>
> Right, of course not. More generally, you can't make *any kind* of
> cell phone call if there is no cell service by any carrier.

you can via wifi calling, which is intended for areas with weak or no
cell coverage.

voip apps can be used on smartphones, also via wifi.

[sms]

On 3/4/2022 6:24 AM, Mayayana wrote:

<snip>

> That's what he's talking about. No coverage is common
> in the US. I have a brother in New Hampshire who has no
> cell service from home. Urban geeks believe the world lives
> by cellphone, but the carriers have no interest in putting up
> towers in areas of low population density.

While there certainly are rural areas of New Hampshire with "no
coverage" it's not quite accurate to call it "common."

Look at the FCC maps of coverage at
<https://fcc.maps.arcgis.com/apps/webappviewer/index.html?id=6c1b2e73d9d749cdb7bc88a0d1bdd25b>.

I captured the maps for AT&T, T-Mobile, and Verizon, see
<https://i.imgur.com/PmHNPYb.png>. The coverage differences between
carriers are very large, but there are definitely some areas with no
coverage by any carrier. AT&T and Verizon provide pretty good coverage
in the northern New England states, but T-Mobile does not since they are
not really into providing rural coverage.

I was up in Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont last September. There was
one place in New Hampshire's White Mountains, near the base of Mount
Washington, where we had no data coverage on Verizon. Again, you can see
the big differences in coverage on the FCC Map, here is a comparison
<https://i.imgur.com/56vVARA.png>.

What people in some rural areas do, if they have broadband service, is
to install a micro-cell in their house. Of course this is less necessary
than in the past since most every carrier and MVNO provides Wi-Fi
calling. I told my neighbor, who is on T-Mobile, to install a micro-cell
and that T-Mobile would provide, see
<https://www.t-mobile.com/support/coverage/4g-lte-cellspot>. But instead
he's changing to a Verizon MVNO.

[Andy Burnelli]

VanguardLH wrote:

> Nice you decided to pay an actual carrier for cellular service, and that
> carrier gave you a repeater (booster) and femtocell for free.

I'm well aware that you're one of the very few people on this ng who has the
capacity to handle detail, so I won't spare that detail for you below.

However, my main observation remains the same as it was, assessed by me as:
*If you have any Internet, you have _fantastic_ coverage in your US home!*

Every major carrier (AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile) in the USA, to my knowledge
and experience, will give you a repeater and/or a cell tower for free.

For example, here is my cellular repeater (aka booster) in the pool shed.
<https://i.postimg.cc/XJChDCPr/spare-access-points.jpg> Repeater (booster)

And here is my Ooma & femtocell connected to an old router in a side office.
<https://i.postimg.cc/QCNqss9T/femto-ooma-switch.jpg>

I have both, but my house is unusual in some ways as it's built to survive
an earthquake (given the fault line is very close indeed); but I still do
very much agree with you that you must pay at least one of the major
carriers for the basic service first and foremost, as you duly noted.

But you can't have much _less_ public infrastructure where you live than I.

Where I live the government doesn't want any more people living here, so
they limit our land to 40 acres, which means that anyone with under 80 acres
can only put a single house on the lot. It goes without saying that we don't
have the concept of public water lines, sewer lines, gas lines, or even
cable.

Like _everyone_ else in the USA, we do have telephone lines & electrical
power lines (but don't get me started on why virtually everyone installed
built-in propane gas generators due to PG&E unreliability & quite a few are
dropping off the grid entirely, via solar & batteries, as PG&E is unreliable
(we've had an outage a month for a day each for the past six years where
last summer we had three power outages a week on average for the entire
summer, consistently).

My point in explaining that is our infrastructure is likely almost as bad as
any others in the US due to intentional rules and unintentional neglect.

Given all of us have generators and that it's a given the telephone
connection is too far away for DSL, most of us dropped telephone long ago
(where I dropped Verizon because the taxes were half the total charges).

So all we have is Internet - and even that comes from 20 miles away by road,
but only about 6 miles as the crow flies given we are all on WISP radios.
<https://i.postimg.cc/QMNv5FBC/typical-range-ptp.jpg> Typical WISP range

My point is if I have _fantastic_ cellular service inside my house, given if
I turn off my repeater (aka booster), I _only_ have the femtocell tower
inside the house, why can't anyone in the USA who pays a postpaid bill to
any of the three carriers have the same as I do.

I'm not special. I am simply miles away from the nearest cellular tower.

> That's
> not true in many cases. To get a booster means the carrier has to
> qualify you are in a low-coverage area.

I agree with you that they're not gonna give you your own booster or cell
tower inside your house if you _already_ have good signal. That's a given.

Although, I must mention that I _used_ to have crappy cellular signal until
T-Mobile gave me a set of half-price 5G iPhones and free 5G Android phones.
<https://i.postimg.cc/Xq5SpS4D/tmopromo02.jpg> $15 iPhone, $0 Android phone

Now my 5G signals _outside_ the house are fantastic as shown in these shots.
<https://i.postimg.cc/zf9w1tGZ/speedtest07.jpg> *255Mbps* 5G speeds at home

But those fantastic 250Mbps speeds only happened with the advent of 5G tech.

Even so, 5G doesn't penetrate the house well (which is also solar protected
so signals bounce off the windows & doors which all have a metal haze
deposited on them, which is required by local code, I'm told).

Inside the house I use the femtocell tower & the cellular repeater signal,
along with a variety of powerful transceivers acting as APs and as bridges.
<https://i.postimg.cc/4xgmTTgm/wifi01.jpg> Multiple access points

> To get a femtocell means you
> have to get the one your carrier provides, and not all do.

I wrote about this _many_ times so it's irksome to have to repeat but they
_all_ do and I know this because I help the neighbors, most if not all of
whom are elderly, and many are widowed, where I make the phone calls for
them.

Yes. For example, I called Verizon about a year ago (and I wrote it up at
the time) for one neighbor where Verizon tried to charge her a shipping and
handling fee and I was emphatic she should get it for free, and they gave it
to her for free.

On AT&T on another call they wanted a $400 deposit and I told AT&T that the
customer was theirs for a long time and wasn't going anywhere, so the
supervisor waived the fee.

Most recently for another neighbor, she called T-Mobile and they gave her a
hard time and she patched me in and they told me they no longer provide the
free wi-fi routers or the free boosters (aka repeaters), but they still
provide the femtocell tower, but at a $25 one-time charge. I was livid with
them, and after asking them to check with a supervisor I got T-Mobile to
credit her $25 for the $25 charge that they now charge - so she had to give
them her credit card, but they credited her bill the same amount so it was a
wash. (To T-Mo's credit, they did a similar $20 charge-credit for me when I
replaced my free Samsung under warranty just a few weeks ago, and I wrote
about that too - so that everyone benefits from knowing what they will do.)

I wrote _all_ of this up in the past so it's irksome to have to repeat it.

My experience is the following:
a. The three carriers all provide free femtocells if you have bad signal.
b. They probably no longer provide free wi-fi routers or free repeaters.
c. They may ask for a deposit or a S&H charge but you can have them waive it

If you're using an MVNO, I don't know what they will do, as I don't know
anyone in the flesh who uses them (although I'm aware Steve uses them so ask
him).

> Those using
> MVNOs (e.g., Tracfone) are *not* customers of the actual carrier to
> which the MVNO user is assigned, so they don't qualify for free, or even
> paid, boosters or femtocells. Your experience does not dictate what is
> available or usable to all cellular users.

I get four lines from T-Mo with unlimited almost everything, including
unlimited data, unlimited text, unlimited MMS, unlimited USA calls, etc.
(the only things limited is the 5GB/month/line of hotspotting & tethering)
for $25/month/line. I even get two iPads with 200MB/month free SIM service.
<https://i.postimg.cc/nhpbcP50/tmopromo04.jpg> $100 for six lines + $16 tax

You never get what you pay for, by the way, as stupid people get less than
what they pay for and only intelligent people get what they pay for. (Don't
even get me started on Apple's ungodly profits if I need to prove that
point.)

Stupid people will make stupid decisions, Vanguard; but my point was that if
you know what I know, then you have no business complaining about coverage.

If you have Internet in the USA, you have _fantastic_ coverage in your home!

While I'm all for saving money, I don't know _anyone_ who uses an MVNO, but
as I said, Steve, who always shills for Verizon but doesn't actually pay
them, is an expert in MVNOs and so you should be asking him what they
provide as I can't tell you what they provide.

However, if the MVNO has crappy signal, and if they won't give you a free
cellular tower for your home, my suggestion would be to change MVNOs as I'm
a believer that lousy service is a tax on the stupid, not on smart people.

Your point that stupid people buy crappy service is fine, but don't blame
the crappy service since I have experience with all three major providers.

[Andy Burnelli]

VanguardLH wrote:

> When did this mutate into a discussion about cellular coverage at home?

Vanguard,
Stop that crap. Just stop it. Stop it right now.

If you can't even _see_ where the thread "mutated" then I can't help you.
Suffice to say that Mayayana said this (and I quote verbatim for you!).
"That's what he's talking about. No coverage is common

in the US. I have a brother in New Hampshire who has no

cell service from home. Urban geeks believe the world lives
by cellphone, but the carriers have no interest in putting
up towers in areas of low population density."

Every time Mayayana posts, it's always dead wrong because it's based on
ignornace, but it has nothing to do with Mayayana as if nospam said the same
thing, or if you did, I'd call the facts as they are.

I don't mince words, Vanguard, when people as stupid as Mayayana is post.

The fact you even asked that question is bothersome to me because it means
you're like the iKooks who don't check a damn thing before they deny it.

> Micky "lives" on the trails he treks? How is micky going to use a
> booster or femtocell on the trails?

Stop it Vanguard.
Stop acting just like the iKooks do.
Nobody said anything like what you're claiming.

Stop it.
Why do you waste our time with silly games Vanguard?

You don't seem to _understand_ what micky asked for; but I do.
What he asks for is reasonable, despite Mayayana's claims to the contrary.
a. He wants to call 911
b. He wants an audible sound when cellular drops below about -115 dBm
c. It would be nice if messages could "queue up" when signal is too low

Unlike nospam who claims nobody could possibly want what plenty of people
want, I fully and completely understand why micky would want that stuff.

I'd want it too.

I and my family probably hike trails with no service as much as anyone,
given where I live there is nothing but trails, as exemplified by this
recent thread which shows what the backcountry is like out here.
*USA backcountry hike from Mount Madonna to Loma Prieta*
*involving 2 topographic geoPDF quadrangles*
*and iOS/Android plus GPX tracks & waypoints*
<https://groups.google.com/g/sci.geo.satellite-nav/c/KDtny69KRvg>

When you backcountry hike, you need to be intelligent about not only your
cellular signal and your incoming/outgoing communications, but also your
ability to accurate map, track, and navigate without access to the net.

> What you have available, and what
> you got for free, depends on to whom you are a customer, and what you
> have at home is irrelevant to the discussion of cellular coverage for
> micky on the wilderness trails.

See above. Tell it to Mayayana who brought up home cellular signal.
Not me.

I simply refuted the ignorant statements by Mayayana.

If you are an adult, you'll either tell it to Mayayana, or, if you think my
statements are in any way in error, then tell it to me.

I'm _always_ willing to tell you what I know and what I do not know.
I'm not afraid of facts, Vanguard.

If you think I got a _single_ fact wrong, for example, tell it to me.
But don't bullshit me.
Just don't.

I have no patience for bullshit.
I didn't succeed at the toughest startups in Silicon Valley by bullshit.

> Either you intended to diverge the discussion to what may be available
> and usable at home (free or not), or you forgot the focus of the
> discussion of micky's predicament. Seems you were more interested in
> your stalking of Mayayana.

Stop it Vanguard.
Just stop it.

If you do NOT tell that to Mayayana, then it's _you_ who is doing exactly
what you just accused me of doing.

If you're ignorant that Mayayana is who diverged, then you should
_apologize_ to me right now, and _then_ you should direct your comments to
Mayayana.

But it's childish of you to be completely ignorant that it's Mayayana who
diverged this into home coverage, and then berate me for correcting him.

It's childish of you Vanguard.
Stop it.

Act like an adult.
a. Either write an apology _and_ berate Mayayana, or,
b. Don't communicate with me ever again as all you did was waste our time.

Stop playing childish games Vanguard.
Just stop it.

You're wasting our valuable time which could be spent helping people.
--
I don't mind people like Vanguard and Mayayana exist, but _everything_ they
post is filled to the brim with such ignorance that they waste our time.

[Andy Burnelli]

sms wrote:

> While there certainly are rural areas of New Hampshire with "no
> coverage" it's not quite accurate to call it "common."
>
> Look at the FCC maps of coverage at

To bring this conversation back to the _adult_ level, be advised:
1. Steve shills for Verizon but he _lies_ about the coverage differences.
2. AFAIK, the FCC maps are only 4G coverage (unless they changed recently).
3. Many carriers have _extensive_ 5G coverage (see my 5G screenshot below).
<https://i.postimg.cc/C5vgmtRd/speedtest15.jpg> *130Mbps* to *255Mbps*

Those were speedtests though, but what we want is cellular signal strength:
<https://i.postimg.cc/Gtywwn8f/signal01.jpg>

I'm not sure if 911 calls go out on the same frequencies as do your cell
phone calls, but if they do, then fundamentally, when hiking, depending on
the cellular frequencies employed, when I looked this up it seems you need
at least about -110 dBm to about -115 dBm or so of cellular signal (among
other factors) just to reliably connect to a cellular tower to make that
emergency 911 call.

What micky seems to want, which I understand and agree with is something
like this, which I would think _everyone_ would want when off the trail.
1. Ability to call 911 to any tower with >-110 (or so) signal strength
2. An audible signal when signal strength inflects at about -110 dBm.
3. A method to queue up incoming/outgoing communications (if possible).

That's what _I_ would want, and I suspect almost everyone would want it.
We should spend our energy trying to obtain those three things, where one of
them, of course, we already have, which is #1, because it doesn't matter who
your carrier is for 911.

However... with the shutdown of 3G signal in the works, it "might" matter
which cellphone you use, doesn't it?
--
Each post to Usenet should flesh out the answer and provide unique value.

[Andy Burnelli]

VanguardLH wrote:

> Personally I have to wonder why micky is going off onto trails to go
> hiking, but has his cell phone on. Isn't the point of venturing into
> wilderness to get away from the din of civilization, not to have a phone
> making noise and interrupting the experience?

I think micky made it clear the point is 911 _emergency_ communications.

But even outside an emergency, there's nothing wrong with sending updates to
your parents, your grandparents, your children, your mom, your aunt, etc.

Look at this thread which shows a perfectly valid use of a cellphone,
although, this perfect apropos usage doesn't require "cellular" signal.
*Using a cell phone for navigation & bearings during backcountry hiking*
<https://groups.google.com/g/alt.comp.microsoft.windows/c/5c_iaS01eHM>

> Oh yes, there's the emergency feature of a phone to call when you need
> help. Um, handholding you in the wilderness takes away from the risk of
> you going there. What would be the point of bungie jumping if there
> were a quater-mile square 100-ft high air pad below? If he really is
> enjoying wilderness, and he is turning off his phone to use only for
> emergencies (especially since the phone's battery is crucial for that
> intended emergency-only use, not to blather to friends or family), why
> would he need an app to tell him when he's out of tower range while his
> phone is off?

While some of the above may be tongue-in-cheek chastising micky, I will say
that my battery on my free Android phone is a whopping 5 amp hours, which,
let's be frank, lasts forever even with the radios running full time.

> When we go camping, and if any kids are attending, we say before leaving
> that they either agree to keep their phones off their during the entire
> trip, leave them at home, or they stay home. The only noise I want to
> hear when camping or hiking are the birds screaming to wake me before
> the sun rises. I don't even want the people on the trip talking since
> the point is to be in nature, not yakking away which can be done back
> home.

That's fine but micky was asking about _emergency_ coverage, and not about a
staid quiet simple family camping trip where the worst thing that happens is
you get bitten by a mosquito.

I, for one, hike with climbing gear and clippers, where there is no way to
hike out here without ending up in a steep ravine, where you then have to
climb back out.

It's not the same thing as a picnic table tentsite campout for sure.

> Just imagine how stupid it would be to go a scuba trip to suffer the
> boobs that managed to use their phones underwater. Gee, how was the
> trip? Oh, so-and-so texted me about their cat having kittens. Um, what
> did that have to do with the scuba trip? Oh, I saw videos of the
> Ukraine invasion. Um, did you see anything of the ocean when diving?

I think the most fantastic use of a smartphone while hiking is
a. It's fantastic for photos (and for communicating them to others)
b. It's fantastic for navigation (and for identifying stellar objects)
c. It's fantastic for plant & animal & sound identification
etc.

Here's a screenshot of just my backcountry "nature" folder, by way of
example, where you can see a compass, a bearing indicator, various geoPDF
apps, starmaps, heading calculators, gps-to-sms emergency apps, mushroom
identifier, bird sound identifier, plant identifiers, etc.
<https://i.postimg.cc/Y0MZd55k/nature01.jpg>
--
The job of a Usenet post is to add useful value each time we communicate.

[Andy Burnelli]

nospam wrote:

>> Right, of course not. More generally, you can't make *any kind* of
>> cell phone call if there is no cell service by any carrier.
>
> you can via wifi calling, which is intended for areas with weak or no
> cell coverage.
>
> voip apps can be used on smartphones, also via wifi.

*As with Mayayana and Vanguard, what Ken Blake said was just dead wrong*.

In this case, nospam is correct, although there is already a recent thread
in exactly which VOIP situations allow 911 calls in the USA and under what
conditions, so I'll just say that Ken Blake was simply ignorant of that.

It's amazing actually, how such people are so ignorant, and yet, people like
Ken Blake, Vanguard, and Mayayana are so very _confident_ in their
ignorance.
--
All of them are clearly to the left of the first quartile in DK, which means
they are supremely ignorant and yet supremely confident in their ignorance.

[sms]

On 3/4/2022 8:22 AM, VanguardLH wrote:

<snip>

> Nice you decided to pay an actual carrier for cellular service, and that
> carrier gave you a repeater (booster) and femtocell for free. That's
> not true in many cases.

Well IMVAIO it's not that smart to intentionally choose a carrier which
doesn't have actual coverage at your home in the first place, especially
when other carriers do have coverage!

