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Communicating at PAX

flatlineflatline Registered User regular
edited November 2010 in PAX Archive
Let me first say (for the new people) that last year I didn't have a ton of problems, but as a former Boy Scout, I like to think ahead (and be prepared).

Not sure what it's like at Prime, but at East in 2010, there were some issues with calls not going through and extremely delayed text messages - I'm talking about receiving a text message from Saturday night on Sunday evening after departing Boston. There was by no means a complete blackout of communications, but there were times when it was fairly unreliable. Since I'm assuming more people will be at the BCEC, we are trying to think ahead in case cellular phones don't work for voice calls or texts. At the Stewart/Colbert rally in DC last month, cell phones didn't work at all on the mall. Completely overloaded the system (although latest estimates I've seen put the crowd at ~250,000 which is several times larger than PAX).

Anyways, wondering if anyone else out there has experience with portable 2-way radios (walkie talkies) that they plan on bringing? I know that the Salmon Security prank used them. My friends that I'm coming with have a set of 6 of these that they use for camping/hunting/fishing (http://www.amazon.com/Midland-GXT1000VP4-36-Mile-50-Channel-Two-Way/dp/B001WMFYH4). Looks like they offer a paging function in addition to straight voice comms. Not sure that it'll be necessary, but we'll probably have them stashed in our bags and if texts stop working we can fall back to these.

I fully admit that this might be overkill, but this isn't the first con where I've seen people using radios. Thoughts?

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Posts

  • zerzhulzerzhul Registered User, Moderator mod
    edited November 2010
    On cell phones:
    I was using a BlackBerry Storm on Verizon for last year's East. I actually had zero problems with calls and zero problems with my 3G data. I saw some slight delay on texts here and there though. Most of the people I heard having issues (in my group and just in general) were using at&t (fwiw) and couldn't get 3G or texts but seemed to be ok on EDGE and calls (with 3G turned off). I know ZERO about T-Mobile or Sprint coverage for the area.

    On radios:
    most systems only have a handful of channels available. This could be decent for a group if the pre-coordinate channels (could even have specific channels for specific things and pre-coordinate that on the forums!) but it has a massive potential for crosstalk and interference given the busy area. It could definitely work, or they could be useless :P can't hurt to try I guess!

    zerzhul on
  • schussschuss Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    2 ways work great (in general), but there may be some issues with the structure blocking some signals. Just setup some common times/places to meet and you'll be fine.

    schuss on
  • punziepunzie Cookie Pimp Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    The general chatter I heard around Prime was that AT&T was slow, but other carriers were mostly fine. The reasoning being that a great many more people use AT&T (iPhone).

    punzie on
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  • zerzhulzerzhul Registered User, Moderator mod
    edited November 2010
    punzie wrote: »
    The general chatter I heard around Prime was that AT&T was slow, but other carriers were mostly fine. The reasoning being that a great many more people use AT&T (iPhone).

    It would be interesting to get a demographic based on pax attendees for the usage. I know Verizon has more subscribers nationwide than at&t, but it could be very possible that an overwhelming number of pax goers use at&t. Maybe if such data gets collected it could be a good tool to submit to the carrier(s) most used to get possible additional temporary coverage (you can hardwire in additional cell stations through ze internets).

    zerzhul on
  • flatlineflatline Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    punzie wrote: »
    The general chatter I heard around Prime was that AT&T was slow, but other carriers were mostly fine. The reasoning being that a great many more people use AT&T (iPhone).

    Yeah, everyone in my group of friends has an iPhone (we're all iLemmings I suppose). Hopefully the infrastructure is just fine this year, and maybe the iPhone 4 troubles have caused more people to go Android. Like I said, probably overkill, but we already have the radios (and even the little security earpieces), so I thought it couldn't hurt to bring them. Just wanted to see if other people had used them previously in this environment. Thanks for the replies!

    flatline on
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  • zerzhulzerzhul Registered User, Moderator mod
    edited November 2010
    flatline wrote: »
    punzie wrote: »
    The general chatter I heard around Prime was that AT&T was slow, but other carriers were mostly fine. The reasoning being that a great many more people use AT&T (iPhone).

    Yeah, everyone in my group of friends has an iPhone (we're all iLemmings I suppose). Hopefully the infrastructure is just fine this year, and maybe the iPhone 4 troubles have caused more people to go Android. Like I said, probably overkill, but we already have the radios (and even the little security earpieces), so I thought it couldn't hurt to bring them. Just wanted to see if other people had used them previously in this environment. Thanks for the replies!

