If you want to call that moving the goalposts, that's your prerogative, I'd call it clarification. The basic point I was making, which I thought was obvious even with my poor wording, was that it was a pretty bizarre exception added to his surely-joking suggestion about speed restrictions. So, yes, sorry, you don't have to have your cell phone powered down during a flight, the way I worded that was wrong even ignoring the new gate-to-gate electronics (which I had completely forgotten about).
What about trains and passengers in cars? Perhaps not SMS, but at least on iPhones, instant messages (over any network) are used instead of SMS text messages whenever possible. The app seamlessly switches between them.
I never tried it. I would have guessed you'd occasionally connect to cell towers long enough for it to handle text delivery. But I'll defer to your expertise. I feel like I've gotten some cell signal several miles out from a tower in rural Minnesota with decent line of site before. Is that a bullshit observation and I was much closer than I thought? Is cruising altitude unfavorable for cell transmissions for some reason? Do cell tower antennas just not direct signal upwards?
Cell towers have wide ranges with no consistent number as it can depend on a number of factors. It can range from a few miles to dozens of miles. I would think for best efficiency the signals are directed to stay at ground level but I guess it could also be sphere around the tower. The problem I see is that a plane is traveling at several hundred miles an hour meaning the phone is going to be pretty much going in and out of areas of coverage pretty quickly probably too quickly to maintain a consistent signal.
How about a device built into the driver seat that emits a signal to a certain range that tells the phone to deactivate texting. So if the phone is within a certain range of the driver's seat, no texts. That was passengers can continue to use their phones as normal and drivers can still use them as hands free.
That will just create a class of even more distracted drivers, leaning, stretching.. striving to keep their phone out of jamming range, squinting to read their new messages.
Not to mention implausible and I'm pretty sure would violate FCC laws on having signal-jamming devices. Yeah, a signal-jamming device that can isolate texting inside the narrow space of the driver's seat. I'd think of something closer to an "annunciator" that detects when the car is moving using the GPS and when the texting mode is on/being used. It causes a pop-up/internal-text that reminds people to look at the road. Maybe it does this when a text is started, is clicked away, and returns periodically as the text and conversation continues. At the very least this would be annoying to texters who won't bother with texting while driving because of it. Passengers, of course, would have to deal with it too but wouldn't have their attention as divided so maybe a bit less of a hassle.
I never said signal jamming. I said a device that sends a signal to the phone that the phone in turn reads and shuts off the ability to text.
That would still shut down the texting ability of anyone else in the car, or like what was mentioned above, they just hold their phone over the passenger's seat. A better solution would be to automatically pair the phone into the bluetooth of the car and that deactivates the texting feature. Still, it would be difficult to get around the fact the other phones in the car would be text-restricted as well. You're usually closer than you think to a cell tower. Regardless, you're also 6-7 miles up when cruising and cell tower signals are designed to radiate out, not up.
Trying to find some technical means to stop phones from texting in a car is a fool's errand. People will always find a way around that. Make it technologically irrelevant with voice activation, dictation, and text-to-speech features. That's really the only way it's going to be solved. (That, or all the idiots texting get themselves killed in the meantime.)
There are many legitimate reasons to text while in a car. Are they necessary? No, probably not. We did okay before we had mobile devices and texting. But it's unrealistic, short-sighted, unnecessary, and narrow-minded to propose that no one should have the ability to text in a car.
^ For extended trips that last hours, I agree, you do need some kind of a diversion. But the whole reason we're discussing this is to eliminate the problem of texting while DRIVING. If that means that passengers can't text either, well, that's a kind of side effect I could live with.
You don't need a diversion. Texting isn't something that is frivolous but suddenly becomes necessary after a certain duration of time. You repeatedly look at issues from a very narrow point of view, your own. Step outside and imagine what other people's uses, needs, and possible alternatives might be instead of just thinking about what you could live with.