Hey there,
first of all I'm happy to see an Open Source'd app for MeshCore rising up. Thanks for starting this project!
I see a rising number of people using it, not because I know these folks, but because of the rising of messages without human readable information in my channels and chats.
European Regulations
In Europe, LoRa and other Short Range Devices (SRDs) operating in the 868 MHz ISM band are governed by ETSI regulations (specifically ETSI EN 300 220). Unlike the US, which uses frequency hopping to manage interference, Europe uses Duty Cycle limits to ensure no single device "hogs" the airwaves.
The 868 MHz band is de-facto standard in Europe, with strict duty cycle limits (1% or 0.1% depending on the sub-band) and power output restrictions (25 mW for most applications).
This is why it's mandatory to send as little data as possible.
High airtime usage
Some people might think that sending a reaction is the least possible way to use airtime, but in fact the amount of data this app submits for a single reaction is way more compared to just sending the 4-byte emoji as a regular message.
For example:
Sending a thumbs up emoji (👍) as reaction results in payload like r: 1769336261000_477365450_1049931098:👍. While the emoji itself is only 4 bytes (UTF-8), the reaction message is 44 bytes – 11x the number of bytes!
Proprietary message format
Additionally, reactions is not a MeshCore standard and so other MeshCore apps show the payload as a message instead of a reaction to a previous message, which leads to additional messages from people who are confused about this and start asking questions.
Danger of regulatory violations
I see a high growing number of Meshcore users and repeaters during the past weeks, and unfortunately an also growing number of very chatty people, who don't seem to care about airtime regulations. Right now I receive approx. 200 "good morning" messages in multiple languages in the morning, and the same amount of "good night" in the eventing - on a daily basis. This does not include the many flood messages sent in other channels.
This will either lead in very strict Region settings in repeaters (e. g. "denyf *") or in a shutdown of MeshCore by authorities. The German Federal Network Agency (Bundesnetzagentur) is known for cracking down hard on regulatory violations (see 2025 with regards to PMR446 and Freenet). This could lead to a very swift end for MeshCore (and all other similar projects).
So I'm asking to stop using up airtime for non-standard features like reactions, and keep regulations in mind.
Thanks!
Hey there,
first of all I'm happy to see an Open Source'd app for MeshCore rising up. Thanks for starting this project!
I see a rising number of people using it, not because I know these folks, but because of the rising of messages without human readable information in my channels and chats.
European Regulations
In Europe, LoRa and other Short Range Devices (SRDs) operating in the 868 MHz ISM band are governed by ETSI regulations (specifically ETSI EN 300 220). Unlike the US, which uses frequency hopping to manage interference, Europe uses Duty Cycle limits to ensure no single device "hogs" the airwaves.
The 868 MHz band is de-facto standard in Europe, with strict duty cycle limits (1% or 0.1% depending on the sub-band) and power output restrictions (25 mW for most applications).
This is why it's mandatory to send as little data as possible.
High airtime usage
Some people might think that sending a reaction is the least possible way to use airtime, but in fact the amount of data this app submits for a single reaction is way more compared to just sending the 4-byte emoji as a regular message.
For example:
Sending a thumbs up emoji (👍) as reaction results in payload like
r: 1769336261000_477365450_1049931098:👍. While the emoji itself is only 4 bytes (UTF-8), the reaction message is 44 bytes – 11x the number of bytes!Proprietary message format
Additionally, reactions is not a MeshCore standard and so other MeshCore apps show the payload as a message instead of a reaction to a previous message, which leads to additional messages from people who are confused about this and start asking questions.
Danger of regulatory violations
I see a high growing number of Meshcore users and repeaters during the past weeks, and unfortunately an also growing number of very chatty people, who don't seem to care about airtime regulations. Right now I receive approx. 200 "good morning" messages in multiple languages in the morning, and the same amount of "good night" in the eventing - on a daily basis. This does not include the many flood messages sent in other channels.
This will either lead in very strict Region settings in repeaters (e. g. "denyf *") or in a shutdown of MeshCore by authorities. The German Federal Network Agency (Bundesnetzagentur) is known for cracking down hard on regulatory violations (see 2025 with regards to PMR446 and Freenet). This could lead to a very swift end for MeshCore (and all other similar projects).
So I'm asking to stop using up airtime for non-standard features like reactions, and keep regulations in mind.
Thanks!