    The nice thing about the BCEC is that it has a very open floor plan that is then cordoned off into the variety of rooms. This means there is a smaller chance that you will have massive signal blocking walls in the way since most of the walls will be less substantial temporary structures. You would still get better comm quality if you were in direct line of sight of each other, but I would think that it would be more likely to be successful at the BCEC than the Hynes.

    zerzhul on
  • feitocomfrutafeitocomfruta Denver, Colorado, USARegistered User regular
    edited November 2010
    This is something that is likely to be an obvious suggestion, but GET TWITTER. PAX has two accounts, @pax_lines for queue updates, and @Official_PAX for news updates. If you have a web-enabled phone, you can use their website, and it's fairly reliable, plus you can text your tweets to the website as well. The only drawback to Twitter is that it can be semi-public, but for the most part, unless someone is following you on Twitter, they can't see your tweets.

    So for me, I think I'll be depending on Twitter for most communications, but in all other cases, I'll need a back-up, which I'll work on closer to the event.

    feitocomfruta on
  • MelesMelesMelesMeles Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    This is something that is likely to be an obvious suggestion, but GET TWITTER. PAX has two accounts, @pax_lines for queue updates, and @Official_PAX for news updates. If you have a web-enabled phone, you can use their website, and it's fairly reliable, plus you can text your tweets to the website as well. The only drawback to Twitter is that it can be semi-public, but for the most part, unless someone is following you on Twitter, they can't see your tweets.

    So for me, I think I'll be depending on Twitter for most communications, but in all other cases, I'll need a back-up, which I'll work on closer to the event.

    This. Twitter saved mah bacon at Prime, and I'll definitely be re-relying on it at East.

    MelesMeles on
  • flatlineflatline Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    MelesMeles wrote: »
    This is something that is likely to be an obvious suggestion, but GET TWITTER. PAX has two accounts, @pax_lines for queue updates, and @Official_PAX for news updates. If you have a web-enabled phone, you can use their website, and it's fairly reliable, plus you can text your tweets to the website as well. The only drawback to Twitter is that it can be semi-public, but for the most part, unless someone is following you on Twitter, they can't see your tweets.

    So for me, I think I'll be depending on Twitter for most communications, but in all other cases, I'll need a back-up, which I'll work on closer to the event.

    This. Twitter saved mah bacon at Prime, and I'll definitely be re-relying on it at East.

    Really? I've been on twitter for a long time. I've never been particularly impressed with their reliability or speed (it often took a long time to 'receive' @/D messages, and sometimes they never showed up), although I guess they've gotten a little better in the past year or two. Most of my friends don't actually use twitter, so for me it's only useful for following official announcements, stalking wil wheaton, and twitter-shitting semi-anonymously.

    I do follow the official pax feeds, but usually at a con (be it PAX, or DEFCON, or even a smaller one like Shmoocon) it's way too hard to digest even a fraction of the #PAX tagged messages. Also, web browsing was v difficult on my phone last year (and, by extension, using Twitter). I'm assuming it was for the same reason that texts didn't always go through (AT&T being behind on building out towers). Does the BCEC/PAX plan to have have wifi? Even if it does, I'm hesitant to use open wifi in that setting (Wall of Sheep at DEFCON springs to mind), but maybe it will alleviate strain on the cellular infrastructure.

    To be fair, last year I was still rocking an original EDGE-only iPhone, which was slow as balls to begin with. I haven't been terribly impressed with the iPhone 4's 3G data speeds, but we'll see how it fares in March.

    flatline on
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  • MelesMelesMelesMeles Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    Once you learn how to use Twitter for PAX, it becomes really helpful. Different events will get different hashtags (see the Twitter thread for details), and you can search by those hashtags to find other people in the area. Also, the #pax hashtag will get totally swamped, but it's a great way of finding people nearby.

    In general, I found that Twitter @/DM were faster and more reliable than any other form of communimicationising.

    MelesMeles on
  • bubblegumnexbubblegumnex Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    Another vote for twitter. If you have your own group, make your own group hashtag. This will keep the group semi-coordinated.

    bubblegumnex on
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  • drspacemonkey2drspacemonkey2 Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    I grabbed a T-Mobile sim for my phone while I was at Prime, never had any issues.

    drspacemonkey2 on
  • macrogeekmacrogeek Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    We used Twitter last year a lot. Twitter and Text messages. Phones worked find outside the Hynes. AT&T's local network kept bouncing from 3g to EDGE all day, so battery life was low.