In the area where "Andy/Dean/Arlen/etc" lives, he could have chosen a
carrier where a micro-cell is completely unnecessary. And of course, as
I pointed out, a micro-cell is even less necessary these days since
every carrier, including most MVNOs, offer Wi-Fi calling. You're doing
VOIP with a micro-cell connected to your broadband just like you're
doing VOIP with Wi-Fi calling.

> When did this mutate into a discussion about cellular coverage at home?
> Micky "lives" on the trails he treks? How is micky going to use a
> booster or femtocell on the trails? What you have available, and what
> you got for free, depends on to whom you are a customer, and what you
> have at home is irrelevant to the discussion of cellular coverage for
> micky on the wilderness trails.

Not sure, since I have our favorite troll filtered out, but actually,
with Wi-Fi calling, coverage at home is of little importance in general,
unless you're using mobile broadband in which case it matters a lot. At
home your phone will connect via Wi-Fi if there is no cellular signal,
even without a micro-cell.

I've seen the narrative of "my carrier's poor coverage doesn't matter
because in an emergency I can still call 911 no matter what." I don't
think that it's a very valid narrative since there are often urgent
calls that are not necessarily an emergency but still pretty important.

The important thing when choosing a carrier is to check coverage on the
FCC web site
<https://fcc.maps.arcgis.com/apps/webappviewer/index.html?id=6c1b2e73d9d749cdb7bc88a0d1bdd25b>
so you know the _native_ coverage you can expect.

You can also use the Whistleout web site
<https://www.whistleout.com/CellPhones/Guides/Coverage> if you want to
see where 5G coverage exists, but remember that 4G is a superset of 5G,
there are no places with only 5G coverage. The Santa Cruz Mountains,
near me, is one place I compared 4G and 5G on T-Mobile, Verizon, and
AT&T, see <https://i.imgur.com/sigt8Xg.png>. I point this out only
because I recall in the past someone was upset that the FCC web site
only shows 4G coverage and they insisted that this was unfair to
T-Mobile, but that person's narrative had no validity.

[Andy Burnelli]

R.Wieser wrote:

> I've seen a story of a restaurant which used such a jammer so their
> coming-in-together guests would actually talk to each other and enjoy their
> meals. They where found out as the jamming spilled over (far) outside the
> establishment.

Addressing Rudy's point about restaurants jamming gsm, I'm not sure that
jamming cellular frequencies would be considered legal, but since this is a
technical newsgroup, I'll try to add value to his tangent by suggesting apps
which can detect anomalies such as IMSI catchers and radio jammers perhaps.

Rudy brings up a point that micky and others can run an app that logs into a
file the signal strength of all the accessible towers where it would report
any anomaly that may occur when signal strength suddently changes greatly.
*NetMonster* by Michal Mrocek, 1M+, 4.3, free, ad-free, google-free, FOSS
<https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=cz.mroczis.netmonster>

Also to Rudy's point of "fake cell towers", I tested all free IMSI catchers
at one point (along with hidden-camera detector apps), some of which are:
<https://play.google.com/store/search?q=imsi+catcher>

I don't know how you'd detect jamming, but I suspect your graphical wi-fi
apps would all of a sudden have fantastic signal strength perhaps.
*Cellular-Z* by Jersey-Ho, 100K+, 4.0, free, ad-free, google free, etc.
<https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=make.more.r2d2.cellular_z>

If you suspect an IMSI catcher, you can see if snoopsnitch alerts you first:
*SnoopSnitch* by Security Research Labs, 500K+, 3.9, free, ad-free, etc.
<https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=de.srlabs.snoopsnitch>
But it hasn't ever detected any (but maybe they just aren't where I am).

If others know more than I do on the tangent Rudy brought up, let us know
since Usenet is a team sport where good people try to help others learn.
--
Usenet is an assemblage of purposefully helpful people teaching each other.

[Andy Burnelli]

R.Wieser wrote:

> But for a GSM tower to "never reject" such a number it ofcourse has to be
> able to receive the phones signal. When it can't ...

Which requires a few things, perhaps the most important being:
a. If the tower doesn't have 3G and the phone is only 3G, it won't work
(I would think - but see my question below please)
b. If the signal isn't of sufficient quality, mostly signal strength too
(You need roughly around about -115dBm just to make the connection.)

My question to the group came up while I was answering Vanguard, which is
what are the implications of 3G service dropping in terms of micky's
question?
--
Every Usenet post should strive to add value in the body (not the headers).

[Andy Burnelli]

sms wrote:

> Not sure, since I have our favorite troll filtered out,

Stop your childish troll crap Steve.
Just stop it.

You lied in this thread.
And you call me a troll?

Act like an adult, if you can, Steve.
a. I get it you _hate_ that I showed you lied for years about FCC maps.
b. I get it you _hate_ me for showing you to be a liar and a fool.

And yet you _lied_ about that coverage yet again in this very thread!
Regardless, I'm not trolling, and, in fact _you_ are being the troll here.

I posted _plenty_ of detailed relevant facts to this thread Steve.
You posted lies using FCC calculated maps which don't say what you claim.

You get paid by Verizon for heavens sake, Steve.
And you don't _tell_ everyone that?

You don't even pay for a Verizon cellular service, Steve.
And yet you shill for them, day after day, year after year.

And you call _me_ the troll?
Stop it.

Grow up.
--
I don't mind ignorant people like Steve existing, but for them to get paid
by Verizon to shill for Verizon at the expense of the truth bothers me.

[Carlos E.R.]

No :-)

--
Cheers, Carlos.

[sms]

On 3/4/2022 7:29 AM, VanguardLH wrote:

<snip>

> Personally I have to wonder why micky is going off onto trails to go
> hiking, but has his cell phone on. Isn't the point of venturing into
> wilderness to get away from the din of civilization, not to have a phone
> making noise and interrupting the experience?

Yes and no.

It's often nice to have coverage for a multitude of reasons even if
you're not involved in a gabfest. And most hikes are not "in the
wilderness."

• Downloading trail maps, especially in areas you're unfamiliar with.
• Finding other hikers in your party if you get separated
• Contacting emergency services if you, or someone you come across,
needs help.
• Keeping track of the distance you're traveling and the number of steps
• Finding the trailhead in the first place, though with offline mapping
you can still do this.

One week a month my wife is on-call and needs to be reachable 24/7. We
can still go hiking even on those days but she has to be in an area with
coverage. Fortunately her employer provides her with an iPhone on
Verizon so it would be rare for her not to have coverage in the areas we
hike.

[Ken Blake]

Perhaps that's the point for some people, but certainly not for
everyone.

[nospam]

In article <svtrh0$jni$1...@dont-email.me>, sms

<scharf...@geemail.com> wrote:

> Well IMVAIO it's not that smart to intentionally choose a carrier which
> doesn't have actual coverage at your home in the first place, especially
> when other carriers do have coverage!

different people have different needs, a concept you do not understand.
some people are not interested in cell coverage at home, where they
have a landline. others have ditched their landline and use their cell
for everything. some use a mix of both.

>
> The important thing when choosing a carrier is to check coverage on the
> FCC web site

maps are well known to be wrong.

the best way is talk to people who live and work in the areas where you
plan to use the phone.

some carriers offer trial periods, which is also an option.

[VanguardLH]

Andy Burnelli wrote:

> That's fine but micky was asking about _emergency_ coverage, and not
> about a staid quiet simple family camping trip where the worst thing
> that happens is you get bitten by a mosquito.

Remember micky noted an app that made noise to alert him when he was no
longer in reach of a cell tower. He is leaving on his phone during his
entire hike, not powering it up when he has an emergency.

[Andy Burnelli]

sms wrote:

> Contacting emergency services if you, or someone you come across,
> needs help.

Every app I suggest on this ng is almost always going to be free, ad free,
login free, often gsf free & almost always works offline, just so you know.
[It takes more effort but any idiot can suggest an app with ads and login
requirements but it takes intelligence to find the best apps that don't.]

To add value to what Steve kindly noted for smartphone usefulness hiking,
let's say while you were moseying along, you run across an injured person.

Instantly, you need to know an accurate coordinate location which apps like
this GPS-to-SMS app are designed to do for you at a single button tap.
*GPS to SMS - location sharing* by Tralchonok Labs, 100K+, 3.6, free
<https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=ru.perm.trubnikov.gps2sms>

> Downloading trail maps, especially in areas you're unfamiliar with.

To add value to what Steve kindly noted for downloading useful park maps,
what's _extremely_ useful is to download a PDF (even better, a geoPDF) of
the local park you're hiking in, as it may have more detail than the USGS
topographic geoPdfs, and that gives you the ability to use _that_ park map
with your GPS navigation on your phone (if you use the right apps).
*Avenza Maps: Offline Mapping* by Avenza, 4.7, free but limited to 3 maps
<https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.Avenza>

*Paper Maps* by Abbro, 5K+, 2.8, free ad free & unlimited number of maps
<https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=ca.abbro.androidmap>

You can even draw your own track on a geoPDF and your navigation software
will let you know at all times where you are in relation to the track.
*All-In-One Offline Maps* by Psyberia
<https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=net.psyberia.offlinemaps>

> Finding the trailhead in the first place, though with offline mapping
> you can still do this.

To add value to what Steve kindly noted for finding old trailheads,
what's really neat is downloading _historical_ geoPDFs from the USGS, which
will show you where you are in relation to long lost cities & trails.

For example, in the Santa Cruz mountains is a reservoir over an old town
from the 1940s, where you can tell where you are on the water with this.

Or you can find the old location of silver mines and cinnabar mines by
loading a geological USGS 1:24K topographic map (they're always free).
<https://ngmdb.usgs.gov/topoview/>

> Finding other hikers in your party if you get separated

To add value to what Steve kindly noted for finding the rest of the group,
one way to do that _without_ having to log into anything is the GPS-to-SMS
app listed above where you simply create a group and schedule periodic
sending of the messages (or send them ad hoc) of your location.

I don't use these but there are plenty of friend-location apps such as:
*Whizz (SMS Locator)* by Green Machines
<https://whizzap.wixsite.com/whizz/downloads>
Note the Google Play app is just a placeholder.
<https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=ca.greenmachines.way.whereareyou>

> Keeping track of the distance you're traveling and the number of steps

To add value to what Steve kindly noted for step counting & profiles,
I tested most of the free pedometer apps where very few had the privacy you
need which is required for all apps (if they need a login, they're no good).

The best one I found is from the privacy team at Secuso, which is this one:
*Pedometer (Privacy Friendly)* by SECUSO Research Group
<https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.secuso.privacyfriendlyactivitytracker>

> One week a month my wife is on-call and needs to be reachable 24/7. We
> can still go hiking even on those days but she has to be in an area with
> coverage. Fortunately her employer provides her with an iPhone on
> Verizon so it would be rare for her not to have coverage in the areas we
> hike.

To add value to what Steve kindly noted for local coverage, there are
crowd-sourced cellular coverage map apps, but I don't use these apps myself:
*Coverage Map* by RootMetrics
<https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.rootmetrics>

[Andy Burnelli]

Vanguard,
Remember?
WTF?

Of course I remember.
Don't you remember what happened?

No?
Really?

Well, I do.

BTW, I'm completely different from most people on this newsgroup.
a. I'm intelligent and purposefully helpful & I have a kind heart
b. Yet, I can't stand the morons who abound, and the trolls
c. Even so, I provide _tremendous_ value to this group in many ways.
As do some others, such as Andy Burns and even Frank at times.

Regarding your sadly hilarious question of whether I remember...

I'm the guy who _suggested_ that alert app to micky in the first place.
You don't remember that?

Here is the thread. Read it _before_ you reply, and when I say read it, I
mean read it (as the iKooks always deny all facts without even reading it).
*An app to tell me when I'm entering the no-signal-zone*
<https://groups.google.com/g/comp.mobile.android/c/mi80JxUj1x0/m/JLX8U9pdAwAJ>

I spent _hours_ on those tests for micky, which I suspect nobody but Steve
spent any time on (certainly not the trolls like Frank, Carlos & Joerg).

I tested about a dozen apps for micky in that thread, in fact.
<https://i.postimg.cc/Njw312j1/lostsignal01.jpg> Testing alert apps

And I settled on the one app that I suggested for him that day.
<https://i.postimg.cc/x1Y5Tv6L/lostsignal02.jpg> Play Store client ratings

When he originally asked, people _tried_ to answer for days.
I felt sorry for him that everyone was giving him the wrong answers.

Just as they did here.
Most people, you have to remember, are incredibly ignorant.

So I dug into it and found out why people were having problems.
It wasn't easy to find a good free ad free app that claimed to do the job.

As you must be aware, especially when the keywords are generic, it takes
knowledge, skill, perseverance, etc., to find a 'good' app, where we can
define good first and foremost that it does the job, but then it has to do a
lot more (like not be obnoxious, not scoop your data, etc.).

The app that micky and Steve and I tested isn't perfect, but it's "OK" in so
much as it doesn't have a minimum decibel setting, which would be ideal.
<https://i.postimg.cc/8zRjbV12/lostsignal03.jpg> Custom verbal alert

I even wrote up a separate tutorial to help people set _custom_ alerts.
a. They type what they want the alert to say
b. And then save that audible alert _directly_ to a wav file
c. And then they set the app to use that custom speech as its alert

To Steve's credit, Steve tested that app using a home made Faraday cage.
It worked for Steve, but it didn't work for micky.
I haven't run out of cell coverage in days so I haven't tested it much.

In summary, stop insulting my intelligence by you being clueless and
therefore by you trying to tell me I don't remember what I spent hours on
just a few days ago for micky.

I own a kind and purposefully helpful heart, but all you remember are my
responses to the many worthless pieces of shit childish iKooks & trolls.

Look for the value of the gift instead of the pretty wrapping paper.
--
Usenet should consist of courteous kind-hearted people helping each other.

[Mayayana]

"VanguardLH" <V...@nguard.LH> wrote

| Personally I have to wonder why micky is going off onto trails to go
| hiking, but has his cell phone on. Isn't the point of venturing into
| wilderness to get away from the din of civilization, not to have a phone
| making noise and interrupting the experience?
|

I'm with you. I see so many people who are just never where
they are. It must be very numbing. But maybe that's why they
want service: They can just no longer imagine life without that
contact. Some younger people have never truly been alone.

There was a sad story a few years ago. A CNet tech worker,
26 I think, went camping with his wife and 2 or 3 kids. They
drove 25 miles up a logging road in California and got stuck on
ice, unable to get out. No cell service. They sat there for 2 or 3
days, burning tires to stay warm. Finally the young man wandered
off into the woods to look for help. He was found dead of exhaustion.
The rest were eventually saved.

They could have walked out of there in maybe 8 hours. They
should have had camping supplies to last several days. There
must have been something they could have done to free the car.
But this was a geek with little experience of physicality, much less
camping.

[Mayayana]

"VanguardLH" <V...@nguard.LH> wrote

| Either you intended to diverge the discussion to what may be available
| and usable at home (free or not), or you forgot the focus of the
| discussion of micky's predicament. Seems you were more interested in
| your stalking of Mayayana.

He's mad because I ignore or block his posts. I do
find it interesting, though... this usage of "racist".
It's a strong accusation, yet it's become synonymous
with "jerk": "You don't like apples? What a racist!"

... This is all just too triggering for me. :)

[Mayayana]

"sms" <scharf...@geemail.com> wrote

|
| While there certainly are rural areas of New Hampshire with "no
| coverage" it's not quite accurate to call it "common."
|
| Look at the FCC maps of coverage at
|
<https://fcc.maps.arcgis.com/apps/webappviewer/index.html?id=6c1b2e73d9d749cdb7bc88a0d1bdd25b>.
|
| I captured the maps for AT&T, T-Mobile, and Verizon, see
| <https://i.imgur.com/PmHNPYb.png>.

They may claim that. It's not necessarily true. There's
also an area of VT I know of with no service. If you can't
expect to be able to use a cellphone then it doesn't much
matter if the carriers claim you can. I imagine part of the
issue might be the mountains, but I really don't know.

The point being that it's not so unusual in rural areas for
people to have no service. Micky's friend apparently thought
that was impossible. I actually know someone in an urban
apt building -- brick exterior and metal lathe interior
walls -- who only gets a signal in certain areas of his apt.

[nospam]

In article <svu6qp$cnl$1...@dont-email.me>, Mayayana

<maya...@invalid.nospam> wrote:


> The point being that it's not so unusual in rural areas for
> people to have no service. Micky's friend apparently thought
> that was impossible. I actually know someone in an urban
> apt building -- brick exterior and metal lathe interior
> walls -- who only gets a signal in certain areas of his apt.

carriers offer femtocells for that purpose.

some commercial buildings also install femto and picocells if coverage
is weak to non-existent.

[VanguardLH]

sms wrote:

> Mayayana wrote:
>
>> That's what he's talking about. No coverage is common
>> in the US. I have a brother in New Hampshire who has no
>> cell service from home. Urban geeks believe the world lives
>> by cellphone, but the carriers have no interest in putting up
>> towers in areas of low population density.
>
> While there certainly are rural areas of New Hampshire with "no
> coverage" it's not quite accurate to call it "common."
>
> Look at the FCC maps of coverage at
> <https://fcc.maps.arcgis.com/apps/webappviewer/index.html?id=6c1b2e73d9d749cdb7bc88a0d1bdd25b>.

The first FCC map doesn't show cell coverage at all. It's just a map of
locations, not cell signal strength and by which carriers. The initial
overlay page says "This mapping tool is provided to assist in viewing 4G
LTE coverage". You click OK to get past the popup overlay page, and
nothing on the map that shows coverage no matter how much you zoom in.
There is no overlay I could add to include cell coverage. Presumably
you were able to get cell coverage (also presumably by different
carriers as denoted by the different colors) using the FCC map for your
screen capture. I couldn't get this map to show cell coverage.

As for coverage maps by the carriers, those are so inaccurate as to be
near lies. They make it look like there's great coverage in most areas,
but that's not true when actually measured.

