….from the Hamsexy.com lawsuit department

We got this pretty funny e-mail today…. It’s from some whacker we mentiond once back in March named “bish1op” or “1bishop” or something. Anyway, here’s his letter:


From: “[removed, although I’m not sure why we’re that nice…]”
Date: July 17, 2005 6:58:36 PM EDT
To:
Subject: Remove this ppage on your site immedately

I am the “bisho1p” in question. I iam sick of the
bullshit as most/if not all of this is untrue. I have
been verbally assaulted on your site, and elightbars.
This will not continue, or my lawyer will be
contacting you immediately, and suing you/your
organization for libel/slander/verbal
assault/misrepresentation/and anything else you are
already obviously guilty of. Just because one
elightbars member was pissed, does not give your
organization the authority to allow public slander of
my character without intervention.

See your webpage for the incident in question.
http://www.hamsexy.com/cms/?p=18

If this is not removed, my lawyer will be contacting
you and your organization, and I will see to it that
your organization never sees the light of day again.

Pissed as hell,
bisho1p

Now now now.. where to start. First of all, our first instinct was to laugh our asses off…. But after a hearty chuckle over this I contacted our lawyer (you can’t run a site like this without having a least a lawyer or two available to run questions by). After reading him the letter, we both had a laugh together. I don’t know why people badmouth lawyers, this dude’s great. Finally, after he regained his composure, his words were clear and he beseeched me with some advice that could only come from many years and hundreds of thousands of dollars of education: “Fuck him”.

So… fuck him we shall. There are a few pretty funny things in this letter that come to mind:

  1. “most/if not all of this is untrue” Oh really now. Which part of “I am a lying whacker” is untrue, then? The part where you’re a whacker or the part where you call yourself a liar?
  2. “This will not continue, or my lawyer will be contacting you immediately, and suing you/your organization for libel/slander/verbal assault/misrepresentation/and anything else you are already obviously guilty of.” This guy suffers from dellusions of grandeur. First of all, he was mentioned ONCE in an article dating back to MARCH. It’s currently the latter end of July. As well, I’m not sure how he expects to file a “libel” suit against us, since all we used to identify him was an internet handle – and “no lawyer worth his salt would ever touch anything like this” (according to our counsel). But, if you still feel to the need to do so, please have your lawyer draft a cease and desist order against us. But please make sure to have him send us a scan of it so I can post it on this site. And no, the page isn’t going anywhere.
  3. “Just because one elightbars member was pissed, does not give your organization the authority to allow public slander of my character without intervention.” Again, where is the libel? (Your lawyer needs to teach you the difference between “Slander” and “Libel”. We’re only working with the material you provided to us. And, btw… it was more than one elightbars member that wrote us, thanking us for putting a spotlight onto you. I can’t remember what they said, because… well.. it was a long time ago, and to be honest I didn’t know who the heck you were until I clicked on the link… and even then it took me a second to remember. Sorry, we deal with so many whackers, it’s easy to forget. I’m sure you’ll forgive us!
  4. “If this is not removed, my lawyer will be contacting you and your organization, and I will see to it that your organization never sees the light of day again.” Bwahahaha….. Lighten up, man!! Dig into your pack and give yourself some of that Epi, man (if you’re infact authorized to carry it). This line got the most laughs from everyone I’ve shown your letter to. We invite you to contact a lawyer. It’s your money, dude. We are quite confident in our case, as our only mention of you was your incomprehensible internet alias, and that’s certainly not enough to warrant a libel case large enough to ensure daylight doesn’t fall on our rosy cheeks again. I am rather puzzled as to why we’d never see the light of day. I mean, Mark David Chapman killed John Lennon, and he sees the sun on a regular basis. Are we going to to be sequestered into the world’s deepest underground courtroom? Maybe that’s it.
  5. Anyhow.. as I said, feel free to hire a lawyer and pay a few hundred bucks to send us a cease and desist letter. And make sure it’s on a nice cream bond paper…. I don’t want it to clash with the others we hang on the wall.

Comments on this gentleman are always appreciated. but be careful as we’re treading on dangerous legal ground.

Oh, and by the way: The page you listed in your e-mail isn’t going anywhere. In fact, if you write us again, I’ll make it a permapost so everyone visiting the site will be able to read it.

Oh…. one more thing… if you had just politley e-mailed us, requestion the page to come down in a very nice manner, the page would be gone and we’d apologize for being a bother. You see? Maybe you’ll learn a lesson out of all of this: The squeaker whacker gets greased. Cheers!