    Twitter was great for networking with other PAXer's. We were able to find a group that wanted to play Munchkin in the hotel lobby that way.

    macrogeek on
  • freakish lightfreakish light butterdick jones and his heavenly asshole machineRegistered User regular
    edited November 2010
    flatline wrote: »
    MelesMeles wrote: »
    This is something that is likely to be an obvious suggestion, but GET TWITTER. PAX has two accounts, @pax_lines for queue updates, and @Official_PAX for news updates. If you have a web-enabled phone, you can use their website, and it's fairly reliable, plus you can text your tweets to the website as well. The only drawback to Twitter is that it can be semi-public, but for the most part, unless someone is following you on Twitter, they can't see your tweets.

    So for me, I think I'll be depending on Twitter for most communications, but in all other cases, I'll need a back-up, which I'll work on closer to the event.

    This. Twitter saved mah bacon at Prime, and I'll definitely be re-relying on it at East.

    Really? I've been on twitter for a long time. I've never been particularly impressed with their reliability or speed (it often took a long time to 'receive' @/D messages, and sometimes they never showed up), although I guess they've gotten a little better in the past year or two. Most of my friends don't actually use twitter, so for me it's only useful for following official announcements, stalking wil wheaton, and twitter-shitting semi-anonymously.

    I do follow the official pax feeds, but usually at a con (be it PAX, or DEFCON, or even a smaller one like Shmoocon) it's way too hard to digest even a fraction of the #PAX tagged messages. Also, web browsing was v difficult on my phone last year (and, by extension, using Twitter). I'm assuming it was for the same reason that texts didn't always go through (AT&T being behind on building out towers). Does the BCEC/PAX plan to have have wifi? Even if it does, I'm hesitant to use open wifi in that setting (Wall of Sheep at DEFCON springs to mind), but maybe it will alleviate strain on the cellular infrastructure.

    To be fair, last year I was still rocking an original EDGE-only iPhone, which was slow as balls to begin with. I haven't been terribly impressed with the iPhone 4's 3G data speeds, but we'll see how it fares in March.

    I was only at Prime this year, so I can't speak for Boston's architecture; however, 3G was completely annihilated inside the convention center, and the only way to get internet at all was to switch over to Edge. There was a wifi signal inside but it refused to even give an IP address when you tried to connect to it.

    freakish light on
  • ukiyo eukiyo e Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    Switching from 3g to edge makes a huge difference. It will take forever to load a website, but at least you will still be able to make calls and receive texts. Twitter works great for communicating with people at PAX, especially if you are trying to meet up with people outside of your own group. You can follow the PAX list to see what everyone is planning for gatherings outside of the convention itself. Don't rely on the twitter website, though. If you use a twitter app you won't need to use as much data to get updates.
    I think the most important thing is to not rely on phones at all. Make plans for meetup times and locations before you split the party.

    ukiyo e on
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  • burnttoast45burnttoast45 Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    As far as radios go, using them in the BCEC worked great for the prank but there are a couple considerations you should keep in mind.

    1) We had specific short blocks when we would be transmitting. I think we would have gone through many more batteries if we left them on for extended periods. I also imagine that over time the false transmissions would have been confusing and annoying.

    2) The frequencies were open. Anyone can listen in and speak. Throughout the course of the weekend we had to change frequencies due to some unappreciated chatter =/.

    The radios were more of a backup plan. I'd have to agree that Twitter and txt messaging worked the best. If you have AT&T, Edge is your friend and served me greatly.

    burnttoast45 on
  • drspacemonkey2drspacemonkey2 Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    Oh, for the out-of-country people (like myself), some tips on finding a decent wireless provider to use for a few days might be nice. It was expensive to get 1 month of unlimited data, but very worth it when you look at how much I would have spent on out-of-country roaming charges. If anyone has more experience than me with the subject and wouldn't mind writing a guide/FAQ, there would be many appreciative people.

    drspacemonkey2 on
  • punziepunzie Cookie Pimp Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    Oh, for the out-of-country people (like myself), some tips on finding a decent wireless provider to use for a few days might be nice. It was expensive to get 1 month of unlimited data, but very worth it when you look at how much I would have spent on out-of-country roaming charges. If anyone has more experience than me with the subject and wouldn't mind writing a guide/FAQ, there would be many appreciative people.

