Marketplace: Theater owners consider silencing phones

You can blame the teenagers!

Theater owners agreed to 'card' young people going to R-rated movies, so the content of movies got watered down to meet PG-13 standards, allowing the largest possible number of patrons to attend the movies.

Solving rude behavior with a physical barrier is not a fix and it's not going to get people to come back to the movies.

If they want active jamming, they're going to need a LOT of money to get this passed (buying lobbyists and congress critters and FCC board members is expensive) and they'll have to come up with technology that doesn't interfere with cellphones operating in the business next door or the road or parking lot outside.

Right now, outside of the military and government, nobody legally has active phone jamming in the US. It's totally against the law. But laws can be changed. Queue K-Street!

Passive jamming might work but it's not going to be perfect or cheap. And it's rude. And not selective. How dare they interfere with licenced 2-way radios.

And the whole thing goes to court when the first person dies because they couldn't summon EMTs because the phones no longer work, and of course, there are no more payphones.

And good luck to them first time a movie theater needs the fire department or police. First responders need to talk to each other from time to time. Comes in handy when the place is burning down or been robbed. Oh well.

The problem besides not being able to call emergency personnel is people like myself who are on call 24x7 but are smart enough to turn their phones/pagers to vibrate. If they block cell signals, I'll never be able to go see another movie in the theatre again. And, I'm sure that I'm not the only one who's in this position.