Posted in Hamsexyness! | 20 Comments

Hamsexy Net tonight!!

The always fun, never dull Hamsexy net is a go tonight at 9pm Eastern (6pm Pacific, 0100 zulu) – catch it on IRLP node 9007.

Live stream will be at http://irlp.net:8000/hamsexy.m3u (thanks to Terry VE3NSV as always) – good for those who aren’t hams or don’t have access to an IRLP node (sorry about the stream not being up last week – technical problems). We will also be accepting check-ins from the net check-in thread.

Once again, net control will be VE3HBD.

All hams from around the world are welcome to check in. We’re building a nice little group of net regulars… hope to see all of our friends and some new faces on the net!

ATTENTION ECHOLINK USERS: If you want to access the net through Echolink, connect to K5MLK-L or Node #207801 (thanks to Matt K5MLK for setting that up) hopefully it’ll work this week!!

See you on the air!

Posted in Hamsexyness! | 3 Comments

Highlights from the Milton Hamfest

Milton, Ontario (up there in Canada) had it’s annual hamfest recently. As usual, we had several people on the ground, reporting on all of the hamsexyness going on. Chuck Bravo sent us these photos of the event – enjoy.


A Van with a very rusty luggage rack and red lights…. don’t know if they flash, or just extentions of his brake lights.


These guys were the hit of the show. Not only did I get several e-mail regarding these nerds, they were also on the lips of everyone at the fest. A few of our contacts at the fest overheard people remarking “hey, did you check out the whackers?”. When you are ridiculed at a HAMFEST, you know you’ve probably got a problem. First of all, they’re all wearing identical cargo pants, like they were all cast members in some sort of gay militia film. One of them is wearing a very unconvincing “Toronto Fire” shirt, and yet another is wearing a white uniform shirt, very tight cargos and an Astro Saber II on his ass. A bunch of strutting, overweight, early-20 ham radio nerds were OBVIOUSLY not fooling anyone into thinking that they were actually firefighters, so one has to question: WHY?


A perrenial favourite at Canadian hamfests, strikingly without it’s enormously obscene yagi on the roof.


What is, and what will be.


The Hamdicapped Bus! Another favourite, and usual lurker of Canadian hamfests. We gotta get a shot of the guy who owns this. I’m envisioning overalls, and nothing else….


Yet another Hamsexy regular…

If any more photos of the Milton Hamfest exist, please send them to [email protected]. Until next time, leave the white blouse and cargopants at home.

Posted in Hamsexyness! | 7 Comments

Shacktopus? WTF?!

Found this on Slashdot:

Anyone remember the guy who built the Winnebikeo and the Behemoth bikes and kayaks? Well, he’s at it again, but this time it’s packable. He’s taking lithium-ion batteries, solar cells, a Yaesu FT-817 HF radio, a Yaesu VX-6R HT, a Zodiac PDA, Linksys WET-11(older version) retrofitted with a Senao Long Range WiFi Card, cellphone and whatnot, and putting it all into something you can wear on your back. Basically, it’s Behemoth in a pack. His website is up for the Shacktopus.”

Clicky for the /. article.

I looked at it and it’s kinda cool. It combines ham radio, wireless data, a li-ion power source into a package that fits into an backpacker’s pack. It’s pretty damn hamsexy in a cool way.

Posted in Hamsexy WTF???? | 1 Comment

Hamsexy Net Check-in List

It looks like Las Vegas has a new contender for the “most check-ins”…. Out of nowhere it seems that every ham in Halifax, Nova Scotia out there in Atlantic Canada signed into the net last night. For the first time we got some check-ins from Quebec, and the usual smattering from our usual stations. We’re starting to form a nice gang of ‘regulars’ on the net, which is great to see. We are saddended to learn that the sign proclaming the border of Oldham Nova Scotia has been stolen, so we cannot get a photo of it (me or Seth better not get the sign in the mail next week…….) Anyhow, here’s the checkin list (as best as I could read my own handwriting….)