The coverage maps by the carriers are not only worthless but misleading.
They'll show an area as red (high coverage), but actual testing shows
there are many dead spots in their professed high coverage areas, and
many dead spots are not small. Every carrier and their coverage map
show that I am in a red (high) coverage area. WRONG! At my mother's
house, I could even go outside, but signal strength there was still poor
making the choice of a cell phone a poor one to replace a landline, and
her house is in a very populated northeast area of a metropolis of
500,000 (another 300,000 in a neighboring adjacent city, and 3.4 million
in the "greater metropolitan" area which includes the adjacent suburbs).
The reason they won't zoom in beyond some magnification is that it
becomes obvious that they are averaging the coverage across overly large
areas. Zoom in too far, and if their maps were accurate, you'd see
there are lots of areas they haven't actually measured, or are
deliberately omitting.

There are apps that provide community reporting of cell strength as the
users move around. Their results are uploaded to provide more realistic
cell coverage data. OpenSignal is one of them. That shows I'm in a
dead zone that is about 3 city-blocks in radius. There are lots of
similarly-sized, or even bigger, dead spots in those so-called high
coverage maps by the carriers, and this is FAR from arguing about what
happens out in the rural areas or hicks. User data is uploaded at a
rate of 100 reports per day, but if a user mostly sits in one place,
like at home, then most of their reports is just for one spot. Really
only helps if the volunteers move around a lot during the day, even if
only around their neighborhood, to reflect more accurately what is
getting measured for signal strength in and around those areas.

Carriers tell me that I'm in a great area for signal strength. Their
maps say so, too. There is what they claim. There is what is true.

Pretty hard to determine what is "common" for all cell phone users. The
carriers are lying, or, at least, misleading by showing coverage across
overly large expanses. The OS app shows even in Boston there are dead
spots as reported by users. As I move the OpenSignal map more north
(without changing the zoom level) to hit New Hamsphire, Vermont, and
Maine, the number of dead or poor spots increases - but, alas, so does
the density of user reports.

> What people in some rural areas do, if they have broadband service, is
> to install a micro-cell in their house. Of course this is less
> necessary than in the past since most every carrier and MVNO provides
> Wi-Fi calling. I told my neighbor, who is on T-Mobile, to install a
> micro-cell and that T-Mobile would provide, see
> <https://www.t-mobile.com/support/coverage/4g-lte-cellspot>. But
> instead he's changing to a Verizon MVNO.

I had considered getting a booster, but there was the expense and labor
to install a tall antenna to make it worth the effort and cost. My
cellular provider is an MVNO, so no free femtocell available (not even a
paid one). Wifi calling to the rescue, but none of which is a choice
for micky on the trails.

Hmm, satellite phones are still doable, but fall outside the free 911
calls possible with cell phones. Satellite phones require a service
plan; e.g., https://satellitephonestore.com/isatphone-pro-service (more
at https://satellitephonestore.com/services/satelliteService).
Considering what folks are paying monthly for cellular service, doesn't
look like satellite service is much different in price - until you look
at the quotas regarding usage (minutes/month). Wonder why they are
illegal in some areas.

If I were in out-of-coverage areas a lot, like I went hiking, fishing,
camping, hunting, and exploring, where there was little or no cell
coverage, and I did those activities a lot, a satellite phone makes more
sense if you feel the need to tie yourself to civilization while
supposedly getting away from it, or if you feel compelled to have
emergency services contact - bbut if you're in the Northwest
Territories, how long will it take for help to arrive, and if it really
were an emergency would you still be alive when they arrived?

[Andy Burnelli]

Mayayana wrote:

> There was a sad story a few years ago. A CNet tech worker,
> 26 I think, went camping with his wife and 2 or 3 kids. They
> drove 25 miles up a logging road in California and got stuck on
> ice, unable to get out. No cell service. They sat there for 2 or 3
> days, burning tires to stay warm. Finally the young man wandered
> off into the woods to look for help. He was found dead of exhaustion.
> The rest were eventually saved.

Oh Jesus. Where do I start?

People like Mayayana are dangerous not because they're ignorant and racist,
but because they are too stupid to realize they are as stupid as they are.

*Almost every single statement in Mayayana's post is patently dead wrong.*
a. He wasn't camping - he was just driving home after Thanksgiving
b. He wasn't found dead of exhaustion - it was hypothermia
c. They simply missed a turnoff and decided to follow a secondary road
etc.

Note there was no incompetence in terms of camping.
No lack of preparation in terms of camping.

*Everything Mayayana thinks he _fabricated_ for his own sick purposes.*

The entire _point_ is that people like Mayayana do not own adult cognition.
That's _why_ they are avowed racists.

They take the fact that they were stuck in the snow, and then this avowed
racist manufactures an entire story around irrespondible camping.

WTF?
There was no camping.

He simply made a wrong turn and didn't know the secondary was blocked.
Every single thought out of Mayayana is fabricated in his own mind.

It's _why_ Mayayana is a racist.
a. Mayayana said most black people are criminals at one point.
b. Mayayana said most jews are trying to steal your money at another.
c. Mayayana said most Mexicans are in the crime cartels at yet another.

What Mayayana does with racism is exactly what he did just now.
A. He takes the bare minimum facts
B. Then he fabricates his own narrative out of those facts
C. In order to support his already-foregone conclusion about the event.

And yet, as always, Mayayana is _completely_ wrong on all the facts.
Every single one.

The problem with utter ignorant morons like Mayayana is, is that
_everything_ they say is dead wrong in almost every way possible.

Who is _that_ stupid as what Mayayana just proved himself to be?
Personally, I've never met anyone in the flesh as stupid as he is.

Seriously.
They're left of the first quartile in Dunning Kruger in that they don't even
_realize_ how fantastically ignorant they are about just about everything.

Yet Mayayana is oh so very confident in himself, even as he's always wrong.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Kim>
--
People like Mayayana are dangerous not because they're ignorant and racist,
but because they are too stupid to realize they are as stupid as they are.

[Andy Burnelli]

Andy Burnelli wrote:

> Yet Mayayana is oh so very confident in himself, even as he's always wrong.
> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Kim>

Even though Mayayana pulled yet another racist move by building his own
nefarious back story about James Kim going camping & being irresponsibly
unprepared for that, there is always some good value to be gotten out of all
Usenet topics.

Here's a cut and paste from the cited article which shows that, in emergency
situations, there is hope in understanding _how_ the cellular signals work!

Although the Kims had a cellular phone with them, their remote location in
the mountains was out of range of the cellular network, rendering the phone
unusable for voice calls. Despite being unusable for voice calls, their cell
phone would play a key role in their rescue. Cell phone text messages may go
through even when there appears to be no signal, in part because text
messaging is a store-and-forward service. Two Edge Wireless engineers, Eric
Fuqua and Noah Pugsley, contacted search and rescue authorities offering
their help in the search. On Saturday, December 2, they began searching
through the data logs of cell sites, trying to find records of repeaters to
which the Kims' cellphone may have connected. They discovered that on
November 26, 2006, at around 1:30 a.m., the Kims' cellphone made a brief
automatic connection to a cell site near Glendale, Oregon, and retrieved two
text messages. Temporary atmospheric conditions, such as tropospheric
ducting, can briefly allow radio communications over larger distances than
normal. Through the data logs, the engineers determined that the cell phone
was in a specific area west of the cellular tower. They then used a computer
program to determine which areas in the mountains were within a
line-of-sight to the cellular tower. This narrowed the search area
tremendously, and finally focused rescue efforts on Bear Camp Road.[11]

On the afternoon of December 4, John Rachor, a local helicopter pilot
unaffiliated with any formal search effort, spotted Mrs. Kim and her two
daughters walking on a remote road. After he radioed the family's position
to authorities, the three were airlifted out of the area and transferred to
a nearby hospital.[12]

Law enforcement officials said that the discovery of the cellphone
connection, and the subsequent analysis of the log data, was the critical
breakthrough that ultimately resulted in the rescue of Kim's wife and
daughters by helicopter.[11]

[Joerg Lorenz]

Am 04.03.22 um 16:29 schrieb VanguardLH:

> Personally I have to wonder why micky is going off onto trails to go
> hiking, but has his cell phone on. Isn't the point of venturing into
> wilderness to get away from the din of civilization, not to have a phone
> making noise and interrupting the experience?

Wilderdness starts where cellphone-coverage ends.
For micky's safety I would recommend a satellite service.

https://www.satelliteinternet.com/resources/satellite-phone-service/



--
De gustibus non est disputandum

[sms]

On 3/4/2022 3:19 PM, Mayayana wrote:

<snip>

> They may claim that. It's not necessarily true. There's
> also an area of VT I know of with no service. If you can't
> expect to be able to use a cellphone then it doesn't much
> matter if the carriers claim you can. I imagine part of the
> issue might be the mountains, but I really don't know.

Actually, I've found the FCC maps to be very conservative. Their maps
are based on actual cells, not on carrier claims. There is often
sufficient signal strength, at least for a voice call or slow data, even
where the maps show none. The carrier maps are often overly optimistic
showing coverage where there is none.

My sister-in-law lives in the Bay Area, up the hill from San Francisco
International Airport. Her data on Verizon and T-Mobile is very slow,
despite the carriers' maps showing excellent coverage. But when you look
at the FCC maps, it's an "aha moment," especially for T-Mobile, see
comparison between FCC and carrier map for T-Mobile in her area at
<https://i.imgur.com/y66Fcjd.png>. The reason I was looking is because
her broadband service, on a municipally-owned cable company is terrible,
and there is no competition. So I checked her address for 5G home
internet on T-Mobile or Verizon.

But yes, there are definitely areas of Vermont and New Hampshire where
you don't have coverage. We were constantly using our phones on a
vacation in New England last year. The only place we lost coverage was
in part of the White Mountains in New Hampshire. Even in Acadia National
Park in Maine we never lost coverage.

> The point being that it's not so unusual in rural areas for
> people to have no service. Micky's friend apparently thought
> that was impossible. I actually know someone in an urban
> apt building -- brick exterior and metal lathe interior
> walls -- who only gets a signal in certain areas of his apt.

True, that's why Wi-Fi calling can be so useful. Some buildings are
especially bad, and especially for carriers using higher frequency
bands. I recall back in the olden days when the U.S. had only 850 MHz
and 1900 MHz, with AT&T and Verizon being mostly 850 MHz and Sprint and
T-Mobile being 1900 MHz. In-building coverage was much better on AT&T
and Verizon, besides better coverage in general because AT&T and Verizon
needed 1/4th the number of cells to provide coverage.

[VanguardLH]

Mayayana wrote:

> "VanguardLH" <V...@nguard.LH> wrote
>
>| Personally I have to wonder why micky is going off onto trails to go
>| hiking, but has his cell phone on. Isn't the point of venturing into
>| wilderness to get away from the din of civilization, not to have a phone
>| making noise and interrupting the experience?
>|
>
> I'm with you. I see so many people who are just never where
> they are. It must be very numbing. But maybe that's why they
> want service: They can just no longer imagine life without that
> contact. Some younger people have never truly been alone.
>
> There was a sad story a few years ago. A CNet tech worker,
> 26 I think, went camping with his wife and 2 or 3 kids. They
> drove 25 miles up a logging road in California and got stuck on
> ice, unable to get out. No cell service. They sat there for 2 or 3
> days, burning tires to stay warm. Finally the young man wandered
> off into the woods to look for help. He was found dead of exhaustion.
> The rest were eventually saved.

Um, why couldn't the wannabe camper use the same road to walk out? Why
didn't they have weather-appropriate apparel for all of them to take the
logging road to walk back out instead of any getting stranded behind?
In 8 hours, they could've trekked the 20 miles to get back out. The
question is how far away the logging road was someplace to get help. In
3 days, they could've trekked 60 miles, or more. They were going
camping, so they obviously had food stores. They would've have tents
and sleeping bags for the nights between day treks back to safety. They
would have had the supplies to trek out. Without those supplies, just
what did they expect to do for "camping" at their intended destination?

This was a family that should never had gone camping beyond those
alongside the road (e.g., Jellystone state parks aka family
entertainment camp resorts). Sounds like another candidate for the
Darwin Awards web site.

The story sounds a bit fishy. If they had been burning tires for 2 to 3
days, the rangers would've spotted and reported the black smoke. Maybe
the "the rest were eventually saved" was due to the rangers spotting the
black pyre of smoke, but the "the young man wandered off into the woods"
sounds fishy instead of taking the logging road back.

> They could have walked out of there in maybe 8 hours. They
> should have had camping supplies to last several days. There
> must have been something they could have done to free the car.
> But this was a geek with little experience of physicality, much less
> camping.

Was this guy named Barney Fife?
(https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x86f2us)

Not using cell phones is also a withdraw symptom in urban areas. People
have become grafted to their cell phones. It's the new legal heroin.

At a friend's house, we had a bonfire and a Halloween maze. We had to
confiscate the phones upon entry to the maze, because the kids agreed
but couldn't comply with not using the flashlight on their phones. At
the bonfire, we played the actor-movie game where you picked a movie,
named an actor in the movie, pick another movie with that actor, pick a
different actor in that other movie, and kept chaining together movies
through their actors. What did the kids do instinctively? Grab their
phones. No, no phones. This is a memory game, not a test of using
Google.

Try going on a fishing trip, and tell the kids they can't use their
phones in the boat. Moan, moan, moan. I paid for everyone to go on a
Disneyworld trip (flights, resort, rental cars, theme park tickets,
dinner theater tickets, and everything else). What did the kids do at
restaurants? Yep, texting. I told them if they didn't want to be with
their family in the restaurant that they go sit in the car to be just as
much by themselves as they were at the table. What did they remember
about the theme parks? Some texts with bogus friends, and what was
happening elsewhere.

There is a definite and massive problem with phone addiction (nomophobia
= no mobile phone phobia), and making excuses proposed as reasons for
why they just must have their phone with them all the time, and it must
always be powered on, and they just must reply to a text when received.

Don't send the kids to their rooms as punishment. Also take away their
phone(s), unplug the RJ45 cable at the modem going to their computer,
and take out the TV. Give them a paper book as salt on the wound.

[VanguardLH]

Andy Burnelli wrote:

> BTW, I'm completely different from most people on this newsgroup.
> a. I'm intelligent and purposefully helpful & I have a kind heart
> b. Yet, I can't stand the morons who abound, and the trolls
> c. Even so, I provide _tremendous_ value to this group in many ways.
> As do some others, such as Andy Burns and even Frank at times.

As evidenced by your history in Usenet, anyone that disagrees with you
or holds a differing opinion just must be a troll. Uh huh.

[nospam]

In article <svudl6$nn5$1...@dont-email.me>, sms

<scharf...@geemail.com> wrote:

> > They may claim that. It's not necessarily true. There's
> > also an area of VT I know of with no service. If you can't
> > expect to be able to use a cellphone then it doesn't much
> > matter if the carriers claim you can. I imagine part of the
> > issue might be the mountains, but I really don't know.
>
> Actually, I've found the FCC maps to be very conservative. Their maps
> are based on actual cells, not on carrier claims.

the most accurate metric are user reports.

> There is often
> sufficient signal strength, at least for a voice call or slow data, even
> where the maps show none. The carrier maps are often overly optimistic
> showing coverage where there is none.

very much false. carriers have a vested interest in exaggerating their
maps. if there is a measurable signal, it shows up on the map, even
though it's weak or unusable in real life.

[sms]

On 3/4/2022 3:32 PM, VanguardLH wrote:

<snip>

> The first FCC map doesn't show cell coverage at all. It's just a map of
> locations, not cell signal strength and by which carriers. The initial
> overlay page says "This mapping tool is provided to assist in viewing 4G
> LTE coverage". You click OK to get past the popup overlay page, and
> nothing on the map that shows coverage no matter how much you zoom in.
> There is no overlay I could add to include cell coverage. Presumably
> you were able to get cell coverage (also presumably by different
> carriers as denoted by the different colors) using the FCC map for your
> screen capture. I couldn't get this map to show cell coverage.

You have to check the boxes on the right for each carrier. Look at this
example <https://i.imgur.com/eO1LWZ2.png>.

Lately, data and voice are almost identical since they both are on LTE
or 5G and there are almost no areas (if any) with 3G only.

[sms]

On 3/4/2022 5:21 PM, VanguardLH wrote:

<snip>

> As evidenced by your history in Usenet, anyone that disagrees with you
> or holds a differing opinion just must be a troll. Uh huh.

In the past, I've urged Andy/Harry/Arlen/Dean to change his approach:
1. Stop constant nymshifting
2. Base his posts based on referenced facts
3. Stop lying and shilling

No one will think any worse of him if he makes the decision to post
factual information. He can repair his reputation though it will take
time. The misinformation he promulgates on Android stuff is bad enough,
but the misinformation he promulgates on things like Covid is inexcusable.

[Andy Burnelli]

VanguardLH wrote:

> As evidenced by your history in Usenet, anyone that disagrees with you
> or holds a differing opinion just must be a troll. Uh huh.

My believe system is based on facts, Vanguard.
Yes. Facts.

I know... you don't know what facts are.
But I do.

Facts.
Point out even _once_ where what you claim happened, actually happened.
*Name just once*

I know what happened.
You _fabricated_ what happened.

The proof is you can't name a _single_ instance of what you claim actually
happening. If you can, let's see it (but I already know you can't).

Because you made it up.
Why?

I don't know why.
I suspect you own the brain of a child, so that's why.

But you tell me.

What happened was people said things that were dead wrong.
Factually dead wrong.

I simply proved that they were factually dead wrong.
That's _not_ the childish thing you said of a "differing opinion".

Facts are _different_ from an opinion.
If you don't know that by now, then you need to learn that.

Facts come first (adults never disagree on facts).
Opinions come second (adults can often disagree on opinions).

Why do adult always agree on facts?
Because if they didn't, they wouldn't _be_ adults.
Facts are funny that way.

Why do adults often disagree on opinions?
Because they put different _weight_ on the facts.
Adults are funny that way.

No adult should be disagreeing on the facts in this thread.
Not you (if you're an adult) and certainly not me (because I am).

Your _entire_ belief system is based on exactly _zero_ facts, Vanguard.
Here's proof.

Show me even _once_ in this thread where I did what you claimed.
*Name just once*

If you can't name it, then your claim was fabricated.
--
The problem with morons like Vanguard is they confuse facts with opinions.

[Andy Burnelli]

sms wrote:

> No one will think any worse of him if he makes the decision to post
> factual information.

Vanguard lied.
You lie like a rug.

The fact remains I spoke facts.
What you and Vanguard can't comprehend is these are different things:
a. Facts
b. Opinions

No adult ever disagrees on facts (it's what makes them adults).

