Dot-dash-diss: The gentleman hacker's 1903 lulz

[Lone Stranger]

S-O-S in Morse code became an international standard for distress signals in 1906. As a spoken distress phrase it was replaced by "Mayday" in 1927.

Whatever for?

I asked my nephew (who is a sea captain). Why couldn't you just say "SOS"?

He had no real answer, but he told me as his best advice that if I really wanted help I shouldn't bother about morseing "SOS" or anything else.

I do not have a proper answer for this but I do know that "m'aidez" is French for "help me."  I guess it is assumed that a lot of people around the world know basic French.

[glamdring]

It would be an intresting way to communicate with people. Now you probably could have virtually privet conversions, few would understand it. It would be a fun downtime project, like when I learned how to write/read binary sentences which I have long forgotten.

[Just18]

It would be an intresting way to communicate with people. Now you probably could have virtually privet conversions, few would understand it. It would be a fun downtime project, like when I learned how to write/read binary sentences which I have long forgotten.

Would have to be encrypted too                 

[The Chief]

S-O-S in Morse code became an international standard for distress signals in 1906. As a spoken distress phrase it was replaced by "Mayday" in 1927.

Whatever for?

I asked my nephew (who is a sea captain). Why couldn't you just say "SOS"?

He had no real answer, but he told me as his best advice that if I really wanted help I shouldn't bother about morseing "SOS" or anything else.

I do not have a proper answer for this but I do know that "m'aidez" is French for "help me."  I guess it is assumed that a lot of people around the world know basic French.

At the time of it's adoption, French was the international language.  It has now been overtaken by English.

[menotu]

And for the 21st Century...................

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by Bonnie Cha February 2 2012 (cnet)

Tweet in Morse code with Tworse Key

Yes, forget your smartphone, tablet, and laptop. The telegraph key is the wave of the future for sending tweets via Morse code. We jest, of course, but this hack is seriously one of the coolest things we've ever seen.

Tworse Key is the brainchild of Martin Kaltenbrunner, who submitted this amazing project to Hack A Day. Kaltenbrunner created the standalone device using a built-in Arduino Ethernet board and an integrated standard LAN cable (cleverly covered in cloth to give it a more old-fashioned look) to connect to the Web.

As you compose your tweets using Morse code, the Ethernet board decodes the signals and transmits your message using the Twitter API.

Tworse Key

[Just18]

I haven't heard anything in Morse as bad as that for many years