Mixed Signals
Any sufficiently advanced information is indistinguishable from noise
Tuesday 30 October 2007, 10:25 AM
Wireless standards: the early years
Say what you like about the Internet, it is a constant source of rich amusement that can jolt even the most time-jaded palate. And from the most unlikely sources.
Last night, for example, I was researching the early history of wireless regulation. Worse, I was digging into what might well qualify for Britain's entry in the 2012 Olympic Geekathon 200 Metre Doze-Off - the origins of amateur radio callsigns. But stick with me.
You may know that each country has its own unique prefix for ham radio licences. It wasn't like that in the early 20s, when it was up to the individual governments, and in some cases the individual amateurs, to decide pretty much at random how to be identified on-air. This started in the days when radio, especially ham radio, was crude, rare and short-range. It didn't really matter that there could be confusion between countries.
That changed as the technology got more accessible, people started to use shortwave and signals could be picked up all over the shop. As a result, the ITU got together in 1927 and agreed an international standard that holds to this day.
Mostly, this was logical. Some countries just got the first letter of their country name as their prefix - Great Britain got G, France F, Germany D and so on. Countries with large populations or particular influence got more than one range (we also got M, for example), while smaller countries or those who didn't really care had to share their first letter with others -- with nearly 70 countries in the ITU and only a third as many characters in the alphabet, something had to give. TA went to Turkey, TG to Guatemala, that sort of thing.
20th century politics being what it was, there are echoes of imperialism all over the shop: V and Z were used for British Empire, which is why India, Canada and Australia all share V sequences with the likes of the Falklands, Bermuda and Mellish Reef. You can see a complete list here, from which the historically minded can pick numerous bones.
Logical enough, in the circs. But what is never addressed and may well be lost is what thought processes and behind-the-scenes politicking allocated the United States of America joint or sole rights to use that country's four letters. As it was the most radio-minded, high tech and industrially expanding nation on earth, few would quibble with such a generous quota on count alone. The number's not the issue.
But how, in the name of Marconi, did the septics get...
W, A, N and K
PreviousComments on this post
(For our provincial readers, one of whom has raised the question, I should perhaps explain that septic is Cockney rhyming slang for American - viz., Septic Tank, Yank.
Jodrell and Sherman and J. Arthur are also Cockney rhyming slang)
The ITU was originally the International Telegraph Union, formed in 1865, well before the advent of radio telegraphy, to harmonize international telegraph line tariffs and content regulations in Europe. See http://www.itu.int/aboutitu/overview/history.html
For a fascinating history, see the book "The Victorian Internet," by Tom Standage ISBN 0-425-17169-8, author's site at http://tomstandage.com/vicnet.html
It's an entertaining read on the subject, full of comparisons to phenomena we thought were unique to the Internet expansion (scams, long-distance romance, text emoticons, regulation of encryption, chat rooms, a meritocratic geek culture, instant millionaires, ...)
73, WA5ZNU
A and N were Army and Navy. Military wireless stations were the first to use organized callsigns to ID stations. The A and N radio callsign's were first used to ID the plane and would be painted on the fuselage. So the radio operator used the plane's ID number as the callsign of the station on the plane or airship or ship. And in the beginning they stuck to that nomenclature and the military weren't going to give that up.
Later US Radio Amateurs that were volunteers associated with MARS, the Military Amateur Radio Services, were issued an A or N callsign along with the FCC issued license and callsign that they used when on the standard amateur frequency allocations. They were a morale boosting service for the soldiers and sailors during the tail-end of WW2 through today.
MARS operations by radio amateurs were and are allowed to use military frequencies adjacent to the standard shortwave radio amateur bands. The MARS operators carry messages back and forth for family members to stay in contact and to pass along important private information to outposts that don't get regular mail service.
Later (beginning in the 1970's) A and N callsigns were issued to regular radio amateurs when the W and K call letter combos were used up, something prison systems are used to with automotive license plates!
The W and K letters were used because at first there were no other letters readily available and all non-military US radio stations were first operated by radio amateurs who operated systems as a hobby or on behalf of a commercial interest. Radio amateurs were not allowed to ID themselves as an Army or Navy station.
Callsigns at the very beginning were self-assigned. Later they began with numbers related to the 10 regions of the US. When the ITU met and set the callsign conventions, the radio amateurs and what beginning commercial interests there were got what was leftover, W and K. There also were no ITU member-states in 1927 that began with W or K.
The first AM broadcast station that broadcast music in the US was owned and operated by a radio amateur that operated his AM radio station after he got home from work in the evenings.
In commercial radio broadcasting, W callsigns were used on the east coast all the way to the Mississippi River. The K callsigns were used west of the river with a couple of exceptions for both the W and K callsigns.
A radio amateur named David Sarnoff that got a job with the Marconi radio company and ended up at a spark radio station in Newfoundland was relaying messages from a ship at sea that was reporting it was sailing to the aid of a ship named Titanic. He later started a broadcast company named RCA, that eventually operated radio networks named the National Broadcasting Company. He was the Google success story at the beginning of the radio age.
In many ways the Internet has siphoned away large numbers of younger hobbyists that would in earlier times become radio amateurs instead of programmers, web site designers or bloggers!
73 de WD5HJP
Thanks for filling in the gaps. I knew of the Mississippi divide between K and W, but not the A and N stories.
There's also quite a lot of resistance from the old school radio amateurs, with computers and Internet-mediated connections being seen as 'not proper radio'. That will change, as will (I suspect) a lot of other things, not least with spectrum allocations and modes.
But it remains a lot of fun for those who are that way minded; I'm contemplating using an Asus Eee ultraportable (built-in webcam) and my FT-817 as a backpack SSTV station next summer, something that would be utterly impossible without the new technology.
And there's nothing on the 'net which can compare with the magic of pulling distant signals out of thin air using bits of wire.
Now, if only those pesky sunspots would come back...
de G6HVY
I was very active with packet radio networking here in Texas with a group of amateurs that put TexNet together. Yes we got a certain amount of resistance from the guys running the voice repeaters and analog networked voice systems. What surprised me (but I'm not now sure why) was that the DXer's went nuts with the packet based DX spotting nets! The unfortunate result was that the HF bands got noisy to the extent that it was like contests were running almost continuously.
I enjoyed the technical aspects of radio and electronics much more than the operating itself. My favorite amateur radio contest was Field Day! The emphasis was more on the fun then how many points you got.