Facts are funny that way.

Often adults disagree on opinions (as they're based on weighting of facts).

Adults are funny that way.

a. What Mayayana doesn't like is I proved he was _factually_ wrong.
b. What Steve doesn't like is I proved he was _factually_ wrong.
c. What Vanguard doesn't like is I proved he was _factually_ wrong.

I didn't say a thing about their "opinions".
I proved their facts were wrong.

And that's OK.
Adults accept graciously when their facts are wrong.

Children do not.
It's like I proved Santa doesn't exist but you still believe it does.

No adult would disagree on the fact that Santa doesn't exist.
And yet, the three of you did exactly that (with respect to facts).

Don't blame me because _you_ got your facts wrong.
If you can find a single fact I got wrong - tell it to me now.

Name just one.
--
I'm not afraid of facts because my belief system is _based_ on facts.

[Andy Burnelli]

VanguardLH wrote:

> Um, why couldn't the wannabe camper use the same road to walk out?

Vanguard,
Mayayana fabricated his entire story.

Why?
You ask Mayayana why.

He turned a simple missed turn into a nefarious unprepared camping story.
Mayana made it all up.

Here are the facts.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Kim>

> The story sounds a bit fishy.

Everyone who knows anything knows the story of what happened.
Mayayana just did what Mayayana always does. He lied.

He took a few tidbits and then contorted them in his own racist mind.
He nefariously fabricated the entire "unprepared camper" bit.

Why?
I don't know why.

Why did he claim long ago that most black people were criminals?
I don't know why but I know his belief systems are not based on facts.

> Not using cell phones is also a withdraw symptom in urban areas. People
> have become grafted to their cell phones. It's the new legal heroin.

BTW, that's an "opinion", which is based on the facts as you know it.
You took the facts, and you made an assessment using different weights.

What you claimed I did was I disagreed with your "opinion" which I did not.
I disagree with facts because they were wrong.

But I did not disagree with people's opinion.
You fabricated that.

Why?
I don't know why.

You tell me.
I suspect you're just vile.

You're like an idiot held-back bully who is told Santa isn't real.
You claim that Santa is real.

If I show you facts, you say I disagree with your "opinion".

Children do that.
Not adults.

> Don't send the kids to their rooms as punishment. Also take away their
> phone(s), unplug the RJ45 cable at the modem going to their computer,
> and take out the TV. Give them a paper book as salt on the wound.

Another opinion which I won't disagree with since my belief systems are
based on facts and I stick to the facts (you can have your opinions).

One fact that is useful though that can bring this thread out of the
cesspool that you and Mayayana and Steve dropped us into is this:
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Kim>

Notice how they claim that the "sms" app saved them somehow?
I know you, Vanguard, are able to comprehend detail.

On the behalf of the SUBJECT of this thread, can you read the facts.
And then summarize for us what they're saying about how they _found_ her?

They apparently found a "ping" from an "sms" app which downloaded "two
messages", but it was confusing how that happens aside from the data.

Can someone who is smarter than I am read that article and expound upon what
the lesson is for the SUBJECT of this thread which is safety while far from
a cellular tower, but perhaps close enough to get a few of those pings?
--
I don't care that most people on Usenet are uneducated, child-like, of low
IQ & of low self esteem; but due to that, they are often wrong on the facts.

[Andy Burnelli]

sms wrote:

> Their maps
> are based on actual cells, not on carrier claims.

You do realize that the FCC coverage maps come from data from the carriers?
Right?

Tell me you know that Steve.
Because if you don't, you're either (a) a liar, or (b) an idiot. (pick one)

You do realize that the FCC coverage maps are completely calculated data?
Right?

Tell me you know that Steve.
Because if you don't, you're either (a) a liar, or (b) an idiot. (pick one)

You do realize that the FCC coverage maps do not contain 5G coverage data.
Right?

Tell me you know that Steve.
Because if you don't, you're either (a) a liar, or (b) an idiot. (pick one)

[Andy Burnelli]

nospam wrote:

> very much false. carriers have a vested interest in exaggerating their
> maps. if there is a measurable signal, it shows up on the map, even
> though it's weak or unusable in real life.

Here's a question for the _adults_ on this newsgroup.
Q: *If I can show screenshots proving what I say, why can't Steve?*

I have to agree with everything nospam said above, which, you have to admit,
is rare.

Steve has lied to us about those FCC coverage maps for years.
I can even _predict_ Steve's likes years in advance (so can nospam).

The lie always goes like this:
a. Verizon is great (but he doesn't tell us that they pay him)
b. T-Mobile sucks (Steve even _fabricated_ slow speeds for them)

Steve happens to have both a T-Mobile & Verizon phone right now.
Yup. In his hands.

He tells us the Verizon speeds are always better than the T-Mobile speeds.
OK. Show me the proof.

He can't.
He never does.
He fabricates the proof with _text_ (a picture, or it didn't happen).

Steve claims the Santa Cruz Mountains has slow T-Mobile speeds, right?
Well, for years, everyone knows I live there, so what are _my_ tests?
<https://i.postimg.cc/4dDhFK5F/speedtest01.jpg> *125Mbps*
<https://i.postimg.cc/vT68k3BW/speedtest02.jpg> *181Mbps*
<https://i.postimg.cc/pdXF4Mtz/speedtest03.jpg> *125Mbps* to *181Mbps*
<https://i.postimg.cc/gcsyc4Vn/speedtest04.jpg> *82Mbps* & -88dBM
<https://i.postimg.cc/mggy315q/speedtest05.jpg> *254Mbps*
<https://i.postimg.cc/43KvqkZQ/speedtest06.jpg> *255Mbps*
<https://i.postimg.cc/zf9w1tGZ/speedtest07.jpg> *255Mbps*
<https://i.postimg.cc/Bb3xjjFm/speedtest08.jpg> *255Mbps*
<https://i.postimg.cc/GhZKX0vZ/speedtest09.jpg> *130Mbps*
<https://i.postimg.cc/28yZdQJR/speedtest10.jpg> *81Mbps*
<https://i.postimg.cc/ydnDcxy8/speedtest11.jpg> *79Mbps* to *81Mbps*
<https://i.postimg.cc/5y063Jsq/speedtest12.jpg> *96Mbps* to *109Mbps*
<https://i.postimg.cc/fbNyPmHb/speedtest13.jpg> *109Mbps*
<https://i.postimg.cc/5tSyWyGS/speedtest14.jpg> *88Mbps* to *102Mbps*
<https://i.postimg.cc/C5vgmtRd/speedtest15.jpg> *130Mbps* to *255Mbps*
<https://i.postimg.cc/W3GgYJtZ/speedtest16.jpg> *125Mbps* to *181Mbps*
<https://i.postimg.cc/nVs0Smw8/speedtest17.jpg> *54Mbps*
<https://i.postimg.cc/N0fx62rz/speedtest18.jpg> *60Mbps* & -85dBm

Here's a question for the _adults_ on this newsgroup.
Q: *If I can show screenshots proving what I say, why can't Steve?*
--
The problem with people like Steve, who, we must say, is a paid professonal
politician, Democrat in fact, is they lie so much that they begin to believe
their own lies - and yet - the fact they lie - means they are insulting us
because they are in effect treating us as too stupid to catch their lies.

[Andy Burnelli]

sms wrote:

> You have to check the boxes on the right for each carrier.

I speak facts.

Steve has been using the same maps for years claiming the same thing:
a. Verizon is great (he is _paid_ by Verizon, let's never forget!)
b. T-Mobile sucks (he _never_ proves that - not even once)

Now I'm _not_ paid by anyone (I'm retired) and I don't care one bit if
Verizon or T-Mobile is better since they're both the same where I live.

Everyone _except_ Steve (e.g., Lewis, badgolferman, nospam, et. al) has told
Steve to stop lying about his vaunted Verizon coverage (which he doesn't
even pay for since he uses a convoluted MVNO setup instead - but that's his
right).

But Steve persists in bringing up these bogus claims based on the FCC maps.
Now, I trusted Steve for a while but then I _looked_ up what they are.

1. They're purely mathematical calculated data!
2. Those calculations are 100% based on data the carriers give to the FCC!
3. Last I checked, they show _zero_ 3G and _zero_ 5G coverage.

Bear in mind T-Mobile 5G coverage has skyrocketed, it's no wonder that
Steve, who we must admit, is a paid professional politician, a Democrat, a
mayor no less, so we have his bio, is a paid liar.

While Steve's facts are wrong, the fact that he based almost his entire
argument on flawed data is _exactly_ what politicians do all the time.

When they do that, I take it as an insult.
They think we're too stupid to know what those FCC maps really say.

And that's insulting.
It's insulting to our intelligence.

Every time Steve makes that claim he made here, only 2 things are possible:
a. Steve is repeatedly and brazenly constantly lying to us, or,
b. Steve is interminably completely ignorant of what those maps actually say.

Pick one.

[Andy Burnelli]

sms wrote:

> You have to check the boxes on the right for each carrier.

I speak facts.
And I rarely discuss people's opinions.

My belief systems are based on facts.

[VanguardLH]

Andy Burnelli wrote:

> Every major carrier (AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile) in the USA, to my
> knowledge and experience, will give you a repeater and/or a cell
> tower for free.

Carrier? Yes. MVNO? No.

> I wrote about this _many_ times so it's irksome to have to repeat

No one here is compiling a biography of your Usenet participation to
review everything you ever said before in other threads.

> I wrote _all_ of this up in the past so it's irksome to have to repeat it.

Yep, if you wrote it elsewhere in some other thread, you'll have to
repeat it in this thread if you are going to reference that prior info.

> My experience is the following:
> a. The three carriers all provide free femtocells if you have bad
> signal.

You note that you and all your neighbors are using cellular service from
the Big 3. You pay more for their service. There are the big 3. Then
there are 139 MVNOs (in just the USA).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_virtual_network_operator

That cites 7 out of 100 cellular users are using an MVNO. Reflects that
many just go with name brands instead of expending the effort to
research what is the best deal for them.

You're posting using Thunderbird. Likely you also use Firefox as your
primary web browser. If so, yep, you're in the minority, but you
decided which was the best web browser instead of getting duped into
accepting Google Chrome. I could buy a 2-pack of Mr Clean Magic Erasers
for $4.99 ($2.50 per sponge), or I could buy a 100-pack of melamine
sponges at eBay for $12 ($0.12 per sponge). Buying the expensive brand
name is not always the best choice.

I don't rely on cell phones when hiking (and I'm far enough in that
there are no trails, other than where the deer mashed the grass to get
to their resting spot) or camping, fishing, hunting, and anything away
from urbania. That means, for use in urbania, I can get the cheapest
cellular service (with rollover, too) with quotas exceeding my usage
($116/yr @ 400 minutes that's tripled for my phone choice) instead of
having to pay hundreds more per year to the Big 3 (e.g., Verizon at
$420/yr @ 500 minutes/month, or $600/yr unlimited minutes). I don't
need unlimited. I'm not even using the 400 x 3 (1200) minutes per year
with Tracfone, and have accrued somewhere over 3000 rollover minutes.
Not all of us need high or unlimited quotas since we will never exceed
the limited quotas. Plus, with wifi calling at home or through any wifi
hotspot, are cellular quota consumption is further reduced. At home, I
never use cellular. It's always wifi. Not everyone needs to pay for
extras or quotas we won't use. MVNOs are an obvious choice for those
not interested in overpaying.

To me, if you're using one of the Big 3, you've been duped. If you have
some bias against Tracfone (and its various brands), go with another
MVNO, like Mint at $15/month (or $180/yr, cheaper than the Big 3), but
that goes up to $25/month after the 3-month trial (or $300, which
exceeds the $116/yr with quotas I don't fully consume, so there is
rollover). The MVNOs are using the same networks as the Big 3.

Ah, but as you note, with the Big 3 you could get a free femtocell aka
microcell (well, if you whine about the cost and manage to get a refund,
else they cost). Not all are free. I remember I could get one from
AT&T for free at one time, but recall they wanted to charge when I
checked again later. Also, not all of the Big 3 offer femtocells
anymore despite you saying so. AT&T no longer provides femtocells; see:

https://www.att.com/support/article/wireless/KM1009372

With wifi calling, none of the Big 3 have to provide femtocells anymore.
With wifi calling over the Internet, and since femtocells mandate
Internet access, why would anyone still be using a femtocell? Well, for
smartphones which have wifi, femtocells don't make sense. For old dumb
phones with no wifi feature, yep, femtocells make sense. The dumb
phones only due cellular. Nowadays smartphones with wifi can be had for
cheap (under $100 for unlocked). Are you and your neighbors using
femtocells still using dumb phones (no wifi)? Other than at the
Goodwill for super cheap, I can't remember when I saw someone using an
old dumb phone. I've had them in the past, but wifi was one the
requirements that moved me to smartphones long ago, and not just for
wifi calling.

> If you're using an MVNO, I don't know what they will do, as I don't
> know anyone in the flesh who uses them (although I'm aware Steve uses
> them so ask him).

There is 7 million users of MVNOs. No, we're not the majority, but
we're also not easily duped. We comparison shop. Even you are not in
the majority for choice of e-mail client (Thunderbird) as Outlook has
that honor, but both have been far surpassed by mobile e-mail clients.

https://kinsta.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/top-10-email-market-share.png
(Thunderbird is so low it doesn't show on the list.)

That Thunderbird is popular (which it isn't) wasn't your reason for
picking it. You likely use Firefox, and you didn't choose it because of
popularity. With wifi calling, reduction in femtocell availability, why
stay with paying more to the Big 3?

I get that many, maybe most, consumers get a comfy warm fuzzy feeling
sticking with name brands. It's an emotional thing. Instead of looking
at the 5-year, or longer, maintenance costs for each car they might
purchase, they look at manufacturer warranty duration to feel comfy
about the durability of their choice of car.

> I get four lines from T-Mo with unlimited almost everything, including
> unlimited data, unlimited text, unlimited MMS, unlimited USA calls, etc.
> (the only things limited is the 5GB/month/line of hotspotting & tethering)
> for $25/month/line. I even get two iPads with 200MB/month free SIM service.
> <https://i.postimg.cc/nhpbcP50/tmopromo04.jpg> $100 for six lines + $16 tax

Geez, I get more quota than I can use for $116 per *year*. I only need
1 line. You're paying that every *month* with your 6-line T-Mobile
plan. Yikes! If you really are doling out the 6 lines to 5 other
members in your family, that comes down to $19/line per month, or
$228/year per line. That's twice the price I get per line from an MVNO.
You must have super high quota demands than do I to pay for high quotas
or unlimited quotas.

> Stupid people will make stupid decisions, Vanguard; but my point was
> that if you know what I know, then you have no business complaining
> about coverage.

The guy that is still using a femtocell, claims all of the Big 3 provide
free femtocells (but don't), and hasn't switched to wifi calling since
he claims to have Internet service is telling me I cannot complain about
cellular coverage that I cannot get that the carriers claim I should
have. Sorry if I don't take your word that you are the cellular God of
wisdom.

> If you have Internet in the USA, you have _fantastic_ coverage in your
> home!

I'm not always at home. Neither is micky when on the trails. Yep, I
have fantastic "coverage" at home with Internet access, because then we
are no longer discussing *CELLULAR* coverage and have migrated to wifi
calling -- which, by the way, is completely free to me by using the
Google Voice app on my phone at any wifi hotspot and an Obitalk 200
appliance on my cable modem at home. I can use Google Voice instead of
my cellular carrier to make/receive wifi calls, especially at home,
which further reduces my quota consumption, and why I never use it all.

Okay, not completely free. Zero for the Google Voice app on my Android
phone. Zero for the Google Voice service. $50 for the Obitalk device,
a one-time cost. The Obitalk device was cheaper but equally functional
to the Ooma device. Google Voice is free, and Ooma has their Basic
service plan* for free.

* The Ooma Basic free plan is missing some features in Google Voice.
https://www.ooma.com/home-phone-service/faqs/why-is-ooma-basic-free-and-ooma-premier-costs-money/
mentions it takes their $10/month Premier plan to have: custom and
anon call blocking, private voicemail, voicemail monitoring (aka
screening), and call forwarding. No mention if the paid Premier Ooma
plan includes spam call filtering. Got all those with free Google
Voice. Ooma Premier says it has a Backup Number feature (calls are
automatically forwarded to another number). With simultaneous ring
and Google Voice forwarding to multiple phones, I don't see the need
for a backup number. One of the multiple phones getting forwarded
calls is a backup. All are backup phones. I've yet to see a
bang-for-the buck feature in Ooma's paid Premier plan that I don't
already have with Google Voice, or conversely, free Google Voice has
more features than Ooma's free Basic plan. No impetus to switch from
Google Voice to Ooma Basic.

> While I'm all for saving money, I don't know _anyone_ who uses an MVNO,

Yes, you do. I announced I'm one. If you look, there are probably
other users of MVNOs that have posted here. There are 139 MVNOs, but
only the 3 biggies.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_virtual_network_operator

MVNO marketshare:
- 139 MVNOs in USA (4.7% marketshare).
- 135 in Germany (19.5%).
- 83 in Japan (10.6%).
- 77 in UK (15.9%).
- 66 in Australia (13.1%).
- 63 in Spain (11.5%)
- 53 in France (11.2%).
- 49 in Denmark (34.6%).

https://www.google.com/search?q=number%20of%20mvnos will show you the
proliferation of MVNOs in other countries or regions. So, now you've
been enlightened there are lots of MVNO customers outside of your
personal cadre of neighbors, friends, and family.

Selling a service does NOT require rebuilding the entire infrastructure
to support the service. Look at how Highwinds, a major Usenet backbone,
resells its bandwidth and hardware resources to 2nd-tier Usenet provider
who resell their resources to 3rd-tier Usenet providers, and so on. You
are not paying Highwinds for Usenet access. You're using free (and
unregistered) AIOE for Usenet access. Is AIOE a Usenet backbone
provider? Hardly. You're using an MVNO of Usenet.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_mobile_virtual_network_operators

I haven't heard of most of those MVNOs, just Tracfone (and their Net10
and Straight Talk brands), Boost, Consumer Cellular, Cricket, Red Pocket
(mostly from their FreedomPOP acquisition), Google Fi, Mint, and Xfinity
Mobile (becaue I'm a Comcast customer) either because I've used some, I
know of others that use some, or because of the TV ads.