KD7SGM Tom Las Vegas, Nevada
N7CSI Aaron Las Vegas, Nevada
KD7LVX Steven Las Vegas, Nevada
N0VSJ Colin Las Vegas, Nevada
N3TOY Las Vegas, Nevada
VE1BSG Matt Halifax, Nova Scotia
VE1KLR Martin Somewhere in Nova Scotia
VE1VAC Andrew Halifax, Nova Scotia
N9FSE Steve Milwuakee, Wisconsin
VE2XDG in Hull, Quebec
VE4UO Shaun in Winnipeg, Manitoba
VE7RXT Sean Chilliwack, British Columbia
VA1TX Bob in Halifax, Nova Scotia
VE1DRU Drew in Blockhouse, Nova Scotia
VE1DTY Terry in Halifax, Nova Scotia
N7CSI Aaron in Las Vegas, Nevada
VE1MCR Charles in Halifax, Nova Scotia
KA3IDN Jim in Las Vegas, Nevada
K7OOL Colin from Las Vegas, Nevada
N9JP?? from Wisconsin
VA3BU Dave from Brampton, Ontario
K9JAC John from Hubertis, Wisconsin
W9ORN Barb from Hubertis, Wisconsin
VE2NHN Norman from Hull, Quebec
VE3HAB Ron from Limoges, ON
KB6SIN Paul from Las Vegas
VE1MGA Mary from Oldham, NS
KE4NOY Matt from Murfreesboro, Tennessee

28 checkins total…. a very good turnout! Unfortunatley the live stream didn’t work last night, and the Echolink connection was also out of service… but it was a good net all around. Thanks to everyone who participated!!

Be sure to visit www.irlp.net for information on IRLP, and how to set up your very own node.

See you next week!!

Posted in Hamsexyness! | 1 Comment

Hamsexy Net tonight….

Just a reminder – the Hamsexy net will once again go *LIVE* tonight at 9pm Eastern (6pm Pacific, 0100 zulu) on IRLP node 9007.

Live stream (as always) will be at http://irlp.net:8000/hamsexy.m3u (thanks to Terry VE3NSV as always) – good for those who aren’t hams or don’t have access to an IRLP node. We will also be accepting check-ins from the netcheck-in thread.

Net control will be VE3HBD.

All hams from around the world are welcome to check in – it’s an informal “hey how are you doing” net.

ATTENTION ECHOLINK USERS: If you want to access the net through Echolink, connect to K5MLK-L or Node #207801 (thanks to Matt K5MLK for setting that up)

See you on the air!

Posted in Hamsexyness! | 3 Comments

Up up and away in my Hamsexy balloon

A balloon launched at yesterday’s Great Plains Super Launch was on
page B3 of the Omaha World-Herald this morning.

Ten flights were launched yesterday between about 8:10 and 8:40am.
All payloads were recovered even though there were some challenges
due to payload and tracking problems.

Posted in Hamsexyness! | 16 Comments

Hamsexy Net Check-ins

Thanks to everyone who particiapted! Here’s the net check-in list:

VE3HBD in Toronto, Ontario (Net Control)
VE7RXT – Sean in Chilliwack British Columbia
VE3LT – Tom in Niagara Falls, Ontario
VE4UO – Shaun in Winnipeg, Manitoba
KD7LVX – Steven in Las Vegas, Nevada
W0NKA – Shane in Fairbault, Minnesota
N3TOY – Jamie in Las Vegas, Nevada
N0VSJ – Colin in Las Vegas, Nevada
KD7SGM – Tom in Las Vegas, Nevada
K8TEK – Tim in Ottawa, Ohio
VE3NSV – Terry in Kitchener, Ontario
VE1MGA – Mark in Oldham (!!) Nova Scotia
N9FSE – Steve in Millwaukee, Wisconsin
W9ORN – Barb in Hubertis, Wisconsin
VE3ESC – Rob in Toronto, Ontario
VE9ATQ – Lakeville, New Brunswick
VA3TSG – Ted in Whitby, Ontario
K9JAC – Jack in Hubertis, Wisconsin
KC0URM – Nick in Fairbault, Minnesota
N0PQK – John in Fairbault, Minnesota
KB9KHF – Bill in Chicago, Illinois
W1NAU – Timpthy in Boston, Massatwoshits
W0ODS – Jeff in Coggon, Iowa
W0AMY – Amy in Coggon, Iowa
KD6IDN – Paul in Las Vegas, Nevada
KG9GP – Roger in New Berlin, WI
VE3ESC – Rob in Toronto, Ontario
VE3XLS – Mike in Toronto, Ontario
VA3BU – Dave in Brampton, Ontario
VE3ECM – Richard in New York City, New York

And, of course, Slimdog

Sin City was well represented this net – thanks guys! Get back to the tables, and get the hell off the radio.

If you want to see a map showing all of the check-ins that we’ve had on the hamsexy Net since we started, check out the hamsexy net map page. I’m working on making it a little more user friendly….

Posted in Hamsexyness! | 4 Comments