    Seconded! I may not be from out-of-country, but I'm still thinking of getting a burner to use for all the MMT and Cookie Brigade stuff so that I'm not giving my personal number to everyone. I know nothing about temp phones though. So yes, if anyone has any advice/info/suggestions, please share! And if anyone has used them in the past, how did they work out? Were there any snags?

    punzie on
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  • itzerokewlitzerokewl Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    I'll go on and throw in another vote for text messages, my group used texts the whole weekend and had no real issues (I'm even on AT&T.) Did use Twitter some as well, but only for larger community gatherings.

    itzerokewl on
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  • flatlineflatline Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    punzie wrote: »
    Oh, for the out-of-country people (like myself), some tips on finding a decent wireless provider to use for a few days might be nice. It was expensive to get 1 month of unlimited data, but very worth it when you look at how much I would have spent on out-of-country roaming charges. If anyone has more experience than me with the subject and wouldn't mind writing a guide/FAQ, there would be many appreciative people.

    Seconded! I may not be from out-of-country, but I'm still thinking of getting a burner to use for all the MMT and Cookie Brigade stuff so that I'm not giving my personal number to everyone. I know nothing about temp phones though. So yes, if anyone has any advice/info/suggestions, please share! And if anyone has used them in the past, how did they work out? Were there any snags?

    If all you want is a temporary-type phone number you can give out freely, why not get a google voice account? I have 2 or 3 different google voice numbers, just set it to forward straight to your cell phone. Boom, 2 numbers that both go to the same phone.

    flatline on
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  • ZeroHourHeroZeroHourHero Allentown, PARegistered User regular
    edited November 2010
    We used 2-way radios at PAX Prime for the prank with little to no issues.

    ZeroHourHero on
  • drspacemonkey2drspacemonkey2 Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    flatline wrote: »
    If all you want is a temporary-type phone number you can give out freely, why not get a google voice account? I have 2 or 3 different google voice numbers, just set it to forward straight to your cell phone. Boom, 2 numbers that both go to the same phone.

    For Canadians, that's not possible - Google Voice won't forward to Canadian phone numbers (unless something has changed that I'm unaware of). For many Americans, however, that would seem to be an ideal solution.

    drspacemonkey2 on
  • [H]olyGeekboy[H]olyGeekboy PAX dad and PC builder ClevelandRegistered User, ClubPA regular
    edited November 2010
    punzie wrote: »
    The general chatter I heard around Prime was that AT&T was slow, but other carriers were mostly fine. The reasoning being that a great many more people use AT&T (iPhone).

    ...that was last year. Now that Android handsets outsell iPhones 2:1, I'm thinking Verizon's going to be taking a pounding as well.

    FWIW, I had great coverage from T-Mobile on my hacked iPhone 2G last year!

    [H]olyGeekboy on
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  • [H]olyGeekboy[H]olyGeekboy PAX dad and PC builder ClevelandRegistered User, ClubPA regular
    edited November 2010
    flatline wrote: »
    If all you want is a temporary-type phone number you can give out freely, why not get a google voice account? I have 2 or 3 different google voice numbers, just set it to forward straight to your cell phone. Boom, 2 numbers that both go to the same phone.

    For Canadians, that's not possible - Google Voice won't forward to Canadian phone numbers (unless something has changed that I'm unaware of). For many Americans, however, that would seem to be an ideal solution.

    You can pick up a prepaid US "disposable" phone for $30 including a couple of hours of talk time, FWIW.

    [H]olyGeekboy on
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  • MJPMMJPM Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    Another vote for radios and Twitter. I'm an iPhone guy, and yeah AT&T blows chunks, but Twitter is your friend. I used a walkie for communication with my group to coordinate filming and such, and it worked pretty darn well!

    MJPM on
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  • WingedillidanWingedillidan Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    We never really had problems communicating during event hours... We always synced our possible/desired schedules and tried to call around them. When we weren't busy in a panel or something, we usually easily caught each other in the Expo Hall or up in BYOC and planned to eat/whatever then.

    It wasn't really our desire to get crazy about trying to contact each other EXACTLY at this time or RIGHT NOW. Which, I think, made our experiences a lot better. This was at both Prime and East, probably will be similar in BCEC... but we DO have a bigger group.

    Though trying to tell each other where you're going quickly before you pass on the escalators was not a good idea...

    Wingedillidan on
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  • ArcoArco Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    Also keep in mind that various departments at PAX have their own twitter feeds, like @paxsat. These can be useful for updates that aren't quite right for the @official_pax feed, but still totally useful and relevant to you.

    As far as cell phone coverage goes: don't rely on voice for almost anything, use texts, get a twitter app, and switch to edge. Stuff everyone has already said, but years of PAX experience adds reinforcement.

    Arco on
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  • Vaulter85Vaulter85 Registered User regular
    edited November 2010
    twitter helped a lot for me. it kept me in the "know" of what was happening, where people were meeting at, where the parties were, etc.

    Vaulter85 on
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