> as I said, Steve, who always shills for Verizon but doesn't actually
> pay them, is an expert in MVNOs and so you should be asking him what
> they provide as I can't tell you what they provide.

I periodically comparison shop. After awhile, I start hunting around to
make a change to see if someone offers better or more features with
competitive pricing. I'm not loyal to any cellular provider. The same
with car and house insurance: about every 5 years, I hunt around
checking coverages and costs along with claims responsiveness. To me,
cellular service is a commodity, and I periodically check if I want to
change. MVNOs are a definite contender for my dollar.

> However, if the MVNO has crappy signal, and if they won't give you a
> free cellular tower for your home, my suggestion would be to change
> MVNOs as I'm a believer that lousy service is a tax on the stupid,
> not on smart people.

The MVNOs are using the same Big 3 cellular providers (AT&T, Verizon,
and T-Mobile) that you tout as better, or really in your realm of
experience.

Since many MVNOs can use any of the Big 3 providers, you don't have to
switch MVNOs to get assigned to a different Big 3 provider. You just
ask them to switch you. Typically they pick the Big 3 that contracts to
rent access at a tower closest to where you live (your home), but if
your concern is better coverage at elsewhere, like at work, downtown, or
wherever you prefer, they can switch you to one of the Big 3 that uses a
tower giving you the best signal strength at the other location. I've
had my MVNO (Tracfone) switch me twice: once when I suspected signalling
problems with Spring (back before T-Mobile acquired them), and again
when a new tower went up across the river (but didn't end up giving me a
strong signal than the prior one, but no reason to switch again to
achieve no effective change).

MVNOs don't have their own networks. They use those of the Big 3. As
all of the Big 3 offer wifi calling hence available to all the MVNOs, no
one needs a femtocell anymore. That requires Internet access (the
femtocell connects to the modem), and Internet access also gives you
wifi calling. Only for old dumb phones with no wifi antenna are
femtocells useful, but I haven't seen dumb phones for awhile being used
by me, my family, my friends, by customers in grocery stores, or other
stores, in malls, or anywhere for several years now.

> Your point that stupid people buy crappy service is fine, but don't
> blame the crappy service since I have experience with all three major
> providers.

Which are the same networks used by the MVNOs. They don't rebuild the
wheel. They just tag along for the ride.

[VanguardLH]

Andy Burnelli wrote:

> VanguardLH wrote:
>
>> When did this mutate into a discussion about cellular coverage at home?
>
> Vanguard,
> Stop that crap. Just stop it. Stop it right now.

I don't do requests.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Oy2xNsR1Mw

> Stop it Vanguard.
> Stop acting just like the iKooks do.
> Nobody said anything like what you're claiming.

You aren't in charge here. You don't moderate this newsgroup. Else,
your attitude would equate you with an evil version of Chris Ilias.

> a. He wants to call 911

That doesn't require his phone be on all the time to hear the following
alerts.

> b. He wants an audible sound when cellular drops below about -115 dBm

That requires he waste valuable battery power to determine when he is
out of range instead of powering off his phone, and then later powering
it back on if there is an emergency. You think the trails wind around
to ensure they're within range of towers? You think micky is going to
go off-trail to stay within tower range because his phone beeped it was
out of range?

> c. It would be nice if messages could "queue up" when signal is too low

They do. For calls, it's called voicemail. For texts, they show up
when I later get in range of a tower. They don't get dumped into the
wastebasket just because they couldn't be immediately delivered. If
that were true, you'd never receive those texts that were sent when your
phone was powered off.

> When you backcountry hike, you need to be intelligent about not only your
> cellular signal and your incoming/outgoing communications, but also your
> ability to accurate map, track, and navigate without access to the net.

Considering the dearth of tower coverage in the hicks, seems proper
planning has you get a satellite phone if staying in contact is super
important to you.

> If you are an adult, you'll either tell it to Mayayana, or, if you think my
> statements are in any way in error, then tell it to me.

I'm not interested in stalking Mayayana, nor am I shy in noting your
errors.

> If you think I got a _single_ fact wrong, for example, tell it to me.

Done that.

> But don't bullshit me.

Your interpretation.

<more vacuous commands from Andy>
<again more vacuous commands from Andy>
<again more vacuous commands from Andy>

[VanguardLH]

sms wrote:

> The important thing when choosing a carrier is to check coverage on the
> FCC web site
> <https://fcc.maps.arcgis.com/apps/webappviewer/index.html?id=6c1b2e73d9d749cdb7bc88a0d1bdd25b>
> so you know the _native_ coverage you can expect.

I can't that page to show cellular coverage at all. Do you know the
source of their coverage maps, if they have any? If the sources are the
coverage maps spewed by the Big 3 (Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile) then those
maps are inaccurate. There are plenty of dead zones within the red
(high) coverage areas in the Big 3 maps.

> You can also use the Whistleout web site
> <https://www.whistleout.com/CellPhones/Guides/Coverage>

That just points to the Big 3 coverage maps which I already know aren't
accurate. The granularity of their coverage is far too coarse (covers a
large area that may be mostly high coverage, but not everywhere in that
zone is high coverage - it's how they bias their maps). All of the Big
3 claim I'm in a high coverage area. Nope.

> ... see <https://i.imgur.com/sigt8Xg.png>

Okay, that has coloring to show where is coverage. Alas, those are your
screenshots. Is there something extra I have to do at the FCC site to
get the coloring showing cellular coverage, and by which provider?

What I see at FCC site:
- On first visit: https://imgur.com/a/isl4Xhi
- Zoom in: https://imgur.com/a/0mL3UlH
- Zoom in some more: https://imgur.com/a/6MlvfT3

No coloring to show cellular coverage. My adblocker (uBlock Origin)
isn't blocking anything at the FCC site.

[VanguardLH]

Andy Burnelli wrote:

> Mayayana wrote:
>
>> There was a sad story a few years ago. A CNet tech worker, 26 I
>> think, went camping with his wife and 2 or 3 kids. They drove 25
>> miles up a logging road in California and got stuck on ice, unable
>> to get out. No cell service. They sat there for 2 or 3 days, burning
>> tires to stay warm. Finally the young man wandered off into the
>> woods to look for help. He was found dead of exhaustion. The rest
>> were eventually saved.
>
> Oh Jesus. Where do I start?

Probably best not to.

> People like Mayayana are dangerous not because they're ignorant and
> racist, but because they are too stupid to realize they are as stupid
> as they are.
>
> *Almost every single statement in Mayayana's post is patently dead
> wrong.*
> a. He wasn't camping - he was just driving home after Thanksgiving
> b. He wasn't found dead of exhaustion - it was hypothermia
> c. They simply missed a turnoff and decided to follow a secondary road
> etc.

You, nor anyone else, knows the reference of Mayayana's statement. He
never cited a reference, like a news story (which is NOT a blog in the
guise of news). You also do not cite your reference. There is nothing
proving you and Mayayana are talking about the same story. There are
lots of similar stories. Only takes a miniscule of change to tell a
different story. You claim Mayayana was wrong or lying yet you don't
cite a reference to prove your story is the correct one.

Mayayana's folklore mentions a wife and 2 kids along with burning of
tires. Your folklore mentions only the guy driving. Although there is
a bit of similarity, there are significant differences indicating you
two are citing different stories.

> They take the fact that they were stuck in the snow, and then this
> avowed racist manufactures an entire story around irrespondible
> camping.

Hmm, a camping racist. Wonder what is the definition of that.

> It's _why_ Mayayana is a racist.
> a. Mayayana said most black people are criminals at one point.
> b. Mayayana said most jews are trying to steal your money at another.
> c. Mayayana said most Mexicans are in the crime cartels at yet another.

So you say. Got the Message-IDs of those articles by Mayayana as proof?

Even if a racist, they can also add 2 plus 2, cite the news, and perform
other functions that to you are non-racist. Being a racist doesn't
condemn everything he says or does as racist based. Just means you
don't like him. I suspect you're starting to not like me, too, so
obviously that also makes me a racist, or some other disparaging title
you want to hurl at others that disagree with you.

> What Mayayana does with racism is exactly what he did just now.
> A. He takes the bare minimum facts
> B. Then he fabricates his own narrative out of those facts
> C. In order to support his already-foregone conclusion about the event.

That's not racism. Without proof to others, your claims he is a racist
are also fabrications. Give proof, and others may believe you.

> And yet, as always, Mayayana is _completely_ wrong on all the facts.
> Every single one.

So far, this is a case of "I recall" versus "You recall", and the
recollections differ. We don't know your recollection is any more
correct or incorrect than Mayayana's. This is like a parent asking 2
kids who broke the vase, and the two kids point at each other. Uh huh.

[VanguardLH]

Andy Burnelli wrote:

> Andy Burnelli wrote:
>
>> Yet Mayayana is oh so very confident in himself, even as he's always wrong.
>> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Kim>

Amazing how you surmized that Mayayana was talking about that guy. I
sure wouldn't have equated the 2 stories. You sure it wasn't you knew
about the one story, and you equated it to Mayayana's story so you could
lambast him on the differences? You could tell many in-the-woods
stories that are similar, but are not the same story. Could be
Mayayana's recollection was about the Kim story, so his recollection was
wrong. Would've been helpful if Mayayana had cited a reference to his
story.

[nospam]

In article <omwav1455sga$.dlg@v.nguard.lh>, VanguardLH <V...@nguard.LH>
wrote:

> You, nor anyone else, knows the reference of Mayayana's statement. He
> never cited a reference, like a news story (which is NOT a blog in the
> guise of news).

*many* people know the reference since it was major news at the time
and mayayana often mentions it to 'prove' that gps is bad.

[VanguardLH]

Andy Burnelli wrote:

> VanguardLH wrote:
>

> Everyone who knows anything knows the story of what happened.

Nope, wrong again. There are plenty of woodland stories that I know of,
that lots of people in my area also know about, but which you never
heard.

> Why did he claim long ago that most black people were criminals?

Guess that would be too long ago for you to provide a MID to his article
stating that.

>> Not using cell phones is also a withdraw symptom in urban areas. People
>> have become grafted to their cell phones. It's the new legal heroin.
>
> BTW, that's an "opinion", which is based on the facts as you know it.

I'm not the one that came up with the term "nomophobia".

> You fabricated that.

Nope. I observed that, and so have others. Do an online search on the
term. Educate yourself instead of arguing it's the way you prefer.

> I suspect you're just vile.

Oh, here it comes folks. Andy has finally gotten close to denouncing me
a vile [troll], or maybe sockpuppet of Mayayana, or some other type of
malcontent. If he really thought me vile, he should plonk me. I
provide plenty of headers to uniquely identify me, and I don't nymshift,
so just the From header is sufficient for a plonk rule. Thunderbird is
limited to which headers on which its filters can test, but my posts
should provide plenty of overview headers on which he can test.

Why don't I plonk him? I'm having fun doing the research he refuses to
do himself.

> You're like an idiot held-back bully who is told Santa isn't real.
> You claim that Santa is real.

Yep, discombobulate by diversion trying to desparately point the finger
at someone else hoping others don't see Andy's true demeanor.

> If I show you facts, you say I disagree with your "opinion".

You haven't shown fact. You cited your realm of experience and
extrapolated it as truth for all. You claim facts, you get disproven,
and then you claim I'm lying, ignorant, or a troll.

> Another opinion which I won't disagree with since my belief systems are
> based on facts and I stick to the facts (you can have your opinions).

Boy, does Andy get stale in claiming he cites facts. He cites his
experiences as facts. If anyone shows actual facts that dispute his
claims, he ignores those and makes vacuous references of attacks against
him.

> Can someone who is smarter than I am read that article and expound
> upon what the lesson is for the SUBJECT of this thread which is
> safety while far from a cellular tower, but perhaps close enough to
> get a few of those pings?

Don't rely on cell phones for survival in wilderness. Use satellite
phone when cell coverage cannot be relied upon, especially if coverage
maps show no coverage in the area. If you intend to travel the boonies,
learn orienteering, carry topographical maps (paper, not on a
battery-operated device), and a compass. If it's winter, don
appropriate apparel for extended travel outside the car. "Kim left his
family to look for help, wearing tennis shoes, a jacket, and light
clothing". Yep, not prepared for the weather outside the car. Deep
snow caused their predicament, but it could've been lack of gas, a
broken gas line, multiple punctured or ripped tires, or a myriad of
other car failures. No car is fail-proof. Don't traverse deep snow or
any offroad hazard you are unsure your vehicle can handle, especially on
an "unpaved logging road". Hell, they weren't even driving a SUV (which
many owners mistake as offroad trucks), but a Saab 9-2X. This is a
commuter car, not an off-roader. Why the hell did they go on a logging
road?

They got stuck in the snow. They really had no experience that snow can
happen around Thanksgiving, or in that area? Why didn't they have a
folding shovel in the trunk, tire chains, and other tools? Bet they
also don't have a tow strap, too, or a toolbox, extra bottle of
windshield fluid, spare engine oil, flashlights, glow sticks, matches or
lighters or both, winter mylar "space" suits, blankets, water bottles
(even if they get frozen, they can thaw), tire inflator, spare valve
cores. Didn't bother to check if their car is one of those that went
cheap by omitting a spare tire, but many users never bother to check the
pressure of their spare tire even if they get around to checking
pressures of the mounted tires. Many drivers don't equip their cars for
failures or emergencies.

"Although the Kims had a cellular phone with them, their remote location
in the mountains was out of range of the cellular network, rendering the
phone unusable for voice calls."

Pretty much it has been stated several times no calls are possible if a
cell tower is unreachable. Nothing to expound upon regarding making 911
calls.

They returned from a Thanksgiving party. Was this the first time they
traveled the area? This was a mountainous area. Cell phone users don't
know radio doesn't pass through mountains? They're driving far outside
any towns, and they've never done that before in or around that area to
know cell towers are sparse?

While they dug themself deeper into trouble, and although cell towers
were too far away for making calls, the wiki article says they were able
to send texts. Why didn't they text to 911? Back in 2017, 6 mobile
providers (AT&T, i_Wireless, Sprint, T-mobile, US Cellular, Verizon)
enabled support for texting to 911. Alas, the Kim story dates back to
2006, but today text-to-911 is available in many, but not all, areas
with sparse density of cell towers.

https://www.slicktext.com/blog/2014/08/understanding-text-to-911/

Rather than test by texting to 911, I suggest to call the local police
in the intended areas of travel, or to ask them how to contact the PSAPs
(Public Safety Answering Point) to inquire about text-to-911 service.
Texting requires less power than calls, especially since the power (to
the antenna) is only used when sending, not when composing. Texting
leaves the screen on while phones usually blank the screen when it is
held close to the head, like next to the ear during calls, so lower the
brightness to preserve power. This wouldn't have helped the Kims back
in 2006, but micky is asking about today.

Rather than check which states have text-to-911, instead check which
states don't: Alaska, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and South Dakota (per
https://www.slicktext.com/blog/2014/08/understanding-text-to-911/).
That doesn't mean every PSAP supports text-to-911 statewide in the
"covered" states.

https://www.fcc.gov/consumers/guides/what-you-need-know-about-text-911
"FCC rules require all wireless carriers and other providers of text
messaging applications in the United States to deliver emergency texts
to call centers that request them. If a call center requests
text-to-911 service, text messaging providers must deliver the service
in that area within six months."

So, it depends on the PSAPs to issue the text-to-911 requests that the
cellular carriers in that area must then support within 6 months. What
is slow is the PSAPs gearing up to adopt the text-to-911 service. There
is a link in that article to an Excel spreadsheet updated monthly listed
which PSAPs have text-to-911 service. On caveat: for texting to 911,
you must have an active cellular plan (so you need a SIM card, too).
While you might carry around a no-plan no-SIM phone in your car's glove
box to use with nearby cell towers to make 911 calls, it is unlikely
you'll be toting a no-plan no-SIM phone into the woods.

In my state, it looks like the sparsest counties, like those in
low-density rural or forested areas, are where the PSAPs have so far
adopted the text-to-911 service, probably because that is where cellular
coverage is poor. Where there is higher density of cell towers the
text-to-911 service probably isn't needed since 911 calls are possible
and preferred.

The Excel document is grouped by publish dates for updates to the list.
No one publish section lists all the PSAPs that have adopted
text-to-911. Instead you have to aggregate each publish group to get a
comprehensive list by state and county. I gave on trying to sort the
spreadsheet by state (kept getting different errors) to sort by state
first and county second to get an aggregate list of all PSAPs in my
state that support text-to-911. It wasn't something I needed to know
right now.

While you might be too far from a tower to make a 911 call, you might
just be close enough in a supported area to send a 911 text.

[VanguardLH]

sms wrote:

> VanguardLH wrote:
>
> <snip>
>

>> The first FCC map doesn't show cell coverage at all. ...

>> I couldn't get this map to show cell coverage.
>
> You have to check the boxes on the right for each carrier. Look at this
> example <https://i.imgur.com/eO1LWZ2.png>.

Argh! In Firefox, that right-side pane (Layer List) is blank (and no
content is getting blocked). In Edge Chromium, I see the checkboxes,
and list of carriers. Seems odd the FCC site is Chrome-only.

https://doc.arcgis.com/en/arcgis-online/reference/browsers.htm

That lists Firefox 94+ as supported. I have Firefox 97.0.2. I don't
have local storage disabled in Firefox, but I do have Firefox purge all
locally cached storage on its exit. I went into FF's security settings,
selected the Custom mode for Browser Security for Enhanced Tracking
Protections, and disabled all the protections, refreshed the tabs, but
still a blank right-side Layer List pane. I disabled all add-ons,
restarted FF, but still the blank Layer List pane. That site does not
like Firefox.

I backed off in the URL to:

https://fcc.maps.arcgis.com/apps/webappviewer/index.html

In its toolbar is a Layer List icon. Clicked that, got a popup frame
(not a pane) for Layer List, but it was empty.

https://community.esri.com/t5/arcgis-online-questions/portal-works-in-ei-and-chrome-but-not-in-firefox/td-p/521843

Might be an old problem when using Firefox. Another article:

https://geotalk.cast.uark.edu/the-best-web-browsers-for-arcgis-online/

mentions "Only WebGL-enabled browsers are supported." I went into
about:config, but webgl.disabled = False (meaning WebGL is enabled)
which is also the default setting, plus the WebGL examples at
https://webglsamples.org/ played okay.

