What is Digg?51 Comments
- rtakach, on 10/12/2007, -0/+25why the ***** is 90% of everything on digg linked to a blog, then in that blog there is a link to the actual article. even if you did stumble on the blog first, you still have a responsibility to post the actual article. I don't give a ***** what Karl from techdirt thinks about the article, and I'm not interested in his dumbass attempt at humor either.
now i'm going to wrap lights around my router to see if my signal strength changes from "excellent" to "good." - Scopitone, on 10/12/2007, -0/+15Yeah, but it boosts Holiday Magic!
- twtmc, on 10/12/2007, -0/+9Just run one of those blue LAN cables underneath your indoor christmas lights! Nobody will ever notice that the flashing lights go across your kitchen floor and into the computer room.
- mooninite, on 10/12/2007, -0/+8What about the new LED Christmas lights that are finally available for purchase?
Does this come from conventional bulbs only? - ShrimpCrackers, on 10/12/2007, -1/+9They do that either to blog spam or because someone else has posted the story first and digg won't let you submit the same link twice.
- Jagdhund, on 10/12/2007, -0/+7Good, now your neighbors can't steal your internets.
Seriously, you can make your house a christmas Wi-fi fortress. - CBanga, on 10/12/2007, -0/+6They also screw with your Wiimote.
- MobbyG, on 10/12/2007, -0/+6It's an attack on Christmas!
/sarcasm - baaaan, on 10/12/2007, -0/+6Are you saying that I went too far by gutting my house for a better WiFi signal?
- toomuchgreentea, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5I doubt it's EMI. At what frequencies do your lights have to be blinking to cause EMI with your WiFi?
I was scanning through the article and they didn't really explain the 25% drop. Give me details, otherwise I'm calling it BS. - trghpy, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4Well that explains why my neighbors wifi is unavailable..
- superal1394, on 10/12/2007, -1/+5news flash! microwaves interfere with wi-fi
wait! another news flash! oak doors interfere with wi-fi signas
WAIT, yet ANOTHER news flash! FREAKING EVERYTHING INTERFERES WITH WI-FI.
I hate articles like this. - BassJunkie, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4If this is true you could get those mesh light's and hang them on your wall to hinder your neighbors sponging ur WLAN!
I doubt anyone will pay attention to this, I can just picture it now:
"I'm sorry children we can't have christmas lights this year as daddy will lose 5% signal on his wireless network" - Logal, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Oh my god, Cyber-war on Xmas!!!!
In other news, Kwanzaa decorations and the Star of David boost signal strength by 50% - Altotus, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Um. How is this news? It seems to me that anything with a current running through it or that independently acts as an antenna degrades RF signals of any sort. Are they saying that Christmas lights are particularly noisy in the 2.4GHz part of the spectrum? I don't doubt that they cause some interference, but I doubt they are any worse than all the other electronic stuff around the house.
- MikeFromAmerica, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3But if your neighbors AREN'T stealing your wifi, you have no plausible deniability when the next round of RIAA lawsuits comes out...
- kirkio, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Newsflash: 2.4 GHz phones, which just happen to share frequencies with WiFi interfere with the signal. I don't need any software to tell me this, just the little icon on the taskbar that says "Wireless Signal Lost"
- jhshukla, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2who the heck cares? people will ask for better quality receptors. probably someone will come up with redundant transmission over multiple frequencies. people are not going to stop decorating just because of this. walls deteriorate WiFi. do I bring them down?
and no one is going to notice the difference unless they are on the fringes. - digitalrift, on 10/12/2007, -2/+4it's EMI, what the hell are you expecting?
- MikeFromAmerica, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Is it an aluminum tree? Maybe it is acting as a waveguide.
- toomuchgreentea, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Sadly in this case, even the original article was a spam piece pushing products.
- thall, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2For slightly different reasons though. In that case it's the flood of IR light drowning out the blinking IR signal from your remote. It's like trying to signal someone with a flash light across a park in the middle of a sunny day.
- HappyScrappy, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2The article says "holiday decorations", not Christmas lights. I read about this article earlier, and it was strongly implied that it is metal reflective balls and tinsel (which is basically chaff on a string) that hurts your reception.
It's bad enough that this links to a blog summary of a two paragraph article. But worse yet that the blog summary is misleading. - yaosio, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Anybody else notice this so-called "wireless" company is actually a wired cable company?
