5 ways Morse code is better than text messaging

Eric Milzarski
Mar 31, 2018 3:01 AM PDT
1 minute read
5 ways Morse code is better than text messaging

SUMMARY

In 1999, the last official Morse code message was sent out from the Globe Wireless master station south of San Franci…

In 1999, the last official Morse code message was sent out from the Globe Wireless master station south of San Francisco. It was the end of an era for a form of communication that lasted well over 163 years. To put this into perspective, early forms of ARPANET email are about 47 years old and SMS text messaging has been around almost 26 years.


Today, only ten Airmen a year learn the craft of reading Morse code and it's more of a history lesson than a practical one. You can still find the occasional radio enthusiast who picked it up as a party trick or a conversation starter. Once you learn the skill, however, you start realizing how many other Morse code nerds there are out there. Hell, even the original Nokia SMS notification chime was just "SMS" written in Morse code as (.../- -/...).

1. It's an easy skill to learn that blows people away

You see it in the movies and on television all the time. In some tense action scene, someone blurts out, "oh my god! It's Morse code!" Suddenly, everyone looks at the guy who figured it out like he's a genius.

It's really not rocket science. Once you realize that the letters are organized in a way that the most common letters in the alphabet, like 'E' and 'T,' have the least amount of dots and dashes ('E' is just one dot and 'T' is just one dash), it starts to make sense. Conversely, the rarer a letter, the more dots and dashes it requires. Numbers are five dots and dashes and punctuation marks are six. Standard guides are nice, but flowcharts like the one below make things so much easier.

(Chart by Learn Morse Code)

2. Doesn't always need electricity

Using an actual telegraph requires electricity. It was called the "electric telegraph" after all. But you can just as easily knock on things or even blink to get your message across.

A famous use of Morse code in military history was in the Vietnam War when Commander Jeremiah Denton was taken as a prisoner of war. He was forced into an NVA propaganda film and made to explain how "well" his captors were treating him. So, he said exactly what his captors wanted him to say while also blinking "torture" (-/- - -/.-./-/..-/.-./.). He got his message across while leaving the NVA completely unaware.

Also read: This Vietnam War POW used a propaganda film to blink 'TORTURE' in Morse Code

(Parker's Video Portal | YouTube)

3. You can talk about people in front of them

On that note, because learning Morse code isn't that common, you can also mock people in front of them if you take the time to learn it.

There's no subtlety in pulling out your cell phone and telling someone that, "this is bullsh*t."

[dailymotion //www.dailymotion.com/embed/video/x2pduoh expand=1]

4. 'K' actually means something

One of the most infuriating text messages you can receive after writing out paragraphs is just, 'k.'

If you send out the message (.-.), or 'k,' in Morse code, you're also saying in short-hand that you're ready to receive the message from the other person.

Spend five minutes writing to someone and they don't even have the time to write more than just one letter? A*sholes... (Meme via Know Your Meme)

5. There are no emojis.

I mean, technically, you can still make old-school emoticons, like ":)" as (- - -.../-.- -.-), but no one will get what you're saying.

But as emojis get more elaborate, conversations start getting dumber. There isn't any of that crap in Morse-code conversations.

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