Tried to resolve. ArcGIS don't like my Firefox. Thanks for the help.

[sms]

On 3/4/2022 7:32 PM, VanguardLH wrote:

<snip>

> That cites 7 out of 100 cellular users are using an MVNO. Reflects that
> many just go with name brands instead of expending the effort to
> research what is the best deal for them.

Well technically a lot fewer now, since a carrier-owned prepaid is not
considered a MVNO and Verizon now owns Tracfone whose various brands
probably comprised 80% of that 7%.

The reality is that the need for home micro-cells largely went away when
Wi-Fi calling became available; even most prepaid and MVNOs now provide
Wi-Fi calling. So even though a carrier may provide a micro-cell, free
upon request, there's not much upside in getting one.

For commercial and government buildings micro-cells are another story
since those entities may not want to provide free open Wi-Fi. My City
tried for years to get AT&T to put in a micro-cell in some buildings, to
no avail. It was a constant complaint by residents that there was no
AT&T or T-Mobile coverage at city hall and the library, and for most of
that time there was no Wi-Fi calling. It was an especially big issue as
soon as the iPhone came out in 2007 since it was only on AT&T for the
first few years and a lot of residents switched from Verizon to AT&T to
get an iPhone, unaware that AT&T coverage had a lot of gaps.

Finally, about three years ago, AT&T started sharing a fake tree cell
tower with Verizon and that issue was addressed, at least for the city
hall and library but it took 15 year or so. I remember when AT&T added
their "branches" to the tree, which I can see from my back yard and my
wife said "where did that tall tree come from?" (see
<https://i.imgur.com/WU3jRCB.jpeg>). But in some other parts of the city
(and other areas in the ZIP code, it is still Verizon-only (see a
comparison, from the FCC maps, at <https://i.imgur.com/ZwDGmp0.png>.

But it's still not very smart to choose a cellular carrier that doesn't
provide service at your home when there are others that do. Broadband
service isn't 100% reliable. Maybe once ever two months or so my Comcast
broadband will go down, usually for only a short time, sometimes for
hours (if a shared utility pole is being replaced, and the poles in my
neighborhood are at an age that is requiring replacement of many).

It's also not very smart to choose a wireless carrier that has the worst
coverage in your area. One area I go through often is the San Mateo and
Santa Cruz coast on California Highway 1; here is a map comparing
coverage in that area, where Verizon is superior, AT&T is a distant
second, and T-Mobile an eve further distant third, see:
<https://i.imgur.com/QOqnAVP.png/>.

I never understood people that make a poor buying decision about goods
or services and then, rather that say "I made a big mistake, you should
learn from me and not do the same thing," instead encourage others to
make the same mistake that they did.

[nospam]

In article <svvucc$iv$1...@dont-email.me>, sms <scharf...@geemail.com>
wrote:

> My City
> tried for years to get AT&T to put in a micro-cell in some buildings, to
> no avail. It was a constant complaint by residents that there was no
> AT&T or T-Mobile coverage at city hall and the library, and for most of
> that time there was no Wi-Fi calling.

sprint had excellent coverage back in the 1990s at the library in 'your
city', and quite likely the others did as well.

> It was an especially big issue as
> soon as the iPhone came out in 2007 since it was only on AT&T for the
> first few years and a lot of residents switched from Verizon to AT&T to
> get an iPhone, unaware that AT&T coverage had a lot of gaps.

also wrong.

first of all, that was 15 years ago and things are very, very different
now.

second, the problem was *not* gaps, but rather that at&t's network was
overloaded due to the popularity of the iphone. coverage was actually
very good, it's just that at&t thought that usage patterns would be
similar to previous smartphones and was unprepared for the actual
demand. it didn't help that they offered unlimited bandwidth.

third, the overloading was mainly dense urban areas, such as san
francisco and new york, and in peak hours. in other areas, including in
'your city' and nearby cities prior to the iphone, and off-peak hours,
there were few issues, if any. in fact, at&t made sure that 'your city'
and nearby had excellent coverage, because that's where a substantial
amount of testing of the iphone was done and at&t had a vested interest
in its success.

[Ken Blake]

On Fri, 4 Mar 2022 17:30:54 -0800, sms <scharf...@geemail.com>
wrote:

>On 3/4/2022 5:21 PM, VanguardLH wrote:
>
><snip>
>
>> As evidenced by your history in Usenet, anyone that disagrees with you
>> or holds a differing opinion just must be a troll. Uh huh.
>
>In the past, I've urged Andy/Harry/Arlen/Dean to change his approach:
> 1. Stop constant nymshifting

Nymshifting is the mark of a troll. Trolls do it to get out of the
killfiles they are in. But it works for only a couple of days.

> 2. Base his posts based on referenced facts
> 3. Stop lying and shilling

Of course that's another mark of a troll.

Urging a troll to change his behavior is useless.
--
The real, original Ken Blake, not some other newcomer

[sms]

On 3/5/2022 12:00 AM, VanguardLH wrote:
> sms wrote:
>
>> VanguardLH wrote:
>>
>> <snip>
>>
>>> The first FCC map doesn't show cell coverage at all. ...
>>> I couldn't get this map to show cell coverage.
>>
>> You have to check the boxes on the right for each carrier. Look at this
>> example <https://i.imgur.com/eO1LWZ2.png>.
>
> Argh! In Firefox, that right-side pane (Layer List) is blank (and no
> content is getting blocked). In Edge Chromium, I see the checkboxes,
> and list of carriers. Seems odd the FCC site is Chrome-only.

Works in Firefox (97.0.2 64 bit) for me.

[Andy Burnelli]

VanguardLH wrote:

>> Everyone who knows anything knows the story of what happened.
>
> Nope, wrong again. There are plenty of woodland stories that I know of,
> that lots of people in my area also know about, but which you never
> heard.

Everyone knew _that_ story if they weren't completely ignorant of news.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Kim>

Anyway, maybe Mayayana can feverishly dig up a _different_ story.
One that fits his pre-defined racist leanings better perhaps?

Shouldn't be too hard to find, even for a moron like Mayayana is.
a. Find an unprepared camper story (shouldn't be too hard)
b. Who died of exhaustion (not too hard to find either I would think)
c. A few years ago (not too hard to find as this is easy to find)
d. It's a "CNet worker" (well, that is going to be hard for Mayayana)
e. In his twenties (Mayayana said "26 I think" so about that range)
f. Who went camping with "his wife and 2 or 3 kids" as Mayayana said
g. They drive "25 miles up a logging road in California" (harder)
h. And then "got stuck on ice, unable to get out" (even harder now)
i. "No cell service" (well, that one is back to being easy to find)
j. "They sat there for 2 or 3 days" (again, gonna be hard to find)
k. "burning tires to stay warm" (Wow, Mayayana is gonna be digging)
l. "Finally the young man wandered off into the woods to look for help"
m. "He was found dead of exhaustion"

n. "The rest were eventually saved."

Vanguard,
You may assume Mayayana is smart, and that's fine, so all I ask _you_ to do
is tell us all how Mayayana's story does _not_ fit (only in outline) this:
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Kim>

And yet, true to form *for all the racists out there*, Mayayana _changed_
the story tremendously, in ways that _fit_ his pre-defined racist narrative.
o. "They could have walked out of there in maybe 8 hours."
p. "They should have had camping supplies to last several days."
q. "There must have been something they could have done to free the car."

r. "But this was a geek with little experience of physicality, much less camping."

Mayayana's racist narrative was a "geek went camping unprepared and the
bastard died of exhaustion as a result of his own camping unpreparedness".

And yet, that's _not_ even close to what happened.
What happened was a "geek visited friends on Thanksgiving and they took a
wrong turn, and then a cavalcade of errors resulted in his death".

But Mayayana needed his racist pre-defined opinion to have a back story.
So Mayayana fabricated the important details (i.e., Kim wasn't camping).

You don't see that instantly_ Vanguard?
Really?

I did.

I think only a _stupid_ person wouldn't have seen exactly what I saw.
Instantly.

Remember when all the iKooks (and, notably, Frank Slootweg) congratulated
Snit for finally, after two decades of posting, proving me wrong once?

You don't?
I do.

Here's the video that they all applauded as showing that the iPhone did
indeed have an app that showed signal strength for all visible Wi-Fi APs.
<https://youtu.be/7QaABa6DFIo> Hilarious Snit video

Vanguard, I'm not stupid.
Instantly, I saw what _all_ the iKooks missed (as did Frank Slootweg).
Yet none of them noticed the _most important fact_ of all.

Not a single one of them noticed that.
They had a pre-defined narrative and they were sticking to it.

Either that, or all the iKooks (and Frank Slootweg) are utter morons.
Because only a moron wouldn't notice, _instantly_ the fatal flaw.

These people are _incredibly_ stupid, Vanguard.
Don't be one of them.

Remember Vanguard: I'm not afraid of facts. Facts don't scare me.
Facts only petrify people (like you) who are wrong on them. Not me.

My belief system is based on facts.
If there are new facts, I change my belief system.

Remember what I say, Vanguard, since you confuse facts with opinions.
(Only stupid people do that, by the way - which is _why_ they're stupid.)

No adult disagrees with facts; facts are funny that way.
If they disagree with facts, they're fools (fools are funny that way).
Yet adults can reasonably disagree on opinions (also known as assessments).

Adults are funny that way.

You claimed I disagreed on opinions, where that's normal even if I did
disagree on opinions, so where in hell do you get up on a huff about it?

What really happened is you're stupid.
You don't know the difference between an opinion and a fact.

What I disagreed with was people were stating incorrect technical facts.
That's all I cared to correct.

Incorrect technical facts.
Not "incorrect technical opinions".
But incorrect technical facts.

You don't know the difference between them.
But I do.

As do all adults.
Yet, you don't.

You're allowed any opinion you want to have, as long as you don't claim it
as a fact, I won't disagree with it (and if I do, I'll apologize the instant
you point it out as I don't derive my self esteem from your opinions).

My challenge stands that you are (a) stupid or, you (b) you simply lied.
*Name just one*

PS: Technical stuff to be covered separately as this is about you making
your vile comments about this thread which you repeatedly fail to back up.
--
I'm not afraid of facts but ignorant people like Vanguard are afraid of
people like me because they don't own the adult tools to deal with facts.

This is what Mayayana says that Vanguard is defending as "fact".

There was a sad story a few years ago. A CNet tech worker,
26 I think, went camping with his wife and 2 or 3 kids. They
drove 25 miles up a logging road in California and got stuck on
ice, unable to get out. No cell service. They sat there for 2 or 3
days, burning tires to stay warm. Finally the young man wandered
off into the woods to look for help. He was found dead of exhaustion.
The rest were eventually saved.

[Andy Burnelli]

VanguardLH wrote:

>>> Yet Mayayana is oh so very confident in himself, even as he's always wrong.
>>> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Kim>
>
> Amazing how you surmized that Mayayana was talking about that guy.

Vanguard,
I'm not stupid.

Mayayanay is stupid.
You are stupid.
But I'm not.

You're so stupid, you don't even realize how stupid you really are.

Yet, I'm not afraid of facts.
I would _love_ for you to prove me wrong.
Really I would.

Because nobody has ever proven me wrong on facts in decades of posting.
Not even once [1].

All you need to do is ask Mayayana to point to the story.

See?
It's not hard.

I pointed to the story that Mayayana is really talking about.
You say he could be talking about a different story.

Yet I know Mayayana is a racist.
I know Mayayana is stupid.
I know Mayayana distorted that story to fit his predefined racist objective.

But maybe I'm wrong.
If I am, I'll admit I was wrong.
Openly.
Honestly.

All you need to do is to ask Mayayana to cite where his story came from.
Easy peasy.

HINT: It will never happen because Mayayana _fabricated_ his story
(well, he fabricated the critical components that fit his narrative).

Just like all the iKooks do every day.
And Steve does it with respect to his Covid and Verizon claims.

Only stupid people don't see through these fabrications, Vanguard.
And I'm not stupid.

You are stupid.
I'm not.

Prove me wrong.

> Would've been helpful if Mayayana had cited a reference to his story.

Hehhehheh...

Here's a fact for you Vanguard.
*You did NOT even _ask_ Mayayana to back up his story before refuted mine.*

Why?

HINT: I know why.
--
[1] Sometimes I make a thinko but I correct that as soon as I see it or, if
someone points it out, then I correct that and apologize, and we even have a
thread by badgolferman on where we proved that is a fact when badgolferman
noticed that the iKooks can never admit they were wrong - they just double
down harder when they're wrong (as Vanguard is doing right now in fact).

[sms]

On 3/4/2022 7:59 PM, VanguardLH wrote:
> sms wrote:
>
>> The important thing when choosing a carrier is to check coverage on the
>> FCC web site
>> <https://fcc.maps.arcgis.com/apps/webappviewer/index.html?id=6c1b2e73d9d749cdb7bc88a0d1bdd25b>
>> so you know the _native_ coverage you can expect.
>
> I can't that page to show cellular coverage at all. Do you know the
> source of their coverage maps, if they have any? If the sources are the
> coverage maps spewed by the Big 3 (Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile) then those
> maps are inaccurate. There are plenty of dead zones within the red
> (high) coverage areas in the Big 3 maps.

The maps are based on the FCC database of cell towers (location,
frequency, power). There will be places that have coverage that show no
coverage and vice-versa. Also, the FCC maps don't show roaming coverage.
A lot of MVNOs and prepaid services have limited or no roaming while
postpaid will often have some off-network roaming available. For roaming
coverage you have to look at the carrier's own maps and be aware that
there are often limitations when roaming, especially for data.

So the FCC maps are not perfect, nor are the carrier's own maps. But you
can still get an a good idea of the differences in coverage between
carriers.

Also, for now, the FCC maps don't show 5G coverage but since 5G coverage
is a subset of 4G LTE coverage, that's not so important for checking
coverage (though perhaps it would be useful for checking speed if a 5G
map distinguished between 5G low band, 5G mid band, and mmWave. For
comparing 5G coverage the Whistleout maps are good. Between the two, you
can get a pretty good idea of which carrier is best in your area.

FCC maps:
<https://fcc.maps.arcgis.com/apps/webappviewer/index.html?id=6c1b2e73d9d749cdb7bc88a0d1bdd25b>

Whistleout maps: <https://www.whistleout.com/CellPhones/Guides/Coverage>

[sms]

On 3/5/2022 7:49 AM, Ken Blake wrote:

<snip>

> Nymshifting is the mark of a troll. Trolls do it to get out of the
> killfiles they are in. But it works for only a couple of days.
>
>
>> 2. Base his posts based on referenced facts
>> 3. Stop lying and shilling
>
>
> Of course that's another mark of a troll.
>
> Urging a troll to change his behavior is useless.

When my Usenet provider was down (eternal-september) I temporarily added
another free provider. Of course none of my filters were in place so I
had to add them back, but with only seven filters this group was back to
normal. A lot of the 64 filters for this group, in my regular Usenet
provider didn't do anything anymore because trolls had either
nym-shifted or disappeared completely, or a subject-specific filter was
no longer needed.

[VanguardLH]

Andy Burnelli wrote:

> VanguardLH wrote:
>
>>> Everyone who knows anything knows the story of what happened.
>>
>> Nope, wrong again. There are plenty of woodland stories that I know of,
>> that lots of people in my area also know about, but which you never
>> heard.
>
> Everyone knew _that_ story if they weren't completely ignorant of news.
> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Kim>

You are not everyone. Get over yourself.

> all I ask _you_ to do is tell us all how Mayayana's story does _not_ fit (only in outline) this:
> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Kim>

I already said that I don't know from where Mayayana recalled the story
he cited. He didn't provide a URL to cite a reference. Neither did you
until pressed.

As yet, there is no basis to mandate Mayayana's and your story are the
same story. Mayayana should cite a reference, but perhaps he isn't
monitoring your posts, or my replies to you.

> I think only a _stupid_ person wouldn't have seen exactly what I saw.

Only a stupid person thinks their experience must match on everyone
else's, or that everyone just must read every tidbit of news (whether
news or not) that you do. Since I'm not your clone (who, by the way,
would still have different experiences than you), gee, I must be stupid
because you know something (or found it later after pressed) that I
don't. Let's see you cite a reference for the story about the hunter
that was left on the opposite shore of an island while the hunting party
flew to the opposite side, drove the moose to the other side, got there,
asked why he saw no moose, and said "All I saw was a bunch of crazy
looking horses go swimming across the lake".

> These people are _incredibly_ stupid, Vanguard.

Read your own citation in Wikipedia of the Kim incident. That's a story
about incredibly stupid people. They're everywhere.

> Don't be one of them.

Sorry, participating in flames about [perceived] trolls makes the flamer
a troll. That's why you won't see me assisting in the flame. In my
filters, I plonk both the trolls (based on my criteria) and the flamers
of trolls. I don't want to see the trolls. I also don't want to see
the flamers of trolls.

> No adult disagrees with facts; facts are funny that way.

Yes, they do. Obviously you are too young to have that experience.
Never been in a debate, either, where both sides cite facts to argue
different views.

> If they disagree with facts, they're fools (fools are funny that way).

No, if they disagree with you then they are fools.

> You're allowed any opinion you want to have,

Not according to you.

> as long as you don't claim it
> as a fact,

You simply claim my differing information is not fact, so it agrees with
you as Usenet God.

> My challenge stands that you are (a) stupid or, you (b) you simply lied.

See, thar yoo go. Someone disagrees with you, so they must be stupid or
lying. I'm seeing a resemblance of you to the Alan Connor kook. Same
behavior.

[Andy Burnelli]

nospam wrote:

>> You, nor anyone else, knows the reference of Mayayana's statement. He
>> never cited a reference, like a news story (which is NOT a blog in the
>> guise of news).
>
> *many* people know the reference since it was major news at the time
> and mayayana often mentions it to 'prove' that gps is bad.

I agree with nospam that the story was widely circulated at the time.

