[EAS] EAS and CMAS

[Bill Ruck]

A friend of mine used to say "You can lead a horse to water but 
sometimes you have to drown the f*cker".

I doubt that any system will reach 100% of the people.  That should 
not inhibit improvements.  There will be some that ignore all 
warnings, even those delivered by police banging on their front door.

The more different ways we have to communicate warnings the better 
the chances that _MOST_ of the people will get the warning.  "Reverse 
911" is not a good idea any more.  A warning needs to show up in 
every radio* connected device: radio, TV, cell phones, i-things, 
email, etc.  That is why I think CAP is such a powerful tool.

The FCC is prohibited from censorship.  This prevents them from 
mandating carriage of EAS messages on radio and TV stations.  I've 
been told by those that know that if the President really exercised 
his ability to activate EAS likely someone would protest and his 
finding giving him that ability will be found to be unlawful.  In the 
perfect world the Communications Act of 1934 needs to be amended to 
require that all Part 73 stations must carry EAS messages.

The radio and TV industries need to be encouraged to carry all local 
warnings.  I don't know what "carrot" or "stick" would work best.

The biggest hurdle still will be local public safety agencies that 
continue to ignore a very useful public safety tool.  My suggestion 
is for FEMA to fund the costs to train everyone in public safety how 
to use EAS / CMAS / IPAWS / CAP.  Then FEMA could use a threat of 
funding cut-off if an agency is found to not use warning technology 
when it should have used it.  This provides the "carrot" and the 
"stick" for motivation.

Bill Ruck
Curmudgeon
San Francisco

*Note: The term "wireless" was considered obsolete until the computer 
guys rediscovered it.  They think they discovered something new 
except that Marconi was doing it reliably over 100 years ago -- send 
text messages without wires!  Remember, digital modulation was the 
primary form of radio communications in 1900.