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Comment by cantSpellSober | Hacker News Reader

> These guys were part of the local BBS/DDial scene which is how I knew them...I remember seeing heavy duty AV equipment there, but I had no idea what it was used for

From https://www.reddit.com/r/chicago/comments/1b4gz1/comment/c93...

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21611551

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1207937

...actually wow this gets posted too many times to count

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Note that the AMA mentioned in the response to that comment was updated later on to mention that the two people bpoag suspected to have done it (and by extension, the people referenced by Anonemoosity, I guess) did not do it: https://web.archive.org/web/20190722060448/https://old.reddi...

Here's an update ruling out that an outsider could have done this, given the equipment that was required to pull it off: https://web.archive.org/web/20161006032146/https://www.reddi...

Lots of people have claimed to be the person(s) who did it, or claim to know them, so far all without proof (as far as I'm aware).

The equipment is the ability to transmit FM video on 6 or 18 GHz. Both stations were on the same building, so all they needed to do is be close enough to get FM capture.

I am guessing someone found an STL transmitter in a dumpster. TV stations were not careful about discarding old equipment.

The thing about those FM STLs is, the receiver AFC circuit would lock on the strongest carrier within 40 MHz. The culprits didn’t need to know the exact frequency nor be on it, they just needed to be within 80 MHz (40 MHz each side of desired carrier frequency) and be the strongest signal and the receiver would move to them.

What they did need to know is audio subcarrier, and the distorted audio hints that they were off by one channel.

I used to repair this gear. It isn’t common equipment, but it also isn’t a truckload. It was quite luggable by the early 70’s, and the reason I suspect it was the result of dumpster diving is, 1987 was a year deep into the transition to NTSC with MTS audio. TV stations needed new STLs to support it. A station upgraded and pitched their oldest mono STL transmitters.

Rather Max Headroom than more OpenAI drama/hype

Reddit thread looks like it was deleted

That's what it looks like when the poster deleted their account, but not the post. When the post is deleted, the body text disappears. Account deleted but not post is relatively common on decade old reddit threads.

You can still view it by going to old.reddit.com instead.

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