In my assessment, you'd have to have been hiding under a rock to miss it.
a. And yet, Vanguard missed it.
b. And Mayayana distorted the fact to create his own racist narrative
RACISM: "Stupid geek went camping unprepared & died as a result"

In addition I commend nospam for adding a fact that I was not aware of.
I didn't know Mayayana often mentions this particular story to prove that
GPS is bad, gps wasn't mentioned even _once_ in the wikipedia cite I gave.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Kim>

Just like Snit changed the facts to fit his narrative in this iKook video:
<https://youtu.be/7QaABa6DFIo>

And just like Steve changes the FCC facts to fit his Verizon narrative...
It's _insulting_ that they think we're too stupid to notice their bias.

Some people are stupid; others are intelligent (most are in between).
Mayayana is stupid.
In addition ...
Mayayana is racist

But what's worse than that is Mayayana _expects us to be stupid_ too!
That's insulting.

Instead of Vanguard defending Mayayana by telling me and nospam that the
story that Mayayana refers to is "some other camping story", what Vanguard
should be doing is asking Mayayana to provide a cite to the story himself.

Did Vanguard do that?
Nope.

Do you know why Vanguard did not do ask Mayayana to back up his story?

I do.
--
What's irksome isn't that people are stupid, nor even that they're racist,
but that people like Vanguard (who are also stupid) back them up every time.

[Andy Burnelli]

VanguardLH wrote:

> You, nor anyone else, knows the reference of Mayayana's statement. He
> never cited a reference, like a news story (which is NOT a blog in the
> guise of news). You also do not cite your reference.

Jesus Christ Vanguard.
I've never met, in the flesh, a person as stupid as you are.

Do you even realize how stupid you are?
a. You claimed I didn't cite the reference I based my statements on
b. And yet I did cite the reference in the very post you say I didn't.

> You claim Mayayana was wrong or lying yet you don't
> cite a reference to prove your story is the correct one.

Holy shit Vanguard.

How can I defend myself against people as _stupid_ as you are, Vanguard?
It's impossible.
You're no different than the iKooks.

You don't even _see_ the references which you claim don't exist.
*Who on earth is _that_ stupid?*

> Your folklore mentions only the guy driving. Although there is
> a bit of similarity, there are significant differences indicating you
> two are citing different stories.

You are denying that facts exist in the very cite that I already cited.
That's what fools do, Vanguard.

You are a fool.

Nobody but a fool will dispute facts that are as clear as day, Vanguard.
1. I cited the reference
2. It states the entire story in that reference

> So far, this is a case of "I recall" versus "You recall", and the
> recollections differ. We don't know your recollection is any more
> correct or incorrect than Mayayana's. This is like a parent asking 2
> kids who broke the vase, and the two kids point at each other. Uh huh.

This is a case of you brazenly denying the facts that exist.
It's childish of you Vanguard.

It makes you look like a fool.
It is one of the ways that I know you are incredibly stupid.

The _only_ person who doesn't know you are a moron, is you, yourself.
Who else would repeatedly deny that I cited the facts, when I did?
--
The problem with people who are as low of an IQ as Vanguard clearly is,
isn't that they're stupid (lots of people are morons), but that they don't
even realize how stupid they are (which makes them dangerous to society).

[sms]

On 3/5/2022 9:20 AM, VanguardLH wrote:

<snip>

> Only a stupid person thinks their experience must match on everyone
> else's, or that everyone just must read every tidbit of news (whether
> news or not) that you do. Since I'm not your clone (who, by the way,
> would still have different experiences than you), gee, I must be stupid
> because you know something (or found it later after pressed) that I
> don't. Let's see you cite a reference for the story about the hunter
> that was left on the opposite shore of an island while the hunting party
> flew to the opposite side, drove the moose to the other side, got there,
> asked why he saw no moose, and said "All I saw was a bunch of crazy
> looking horses go swimming across the lake".

Apparently the Kim tragedy was exacerbated by them taking a road that
was supposed to be gated closed but the gate had been left open in case
there were people coming out of that area "government officials
confirmed that a gate blocking access to the road on which the Kims were
stranded should have been locked."

Last September we were on a back road in rural Vermont and there was a
big sign "Your GPS is Wrong" see <https://i.imgur.com/szghXLq.jpeg>.

Actually the GPS was not wrong, and the road was open and went through
the mountains to the next town, but in the winter the road doesn't go
through.

[sms]

On 3/5/2022 9:20 AM, VanguardLH wrote:

<snip>

> See, thar yoo go. Someone disagrees with you, so they must be stupid or
> lying. I'm seeing a resemblance of you to the Alan Connor kook. Same
> behavior.

Please just filter out the trolls rather than responding to them.

[Andy Burnelli]

VanguardLH wrote:

>> Everyone knew _that_ story if they weren't completely ignorant of news.
>> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Kim>
>
> You are not everyone. Get over yourself.

You'd have to have been hiding under a rock to miss that story, Vanguard.
a. You repeatedly demanded I quote my source
b. And yet, my source was there in the very posts which you demanded it!
c. Apart from that proving you're a moron - why don't you ask Mayayana?

Vanguard.
Usenet is water under the bridge.
If you act like an adult, I treat you like an adult.

If you are an actual adult, you'll demand the cite from Mayayana.
Ask Mayayana for a cite backing up what he based his statements upon.

Since I already gave you the cite that I based my statements upon.

> He didn't provide a URL to cite a reference.
> Neither did you until pressed.

Jesus Christ Vanguard.
The very article you asked me for a cite _contained_ that cite, you moron.

This is how I know your IQ can't be greater than about 70 or 80 Vanguard.
You are so very confident in being so very wrong.

I've never met in the flesh people as _stupid_ as you are.

No adult denies facts. That's what makes them adults.
Kids do that. Not adults.

Stop acting like a kid.

You're no different than the iKooks.

Apologize to me as an adult, that you said I didn't provide the cite "until
pressed" when the cite is in the article that you claim it isn't in.

Apologize.
If...
If...
If...

If you are an adult.

PS: I do NOT expect an apology from you, as I don't think you are an adult.

> As yet, there is no basis to mandate Mayayana's and your story are the
> same story. Mayayana should cite a reference, but perhaps he isn't
> monitoring your posts, or my replies to you.

No. He's reading it all (IMHO).
Every single word of it.
He is not only racist, and stupid, but also a coward.
He won't answer (IMHO).

Ask _him_ to cite his reference instead of telling me I didn't cite mine
(when I clearly did).

>> I think only a _stupid_ person wouldn't have seen exactly what I saw.
>
> Only a stupid person thinks their experience must match on everyone
> else's, or that everyone just must read every tidbit of news (whether
> news or not) that you do.

You'd have to have been hiding under a rock to _not_ know that story.
Even the article I cited said it was widely circulated.
It was a big deal at the time.

You think me knowing that story makes _me_ stupid, which is kind of funny.
I think it just shows me again how _ignorant_ you are Vanguard.

And I do not mean that as an insult.
It's just an assessment of the facts.

>> No adult disagrees with facts; facts are funny that way.
>
> Yes, they do. Obviously you are too young to have that experience.
> Never been in a debate, either, where both sides cite facts to argue
> different views.

Vanguard, are you aware that I have higher degrees in difficult topics?
No?
Well accept _that_ as a fact.

I know certain scientific topic rather well and even am a co author on peer
reviewed material deep in the sciences (where we noted a purported
biological fact which has since been overwhelmingly supported by newer
facts).

You have no education (IMHO).
You confuse opinion (aka assessment) with fact.

Stop that.
It's difficult for me to lower myself to your level.
It really is.

You're at the same level as the iKooks:
a. Low IQ
b. No education
c. Low self esteem
d. Such that you react like a child to any discussion about facts.

Child: Santa exists.
Adult: No it doesn't.
Child: But I saw him at the mall.
Adult: That was just a man dressed as Santa.
Child: No. It _was_ Santa.
Adult: Unfortunately, Santa is just a marketing gimmick.
Child: Liar! Liar... Liar... Pants on fire!

You, Vanguard... You.

You...

You are that child.

>> If they disagree with facts, they're fools (fools are funny that way).
>
> No, if they disagree with you then they are fools.

No. You are the fool.
a. I stated a fact.
b. You stated that I didn't state that fact.
c. And yet, that fact was in the very article where you stated it wasn't.

That is the definition of a fool.

>> You're allowed any opinion you want to have,
>
> Not according to you.

You can have the "opinion" that I didn't state the reference.
And yet, the "fact" is that I _did_ state the reference.

You can have the "opinion" I only provided the reference after being asked.
And yet, the "fact" is that I supplied it in my original response to
Mayayana.

It is _you_ who doesn't know the difference between a fact and an opinion.
Not me.

It's what makes you a moron, Vanguard.
You're not an adult.

Adults never disagree on facts (facts are funny that way).
But adults can logical disagree on opinions (adults are funny that way).

>
>> as long as you don't claim it
>> as a fact,
>
> You simply claim my differing information is not fact, so it agrees with
> you as Usenet God.

I don't mind you elevating me to "Usenet God" but I will have to
respectfully disagree with your opinion since I'm just a person, like you.

1. You have a low IQ, I don't (this is an assessment).
2. You got the fact wrong about my cite (this is a fact).

It's _you_ who confuses an assessment from a fact.
Not me.

You're the moron.
Not me.

>> My challenge stands that you are (a) stupid or, you (b) you simply lied.
>
> See, thar yoo go. Someone disagrees with you, so they must be stupid or
> lying. I'm seeing a resemblance of you to the Alan Connor kook. Same
> behavior.

Aye, aye, aye.

This is a fact:
*The fact is I supplied the fact in the article that you said I didn't.*

This is an assessment of that fact:
*That means you are either stupid, or you lied.*

No _adult_ would disagree with the fact (facts are funny that way).
But adults can logically disagree with the assessment (adults are funny).

So, if you are an adult, then you agree with the fact, right?
OK.

So what is your assessment of that fact?
Q: Why did you claim I didn't supply the cite when, clearly, I did?

You tell us why, Vanguard.
Why?
--
The problem with low IQ peole like Vanguard isn't that they're incredibly
stupid, but that they change the narrative to fit their particular bias.

[Andy Burnelli]

sms wrote:

> Apparently the Kim tragedy was exacerbated by them taking a road that
> was supposed to be gated closed but the gate had been left open in case
> there were people coming out of that area "government officials
> confirmed that a gate blocking access to the road on which the Kims were
> stranded should have been locked."

Steve is correct, where it's my assessment that Mayayana was talking about
that Kim tragedy, but, Mayayana being the racist he is, Mayayana distorted
the story (which started with a wrong turn) to fit a pre-defined agenda
biased against 'geek unprepared campers'.

However, I'm not afraid of facts.
Only people who base their belief systems _not_ in facts are afraid of them.

IMHO, Vanguard should be demanding a cite from Mayayana before he demands a
cite from me *that was already very clearly in the very post that Vanguard
replied to when making that demand of me but not of Mayayana as he defends
Mayayana to the death at all costs).
--
Sound familiar? It's _exactly_ what politicians do, and what iKooks do.

[Andy Burnelli]

sms wrote:

> Please just filter out the trolls rather than responding to them.

Stop that troll crap Steve.
Just stop it.

It means you're a child.

I stated facts in my response to Mayayana.
Vanguard disputed every one of those facts.

In fact, Vanguard demanded I _cite_ the facts when that cite he repeatedly
demanded of me was in the very article in which he was responding to.

Citing facts does not make me a troll, Steve.

You calling that a troll is more evidence that you _hate_ when facts are
presented, and that's fine because you're a consummate paid politician.

Since what you decry is the fact that I reference my facts, here it is:
<https://www.cupertino.org/home/showpublisheddocument/28201/637326644281870000>
Name: StevenScharfBiography.pdf
Size: 90653 bytes (88 KiB)
SHA256: B6ADCB89B3FABDEFA35CFCBD7B479C2E7B5CD08191A32A5B1407021075291AC6

I told you to stop claiming all facts are trolls Steve.
Just stop it.

Act like an adult for once in your life.

[Andy Burnelli]

Ken Blake wrote:

> Nymshifting is the mark of a troll. Trolls do it to get out of the
> killfiles they are in. But it works for only a couple of days.

Let's look at Ken Blake's _entire_ argument... as an actual adult would.

FACT:
a. The technical value of a gift isn't in the wrapping paper
b. If it takes seconds to figure out my posts, you are likely a moron

FACT:
1. I've said many times why the headers change over the years (privacy).
2. Ken Blake claims that anyone wanting privacy must be a troll, right?
3. Yet, Ken Blake has never cited even a _single_ troll from me (ever!).

Not even one.
How can I be a troll in Ken Blake's mind, when he can't find even one troll?

An example of [2] above is that Ken Blake would say:
"Wearing a bandana over your face is the mark of a bank robber"
"Bankrobbers do it to get out of being identified by the police"

And yet, Ken Blake did _exactly_ what Mayayana did, due to his low IQ:
a. Mayayana noted some blacks are criminals so he claimed all are.
b. Mayayana noted some jews are greedy so he claimed all are.
c. Mayayana noted some latinos are drugg dealers so he claimed all are.

Clearly Ken Blake's _entire_ belief system is based on exactly zero facts.
Ken Blake's entire argument is that of a child.

Child: Santa exists.
Adult: No it doesn't.

Child: But I saw him at the mall.
Adult: That was just a man dressed as Santa.

Child: No. It _was_ Santa.
Adult: Unfortunately, Santa is just a marketing gimmick.

Child: Liar! Liar... Liar... Pants on fire!

Ken Blake _is_ that child.
--
If you tell a kindergarten kid the fact that Santa doesn't actually exist...
*He'll respond exactly as Ken Blake just did*

[Andy Burnelli]

sms wrote:

> A lot of the 64 filters for this group, in my regular Usenet
> provider didn't do anything anymore because trolls had either
> nym-shifted or disappeared completely, or a subject-specific filter was
> no longer needed.

Steve,

I have given you plenty of warning just as NATO did with Putin.
And yet, warnings don't deter people like you who are bent on lies.

FACT:
Every fact I claim I back up.
For example, I claim you are (were) a paid politician.

You claim that I lie.
You claim that all facts are trolls.

Well, here's the cite for the fact which I base my claim upon.

<https://www.cupertino.org/home/showpublisheddocument/28201/637326644281870000>
Name: StevenScharfBiography.pdf
Size: 90653 bytes (88 KiB)
SHA256: B6ADCB89B3FABDEFA35CFCBD7B479C2E7B5CD08191A32A5B1407021075291AC6

For all the facts I present, you _still_ claim that they are lies, right?
Well, here is the _text_ of that fact that I claimed which proves that my
claim that you are (were) a paid politician is indeed, a fact.

"Steven Scharf (he/him/his) has lived in Cupertino since 1999.
Steven was elected to the City Council in 2016 and served as mayor in 2019
and 2020. He is Cupertino¢s representative on ABAG (Association of Bay Area
Governments) and on the Santa Clara County Cities Association. In the past
he represented Cupertino on the Santa Clara County Library District
and on the Santa Clara County Water District."

That fact proves what I claim where you keep saying even despite my many
warnings to you that all facts from me are lies - and yet they're not.

It is _you_ who lie.
Why?

I don't know why.
I simply note the fact you are a consummate politician.

My facts are never wrong, and if they are, I apologize and learn from it.
Are yours, and do you?

[Andy Burnelli]

VanguardLH wrote:

> Do you know the source of their coverage maps, if they have any?

Vanguard,

That is a question which has been _answered_ many (many) times in this ng.
And it has been answered in this very thread.

How can you always be so ignorant of the fact?
The fact you miss such facts is why I base my assessment of your IQ at 80.

1. The FCC maps are _calculated_ data.
2. They are based on information the cellular providers give to the FCC.
3. They do not have any 3G or 5G coverage in them (last we checked).

Why do you ask Steve when it's only Steve who doesn't know that?
a. Steve is a consummate politician.
b. Steve is remunerated by Verizon in some fashion that he himself admitted.
c. We can predict _years_ in advance Steve will claim Verizon >> T-Mobile.

The fact you are ignorant of the facts is how I know you own a low IQ.
It's insulting to even have to read the garbage you consistently post.
Just to find out your brain is that of a child.

Child: Santa exists.
Adult: No it doesn't.
Child: But I saw him at the mall.
Adult: That was just a man dressed as Santa.
Child: No. It _was_ Santa.
Adult: Unfortunately, Santa is just a marketing gimmick.

Child: Prove it!

You are that child, Vanguard.

[VanguardLH]

sms wrote:

> Apparently the Kim tragedy was exacerbated by them taking a road that
> was supposed to be gated closed but the gate had been left open in case
> there were people coming out of that area "government officials
> confirmed that a gate blocking access to the road on which the Kims were
> stranded should have been locked."
>
> Last September we were on a back road in rural Vermont and there was a
> big sign "Your GPS is Wrong" see <https://i.imgur.com/szghXLq.jpeg>.
>
> Actually the GPS was not wrong, and the road was open and went through
> the mountains to the next town, but in the winter the road doesn't go
> through.

Missing a turn, and taking unknown logging roads instead of heading back
to the missed turn. Trying to use their car as a snow plow. Taking any
road that is beyond the capabilities of the vehicle, or the driver, or
both. Despite having all-wheel drive, it was a commuter car, not a
robust offroader. An open gate does make the driver blind to the road
condition. No tools (e.g., folding shovel) and no survival supplies
stowed in the car. No proper apparel (as emergency supplies in the car,
or on the person -- car failures happen) for winter outside trekking.
Heading off into the woods without a topographical map and compass
instead of staying on the road where the road map he had would have had
some value. Batteries die and electronics fail, so have a paper map to
trek into the woods. Did he have a compass app on his phone, and know
how to calibrate it? A magnometer doesn't need a radio antenna. Did he
have a compass in his car's emergency supplies? A compounded slew of
bad decisions leading to a tragedy. A sad story, especially since James
Kim left behind a wife and 2 kids.

I remember a Disneyworld family trip where I missed the turn on the way
back to the resort. There was a small sign, pointed on one end, saying
"Kissimmee" (like it was pointing to where to go to get to the city).
It was on a grass covered dirt road (just the 2 ruts where tires had
tread a few times before), and pointed into a forested swamp. Um, no
thanks. I'm not feeding the alligators today. Made a u-turn a little
further down the highway, and found the missed turnoff to the city. If
I lived there, and was alone in the car, I might've felt like having
some fun with a much more capable offroading vehicle than a rental to go
exploring through the swamplands. I was there for less risky
entertainment. They found Kim's body. The alligators wouldn't have
left mine. We still joke about that road sign, but it wouldn't have
been a joke if I was so pompous as to think I could go offroading in a
rental through a swamp without proper emergency gear while risking the
lives of other passengers.