- drpeppper, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1this is true. i put up christmas lights and now i lag in cstrike. :(
- starbird, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1what is odd is that I, for what ever reason, have a better signal since the tree went up....
- RetardoCrisp, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1This also applies to TV remote controls etc as well. Christmas lights mess the signal of those too.
- shawgo, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1as if I didn't have enough problems with my wireless network already... I hate Christmas.
- thall, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1It's the fact that with the string of lights wrapped in a spiral makes for a stronger noise transmitter than most electronic devices, and in some cases can be strong enough to raise the noise floor in Wi-Fi devices higher than what their filters were designed for.
When you put your lights up on the tree you're effectively creating a new electronic device, and I wouldn't be surprised if such a "device" would fail FCC emission tests miserably. - profOblivion, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1God forbid we use anything electrical near our electronics.
Oh, and it depends what you mean by 25%. Is that SNR? Power? Decibels?
A 25% decrease in power is equivalent to a drop of LESS THAN 1 dB. - AnotherBrian, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Christmas lights consist of long wires that act like antennas so it's not that surprising that there could be some interference. I wouldn't recommend decorating you antennas with lights but otherwise it's not going to be a problem
- scottjl, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1better news article "security networks protected by holiday lights." lol
- Kinser, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I think.. I'm going to put up even more lights now.
- marinist, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Better news would be putting security on your network.
- astrotrain, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Interesting... and I bet this individual who is claiming that Christmas lights degrade your WiFi, has a solution for only $49.95 + tax.
Sounds like someone selling Snake Oil to me... - thall, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1LED lights could be potentially worse, since most of them are designed as just a bunch of diodes (the D in LED) in series, which block current in one direction. So in a 50/60Hz circuit they blink at a 25/30Hz rate with a rather crude bunny-hop waveform. The sharp edges resulting at the 0 crossing line contribute to the noise. A well designed LED string should have a filter in the plug to help attenuate this effect, but if it exists I haven't seen it advertised on any of the boxes.
- schokie, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I agree. It's most annoying to read the whole page only to find out that there's no article there. If I just wanted to read someone's comments on it I wouldn't have tried to leave Digg.
Here's a direct link to the article:
http://www.airmagnet.com/news/press/news.20061205.htm - finn, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1how about xmas lights that double as cat5e cable, and light up brighter acording to data being transmitted... mmm...and then have the tree-topper star/angel/whatever be a access point for wifi..
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0I am curious about what Christmas lights have that other lights don't. I didn't think they were putting dimming circuits in these (mostly cheap) lights so what is the source of EMI? Sounds like BS to me. WiFi is spread spectrum with about 9 dB of process gain which is pretty tolerant of the kind of noise made be dimmers .
- Camper17, on 10/12/2007, -2/+2This is actually good new. It cuts down on the chances that my neighbors are stealing my wireless access and it gives me an excuse to leave my Christmas lights up year round
- SuperJason, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Yep: http://www.digg.com/gaming_news/Wii_doesn_t_work_right_around_Christmas_Lights
- thall, on 10/12/2007, -2/+2EM radiation comes from the switching itself. The obvious frequency of this is the blink frequency, which is less than 1Hz. A lesser obvious frequency is the 50/60Hz running through the circuit. And depending on the switching circuit there's an even lesser obvious frequency: the sharp edges created when the current is snapped off/on.
Also consider that anything radio based must use RF filters to keep the noise out while letting the data signal in. Filters can't completely remove the noise, just dampen it. If the noise from the lights, whatever the frequency, is stronger than what the filter was designed for, then enough noise can leak into the data signal and corrupt it. - elqboy, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1this is one of reasons why the wii is weak console.
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -2/+1http://www.endchristmas.com
- Firehawkws7, on 10/12/2007, -1/+0damnit, this article just broke my BS meter. or maybe it was my christmas lights that broke it.
- MacLiberal, on 10/12/2007, -2/+1This is a real good reason to outlaw those stupid christmas lights.
- kosmodagreat, on 10/12/2007, -1/+0They should make a Wi-Fi antenna that hooks to you Xmas tree. Instant wifi extender. lol
- soundguise, on 10/12/2007, -5/+3I love it. I swear everything degrades my Wi-Fi! The usual suspects of course like microwaves but even the weather seems to throw off the signal.
- agree2disagree, on 10/12/2007, -2/+0christmas is a time for family, not for cstrike!
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -5/+0 .
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