[VanguardLH]

But I'm having fun. Ahhh, okay mom.

[Mayayana]

"VanguardLH" <V...@nguard.LH> wrote

| The story sounds a bit fishy. If they had been burning tires for 2 to 3
| days, the rangers would've spotted and reported the black smoke.

https://www.cnet.com/tech/tech-industry/james-kim-died-of-hypothermia-autopsy-reveals/

The facts were not quite as I remembered them, but close.

[Andy Burnelli]

VanguardLH wrote:

>> Every major carrier (AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile) in the USA, to my
>> knowledge and experience, will give you a repeater and/or a cell
>> tower for free.
>
> Carrier? Yes. MVNO? No.

FACT: I never said MVNO's give you a free repeater or femtocell.
SUGGESTION: Ask Steve what MVNO's do as he loves his varied MVNOs.

>> I wrote about this _many_ times so it's irksome to have to repeat
>
> No one here is compiling a biography of your Usenet participation to
> review everything you ever said before in other threads.

You miss the point that ignorance is what you exhibit in spades.

Why else would you repeatedly deny facts existing when they existed in the
very article you replied to that contained those facts in this very thread.

> That cites 7 out of 100 cellular users are using an MVNO. Reflects that
> many just go with name brands instead of expending the effort to
> research what is the best deal for them.

Thank you for that fact, which I will _remember_ (which distances me from
people like you who don't even remember what was in the very article they
just replied to moments ago).

About 7% of US customers use MVNO's is what I'll remember. About 93% don't.

> You're posting using Thunderbird.

You don't have basic Internet skills Vanguard, if you believe that.

I don't even _know_ what my nntp headers say as they're done with a
dictionary lookup that has a timed switch which is under my control, but the
only header that is in my control that isn't random is the SUBJECT line.

You helped me write that code, in fact, as did Marek, rest his soul.
You probably don't even remember helping me write it - but I remember.

Both you and Alan Baker don't have the minimum necessary Usenet skills.
*Why are apologists like Alan Baker so fantastically immune*
*to basics skills an adult should have on the Internet?*
<https://groups.google.com/g/comp.sys.mac.system/c/_50ZqBhcbYs/m/higfbs1MBAAJ>

Let me tell you a _fact_ which, again, I've said many times and only the
utter morons (like Alan Baker) believe most headers can't be spoofed.

FACT: There is only one line in the header which is _not_ meaningless.
(Well, one line under your control anyway, and not added by the server.)

Here is an intelligence test for you Vanguard, where I'm well aware that you
and Frank Slootweg went on endlessly about the PATH header (which too can be
modified by the user, as Frank is well aware of having been an nntp admin
himself, but it isn't completely under the control of the user).

IQ Test for Vanguard (note Alan Baker failed this test _many_ times already)
Q: Which is the _only_ header in control of the user that is meaningful?

Hint: Your attempt at checking the path is futile Vanguard.
As with the FCC coverage maps, and as with the Kim tragedy, you're the only
one who doesn't already know that.

Your ignorance can be cured - but I don't you have the IQ to cure it.

> To me, if you're using one of the Big 3, you've been duped.

Hey, if you can point to an MVNO who gives me unlimited almost everything,
for less than I'm paying, I'm all ears.

I've had Verizon. I've had AT&T. And I've had T-Mobile. I switch.

I am retired so I have no income to speak of where all I ask of you is for
you to back up your claim that an MVNO in my area will give me a better
deal.

Since I'm not afraid of facts, here's my deal (six devices for $116/month),
four of which are modern cellphones, the other two are SIM-carded iPads:
<https://i.postimg.cc/nhpbcP50/tmopromo04.jpg> $100 for six lines + $16 tax

With this deal I get free towers for my home, and free & half-price phones.
<https://i.postimg.cc/Xq5SpS4D/tmopromo02.jpg> $15 iPhone, $0 Android phone

I also get free unlimited text and data in Europe, along with free roaming
in both the USA and Europe (which I visit a few times a year)

If an MVNO provides all that, I'll certainly look into it with all my heart.
I have no desire to waste money if I can get at least what I have, for less.

Which MVNO do you recommend?

> With wifi calling, none of the Big 3 have to provide femtocells anymore.

Getting back on technical topic, I don't know if the femtocell versus wifi
calling has any difference in terms of _data_ and _SMS/MMS_ purposes.

Are you claiming that wifi calling supersedes everything the femtocells did?
I'm not asking about old dumb phones, but the latest ones like mine.

> With wifi calling over the Internet, and since femtocells mandate
> Internet access, why would anyone still be using a femtocell? Well, for
> smartphones which have wifi, femtocells don't make sense. For old dumb
> phones with no wifi feature, yep, femtocells make sense. The dumb
> phones only due cellular.

Let's ignore dumb phones for this purpose.

I use _both_ wi-fi calling _and_ the femtocell (and a cellular repeater).
So I never bothered to look for how they each differed in detail.

Of course, a repeater works differently than a femtocell, but how different
is wifi calling from a femtocell in terms of Internet _data_ and SMS/MMS?

I don't know.
Do you?

> Nowadays smartphones with wifi can be had for
> cheap (under $100 for unlocked). Are you and your neighbors using
> femtocells still using dumb phones (no wifi)?

Almost all of my neighbors are in the upper level management of the most
profitable companies on the planet (and yes, that one too).

Nobody is using a dumb phone so let's just forget that.

> I get that many, maybe most, consumers get a comfy warm fuzzy feeling
> sticking with name brands. It's an emotional thing. Instead of looking
> at the 5-year, or longer, maintenance costs for each car they might
> purchase, they look at manufacturer warranty duration to feel comfy
> about the durability of their choice of car.

Find me an MVNO which gives me at least what I care about, and I'm in.

> Geez, I get more quota than I can use for $116 per *year*. I only need
> 1 line. You're paying that every *month* with your 6-line T-Mobile
> plan. Yikes! If you really are doling out the 6 lines to 5 other
> members in your family, that comes down to $19/line per month, or
> $228/year per line. That's twice the price I get per line from an MVNO.
> You must have super high quota demands than do I to pay for high quotas
> or unlimited quotas.

Well, now you're talking my language.
First of all, in reality, it's _worse_ than what you calculated because,
while I have six lines, two of them are guaranteed for life.

So I'm really paying for only four lines, which makes your calculations even
worse for me.

If you can find an MVNO that gives me unlimited everything for less than
what I'm paying, I'd be a fool for not giving them a call, wouldn't I?

> The guy that is still using a femtocell, claims all of the Big 3 provide
> free femtocells (but don't), and hasn't switched to wifi calling since
> he claims to have Internet service is telling me I cannot complain about
> cellular coverage that I cannot get that the carriers claim I should
> have. Sorry if I don't take your word that you are the cellular God of
> wisdom.

Who said I didn't "switch to Wi-Fi calling"?
Not me.

Did you guess that?
Stop it.

Don't assume I don't use _all_ the tools available to me at any moment:
a. Wi-Fi calling
b. Femtocall calling
c. Booster calling
d. Over the air calling (without connecting to any of the above).

Why would I limit myself by _not_ turning on Wi-Fi calling?
I've even posted numerous screenshots of the various settings in the past.
<https://i.postimg.cc/VN5K5k6Z/wificalling01.jpg> Prefer wifi or cellular

>> If you have Internet in the USA, you have _fantastic_ coverage in your
>> home!
>
> I'm not always at home.

Yeah but Mayayana was explicitly talking about people he knew at home.
Why must you contort the facts just to make a point nobody needed?

> Okay, not completely free. Zero for the Google Voice app on my Android
> phone. Zero for the Google Voice service.

Trust me, I use Google Voice extensively.
I've written about GV many times, in fact.
Even just recently, in fact.
*Is there a viable free alternative to Google Voice in the USA?*
<https://groups.google.com/g/comp.mobile.android/c/35H9ClsLX8Y/m/hxOuk8q7AwAJ>

> $50 for the Obitalk device,
> a one-time cost. The Obitalk device was cheaper but equally functional
> to the Ooma device. Google Voice is free, and Ooma has their Basic
> service plan* for free.

I also have an Ooma (for years) which I think I'll drop as it sucks now.
<https://i.postimg.cc/QCNqss9T/femto-ooma-switch.jpg> My ooma & femtocell

The ooma is technically free, but it's a few dollars a month where I chose
the _cheapest_ zip code in the USA (somewhere in Kansas as I recall) for
that, and no, I'm not worried about 911 calls not knowing where I live.

Every time I call Ooma to say the service sucks they claim that my jitter is
too high and that's that (bearing in mind I'm on a WISP and not on an ISP).

> I periodically comparison shop. After awhile, I start hunting around to
> make a change to see if someone offers better or more features with
> competitive pricing. I'm not loyal to any cellular provider. The same
> with car and house insurance: about every 5 years, I hunt around
> checking coverages and costs along with claims responsiveness. To me,
> cellular service is a commodity, and I periodically check if I want to
> change. MVNOs are a definite contender for my dollar.

Cellular service is a commodity, I'm not loyal to any one either.
If one is better, I'll switch. It's that simple.

> The MVNOs are using the same Big 3 cellular providers (AT&T, Verizon,
> and T-Mobile) that you tout as better, or really in your realm of
> experience.

Again, you prove to me your IQ is too low to communicate well with.
I never _touted_ any cellular provider over the other.

In fact, I've _always_ said that I have had all three and I find them about
the same. You can disbelieve that only if you don't know the facts.

For you to claim I "tout" one is ridiculous.
I happen to "pay" one; but that's a different fact.

You really do have a huge problem (as does Mayayana) with facts.
You're almost always wrong.

Stop it.
Don't say stuff that isn't known to you to be a fact.

Usenet is water under the bridge.

I will treat any adult communication from you as if you are an adult.

You only see me treating you as a child when you post as a child.
Post as an adult and I'll treat you as an adult.

> Since many MVNOs can use any of the Big 3 providers, you don't have to
> switch MVNOs to get assigned to a different Big 3 provider. You just
> ask them to switch you. Typically they pick the Big 3 that contracts to
> rent access at a tower closest to where you live (your home), but if
> your concern is better coverage at elsewhere, like at work, downtown, or
> wherever you prefer, they can switch you to one of the Big 3 that uses a
> tower giving you the best signal strength at the other location.

Thank you for teaching me that information which I didn't know beforehand.
What you don't know is I stay at home almost 100% of the time.
I know exactly where the nearest towers are, and that they are _miles_ away.
It is what it is.
For all the major carriers, it's the same (despite Steve claiming
otherwise).

The point with Steve that you need to know is
a. He's a politician
b. He lies
c. He bases almost all his arguments on flawed data
d. He doesn't even _pay_ Verizon (he uses an MVNO).
e. Yet Verizon remunerates him somehow (he said so himself so ask him)

Note that _everyone_ but you knows this.
We can _all_ predict what Steve will claim, years in advance.
So it's not just me saying this, Vanguard.

>> Your point that stupid people buy crappy service is fine, but don't
>> blame the crappy service since I have experience with all three major
>> providers.
>
> Which are the same networks used by the MVNOs. They don't rebuild the
> wheel. They just tag along for the ride.

In summary, Usenet is water under the bridge for me Vanguard.
You have a capacity for detail that can enlighten me when you don't play
games. I, for my part, treat you as you treat me.

If you post as a child, I treat you as a child.
If you post as an adult, I treat you as an adult.

I substitute at the local schools and they teach us to teach the kids that
their past is water under the bridge so that they can improve their future.

Learn that lesson and we will communicate well together.
a. I can definitely learn from you, and,
b. Perhaps, maybe, you can learn from me.

That's all I want.
A win:win situation in technical knowledge improvement.

[Andy Burnelli]

VanguardLH wrote:

> You aren't in charge here. You don't moderate this newsgroup.

Jesus Christ Vanguard, that's the post of a small child.

FACT:
1. Mayayana said something about "home"
2. I responded to what he said about "home"
3. You berated _me_ for talking about "home"
4. You didn't berate Mayayana but instead accused me of the tangent
5. I then reminded you it was Mayayana who tangented' to "home"
6. Then you tell me "I'm not in charge" so you can say any stupid thing you
want and nobody can call you out for you saying those stupid things?

WFT?
How old are you anyway?

It's demeaning that I even have to bother to say what I just said above.
I guess people say I "troll" because I respond to morons like you.

And, well, in a way, they may be right.
It's sad that people like you actually exist.

[Andy Burnelli]

sms wrote:

> The reality is that the need for home micro-cells largely went away when
> Wi-Fi calling became available; even most prepaid and MVNOs now provide
> Wi-Fi calling. So even though a carrier may provide a micro-cell, free
> upon request, there's not much upside in getting one.

In an attempt to pull this thread out of the cesspool, I openly admit
I am ignorant of how the _data_ functionality differs between:
a. Wi-Fi-calling data & SMS/MMS
b. Repeater-calling data & SMS/MMS
c. Femtocell-calling data & SMS/MMS
d. Over-the-air-calling data & SMS/MMS

Notice I'm not at all confused about the actual _calling_ part.
What confuses me (since I never looked it up) is how those four ways of
making connections over the cellular plan _differ_ in terms of:
a. Internet data packets
b. SMS text packets
c. MMS data packets

Does anyone know off hand if they even differ at all in those terms?

[Alan]

On 2022-03-05 12:01 p.m., Andy Burnelli wrote:
> sms wrote:
>
>> The reality is that the need for home micro-cells largely went away
>> when Wi-Fi calling became available; even most prepaid and MVNOs now
>> provide Wi-Fi calling. So even though a carrier may provide a
>> micro-cell, free upon request, there's not much upside in getting one.
>
> In an attempt to pull this thread out of the cesspool, I openly admit
> I am ignorant

About time.

[Andy Burnelli]

VanguardLH wrote:

> Missing a turn, and taking unknown logging roads instead of heading back
> to the missed turn. Trying to use their car as a snow plow.

There is no doubt in most people's minds that he could have made decisions
that would have turned out a lot better for him than it ended up being.

But my point was that Mayayana tried to use it as anecdotal evidence to
claim that a geek camper went camping with his family wholly unprepared.

That it was not.
Which was my point.

a. I _knew_ that Mayayana was racist (from long experience)
b. I _knew_ all about that story (as did most people here)
c. I knew _instantly_ that Mayayana was contorting the facts.

And he did.
I simply called him out for that.

And you repeatedly chastised me, and yet, not him - and not even once him.
Which tells me all I need to know about how your brain works.
--
It's not my fault that your brain works the way the facts show it does.

[Alan]

If you talk like that to people in person, you'll get your little face
slapped...

...but we know you don't actually talk to people like this where there
can be consequences, don't we?

[Andy Burnelli]

Mayayana wrote:

> The facts were not quite as I remembered them

You purposefully distorted the anecdote to fit your biased narrative.

[VanguardLH]

sms wrote:

> On 3/5/2022 12:00 AM, VanguardLH wrote:
>> sms wrote:
>>
>>> VanguardLH wrote:
>>>
>>>> The first FCC map doesn't show cell coverage at all. ...
>>>> I couldn't get this map to show cell coverage.
>>>
>>> You have to check the boxes on the right for each carrier. Look at this
>>> example <https://i.imgur.com/eO1LWZ2.png>.
>>
>> Argh! In Firefox, that right-side pane (Layer List) is blank (and no
>> content is getting blocked). In Edge Chromium, I see the checkboxes,
>> and list of carriers. Seems odd the FCC site is Chrome-only.
>
> Works in Firefox (97.0.2 64 bit) for me.

I waited until after this morning's scheduled Macrium Reflect backup, so
I could restore the old Firefox profile (their Profile Manager sucks to
let you pick an existing old profile folder). I did the Refresh in
Firefox which creates a new install-time profile folder: no add-ons, and
no config-screen or about:config tweaks. Still got the blank right-side
Layer List. A fresh/clean FF profile didn't help. So, I used my
Macrium backup to restore the entire Firefox folder rather than just the
Profiles subfolder. No point in having to rebuild my old profile into a
new one since the new defaults one didn't resolve the problem.

I noticed after loading that web page dozens of times on a new load of
Firefox (i.e., Firefox closed, double-click on your URL) that
occasionally I saw the content of the List Panel pane, but it was
positioned not on the right-side of the window but down in the draggable
lower pane (Attributes Table pane - hover over the handle to get a popup
showing the pane's name; click the handle to show, drag to resize).
There's a handle that lets you drag that pane up or down, or all the way
down to hide it). The contents of one pane (Layer List) were getting
painted in the wrong pane (Attributes). Alas, the content was managed
and unusable when it appeared in the wrong pane.

Oh well, I added the web page to my FF bookmarks as "FCC 4G LTE Coverage
(view in Chrome)", and imported my FF bookmarks into Edge Chrome.
Thanks again for the assist.

[Andy Burnelli]

VanguardLH wrote:

> Oh well, I added the web page to my FF bookmarks as "FCC 4G LTE Coverage
> (view in Chrome)", and imported my FF bookmarks into Edge Chrome.
> Thanks again for the assist.

What good is a 4G coverage map if you have a 5G phone?

[micky]

In comp.mobile.android, on Fri, 4 Mar 2022 02:35:14 +0100, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_...@es.invalid> wrote:

>On 2022-03-03 23:12, micky wrote:
>> Please settle an argument I have with a friend. She wouldn't take my
>> word for it. I went hiking today, short hike, off road, away from
>> cities and towns, sometimes no cell service** even on parts of the
>> highway leadintg to the hike,, and there was no cellular service on the
>> trail.
>>
>> My friend insists you can still make emergency phone calls. I keep
>> telling her, only if there is cellular servie on an cell company you
>> don't subscribe to, or if you have no sim card at all. She pauses and
>> thinks, and then doesn't believe me. But if you all vote, she'll
>> believe you.
>
>There has to be coverage from at least one company. If no company has
>any coverage, you are stuck, isolated.
>
>If one or more companies give coverage, then you "should" be able to
>call emergencies on it. The trick to do it may vary. Change network on
>your phone, try removing the sim... In some cases, no way, nothing works
>except a sim of said company, according to some reports.

Thanks Carlos and Vanguard, SMS, and Andy. I don't know why I didn't
read most of the replies until 2 months later. (I guess being in the
car didn't help.)